In Response To The Teaching That Sexual Sin Is Accepted By God

Recently I have been coming across some terrible and wrong teaching from people who call themselves Christians. But these are people who want Jesus while holding on to their sin. These are the sort who dismiss parts of the Bible by pointing out some of the lesser laws as an excuse to dismiss the important stuff. I am sure you have come across the two types of material argument to excuse the acceptance of homosexuality.

What we are failing to understand is that Jesus is the complete and perfect revelation of our God. In him all the law was made complete. Our example is found in him. His words are what we live. We do not need to search for anything outside of him. So, in order to find the truth I look to Jesus and found he told us plainly what is important:

"Don’t you know that everything that goes into the mouth enters the stomach and goes out into the sewer? But what goes out of the mouth comes from the heart. And that’s what contaminates a person in God’s sight. Out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adultery, sexual sins, thefts, false testimonies, and insults. These contaminate a person in God’s sight." (Matthew 15:17-20)

Jesus fulfilled the whole law and made it possible for our hearts and minds to be transformed. We have been made into a new creation, like Jesus. Our bodies will be transformed when it is time but for now it has been made possible for us to understand the will of the Father and to live a life pleasing to him. And here Jesus tells us what the priority is in the Kingdom.

All sexual sin is wrong because it comes from a contaminated heart. Jesus defined the only acceptable relationship for sex, the relationship for which it was created:

“Haven’t you read that at the beginning the creator made them male and female?  And God said, ‘Because of this a man should leave his father and mother and be joined together with his wife, and the two will be one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh." (Matthew 5:4-6)

If we truly know Jesus and have laid down our life to him we know this to be true. But if we are seeking a philosophy and claim to know Jesus while fiercely holding onto our sin, we have not honestly encountered him and made a decision for him. If we search hard enough we are going to find some demonic spirit preaching whatever our itching ears want to hear, but if we are a true seekers then we will gladly lay it all down for him.

It doesn't matter if we are talking about homosexuality, fornication or adultery, they all come from a sin bound heart. Jesus came to set us free from this not to make us more comfortable in it. He came to give us the power to repent, to turn away from those things that do not please God, and we do exactly that because we love him. True love produces obedience. Sin produces rebellion.

Remember that Jesus said that the way is narrow and not many will make it. Remember that he said if we want to be his disciples we have to first of all deny ourselves. Deny our flesh desires. Deny our opinions. Deny everything about our former life so that we can be dressed in the clothing of the Kingdom, his righteousness.

We can lie to ourselves. We can be self-delusional. We can continue to be lovers of self and proclaim to the darkness that we are Christians but the fruit of our heart does not lie. You cannot have the sinful pleasures of this fallen world and Jesus Christ. It just doesn't work that way.

What Is Going On Here?

I remember at school feeling very much left out of things because I had not yet found a group to which to belong. Everyone always got categorized so you neatly fit into this bizarre society in middle school. It wasn't until I hit High School before I found a group where I felt accepted and included. Once there, I would do anything to defend my friends. It became like family.

Finding a like-minded group to be part of is only natural. Most of our friends will have several things in common with us and being with them is not difficult at all. It is why they are our friends. But, such groups are also hard to break into. This is true of a small group of friends or even a church. People become like family and anyone entering as a stranger can feel they are not part of the group.

Exclusivity happens in all kinds of societies; sports, politics, education, religion. You don`t have to look any further than the Christian Church to see how exclusivity works. We call them denominations and each believes they have the exclusive truth of Jesus. If you can understand this (and many don`t) then you can understand what Jesus was up against while speaking to the woman at the well.

She was a Samaritan and had exclusive access to this well, which was thought to have belonged to Jacob. This is how groups often act, as if they have exclusive access to something no one else does:

“Sir,” the woman said, “you don’t even have a bucket, and the well is deep. Where are you going to get this life-giving water? Our ancestor Jacob dug this well for us, and his family and animals got water from it. Are you greater than Jacob?” (John 4:11-12)

She had no idea that she was speaking to the Creator of Jacob, the one with whom Jacob had wrestled. But none of this mattered to Jesus. It was plain foolishness. He transcends such trivial matters as traditions and history. What God offers us is greater than anything that man has to offer. His power is greater than any barriers we can erect:

Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will get thirsty again. But no one who drinks the water I give will ever be thirsty again. The water I give is like a flowing fountain that gives eternal life.” (John 4:13-14)

There are those lost in sin today who cry out the anthem of freedom. They champion their right to do what they want, no matter the offense against God. Homosexuality is only the latest in a long list of things that we have set our heart on that flies in the face of the love of our Holy God. But getting into these groups is hard, when they have become like family and are strengthened in what they consider to be exclusive to them. It is their sin and no one has the right to come against it.

What Jesus has to offer goes beyond any limited freedom we have in this place. God is not limited by our small vision or understanding. He is not limited by sexual orientation. He is not dragged down to our level. Marriage is only an invention for earth. When we are called home we will be lifted beyond these shadows to stand in the true reality of God. God is not limited by the barriers of exclusivity; he transcends them all. He reaches into all these groups and offers hope, joy, peace, and reconciliation; not by him bowing to our will, but us recognizing that his is the only truth, the only way.

This is not about sexual orientation but about what is and is not acceptable and holy in God`s eyes. It doesn`t matter what the rest of us think; it is God who defines the holy and the common. Our insistence to be exclusive does not create a barrier for our God. He is greater than all of it and he has decided to love. However, his forgiveness and grace remains for those who are willing to let the barriers fall and repent of their sins. Those who remain behind the barriers are lost. It is to the lost, those behind the barriers, to whom we have been sent.

Let`s see those walls fall my brothers and sisters as we fight for, not against, those lost in the darkness of this world.

Calling Good Evil And Evil Good

God is love! That is the clear message of the Church today, and it should be because there is no love that compares to the love of our Father. This love has brought in an era of grace through the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. But unfortunately some have interpreted this love to mean that "anything goes". As we see evil called good and good evil we should be shocked that this message is arising from the Church.

Yes, God is love but he is also holy. Yes, grace is incredible and without limits but we have been warned not to abuse it. There is a lopsided message starting to emerge from the Church and it is wrong. It is made up of lies covered by a thin veil of truth and people are falling for it.

Yes, Jesus hung out with the prostitutes, the drunkards, the liars and thieves, but that did not stop him from teaching the righteousness of God. Yes, he forgave sins but he also told people to stop sinning. The woman caught in adultery was saved from stoning but Jesus told her to "sin no more". When people met Jesus they were never the same again. When he invited people to follow him, Jesus set an example for them and they left everything they had been to become something more. They did not continue as they were, doing what they wanted, free to sin to their heart's content.

Today, in our desire to be inclusive, we forget the transformation that takes place with the new birth. If there is no transformation then it is conformity and conformists will not make it into the Kingdom. It is a heart change, a repenting, a turning away from what we were and grasping what God has called us to be; a complete transformation under the power of the Holy Spirit.

The audacity to come before our Creator in the depravity of our thinking and say, "Accept me as I am with my thoughts and limited wisdom, with my sin. Don't change me. If you try to convince me I am wrong I will serve someone else." We are not doing God any favours. It is he who has rescued us at great cost and he has said to us, "If you love me you will obey what I have commanded". Famous servant's of God are now saying, "You had better accept sin or I will decide to spend eternity in hell". With such an attitude I think the choice has already been made, but it is the damage and confusion they are sowing that concerns me.

Yes, God is love and that love also makes forgiveness available. We need forgiveness and transformation because our ways are so entrenched in sin and the depravity that comes from it that we are desperate for his forgiveness. How can we be forgiven of things that we no longer consider wrong?

Yes, God is love and that love comes from his holiness. As a holy God he hates sin. Just a tiny, and I mean tiny, example from his Word:

"There are six things The Lord hates, seven that are detestable:

     - haughty eyes

     - a lying tongue

     - hands that shed innocent blood

     - a heart that devises wicked schemes

     - feet that are quick to rush into evil

     - a false witness who pours out lies

     - and a man who stirs up dissension among brothers." (Proverbs 6:16-19)

Jesus did something incredible with the law; he took us to a deeper place in it. "Do not murder but I tell you do not hate. Do not commit adultery but I tell you do not lust." The law went from a document impossible to live, to something written on our heart by the Holy Spirit and alive in us by that same Spirit. Grace does not give us an excuse to sin but should give us a desire to be more like our God.

Of course the problem now is the definition of sin. What do we consider sin? As we redefine it, calling good evil and evil good, the debate is really over what God defines as sin. We have certainly come into the last days as people run after the teachings of demons, which are convincing people to abandon the Word of God and go with what feels right. We set aside the wisdom of our God for the wisdom of man forgetting that our God has told us that his ways and thoughts are so much higher than ours.

Redefine sin any way you want but it still comes down to what God has said. Re-write his Word to make it say what you want but you will still be held accountable to the truth. God is love and that is why we have had two thousand years of grace but the day of judgment is coming and then we shall see if there is a hell or not. His love has made it possible for us to escape judgement but those who have rejected his truth for their own will be condemned by our righteous God according to the decisions they have made.