Being non-judgemental
Submitted by Forgiven on October 29 2001 13:17:24
In reply to Since no one else brought this up......... submitted by Dakota on October 29 2001 01:36:44
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One of the more messy issues in the modern church is the total confusion over the challenging sin in other people's lives. The New Testament pattern appears to be - from Paul's comments in I Cor 5 and the parable of the wheat and tares that we should ignore the sin of the non believer, but challenge clearly that of people within the fellowship. (Though with great caution and with the intention of achieving their repentance.) It is therefore my argument that we should not rush in to question our friend's gay relationship at a time when he would identify himself as a seeker, rather than a member of the church. (Note that this assumes that we reject gay relationships as legitimate for Christians, which I do, but I really don't want to get into that argument again here!!) Rather we should look for him to engage fully with God, and let the Holy Spirit do His work of convincing of sin. To insist that he rejects the most important relationship in his life in effect as a condition of getting to 'seeker' status is to ask him to make an enormous jump in his life before he even begins to see the case for doing so; all that is likely to happen is that he ends up walking away from Jesus having been presented with a caricature by the church. Note that this doesn't mean that the issue shouldn't be dealt with eventually - but not 'up front'. Consider Jesus' approach to Zachaeus and his reputation as a friend of tax collectors and sinners; he goes to where they are, so that can have a real encounter with God; the hope is that they then come to true repentance. 'Taste and see that the Lord is good' The counter argument is that the relationship is so damaging to him that it must be ended at once. This I am not in a hurry to endorse this (though I suspect I'd come down on the other side though if he has a sexualised relationship with a YF....); to believe that a long term sexual relationship automatically puts a person beyond being able to respond to the gospel strikes me as being overly pessimistic about the ability of God to bring people to new birth. And that is the important thing; I want to be meeting our friend in heaven one day - anything else is almost irrelevant. |
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