Posted on 11/01/2001 12:25:24 PM PST by Khepera
Where do people get the idea that Christians are people who don't judge other people?
I want to talk to you about why I'm making such a big fuss about this homosexual issue like I did yesterday. I'm sure there are people who are convinced that I'm a hate-monger. I was called a bigot yesterday, again, a homophobe, that I hated people and all this hate is coming from me. I pointed out at the time that hate has to do with my motives and my internal intentions. Unless somebody has access to my internal intentions it's hard for them to know exactly what's going on inside of me. And I guarantee there's nothing hateful going on inside of me towards people who have an inclination towards homosexuality. But there are some strong feelings about this issue and that's what we talked about yesterday.
Probably the biggest crime that I committed yesterday among anything from those who objected to my point of view, even those who claim to be Christians and thought that I wasn't, was simply that I was moralizing. I don't understand where people get the idea that Christians are people who don't judge other people.
As a matter of fact I have an article in front of me from the Beach Reporter , May 29 [1992]. And this has to do with some of the flap in the South Bay a couple of weeks ago over Mayor Brad Parton's comments in a city council meeting regarding providing a liquor license to a homosexual group who wanted to use the park. Since there had been times in the past when the city council had turned down licenses because they didn't like the group (this is contrary to what a lot of people understand) then Brad Parton simply suggested that maybe we ought to come up with some standards to determine who they turn down and who they approve.
And of course the implication in this situation was maybe the homosexuals weren't welcome because he questioned whether it was appropriate in some way to give public visibility, or sanction even, to this kind of behavior. In the past when they've had these groups and the "sads" have taken over the park, there has been a lot of questionable public behavior that has offended some people. So Brad has raised the question.
Of course he was eviscerated in the press. One of the letters that was written to the editor of the Beach Reporter came from a woman named Deborah in South Bay, a member of the NOW gang, the National Organization of some Women. Among other things--comments about his bigotry, etcetera--she makes this particular point. She says, "In addition, as someone who considers himself a Christian, you surely must be aware that a fundamental tenant of Christianity is the virtue of tolerance as personified by Jesus Christ who accepted all members of society, including those whom members of the majority of the community were determined to heap scorn and derision."
Now I've heard this comment a number of times before. In fact, the week following there was another comment about Mayor Parton not being very Christ-like because he wasn't tolerant and accepting of all perspectives and views.
I am simply amazed that any intelligent people still believe that Christianity, of all religions, spawned the idea of tolerance or that its central thrust is tolerance. Clearly, these people have never read the documents that define Christianity: the New Testament. As far as I can tell, Christianity has never been known for its tolerance until recently. Tens of thousands of early Christians covered with pitch and crucified and torched to light the roads leading into Rome or tossed to the lions were not a tribute to tolerance but to radical intolerance of competing religions and moralities.
If we are to cite Jesus, one needs only to look at the details of His life to realize that He was not tolerant to those who opposed the truth, the Scriptural truth, as He taught it, as the Old Testament taught it and then, of course, later as the New Testament writers articulated it. This is a man who has tremendous conflict with people partly because He was intolerant. You should read chapter 23 of the book of Matthew. In that particular book you see Jesus going at it tooth and nail with the religious leadership of the time.
Now of course, some people who read and then think in a shallow way about these things and do not look at the details or the context might simply draw the conclusion that Jesus railed against religious people of that time and therefore it's the religious leaders of this time that are out of step. Not so, necessarily.
One has to look at the content of what it was that Jesus objected to in them and what the religious leaders now are saying. Jesus objected to the religious leaders' misrepresentation of orthodoxy, a cold-hearted orthodoxy that did not capture what the Law was really about and what the message of the text was really about, a cold, condescending, arrogant, self-righteous hypocrisy in which people looked down their nose at other people and at the same time were guilty of the very crimes they were accusing others of committing.
At the same time that Jesus was attacking this He was also attacking unrighteousness and unbelief. Was He sensitive and accepting of those who were sinners? Of course, those people who came to Him in contrition and repentance Jesus accepted openly. Those people who opposed the truth, Jesus opposed openly and said, "Woe unto you. Woe unto you. Woe unto you." Jesus, of all people, was the most judgmental given certain circumstances.
Any non-Christian that comes to us in the depth of their own struggle with sin and seeks compassion and help should receive that and will receive that from me. But any person who comes to me justifying unrighteous lifestyles and immoral living, lifestyles that are destructive to them and destructive to society, they will get a fight from me tooth and nail, just as they got from Jesus. Jesus was one of the most judgmental people in the entire Bible. If you think that He was Jesus-meek-and-mild who loved everybody and ignored sin, then you'd better take a closer look at the Gospels. The fact is that this was a man who caused Himself so much trouble that He got Himself killed.
I was listening to this station a couple of days ago. Craig Hawkins had a guest on. I don't know who it was. It was a woman and they were talking about hate crimes and homosexuality. I tell you I haven't heard such a crock in a long time regarding this issue. Craig was much more gracious with this woman than I would have been. She had the audacity to say that pastors were basically limp-wristed men who needed to affirm their masculinity by attacking the sads from the pulpit. Of course, they could afford to do it because they've chased the sads from their church a long, long time ago. They can beat up now on their non-paying customers because they aren't there to defend themselves. They went someplace else where they were more welcome. She never gave one quarter to pastors who might be preaching out of a sense of deep conviction based on the Word of God and religious and spiritual morality. This is why we have to go back to the text on some of these things and see what it has to say on what is our responsibility on speaking out on these things and taking a stand in spite of the fact that it may be unpopular.
Why do I talk about his? As I mentioned yesterday and for those who don't think I gave enough time to this, I will state it again: there is no place in the Christian life for hatred or prejudice, pre-judging of any kind, of unjust treatment to people whether it's verbal harassment or physical harassment, of any person for that matter, not just homosexuals. But I do not consider it verbal abuse or inciting physical abuse to take a moral stand on sexual behavior. As far I can tell, I'm no more inciting people to beat up on homosexuals by saying that homosexuality is immoral and we should not tolerate it as an alternative lifestyle than I am encouraging people to beat up on heterosexuals when I say that heterosexuality [i.e. fornication ] is immoral and shouldn't be tolerated as an alternative lifestyle. I speak out on both of those things, or adultery for that matter.
I talk about this is for two reasons. Not to cause strife and foment hatred and anger, but first of all, a person is never going to go to the doctor as long as he insists that he is healthy. So, part of our responsibility, and Jesus did it too, is to point out how people are genuinely sick. The reason He accepted the people who came to Him that were sinners was because they knew they were sinners and they acknowledged it openly. He said, "Come unto me all you who are weary and heavy laden. I will give you rest." "I came not to seek the righteous, but sinners. I came not to heal the healthy, but the sick." But you must know that you're a sinner. You must know that you are heavy burdened. You must know that you are sick before you can come and seek solace from Jesus.
One of the reasons that I speak about these things is that I refuse to accept the politically correct notion that all sexual lifestyles are morally equivalent. It just isn't so. And if people are told that, then they have no reason to seek forgiveness from something which they don't believe is a sin. So part of what I'm doing is heralding the truth from the text.
Secondly, this particular disease, even for people who won't acknowledge its truthfulness, is an infectious disease and those who are stricken are spreading it. I'm not speaking about AIDS here and I'm not even speaking specifically about homosexuality. What I'm talking about is sin. When people are stricken with sin and when people say sin is not sin and wrong is right and give hearty approval to those who practice it--Paul's words from Romans 1--then that's sin. That's immorality and the destructive power of those things spreads.
We've seen the reaction in our culture of that kind of thing. We've seen the spread of this kind of thing as people are promoting immorality on all fronts, not just the sad political movement, but also in heterosexual immoral sex. We've seen the undermining because of the so-called sexual revolution, the undermining of the foundation of the family. We've seen society begin to fall apart as a result of that. This is what happens when people call wrong right and when people call right wrong.
I, for one, am going to stand for right as much as I can and as graciously as I can and as intelligently as I can. I'm going to speak the Word clearly, and hopefully in the process not only educate others but encourage others to stand firm as well for what is right even though the rest of the world is going straight to hell. It's our job. There is no one else that will do it, Christian. It is our job to do that, to speak out strongly and without being moved to stand firm--Paul's own words in Ephesians 6.
I want to tell you something Christians, things are heating up. Things are getting rough. They are getting hard. I don't want to be alarmist here, but one has only to look about him and if he's not in a monastery somewhere he realizes that the forces are massing on every single front against this Book and what this Book represents.
If Christians do not stand on the front lines the enemy is going to break through and take over everything. We must stand. We must put our lives and our reputations and our jobs and ourselves on the line. We must be willing to pay the same price for truth as Jesus Himself paid and Christians for the last 2000 years have paid.
The end-all for Christians isn't to get as many signatures as possible on the fire insurance policy. Yes, we want to bring people into the Kingdom, but we must also stand for Kingdom virtue and values at the same time even if people don't come in. We must do good in this world. It's not enough just to tell people about Jesus and forgiveness. Part of our responsibility is that we have been created by God for good works. Ephesians 2:11, "You have been saved for good works that God has prepared beforehand than you should walk in them." One of those good works is that we do goodness by standing for truth, pointing out error, not participating in the evil deeds of darkness, even exposing them.
For those of you who think that I've been off the mark, simply listen to this, 2 Timothy, Paul's last letter. He sees his end; he's about to die. He was to lose his head, literally--they chopped off his head on the Appian Way in Rome, a martyr for the cause of Jesus Christ. He writes a final letter, a pastoral letter, to his disciple Timothy, his beloved son in Christ. He speaks to him about those things that are most important to communicate to his disciple. He passes the torch to Timothy and tells Timothy to carry that torch on.
Here are the things that he says. I think that these words are very appropriate for us now. Christian, wherever you are, whether you're a pastor or a radio talk show host or an assembly line worker in a factory, whether you're a carpenter or a waitress or a teacher or an educator of some sort or whatever it is that you are, wherever you are at, you belong to Jesus and He has passed on to you a great and weighty calling. That calling is to stand for truth in a society that shuns it at every quarter.
Listen to Paul's last words to his son in the faith, 2 Timothy, chapter 3: "Realize this, Timothy, in the last days difficult times will come, for men will be lovers of self. They'll be lovers of money. They will be boastful and arrogant, revilers. They'll be disobedient to parents. They'll be ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good. They'll be treacherous, they'll be reckless, they'll be conceited. They'll be lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. They will be people who are always learning but never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. But you...."--But you, Timothy. But you, Greg Koukl. But you, John Stewart and Craig Hawkins. But you, Eric Bissell behind my window here operating the boards. But you, every person listening to my voice who names Jesus Christ as Lord.--"But you, follow my teaching. You follow my conduct, purpose, faith, patience, love and perseverance, persecutions, sufferings such as happened to me at Iconium and at Lystra, what persecutions I endured. And out of all of them the Lord delivered me and indeed all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. But evil men and impostors will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived."
What's the Rx? What's the solution? "I solemnly charge you," chapter 4:1, "in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus who is to judge the living and the dead and by His appearing, and by His Kingdom. Preach the Word. Be ready in season and out of season. Reprove, rebuke, exhort with great patience and instruction. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires and will turn away their ears to the truth and will turn aside to myths. But you be sober in all things, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry."
That's what I'm attempting to do, my friends, as best as I possibly can. You want to be angry with me, that's your business. You want to yell at me and berate me on the phone, go ahead and do it. In the process I may learn some things, because sometimes I'm out of line too, and I need to be corrected.
However, all I have to say is that there is a day in which there will be a reckoning and all of the things that are hidden will be made known. That which we've whispered in the back rooms will be shouted from the rooftops. In what I would consider the nearly immortal words of Dr. William Allen, "There is a justice. And someday the world will feel it." When that times comes, my friend, I would that I and all of you would be standing at the place where Jesus beckons to His people and says, "Well done, good and faithful servant. Enter into the joy of the Lord."
How do we know if we're doing that? By faithfulness to do what Jesus told us to do, all of it, from Genesis to Revelation. "Well, Jesus wasn't involved in Genesis." Yes, He was. He is the second person of the Trinity, the Word of God. That's all His--not just Matthew, Mark, John, Luke--right through the book of Acts, right through the Epistles--even the things that Paul says are Jesus' words--because they're all words spoke from God. Moses spoke for God, Jesus was God. The prophets spoke for God, Jesus was God. Jesus is there from the beginning to the end. It's our responsibility to reflect the truth of that in balance, not just picking and choosing what we like because it tickles our ears, but doing the job, to hold back the tide of evil in the world. We have the privilege of participating in that.
All we need to do is very simple: know the truth, proclaim it. Know the truth, proclaim it. And if we take gas in the process, that's just part of the program. And that's part of this program too.
At least that's the way I see it.
As a Christian, I agree with several of his points and disagree with several. Does this make me un-Christian or less of a Christian ? I certainly think not but the author seems to imply such. His heart may be in the right place, but the manner in which he delivers his message can be improved. He probably prefers to view any opposition to what he says as "anti-Christian", but its not ... he should try to take some of the criticisms as constructive and learn from them.
I'm alway heartened when someone takes a true Christian stand against sinful behavior. There can be no other path for the believing Christian. Jesus said "Go and sin no more!" Gee, wasn't that rather judgemental of Him? So far as the behavior was concerned, you better believe it. Those who ignore the warnings will face a much harsher judgement when the time comes.
Here are a couple of additional links that speak to the same topic.
I always find it interesting how some (not pointing the finger at anyone this thread, but in general) presume to judge the Heart/Soul/Mind of others and yet allow Actions that are un-Christian or un-enlightened.
Indeed! And yet some of these people actually encourage homosexuals to remain in their self-destructive lifestyles, thereby taking it upon themselves to re-interpret the very word of God.
Probably my biggest crime ...
I was referring to his description of some people who disagree with him as "so-called Christians" implying that they are in some way not equal to him or their faith is unequal to his simply bcause they may not fully agree with him. Its not that I don't agree with many of his points, but its just disheartening when one Christian cannot question or debate another's opinion without his or her own faith or level of faith being belittled in some manner. That's all, no big deal, just a comment on his style.
and
Christians need to keep in mind that our struggle is not as much with the people espousing the bad ideas of the gay rights movement as with the ideas themselves.
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