Today, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments on whether
the Constitution permits an extension of the definition of marriage to include
same-sex couples. This issue has been the source of contentious and impassioned
debates fueled by sentimental existentialism on one side and unsympathetic
dogmatism on the other. Such reactions testify to the weight of the issue. But
how should the church, those who follow Christ, the One full
of grace and truth, engage the issue?
To help avoid the traps of existentialism and dogmatism,
several cautions are in order. First, the church should neither scoff at nor degrade
those at the heart of this issue. The church’s typical and too often
thoughtless rejection of the archetypal “I was born this way” argument is
grounded in a shallow understanding of sin that assumes sin merely is something
external one can simply resist. In this way of thinking, homosexual inclinations
or desires are not internal realities but external possibilities. In other
words, it is not possible that one is born predisposed to homosexuality. It is
only possible that one is a homosexual as he or she consciously and willingly rejects
heterosexual desires in favor of homosexual desires. Not only does this way of
thinking reject the biblical testimony that we are all born into sin, slaves to
idolatrous desires and suffer from corrupted sexualities, this way of thinking
has postured many Christians in judgmental condescension over those who
struggle with or embrace homosexuality.
This way of thinking has robbed the church of any capacity to weep over
sin’s destruction—both of the individual and of society—and has instead fueled a
dogmatism void of real compassion. The church must remember that apart from
Christ, we are all subhuman and slaves to sin. I myself am predisposed to all
sorts of evil and ungodliness—pride, apathy, greed and other sins of which I am
shamefully not even aware. This by no means excuses or minimizes these sins. If
I am predisposed to anger, such a predisposition does not provide permissible
grounds for murder. Still, the church must bear in mind the biblical testimony
that we are all alienated from a true humanity and in need of the redemption of
the whole of our being. Our minds, bodies, desires and affections are all
corrupted, inclined to sin and in need of the regenerative work of the gospel,
apart from which we have no hope of escaping the holy God’s just judgment
against all of our sin. The church must engage those who struggle with or
embrace homosexual desires remembering the Apostle Paul’s reminder to the
church at Corinth, “and such were some of you.” It is only out of this humility
that the church can engage the world around us with a deep, compassionate love
that longs to see God unleash the redemptive power of the gospel on those held
captive by sin.
Second, the church must affirm Scripture and its testimony
as the highest truth and the ultimate reality. Postmodernism has relocated the
locus of truth from external objectivism to internal subjectivism. In other
words, as popular culture defines it, the only real source of truth is the
individual experience. There is no such thing as absolute, objective truth. The
influence of postmodern thought has given rise to great skepticism and even
outright rejection of the Bible and its truth claims. Experience has been
elevated as the final verdict of truth. The individual has been moved to the
center of the universe. There is already evidence of the perilous effects of
postmodernism’s influence in the thinking and life of the church. Perhaps at
its worst, consider the recent rise of universalism, the false doctrine that
espouses no one will actually spend eternity in Hell since God, being love,
would be unloving to subject someone to eternal, conscious torment. While this
is not the place to undo the arguments for universalism, it should be
reinforced that such an idea does not at all agree with Scripture. However, for
the sake of this argument, it should be noted how universalism elevates
experience and emotion over the testimony of Scripture. It is admittedly
tempting to do so if one has an unbelieving friend or relative or neighbor
whose moral uprightness seems, from a cultural perspective, undeserving of divine
punishment. Yet the church must maintain unwavering commitment that Scripture
alone is the final source of truth. It would in fact be unloving of the church
to elevate another truth claim alongside Scripture or to subject Scripture to
some external truth claim because Scripture is not the unfair, joy killing list
of commands of a tyrant dictator. Scripture is the story of God creating a
people for Himself who He offers to delight in the eternal joy of His
fellowship and presence but who reject God’s free invitation to find joy in Him
and seek it elsewhere. Though such a rejection of God justly demands God punish
them by forever withholding the joy to be found only in Him, God opens anew the
way to the joy of His presence by Himself taking on flesh and enduring the
curse for man’s sin and rising again to new life so that all those who turn
from sin and trust in Him will be restored to the fellowship of His presence in
which there is eternal joy and everlasting pleasure. Scripture, therefore, is
an unmistakable declaration that God is for our highest, deepest, fullest, most
enduring joy that is to be found only in Him by walking in obedience to the
commands He lays out to guide us into that everlasting joy.
More subtle than universalism, consumerism and individualism
are other evidences of how the postmodern rejection of Scripture as the
ultimate canon and judge of truth has influenced the thinking and life of the
church. Consider the primary grid for many in our culture for deciding with
which church to gather on Sunday mornings. Is it not individual preference and
convenience? If one does not like the style of corporate singing or the
preaching or the color of the carpet or the lights on the stage, is he or she
not inclined to search out a gathering that is more congruent to their
preferences? It may appear these issues are of far less significance than the
issue of homosexuality, and to a degree that is true. But in either case, the
church must be aware of our own (unbiblical) tendency to orient our life—even
our life on Sunday morning—around individual preference and convenience. We
too, have become our own gods, determining what is right and good, what is
wrong and evil. If the church is to engage in the discussion of homosexuality,
we must resist any and all temptation to elevate our individual experience or
consumeristic preferences to or above the level of Scripture. Scripture alone
is unapologetically the final verdict on all truth, and as stated before, the
church would indeed be unloving to depart from appealing to Scripture as the
universal and final truth claim. Imagine if you were walking on the shore of a
lake and up out of the water and onto the shore flies a fish. This fish made
quite the mighty leap onto the shore and is unable to return himself to the
water. Knowing that this fish cannot live on the shore since he was made for
the water, you approach him with the intentions of returning him to the water.
But imagine this fish rejects your efforts to return him to the water and insists
you leave him on the shore since that is where he has decided he will now live.
How should you love this fish? Is it loving to concede to his desires to
(attempt to) make a life for himself on the shore? Is it loving to allow the
fish to determine what is right and best and good for himself, even if he
determines that is a life out of the water? Certainly not! You know the fish,
despite his best intentions or deepest desires will die on the shore because he
was made to live and to thrive in the water. So too, the church must engage in
the discussion of homosexuality not as heartless law enforcers or as
sympathizers with the choice of the individual but as those who herald and
offer Life. We must engage those who struggle with or embrace homosexuality
with a deep desire to see them live knowing that true, abundant, everlasting,
joyful life is found only in Christ.
When considering these cautions, we may be tempted to simply
retreat and not engage the issue at all. Perhaps the constant politicization of
this issue is exhausting and has left you no capacity to engage in the issue.
But too much is at stake for the church to sit back and refuse to have a voice.
This issue is far beyond political agendas and cultural trends. The gospel is
at stake. Marriage bookends the biblical narrative. The biblical narrative
opens with a marriage in Genesis 2 and ends with a marriage Revelation 21.
Somewhere in between, in Ephesians 5, the Apostle Paul declares that the
pattern of marriage established in Genesis 2 between a man and a woman is a
shadow of the substance of the gospel. Marriage is a constant thread from
Genesis to Revelation that holds the biblical narrative together in a glorious tapestry
whose center is the gospel declaration that God in Christ is making all things
new. Therefore marriage is not incidental or accidental to the gospel, it is
integral. Marriage is a gospel issue, and as such, the church must fight to
uphold the integrity of the gospel that, according to God’s design, is pictured
in the union of a man and a woman in the covenant of marriage. If marriage
becomes anything less than that, the gospel itself is minimized and obscured.
If the thread of marriage (biblically understood) woven throughout the fabric
of the biblical narrative is altered, the fabric of the narrative will fray.
Therefore, above all political agendas and personal experiences, the church
must strive to preserve the integrity and purity of the gospel with which we
have been entrusted so that we might live in and among the world as heralds and
agents of the transformative, life-giving gospel.
There is much more that could and should be said about the
so-called marriage debate and the role of the church in it. What is found here
is merely an attempt to undercut the unbiblical thinking that typically informs
the church’s engagement of this issue and to help establish a pattern for more
biblical thinking. For additional resources that further the conversation
started here see:
Kevin DeYoung, What
Does the Bible Say About Homosexuality? (a more accessible treatment of
these issues)
Robert Gagnon, The
Bible and Homosexual Practice: Texts and Hermeneutics (a scholarly
treatment of these issues)
Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, ERLC.com (a host of
resources and updates on the SCOTUS decision)
No comments:
Post a Comment