Truth and Love

Love wins.  It's an oft repeated phrase that signifies love and brotherhood overcoming hatred and bigotry.  We see it all the time from bloggers and journalists to your average Facebook post and often it labels a truly good thing.  Love however, is not the only ethic worth supporting or championing.

We in the church have been guilty of many things over the years usually as a result of our tendency to overreact to the events around us.  We blame people instead of conditions, we hate where we should love, and lately we support what we ought to condemn.

"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, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God."
(1 Corinthians 6:9-10 NKJV)

Sexuality, Gender, and their related issues have become hot topics these days.  The cultural marketplace is thick with discussion as to their meaning and role and how we understand them in our daily lives.  The Bible is very clear on these issues and yet those who call themselves Christians are waffling and even refusing to make definitive statements regarding these issues.  The passage I just listed is only one but the point remains clear, and we can make it clearer.

"Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God."
(1 Corinthians 6:9-10 KJV)

The word translated "effeminate" is the Greek word "malakos" and does indeed mean effeminate and "of uncertain affinity" but beyond its literal meaning I've read that the term was used to denote the -well- receiving side of a homosexual relationship.  Even more specific is the next phrase after that "abusers of themselves with mankind."  That word is the Greek "arsenokoites" which means a sodomite, taken from the words "arrhen/arsen" male, and "koite" cohabitation, chambering, conceive.

"'You shall not lie with a male as with a woman. It is an abomination."
(Leviticus 18:22 NKJV)

From the Old Testament we have a very clear statement and before anyone starts bringing up that we are not under the old covenant, remember that these laws represent God because they reflect Him.  He did not give the law out on a whim but as an extension of Himself.  Not to mention we're talking about something of slightly more import than dietary or clothing restrictions here!  This is only a brief run through of course, but the point of this post is not to argue this topic.  The point is this, although we must show love to the unsaved and not judge them for their sin we have a duty and responsibility to call out those who claim the name of Christ but refuse to repent of clear Biblical sin.

When the sinner sins, we should not be surprised as that is their nature and apart from the work of God humanity has no reason nor ability to do otherwise.  When we condemn them and lambaste them for their sin we are clearly in the wrong.  Our calling is not to bludgeon people with their guilt or to bury them in shame and leave them rot, or job is to lovingly show them that their actions and nature are killing them; that they are indeed already dead and in desperate need of a savior to bring them to real life! We are to be wise yet gentle as the verse says.  We must not inhibit the work of the Gospel by spreading it through hatred and anger.  Remember the words that come after the earlier quote from Corinthians "and such were some of you."

We are all born sinners so we have no right to look down on those who have not yet been redeemed.  When we look inward however, the game changes.  We are still called to love but hatred is to be found, hatred of sin.  It is partly because of God's love for us that He hates sin, it's destroying His people!  Similarly we cannot claim to love God and His truth and not point out sin in our midst.

So many people are coming out these days as "Christian" homosexuals.  These men and women are claiming the salvation of God but living and espousing lives of sin and rebellion.  In my eyes that makes them false teachers and the Bible is very clear on them.

"O Timothy! Guard what was committed to your trust, avoiding the profane and idle babblings and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge; by professing it some have strayed concerning the faith. Grace be with you. Amen."
(1 Timothy 6:20-21 NKJV)

"Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ."
(Colossians 2:8 NKJV)

"Shall I not punish them for these things?' says the LORD. 'Shall I not avenge Myself on such a nation as this?' "An astonishing and horrible thing Has been committed in the land: The prophets prophesy falsely, And the priests rule by their own power; And My people love to have it so. But what will you do in the end?"
(Jeremiah 5:29-31)

And finally,

"I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. Yet I certainly did not mean with the sexually immoral people of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I have written to you not to keep company with anyone named a brother, who is sexually immoral, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; not even to eat with such a person. For what have I to do with judging those also who are outside? Do you not judge those who are inside? But those who are outside God judges. Therefore "put away from yourselves the evil person." 
(1 Corinthians 5:9-13)

We do not judge the world, that is God's job, but we are called to discern the behavior of those who claim to be Christians -those "named a brother."  When we see someone who drops the name of Christ and who claims to be redeemed but is living in sin we must not sit idly by and be quiet and we certainly can't lift that person up as an example!  They are saying that God was wrong when He told us something, that what He called evil is really good.  How then are they different from Satan when he asked "did God really say?"  We must call out their sin for what it is, sin!  If we fail to do this then we corrupt our own body and confuse the message sent to the world.

Love won when Jesus was brutally killed on the crude cross outside Jerusalem.  Love won when the Son of God was whipped to shreds, when He was spat upon, when He was hung up like a criminal and slowly suffocated on public display.  Love won when God the Father poured out His wrath upon His perfect sinless Son so that we could be free of the sin that is destroying reality!  I for one cannot stand by and watch people trivialize His sacrifice for the sake of good feelings, getting along, and a false peace that only ushers millions to their eternal damnation!

Lately I've been feeling tired.  I'm too tired to sit on the stands, too tired of world that hates the God who loves them, too tired of a church too self-serving and pathetic to stand up for truth, too tired of intellectual holier-than-thous who think they know better than centuries of Godly men and even God Himself.  I'm too tired now to be quiet.

Love doesn't win when we refuse to point out sin.  So they might hate you, so you may look foolish; so they call you a bigot, closed minded, homophobic, regressive.  So what?  Love doesn't win when are so selfish that we can't love someone by showing them how to have life everlasting.  Love fails when we use it an excuse to be quiet.  It fails when we use it to justify a life more comfortable than true.  I want love to win, but only real love -the love of God- stands a chance.

"I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom: Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables. But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry."
(2 Timothy 4:1-5 NKJV)