Posted on 08/10/2012 6:48:52 AM PDT by Graybeard58
WAKE FOREST, N.C. (BP) -- Today it is popular among those promoting same-sex marriage to say that Jesus never addressed the issue, that He was silent on the subject.
Those who affirm the historical and traditional understanding of marriage between a man and woman often are admonished to go and read the Bible more carefully. If we do so, we are told, we will see that Jesus never addressed the issue. So, the question that I want to raise is, "Is this assertion correct?" Is it indeed the fact that Jesus never addresses the issue of same-sex marriage?
When one goes to the Gospels to see exactly what Jesus did say, one will discover that He addressed very clearly both the issues of sex and marriage. He addresses both their use and misuse. And, as He speaks to both subjects, He makes it plain that issues of the heart are of critical importance.
First, what did Jesus say about sex? Jesus believed that sex is a good gift from a great God. He also believed that sex was a good gift to be enjoyed within a monogamous, heterosexual covenant of marriage. On this He is crystal clear. In Mark 7 Jesus addresses the fact that all sin is ultimately an issue of the heart. Jesus was never after behavioral modification. Jesus was always after heart transformation. Change the heart and you truly change the person.
Thus, when He lists a catalog of sins in Mark 7:21-22, He makes it clear that all of these sins are ultimately matters of the heart. It is the idols of the heart that Jesus is out to eradicate. Among those sins of the heart that often give way to sinful actions He would include both sexual immorality and adultery (Mark 7:21). The phrase "sexual immorality," in a biblical context, would speak of any sexual behavior outside the covenant of marriage between a man and woman. Therefore, Jesus viewed pre-marital sex, adultery and homosexual behavior as sinful. And, He knew that the cure for each is a transformation of the heart made possible by the good news of the Gospel. The Gospel changes us so that now we are enabled to do not what we want, but what God wants. Here we find real freedom and joy.
Second, what about the issue of marriage? Is it truly the case that Jesus never spoke to the issue in terms of gender? The answer is a simple no. He gives His perspective on this when He addresses the issue in Matthew 19:4-6. There, speaking to the institution of marriage, Jesus is clear when He says, "Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, 'Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh'? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate." That Jesus was committed to heterosexual marriage could not be more evident. A man is to leave his parents and be joined to a woman who becomes his wife. This is heterosexual marriage. That He also was committed to the permanence and fidelity of marriage is clear as well.
So, how might we sum up the issue? First, Jesus came to deliver all people from all sin. Such sin, He was convinced, originated in and was ultimately a matter of the heart. Second, Jesus made it clear that sex is a good gift from a great God, and this good gift is to be enjoyed within heterosexual covenantal marriage. It is simply undeniable that Jesus assumed heterosexual marriage as God's design and plan. Third, Jesus sees all sexual activity outside this covenant as sinful. Fourth, it is a very dangerous and illegitimate interpretive strategy to bracket the words of Jesus and read into them the meaning you would like to find. We must not isolate Jesus from His affirmation of the Old Testament as the Word of God nor divorce Him from His first century Jewish context. Fifth, and this is really good news, Jesus loves both the heterosexual sinner and the homosexual sinner and promises free forgiveness and complete deliverance to each and everyone who comes to Him.
John 7 tells the story of a woman caught in adultery. The religious legalists want to stone her, but Jesus intervenes and prevents her murder. He then looks upon the woman and, with grace and tenderness, tells her that He does not condemn her. Then He says to her, "go and sin no more." In Matthew 11:28 Jesus speaks to every one of us weighed down under the terrible weight and burden of sin. Listen to these tender words of the Savior, "Come to me all who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest." This is the hope that is found in Jesus. This is the hope found in the Gospel. Whether one is guilty of heterosexual or homosexual sin, one will find grace, forgiveness and freedom at the foot of the cross where the ground is always level.
When I came to fully trust Jesus as my Lord and Savior at the age of 20, I determined that I wanted to think like Jesus and live like Jesus for the rest of my life. When it comes to sex I want to think like Jesus. When it comes to marriage I want to think like Jesus. That means I will affirm covenantal heterosexual marriage. It also means loving each and every person regardless of their lifestyle choices. It means, as His representative, proclaiming His Gospel and extending the transforming grace of the Gospel to others that takes us where we are, but wonderfully and amazingly, does not leave us there. That is a hope and a promise that followers of Jesus gladly extend to everyone, because we have been recipients of that same amazing grace.
Daniel Akin is president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, N.C.
Ping
Liberals comprehend NOTHING except power and their own desires.
You have to remember that the Bible was written by men, inspired by God, but in specific cultural milieus. In those times, I don't think women were considered all that important as people. But I do think that the moral strictures of God applied to them as well.
There never would have been any opportunity for Jesus to address “same ‘sex’ marriage,” since in his time the candidates would have been stoned to death in a roadside ditch.
Good grief, Jesus’ first miracle was at the Wedding of Cana where a man and a woman were married!
>> “Daniel seems confused.” <<
.
Daniel seems to be doing the work of his father, Satan.
More so in some cultures, less so in others.
But I do think that the moral strictures of God applied to them as well.
Sure. And The Law explicitly forbids women having sexual relations with animals. Doesn't mention women having relations with women.
Maybe it just wasn't a problem.
Drunk driving (a chariot, for example) isn't mentioned, either.
Jesus did not address directly each and every violation of the Law. However, he did address the Law itself.
Luke 16: 15 - 17
15 And he said unto them, Ye are they which justify yourselves before men; but God knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God.
16 The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and every man presseth into it.
17 And it is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to fail.
You are right. There is no female equivalent to Leviticus 18:22 or 20:13. It is likely that there is something cultural going on here. There were cultural differences between east and west in the ancient world in regard to sexual practices and the tolerance thereof.
The Greeks, as I’m sure you know, were regarded as the popularizers (if such a word can be used in this context) of, especially, male homosexuality. It is not that homosexuality (or at least sex between men, as in Afghanistan today) was not practiced elsewhere, because there is evidence in art and, less, in literature that it was. But the Greeks not only tolerated it, but celebrated it and often depicted it in art. The Greek attitude toward lesbianism (or, again, at least sex between women) is a little less certain. The term lesbian is derived from the island of Lesbos, the home of the lyric poet Sappho (the origin of the term, sapphic), but was not really used in the sense we do today until about the 18th century, as classical studies attracted more and more attention. But unlike with men, I know of no depictions of female to female sex even among the Greeks. And it is not certain that Sappho’s either requited or unrequited love for other women involved physicality. In later antiquity there are other indications, but I don’t have time right now for that.
So, if among the Greeks, well known in the ancient world for their tolerance of and even approval of male homosexuality, there is little direct evidence of female homosexuality/lesbianism, it stands to reason that in the east where there is less evidence of male homosexuality (although there is quite a bit) that there would be near silence in regard to female homosexual practices.
That such practices would be viewed unfavorably in the ancient Near East, analogous to the culture’s general view of male homosexuality, is probable, if not certain.
But in the end one would have to say, with Solomon, that there is nothing new under the sun. I’m the same perversions of today were to be found then.
The question of whether something was specifically addressed rahter than being able to be reasonably inferred from the context, and from the whole text of the Bible, is a separate question.
Now, maybe you are addressing a separate question, but to me the question is: Does the Bible disapprove of lesbianism, and my considered opinion is that it does.
The question of whether something was specifically addressed rahter than being able to be reasonably inferred from the context, and from the whole text of the Bible, is a separate question.
Now, maybe you are addressing a separate question, but to me the question is: Does the Bible disapprove of lesbianism, and my considered opinion is that it does.
“The only people who suggest otherwise are those who are desperately trying to justify their perverted, evil and godless lifestyle. “
Exactly. They are trying to force government to redefine religion and specifically Christianity into what THEY (Gays) want it to be instead of what it is. To do so would be to violate that religion’s first amendment rights.
Religion and Christianity is what it is. They just can’t accept it for what it is. Sucks to be them (so to speak).
1) Any Israelite or any foreigner residing in Israel who sacrifices any of his children to Molek is to be put to death
2) I will set my face against anyone who turns to mediums and spiritists to prostitute themselves by following them, and I will cut them off from their people.
3) Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death. Because they have cursed their father or mother, their blood will be on their own head.
4) If a man commits adultery with another man’s wife —with the wife of his neighbor—both the adulterer and the adulteress are to be put to death.
5) ‘If a man has sexual relations with his father’s wife, he has dishonored his father. Both the man and the woman are to be put to death;
6) If a man has sexual relations with his daughter-in-law, both of them are to be put to death. What they have done is a perversion; their blood will be on their own heads;
7) ‘If a man has sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They are to be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads;
8) If a man marries both a woman and her mother, it is wicked. Both he and they must be burned in the fire, so that no wickedness will be among you;
9) ‘If a man has sexual relations with an animal, he is to be put to death, and you must kill the animal;
10) If a woman approaches an animal to have sexual relations with it, kill both the woman and the animal. They are to be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads; (not sure why it’s the animal’s fault)
I think what we are talking about is covered under #7, and remember, Jesus came not to change the law, not one jot, not one tittle. He might forgive you, but you’d have to admit what you had done was wrong first.
This leaves the question of whether The Law explicitly and specifically condemns women having sexual relations with other women, and I find no example of such.
Thus we are left with "Does the Bible disapprove of lesbianism" ... and we must present a totality of evidence and general point of view argument. THAT argument, IMO, suggests that God disapproves sexual relations outside of marriage, and that marriage involves one man and one woman, and that the relationship of husband & wife is dissolved only by the death of one or the other.
It is what God gave us, therefore it is sufficient.
Throughout the Holy WORD of G-d, marriage is a metaphorshalom b'SHEM Yah'shua HaMashiach
for the relationship of YHvH and his "called" people.In the Tanach YHvH is the Bridegroom and Israel is the Wife.
Later "called" gentiles are referred to a Bride.A clear reading of Romans 1 in context beginning at
verse 16 shows that those who should know YHvH and his creation
but reject Him are given over to a perverse relationship in direct
opposition to the metaphor of marriage.
Well, then, I guess that we are more or less in agreement. You have a nice day.
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