You Need Only Listen
By James Farlow
Like most Christians, we are never far from the culture wars. We try to carve out a space for ourselves where a more peaceful, loving dialogue can prevail in the midst of vitriol and miscommunication. But just when we think we’ve allowed ourselves to sit down at our favorite restaurant to get a wrap, we find ourselves in the midst of an evangelical apocalypse. Sometimes, like everyone else, we just want to avoid the issues.
A short time ago the Peace and Justice Advocates at Fuller hosted Justin Lee, executive director of the Gay Christian Network. In one of the discussions during his visit, he said “My life is not an issue. I am a person, and I don’t want to be alone.” For Justin and those in the LGBT Christian community who have spent their entire adult lives on a frustrating pilgrimage of rejection in the church, the determination of words on a page is more than “an issue.” Communal judgment in the church and our culture shapes the experience of their emotional and spiritual lives.
So far at Fuller we have been spared much of the heated rhetoric that surrounds the future of the LGBT community, but we can’t look away anymore; a great earthquake has split our culture in two and the consequences are tearing apart our churches. There are students on this campus who face tremendously difficult futures as leaders in the church and what are we doing to help them? In many ways, we have access to better information and data to answer some of our deepest questions, but instead of faithfully asking the difficult questions and struggling for community in a Spirit of truth and love, we are officially ignoring them as a community. We ask “ “What is the precise meaning of the Biblical authors?” Like our forebears in the Protestant community, our first reaction is to create a Biblical mandate. This is the wrong question. Behind it lies a false answer that beckons our shallow response. We think that if we can somehow answer this question, then we will know the right way to approach the issue of sexuality. As if in every other age of history, Christians simply examined the scriptures, came to a precise understanding of the proposition of a passage, and considered the matter settled. As if that’s really the way it happened. As if that’s how the scriptures are written. As if that’s how God actually speaks to us today.
The word of God came to us in the flesh. If letters were all that we needed to save ourselves, Moses would not have cast stone tablets onto the desert floor. Let us consider the most fundamental story of our faith: Jesus spoke to his disciples about scripture and about himself for three years. Were they able to understand that the prophecies of the Messiah referred to a suffering, crucified, and resurrected God? Were they able to understand the heart of Jesus as he was broken by oppression? It is only after experiencing and witnessing his resurrection that they began to understand the Word of God. They spent the rest of their lives beginning to understand and tell others about the nature of the good news of Jesus Christ. It is in the witness and experience of Jesus Christ that the scriptures and the parables made sense. Under the tutelage of the Holy Spirit, the disciples walked faithfully in the work of God. The disciples did not ignore scripture, and neither do we. But if we pretend to have answers, to have knowledge absent the witness of communities and people who we judge, we make a mockery of the witness of Christ.
The absurdity of our debates is only highlighted by our history. When Peter proclaimed access for the Gentiles without circumcision or any sort of ritual purity, does he get there through sound exegesis, through a meticulous diacritical examination of texts? I assure you, he did not get there from a historio-critical analysis of Leviticus. Acts tells us what happened, and it involved the baptism of the Holy Spirit. He could not deny the work that God was doing.
Returning to Justin’s statement, people’s lives are not scenarios to be deciphered so that we might extract the proper moral coding. Human beings are factories of love and desire, and they are desperate not to be alone. Human beings are sexual. We long to be connected in deeply personal ways with others. We don’t just want to interact, to have great conversation; we deeply desire to touch and be touched. We want to have another person around the house who will share our joys, our sadness, our graces, and our foibles. It is only natural that this companionship extends to where we are naked and unashamed. It is not only natural, it is good. Celibacy is a great gift, but one not often chosen. It requires special allowance from the community so that those who remain celibate may not be cut off from companionship. Are we fooling ourselves into believing that we are offering companionship to those in the LGBT community?
Members of the LGBT community are going to seek companionship, Christian and non-Christian. We seem to be learning over and over again that calling those relationships into covenant is not damaging, but rather a blessing. Maybe in our rush to condemn those who are different, we ought to rejoice that the LGBT community is celebrating the idea of marriage and covenantal sexual faithfulness.
I am here today to argue for you enter into dialogue. To interact with your brothers and sisters in the LGBT community. They are not your enemy. I have seen the Holy Spirit doing mighty work in their midst. You do not have to agree with them. You need only listen.
About the Author
“I am here today to argue for you enter into dialogue. To interact with your brothers and sisters in the PEDOPHILE community. They are not your enemy. I have seen the Holy Spirit doing mighty work in their midst. You do not have to agree with them. You only need listen.”
Like it? How about this one:
“Maybe in our rush to condemn those who are different, we ought to rejoice that the one community that is celebrating the idea of marriage, of covenantal sexual faithfulness, is the PEDOPHILE community.”
No? Don’t like it so much?
If not, then quit pretending this is about being somehow loving and listening. This is about embracing homosexuality itself. Let’s do it with rapists, pedophiles, and people who beat their spouses and cheat on them.
Don’t want to? It’s not the same thing to you?
Then, again: Quit pretending this isn’t about embracing the sin of homosexuality.
Rorschach, as always, I am mystified at the gaps in your firebomb theology.
It is okay that you disagree – in fact, I am glad you do. I encourage it. The fabric of America is woven with different opinions and I feel it is a good thing that not everyone does, will, or should think like you.
One of the staples of The SEMI is that it represents the different voices of Fuller students. James is not only a student, he is also the new president of TGU and this is an important topic to him. I know this is a topic that you feel very decisively about, so I want to encourage you to direct your comments towards an article – ideally, in a constructive way – rather than degenerate into caustic comments laced with exaggerated rhetoric.
You will surely have found by now that your argument loses traction when it is not concise, informed, and articulate.
Randall -
My argument is clear. Unless you’d say the same things about pedophiles, why would anyone take this article seriously?
If you don’t like the argument, argue against it. But it is quite informed and articulate. You’ve decided to attack a straw man rather than address my actual argument.
Randall,
Your messages are hateful. Jesus was not hateful. He loved the sinner and hated the sin. You well know that although the Bible speaks about homosexuality Jesus never did.
Regardless of your point of view about homosexuality, when you bring hatred for God’s creation (least you’ve forgotten He created all of us whatever our flaws) into your own mind, you polarize yourself against God. Is that your intent?
Hate homosexuality and oppose gay marriage all you want, but once you’ve lost the Love of God in your heart for others you too are lost.
Stay with God,
Paige
Hi Paige – was your comment for me, or for RW?
How does a false analogy clarify anything in this discussion, other than RW’s rejection of the gospel? (If I follow RW’s logic correctly, sinners are not humans made in God’s image. As such, they are not worthy of love or respect. We should treat them as the boogeyman — an enemy undeserving of understanding or grace. Their sin is so awful that we should condemn them [not even their sin, but THEM] from afar and assume that God cannot possibly be doing any good work in their lives, because their sin is the totality of their existence. We should assume that we are not in any sort of relationship with them, because love and conversation is inappropriate for monsters so heinous as these.) [One might note that RW does not bother to explore how effective this strategy of totalizing demonization, avoidance of dialog/conversation, and condemnation from afar has been in curbing sexual abuse in the church.]
The second analogy is rather remarkable, as even RW seems to realize that this is an unfair analogy (“don’t like it so much? well, I’m right!”) It’s worth pausing a moment to think about how important the totalizing label “pedophile” is to this argument. Actually, if a pedophile was able to enter into a relationship shaped by covenant fidelity, a relationship that by definition is consensual and non-abusive, celebration WOULD be appropriate — but that relationship would by definition NOT be a relationship with a minor. Children lack not just the right to enter into a sexual covenant with an adult but also the maturity/competency to consent to a sexual relationship; Due to the power imbalance, sexual relationships between adults and children are inherently abusive. If you’re going to make this analogy, you need to assert with more than the force of your ego that there’s a similarity between committed consensual relationships and abusive relationships.
Nowhere in this article do I see Farlow deny that same sex relationships are unique. He just suggests it might be worth understanding those relationships before we condemn them. If your ignorance prohibits you from understanding that there’s a difference between same sex relationships and abusive relationships, then perhaps you more than most are in desperate need of the advice Farlow offers in this article. Stop talking out of self-assured ignorance, listen, and understand before you speak. Perhaps, in the process, you will stop doing violence to the image of God as it indwells all people but also to the gospel.
This isn’t logic. It’s attack ad hominen.
Young man McDonald,
You as well are guilty of attacking a straw man.
I substituted a word to make a point. You have not addressed that point. Instead, you asserted that you were following my logic (when I really just quoted the article itself, inserting another word), and went on a totally baseless rant.
You also accused me of denying the Gospel (which is nowhere present in my post). You call yourself a reverend? I suggest you have no reverence for the Word of God, you have no respect for your brothers, and you bear false witness against me.
I won’t respond to your comment, because there is no content there. If you care to retract your attacks and instead deal with the argument, we can talk. And I will speak to you as if you have the maturity you here present. Which is not much. But perhaps you can cool off and re-examine your thoughts before you post such nonsense as suggesting that I said God cannot do any good in the life of a homosexual, for instance.
Actually, upon further examination, you are openly a celebratory gay! Which only proves my point — that those whose thinking is aligned with this article are not thinking in a redeemed way.
Repentance is necessary for salvation. God does not love your homosexuality. If you repent and believe, salvation can be yours. But if you profess faith and yet walk in darkness, the church should shun you, for the sake of your soul. Do you acknowledge that homosexuality is a sin, and that just as any sexual sin must be repented of, your homosexuality must be repented of as well?
RW, I wish you had chosen a different example than ‘pedophile’ because it perpetuates a widely held myth that pedophiles are usually homosexuals. http://psychology.ucdavis.edu/rainbow/html/facts_molestation.html. That’s not the real point, of what you’re saying though.
Your point is that you already know that homosexuality is a sin, and if that’s the case, it cannot possibly be the Holy Spirit doing anything, and so there is no need to listen. Your point is that this article is all about asking you to accept what you know from scripture is sinful and therefore cannot and will not accept. I hope that’s a fair summary of your position.
There are two positions on this, the Traditionalist view and the Reformist view. The Traditionalist camp holds that
1) The Bible is authoritative.
2) What the Bible says can never be turned into a nose of wax, regardless of what happens in contemporary society.
3) The Holy Spirit will never lead “The Church” into any ‘new’ understanding of these issues. Whenever the Spirit seems to be doing something in the Church which is opposed to what the Bible says, you have misunderstood the Spirit, or this isn’t the Spirit at all, but Satan. How could the Spirit act in a way contrary to the Bible? The Holy Spirit has led us to a consistent tradition.
RW, I think it’s fair to put you in this camp. The most generous, sympathetic Traditionalist will end up having to say “I’m sorry, but as much as I’d like it to be different, I cannot accept that view as consistent with Scripture. Homosexuality is sin.” There are traditionalists who are sympathetic to a rebuttal, but feel that any compromise would be abandoning the Bible and G-d due to “peer pressure.” Most Traditionalists think of the Bible as an ace in the hole; as an unanswerable argument, and think of those who disagree as either deceived, or godless.
An alternative to the Traditionalist camp is the Reformist camp which holds that
1) The Bible is authoritative.
2) What the Bible says must be understood in light of the continued guidance of the Holy Spirit.
3) The Holy Spirit is guiding “The Church” into increasing sensitivity and engagement on these issues, reforming us. What the Church taught in the past is, in some cases, opposed to what the Holy Spirit is doing in the world today. How do you resist what the Spirit is doing? We must have understood the Bible incorrectly back then.
I think it’s fair to put James Farlow into this camp. In this vein, the article also asks the question to what scripture could Peter have appealed when he abandoned the universally accepted exegesis of the day that Gentiles had to become Jews to follow Jesus? Peter had none. It was only recognition of the activity of the Spirit that allowed Peter to make this change. In the history of the modern church, this has happened on divorce and remarriage, and on women in ministry. In fact, my mentor at Fuller, Ray Anderson, wrote articles arguing that it was the fact that churches kept sending women to Fuller to get ministry preparation, and the recognition by Fuller faculty members of the Spirit’s work in these women, that prompted them to go back, look at the scripture, and come to the conclusion that the church had not understood the Bible correctly.
So, RW, you don’t want to listen to those trying to get you to accept the sin of homosexuality. Fair enough. Engage the exegetical question of how one interprets the bible in light of the activity of the Spirit, and come back to the question of ‘the sin of homosexuality’ later. I’m convinced that the Reformist camp is the more faithful camp. It also requires that I take on responsibility for my mistakes (a la Dietrich Bonhoeffer) rather than standing back and proclaiming my innocence and purity because I have upheld the scriptures. I should rather face G-d having attempted to be responsible and discovered that G-d’s grace doesn’t go as far as I though it did, than to face G-d having failed to follow the Spirit because of my adherence to my exegesis.
I also wish you hadn’t ended by bringing up rape, domestic violence, and adultery. All of these have clear victims and perpetrators. It is an intellectual and pastoral failing if you are unable to differentiate a 30-year monogamous committed and caring relationship from a rape. You’ve muddied the water when you lump these together. This topic needs our best thinking, and the wisdom of the Spirit.
“RW, I wish you had chosen a different example than ‘pedophile’ because it perpetuates a widely held myth that pedophiles are usually homosexuals.”
Not my intention. I simply wanted to bring up another sin and point out that the argument of this article falls on its face when it’s not a trendy, culturally-acceptable sin like homosexuality.
“I also wish you hadn’t ended by bringing up rape, domestic violence, and adultery. All of these have clear victims and perpetrators. It is an intellectual and pastoral failing if you are unable to differentiate a 30-year monogamous committed and caring relationship from a rape. You’ve muddied the water when you lump these together. This topic needs our best thinking, and the wisdom of the Spirit.”
How on earth do you know that having a victim and a perpetrator makes something wrong? You sound like an atheist! “So what if the Bible says homosexuality is a sin? There’s no victim!” YOU have come up with your own, fleshly, Bible-ignoring definition of what is right and wrong. How dare you call that the wisdom of the Spirit, when you deny His very Word! You have no basis for saying adultery or anything else is wrong — you have shirked God’s revelation.
The Bible is authoritative. If someone says “Well, the Bible says Jesus is the only way, but the Spirit is revealing new things and new understandings to us now,” why would I take that seriously? Scripture is truth. If the Spirit revealed something to be sin, it’s sin. If you want to talk about the Spirit, how could you possibly know what the Spirit is or isn’t doing, especially if you totally disregard what the Spirit Himself has spoken?
You want to ignore what the Bible says. I get that. But don’t blame it on the leading of the Spirit.
If only listening was the command that God has given to his followers, James’ article would be a lovely and sympathetic approach to the issue of a Christian response to homosexuality.
As if Christians were called to be silent when the Bible disagrees with someone’s actions. As if the LGBT community has not made homosexuality and same-sex marriage an “issue.” As if “officially ignoring them as a community” necessarily means that Fuller’s students are unable to ask the difficult questions and struggle for community in a spirit of truth and love. As if asking “what does the Bible say about this?” is a dirty question. As if we are “pretending to have answers, to have knowledge” without first speaking to a member of the LGBT community. As if our human desires dictate what is holy, righteous, and good.
“We make a mockery of the witness of Christ” when we cower in fear of what the non-Christian world will think of us if we believe and teach the Bible. When did the Church become so afraid of offending people, of allowing secular culture to determine what is acceptable to God, that we dismiss biblical authority in the name of “tolerance?” When did the Church become more concerned with listening and dialogue, and less concerned with the proclamation of the gospel and calling people to repentance?
James seems to forget Jesus’ and Paul’s words against sexual immorality and the warnings that accompany them. I am terrified by the current trend in Fuller students (those who are and will be leaders in the church), and the growing regularity of seminarians’ approval of a sinful lifestyle. How should the Church respond to a pastor who is an adulterer? What is the Church’s responsibility in the sanctification of a member who engages in bestiality? Is the Church commanded to confront sin in the Church in hopes of repentance, restoration, and righteousness? IF we are, then as Christians we are compelled to lovingly confront those who are living in sin for the purpose of repentance and righteousness. If we say that homosexuality is no longer a sin, what do we do when another person comes to us and demands that the Bible is incorrect and their actions (greed, gluttony, lust, drunkenness, hatred, gossip, etc.) are not sinful? How do we differentiate between what is sinful because the Bible says so, and what is not (even though the Bible speaks against it)?
Sometimes I wonder why the Church has become practically impotent. Then I encounter Christians who are afraid and unwilling to preach and proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ to a lost and hurting world. We have no need to fear the hostility and condemnation of those outside of the Church and should certainly not compromise the gospel in hopes of attracting anyone to the truth.
I am here today to argue for you to boldly proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ. To look to the Bible as the authority over all humanity and to allow God to determine his standard of holiness and to define sin. The Bible is not your enemy. Holiness is not your enemy. Calling others to repentance and righteousness is not your enemy. One thing that I agree with James is his saying “you do not have to agree with them.” I will not. I will listen to them, but not with the intention of compromising Biblical truth. As Martin Luther once said “Unless I am convinced by the testimony of the Scriptures or by clear reason…I am bound by the Scriptures I have quoted and my conscience is captive to the Word of God.”
Haven’t you heard? Apparently the Spirit is revealing different things than what the Bible says. Just like He revealed new truths to Joseph Smith, and just like He revealed truth to Muhammed. And we can decide for ourselves what the Spirit is saying — after all, we don’t hold ourselves to the Bible anymore!
Sechrest told us that Paul lied in Scripture and doesn’t understand Jewish religion. Mouw told us that Jews who explicitly reject Christ can still go to heaven. Goldingay told us the Old Testament didn’t really mean what it said. (Remember, all of these people profess to holding a “high view of Scripture”.) So given that all of these people hold a high view of Scripture, all the while knowing MORE and BETTER than Scripture, how can you expect us to listen to what the Bible says? Obviously you just think truth doesn’t change, the Spirit never changes His mind, and Scripture actually means what it says.
But here, at Fuller…we know better than that.
RW,
Every person who calls scripture authoritative must deal with these issues, but you speak as if you don’t. The bible clearly says lots of things and the church has had different understandings of these things over the millennia. The list of these subjects is long, and non-trivial: slavery, war, polygamy, socialism, divorce, remarriage, women in ministry, and more. Saying ‘the Spirit has moved the church to a deeper understanding’ is not the same as ‘the Spirit is revealing different things than what the bible says.’ You have misrepresented the words I have written, and have created a straw argument. This is beneath you. It borders on bearing false witness.
I also believe that we can come to radically new understandings. “Haven’t you heard? Apparently Shekinah is revealing different things than what the Torah says. Just like She revealed new truths to Jesus of Nazareth, and just like She revealed truth to that Saul/Paul fellow. And we can decide for ourselves what the She is saying – after all, we don’t hold ourselves to the Torah anymore.” Do you see that the argument you make could have been (and almost certainly was) made against the first Christians, and against Jesus himself? Jesus was crucified on exegetical grounds. There were those who saw something in him they had not seen in anyone else. Peter either committed blasphemy, or he recognized the person of G-d when he said to Jesus, despite all the exegetical evidence, “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” This is discernment. You might say that such discernment ended with the apostles, but the church had to continue this process in establishing the canon, writing the creeds, developing polity, soteriology, and many other non-trivial issues. The church continues to deal with this today.
EVERYONE,, including David Skillings, including you, has to deal with this. You disparage Sechrest, Mouw and Goldingay for the conclusions they draw, but every person you DO think has a high view of scripture also has to address the issue of shifting understandings of scripture. It is reported that Oliver Wendell Holmes said “I would not give a fig for the simplicity this side of complexity, but I would give my life for the simplicity on the other side of complexity.” I do not think you have yet shown any movement from the facile “The bible says it, I believe it, and that settles it” to the far side of complexity. You haven’t even admitted that it is complex. Anyone who goes through seminary without acknowledging how terribly complex this is has not had an adequate education.
Rather than simply repeat “Scripture actually means what it says”, please address the difficulty of determining what scripture says given that people of faith have been arguing about what it says for centuries, and continue to argue about it today. Say how YOU struggle with this. Otherwise, your words, for all their snarky orthodoxy, have no weight, and they prevent the conversation from going forward.
When you do admit that it’s complex, that what the bible says about a subject is not always as clear as we’d like it to be, and people of faith can disagree on what it says, what it means, what the implications are, and whether the Spirit has any role in answering those questions, when you’ve acknowledged that, we’ll be in a better place to move this conversation forward. Right now, it feels dead in the water to me.
Scripture is clear. Why do I need to struggle with it? You only struggle with it when you don’t like it. But if you SUBMIT to Scripture, what’s to struggle with?
As I responded to your earlier post, you have no basis for claiming ongoing revelation, nor any basis for any claims of morality. You have rejected the tradition passed down to you. If you think that Peter acknowledging Christ is in any way similar to you saying the Spirit has changed His mind about homosexuality, then…well, I don’t even know what to say.
This is just dribble. You’ve misquoted the Professors quite terribly.
Agreed, Tanya. Shameful.
I really believe God created man and woman for one another as fundamentally different complementary halves, and that he intended them to become one flesh in marriage. I also believe that sex is a God-given blessing in marriage. I don’t think these beliefs are radical.
I also believe gay people can have fruitful relationships, and can share many, if not all, of the same emotional and intellectual intimacies that a man and woman have in a romantic relationship. But I do not understand how two men or two women can engage in the same one-flesh union as a man and a woman can. And if they cannot, they cannot truly participate in marriage. Outside of marriage, I don’t believe ongoing sexual activity can be anything other than sinful. And if two men or two women are dedicated to one another in a romantic relationship over a number of years, as the sexual beings they are, they will nearly inevitably engage in sexual activity.
I have a gay coworker whom I love and largely admire, and I don’t think I find much, if anything, to dislike in gay people that I do not find in straight people. But if someone could present any new insight on my thoughts posted above, it would be appreciated, as it is very difficult to engage in this sort of conversation in person without inflaming anger and wounds.
I find myself in almost exactly the same situation. I have friends whom I love dearly that are homosexual, some in relationships, and some who have chosen to remain celibate. I am saddened by those who have chosen to pursue sexual gratification, as I am saddened by my heterosexual friends’ sexual immoralities. Clearly there were changes between the Old Testament and the New, and many in the period of time before the canonization of the New Testament found themselves wondering what God was doing. They did not have the benefit of the New Testament to guide their discussion. We do.
While the church was on the wrong side of the slavery issue for far too long by citing the Bible’s seeming acceptance of the practice, they eventually righted their wrongs and became the loudest voice for civil rights in America. This issue is diametrically different from that one, though, in that we have here a clear biblical prohibition. Unless we are truly willing to say either A) we are entering a new, new covenant, where God is once again adjusting what was previously written to his people, or B) that if we perceive the Spirit to be doing something in opposition to the New Testament we should follow our perceptions over the written Word, I don’t know what we could possibly continue to discuss. Either the Word of God is still authoritative in all areas of life, or it’s not. Either we allow the Word and the Spirit to continue to shape and mold our hearts, minds, actions, and affections, or we allow those things to instead shape and mold our reading of scripture and our perception of the Spirit. If the Word is not able to convict us of sin, but instead reread and rehashed until it fits our proclivities then it ceases to bring us any closer to God or help us to work out our sanctification. Holiness, in that case, is a bygone pursuit.
The two horns of the dilemma everyone faces are 1) doing what the Bible says simply because that’s what we think the Bible says, and damn both the consequences and human thought on the matter, or 2) doing what we think is right, and damn the Bible, history and tradition. Both of these are unacceptable, yes? When faced with a dilemma, you are either impaled on one of the horns, or you find a way through the middle. EVERYONE faces this dilemma, and the traditionalist and reformist views are two attempts to confront this dilemma.
Brandon, you sound as though you are taking the traditionalist position, and misrepresenting the reformist position. It’s always easy to trounce an argument no one is putting forward. There is no “new, new covenant”. There are two interpretations of the one “new covenant”. The reformist position is that on slavery, war, polygamy, socialism, divorce, remarriage, women in ministry, and more, the Spirit has led the church to a better understanding of scripture, and that the Spirit is NOW leading the church to a better understanding of scripture on homosexuality. Not a new, new covenant, but another example of the Spirit guiding the church in the original new covenant.
You say that the church was on the wrong side of slavery. I agree. Slavery supporters cited the Bible’s “seeming acceptance”. I agree. The church righted their wrongs, and supported civil rights. I agree.
Did the Spirit have a role in that? Did the Spirit of God correct the church on the subject of slavery? If the Spirit corrected the church, then aren’t you in the reformist camp? If you are in the reformist camp, on what basis do you say “the Holy Spirit can correct the church on slavery, but not on homosexuality”? The Bible is authoritative in the view of the reformist camp, but what the church taught about slavery for nineteen hundred years was only the Bible’s “seeming acceptance” of slavery, and the Spirit FINALLY led the church to a better understanding of the scripture, to the Bible’s ‘real condemnation’ of slavery. In which case, you really don’t want to be resisting the Holy Spirit if the Spirit is trying to teach the church a better understanding of homosexuality, right? “But, we have a clear biblical prohibition! The Spirit can’t teach the church a better understanding of homosexuality!” Isn’t that exactly what the church teachers were saying about slavery two hundred years ago? “We have a clear biblical precedent! Paul tells slaves to obey their masters, so slavery is OK!”
Now, if the Spirit had no role in changing the church’s teaching on slavery, you’ve pretty much limited the role of a member of the trinity to establishing the canon, and then taking the rest of recorded human history off. That’s a position you could take, but it has its own set of problems.
I admit there is some scary stuff to the reformist position: we become responsible to be hearers of the Spirit, and figure out how that relates to scripture, on non-trivial topics. The reformist position says that the Spirit changed the church’s understanding of the Bible on war, polygamy, socialism, divorce, remarriage, women in ministry, and more. It’s a terrifying thing to risk here: either we quench/ignore/silence the Spirit because we know confidently what the Bible says (ignoring all those topics we all agree the church was wrong about in the past, and wrong for centuries) or we risk being criticized for abandoning the Bible in favor of a Spirit who might teach us any fool thing.
Given how scary the reformist position is, it’s tempting to adopt the traditionalist position. However, it’s no easier there, because they face exactly the same dilemma. If we say that we know what the Bible says, how do we explain all the centuries that the church didn’t know what the Bible said, when the church was on the wrong side of the issues? Traditionalists also have to work through war, polygamy, socialism, divorce, remarriage, women in ministry, and more. Some are hard liners; they don’t allow divorce, or remarriage, or women in ministry.They have to figure out if a 59-year-old widow must be forced to marry or starve, while a 60-year-old widow can receive aid from the church (I Tim. 5:9, 10). EVERYONE faces the dilemma, and if you don’t have a way between the horns (the reformist camp is one way) then you either have to come up with another way, or you get impaled on the traditionalist horn.
Here’s the argument I am making: “While the church was on the wrong side of the homosexuality issue for far too long by citing the Bible’s seeming condemnation of the practice, they eventually righted their wrongs and became the loudest voice for civil rights in America.”
The reformist position argues that the Holy Spirit does indeed teach us how to interpret the scripture, and that what the church taught “back then” could have been wrong, and that the Spirit will guide us today into truth. It’s a scary position, but it’s also one which makes us responsible. Accepting the traditionalist horn allows you to remain innocent of violating what you think the Bible says, but it also leaves you stuck with how to explain it when the church taught what you clearly believe to be falsehoods.
Again, if you can’t say how to get past the dilemma, the conversation is at a standstill. It does no good to accuse reformist of a position they don’t hold. That bears false witness, and ends the possibility of discussion.
Hey Allen,
My name is Ricky. I was just wondering if you could explain a little more your reasoning on why you believe the church has been on the wrong side of understanding homosexuality. How do I now look at scriptures such as, “Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites…(1 Corinthians 6:9 NKJV). Also in Jude 1:7 it says that Sodom and Gomorrah are set foward as an example to us. They were destroyed because of their sins and we are able to read what their sins were. I agree that the anointing can teach us in all things (1 John 2:27), but the Spirit and anointing will not teach us something different than the Word of God. A house divided against itself cannot stand. If there is no scripture to support that the Spirit is showing us a better way to view homosexuality then the Spirit is not saying it. Please understand my tone because I am not trying to sound rude. God bless
Allen, I believe Brandon’s struggle on this issue is similar to mine, in that we can understand the Reformist position on something like slavery, or women’s role in society & the church, but cannot reach the same conclusions regarding other points, homosexuality among them. And I don’t think that either of us thinks the church, as a human institution, can be mistaken–but that doesn’t mean that it is always mistaken, or that it must yield to popular thought whenever there is a conflict of opinion. The thing I cannot get past is that in Old Testament and New, in whatever context it is discussed, the basic tenets of marriage are that it is a union between a man and a woman, and that marriage is where God-blessed sexual activity occurs. I don’t think marriage is a black-and-white or especially legalistic institution (e.g. is it adultery to have sex with your wife the night before your wedding? does marriage begin when you say “I do,” or when you decide to commit yourself to that person for the rest of your life?), but surely it must have some definition. And the bare minimum that every biblical marriage, or mention of marriage, meets is the one I listed above: that it is between the complementary sexes.
You mentioned two options on homosexuality in your post, the Reformist position that homosexuality is now blessed because it seems to be on the right side of history (i.e. it follows current political currents), or the traditionalist opinion, which is wrong and will “impale” you. I confess that I’m only a theological novice (that’s part of why I’m at Fuller), and that my thinking is as susceptible as anyone’s to error. But I am still searching for reasons to be pulled into the reformist camp on this issue.
“I agree that the anointing can teach us in all things (1 John 2:27), but the Spirit and anointing will not teach us something different than the Word of God.” Do you see how radically different it is to say ‘the Spirit will not teach us something different than what we thought was the Word of God’?
If the church was wrong about making Gentiles conform to Jewish law when they converted to Christianity, if the church was wrong about slavery, if the church was wrong about divorce and remarriage, then the church could be wrong about homosexuality. The Spirit can correct what we thought. One does not have to toss out the Bible (as several above have insisted) to come to this conclusion. Further, those holding the traditionalist position have some big problems of their own. EVERYONE has to answer this problem. Some people refuse to, and simply dismiss those who want to wrestle with the problem as having rejected the bible, instead of seeing how the Spirit and the church have interacted with the bible in the past.
If you want to do research on particular passages, whole books have been written about them. I’ll point you to some online resources: On I Cor, have a look at http://bit.ly/Oq5M9r. On Jude, http://bit.ly/S1NzjN.
However, you don’t need me to answer these things. Watch what the Spirit is doing, and let that drive you back to see where the church MUST have misunderstood the bible in the past. It’s risky, because you could be wrong. The alternative, presented above, means that you are never “wrong,” but may have to face up to having quenched the Spirit. I know which side on which I want to err.
“I agree that the anointing can teach us in all things (1 John 2:27), but the Spirit and anointing will not teach us something different than the Word of God.” Do you see how radically different it is to say ‘the Spirit will not teach us something different than what we thought was the Word of God’?
If the church was wrong about making Gentiles conform to Jewish law when they converted to Christianity, if the church was wrong about slavery, if the church was wrong about divorce and remarriage, then the church could be wrong about homosexuality. The Spirit can correct what we thought. One does not have to toss out the Bible (as several above have insisted) to come to this conclusion. Further, those holding the traditionalist position have some big problems of their own. EVERYONE has to answer this problem. Some people refuse to, and simply dismiss those who want to wrestle with the problem as having rejected the bible, instead of seeing how the Spirit and the church have interacted with the bible in the past.
If you want to do research on particular passages, whole books have been written about them. I’ll point you to some online resources: On I Cor, have a look at http://bit.ly/Oq5M9r. On Jude, http://bit.ly/S1NzjN.
However, you don’t need me to answer these things. Watch what the Spirit is doing, and let that drive you back to see where the church MUST have misunderstood the bible in the past. It’s risky, because you could be wrong. The alternative, presented above, means that you are never “wrong,” but may have to face up to having quenched the Spirit. I know which side on which I want to err.
“I agree that the anointing can teach us in all things (1 John 2:27), but the Spirit and anointing will not teach us something different than the Word of God.” Do you see how radically different it is to say ‘the Spirit will not teach us something different than what we thought was the Word of God’?
If the church was wrong about making Gentiles conform to Jewish law when they converted to Christianity, if the church was wrong about slavery, if the church was wrong about divorce and remarriage, then the church could be wrong about homosexuality. The Spirit can correct what we thought. One does not have to toss out the Bible (as several above have insisted) to come to this conclusion. Further, those holding the traditionalist position have some big problems of their own. EVERYONE has to answer this problem. Some people refuse to, and simply dismiss those who want to wrestle with the problem as having rejected the bible, instead of seeing how the Spirit and the church have interacted with the bible in the past.
If you want to do research on particular passages, whole books have been written about them. I’ll point you to some online resources: On I Cor, have a look at http://bit.ly/Oq5M9r. On Jude, http://bit.ly/S1NzjN.
However, you don’t need me to answer these things. Watch what the Spirit is doing, and let that drive you back to see where the church MUST have misunderstood the bible in the past. It’s risky, because you could be wrong. The alternative, presented above, means that you are never “wrong,” but may have to face up to having quenched the Spirit. I know which side on which I want to err.
Allen,
You claim to be a Christian but you support abortion.
You put that in apposition, suggesting that you think I am not a Christian. That strikes me as an ugly way to pursue a discussion. It also presumes something false, because the two are hardly mutually exclusive. Many, MANY Christians believe abortions should be legal, safe, and on demand. The majority of people in this country believe that Roe vs. Wade should not be overturned, and that includes tens of millions of people who identify as Christians. I hope you don’t claim for yourself the wisdom to decide who is and who is not a Christian.
Second, what does that have to do with this exchange about homosexuality? You haven’t made any explicit connection, but if you are suggesting: “Allen is wrong about abortion, so he’s wrong about homosexuality”, or “Allen supports abortion, so he’s not a Christian, so anything he says about homosexuality is also wrong”, then there’s no basis for a discussion. We aren’t talking the same language.
Allen, just b/c many Christians believe abortions are okey dokey doesn’t mean it is right. The tenants of Christianity are not based on mob rule.
As for you and your beliefs which include abortion on demand, pro-gay, pro-bisexual, pro-tranny, pro-feminist and anything else that goes against the basic tenants of Christianity, I don’t see how you are fit to give an informed opinion on Christian thought.