Icky Theology Doesn't Hack It

Challenges to the homosexual agenda fail for two reasons:

1.No Questions Allowed

We are living through a massive redefinition of human sexuality. Proposed by militant gays and their supporters, it generally refuses calm, intelligent discussion. Its success often depends on intimidation that maligns opponents as “haters,” “homophobes” and “bigots.” Like the proponents of man-made global warming, about which Al Gore says, “the science is settled” (in spite of unsettling “inconvenient truths” to the contrary), so the moral case on homosexuality has been decided in advance—“one should be free to love whomever one wishes.” Sexual diversity is assumed to constitute the glorious future for human liberation—whether in the media or in the halls of education. Exclusive heterosexuality is dismissed as the imposition of an oppressive past, unworthy of public debate.

The power of this approach is stunning. Without providing any peer-reviewed scientific evidence that therapy for clients with unwanted homosexual feelings is harmful, the UK government recently pressured the Association of Christian Counselors (ACC) into expelling a long-serving Christian counselor for offering therapeutic support to someone with unwanted same-sex attraction.

2. No Answers Given

Even were the discussion to be opened, many Christians would not know where to begin. Take, for example, the “Confessions of an Ex-Evangelical, Pro-SSM Millennial.” This twenty-four- year- old recounts:

I went to Evangelical churches fifty-two Sundays a year for the better part of 19 years….my evangelical church made exactly one argument about SSM… “Being gay is icky.” The moment a gay person ceases to disgust you, you have nothing left. It failed to train the young people…providing them no doctrinal depth by keeping them in a bubble of emotion, dependent on their never engaging with the outside world on anything but warlike terms. Icky

Or consider the cult-like Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, KS which appears in public, and even at funerals, with signs reading “God Hates Fags,” and “Thank God for 9/11.” This may be the only place where the accusation of hate speech is truly appropriate, and where, as an argument, their approach is woefully inappropriate.

These cases exhibit the lack of clear, convincing reasoning about sexuality—reasoning that respects the interlocutor as a person made in God’s image, while grounding the discussion in sound biblical theology. Actually, a valid argument is not that complicated, but it must step back to ultimate issues, as does British theologian Colin Gunton (1941–2003):

There are, probably, ultimately only two possible answers to the question of origins: [either] that the universe is the result of creation by a free personal agency, or that in some way it creates itself.

The only two possible answers are faith statements, since none of us were there at the time, defining two mutually exclusive forms of religious commitment, as the apostle Paul wrote long ago:

…they exchanged the truth about God for [the] lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen (Rom 1:25).

For simplicity I call these two options Oneism or Twoism.

Oneism: The self-creating world is self-explanatory, and all is made up of the same stuff, whether matter, spirit or a mixture. Thus, all distinctions are in principle eliminated. This is what can be called homocosmology, a worldview based on sameness.

Twoism: There are two kinds of existence—the uncreated Creator, and everything else, which is created. Twoism celebrates both God’s otherness in relation to the world and also explains the distinctions he placed in the creation to celebrate this Twoist reality. This is a heterocosmology, a world based on otherness and difference.

These two understandings of the world give rise to two views of sexuality. (For a deeper discussion, see my book God of Sex.)

As Oneist spirituality invades our once Christian culture, modern sexuality eliminates gender distinctions. Androgyny (male and female in one person) becomes the sexual model, promoting gender confusion and symbolizing, as one spiritual homosexual said, “the primordial cosmic unity…representing the sacrament of monism [or Oneism].” Hence the ideological and sacramental importance of SSM.

Similarly, the Twoist historic biblical faith celebrates the representative ideological importance of heterosexuality. In the beginning, reflecting God’s Trinitarian image of difference in unity, human beings were made male and female (Gen 1:27-8), and that structure mirrored the Twoist “mystery” of Christ’s redeeming love for his bride, the church (Eph 5:32).

There is no appeal to “icky,” no incitement to hate in this argument. Biblical cosmology brings light to the discussion and, in God’s grace, prepares hearts for conversion and life-changing behavior. As the Apostle Paul said,

“And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.” 1Corinthians 6:11

About the author: Dr. Peter Jones is Director of truthXchange, and Adjunct Professor of New Testament, as well as Scholar in Residence, at Westminster Seminary California. He has written The Gnostic Empire Strikes Back (1992), Spirit Wars (1997), Gospel Truth/Pagan Lies (1999), Capturing the Pagan Mind (2003), Cracking DaVinci's Code (2004, co-author, James Garlow), Stolen Identity (2006),The God of Sex (2006), and One or Two (2010). Peter Jones is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church in America, and is married to Rebecca Clowney Jones. They have seven children and twelve grandchildren. For recreation, Dr. Jones enjoys playing jazz piano and golf.

Each generation must learn anew that the stove is hot, by touching it. Then we find, to our surprise, that the old dead guys were right after all.

So you don’t like to study fish? (Oh, that’s Ickthyology.)

Each generation must learn anew that the stove is hot, by touching it. Then we find, to our surprise, that the old dead guys were right after all.

I'm stealing that.

Jesus said, "He that has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me." The church (leadership) is so afraid to discuss obeying Christ's authority and commands that it lacks authority. 1 Thess 4:1-8 gives one of the commands:

"Finally then, brethren, we urge and exhort in the Lord Jesus that you should abound more and more, just as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God; for you know what commandments we gave you through the Lord Jesus. For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one should take advantage of and defraud his brother in this matter, because the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also forewarned you and testified. For God did not call us to uncleanness, but in holiness. Therefore he who rejects this does not reject man, but God, who has also given us His Holy Spirit."

Note the last sentence - He who rejects this rejects God.

The arguments against homosexuality should be based on God's authority, not "icky".

I love that Scripture with its positive “each of us must learn”. Another one states “the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. “ (1 Cor)

Coming from the very messed up Sixties, I find God’s wisdom to be beautiful.

The homosexual lobby would like you to think that homosexuality is just two old guys sitting in front of a fire drinking hot chocolate and reading poetry. The reality of male homosexuality is one man sticking his penis into the anal canal of another man. The act defines them. It’s not a genetic characteristic. It’s the ACT.

Actually, “icky” is just another way to say “abomination.” God calls homosexuality “abomination,” and “abomination” in context means “disgusting/sickening.” Icky.