A very full reply
Submitted by Forgiven on January 20 2002 06:38:11
In reply to Hardened BL hearts submitted by Jiggles on January 19 2002 17:10:44
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(which had the benefit of making me think what I really believe, which is always a good thing!!) One of the major challenges for the Christian faith is to proclaim the whole gospel in a way that is neither so repugnant to the listener that it is immediately rejected unheard, nor so partial that an essential truth is lost. So in the certain knowledge that I will probably use formulations that have been condemned at some point in the past, let's try and give a short summary of the doctrine of salvation and then try to application to the Gay and BL issue. The core presuppositions - and if you want to reject these, I'm not prepared to argue with you as a 'Christian' - they are so basic to Bible that you have abandoned anything that I would accept as the faith 'once for all delivered to the saints'. So if you don't agree with these, don't bother to respond to this post - it's not for you. 1) God is holy, and the presence of sinful creatures is in presence is impossible 2) As a result of Jesus' death on the cross, our sins can be no longer a problem that keeps us from the presence of God.(Note the careful phrasing here.....) 3) There is an afterlife where those who are in the presence of God will have an idyllic, joyful life for ever (to be referred to hereafter as heaven as a shorthand) Now there are a large number of ways of responding to these facts: 1) Universalism - all people everywhere will get to be in heaven whatever they do and however they live. This actually doesn't require a belief in the core presuppositions of course. I wish it were true, but it just doesn't reflect what the bible actually says. And it lets a lot of very evil people get away with their behaviour. 2) Punk Catholicism (i.e. a version of Catholicism that doesn't actually reflect what the church really teaches, but it sometimes looks like it). Baptism is the key - if you are splashed as a baby you will eventually get to heaven regardless of what you've done. 3) Mediaeval Catholicism - I'm not sure whether it is a fair statement, but it appears to be. Confession is the key; whatever you do, and intend to do as long as it is explicitly confessed to a priest you will get to heaven. Venial sins that aren't confessed will get you a period in purgatory. But woe betide you if you happen to have a mortal sin on your conscience when you die.... 4) Punk Calvinism - or 'once saved always saved'. As long as at some time you prayed the sinner's prayer, you'll make it to heaven however you live afterwards. This has the major attraction of keeping parents happy because little Johnny once said the words, though he's now out ..... 5) Legalistic fundamentalism - OK you've been saved by faith, but you've got to keep these rules or in fact you won't make it (rules such as don't go to the cinema, drink alcohol, join political parties). I would appear that the Amish community is an extreme example of this.... OK - so now the hard bit - where do I stand? This is where it gets VERY subtle - so please read VERY carefully before commenting... 1) We are wholly dependent on God's grace for getting to heaven. We will NOT get there without it. 2) We will be surprised by who gets to heaven, and who doesn't. I have no doubt that many from a non-Christian background who have realised their total dependence on God will be there, and many 'Christians' who slipped into thinking they were doing OK and didn't need God anymore will lose out 3) Coming to the point of accepting the need for God's grace in our lives is a work of the Holy Spirit who 'convicts the world of sin'. For any particular person there are certain sins they are not tempted by, there are some things that they don't regard as sinful though God does, and there are some things they do that they know are wrong. When I say they 'know' I mean God has revealed it to them - they know this is true in the core of their being. 4) Once 'converted' or 'born again' God continues to work on those areas in the person's life that don't conform to His standards. To the extent that the person works with God on these things, he is accepting God's grace; where he continues what he KNOWS to be wrong with the attitude 'I know it's wrong but I don't care', he is rejecting God's grace. Where he does it in the context of a struggle not to (and only the person knows whether he is really struggling or just pretending) then he is not rejecting God's grace. 5) It is the task of the church to preach the gospel and to encourage her members to move onwards with God. In doing this it is seeking to articulate and reinforce the message that God is seeking to give to the individual. Ideally the work of the church should be exactly that - to bring specific challenges to people exactly where they are; in practice the reality of church life today is that we are seldom close enough to one another to be able to do that. Given all this, there are two opposite mistakes that the church can make in its proclamation to the world: 1) Downplay the need for repentance - in effect preach a cheap grace that doesn't challenge at all. This is to say 'Peace, peace where there is no peace'. The holy spirit has bought conviction - now we must offer assurance that despite those sins the person is accepted. The extreme case of this is where in fact there is no work of conviction at all - the person joins / continues in the church because they are all such nice loving people, doing such excellent social work, my children would do so well at the church school.... 2) Set their own agenda of the sins that must be repented of. This will of course be whatever happens to be socially unfashionable at the time and ignore other items. In the 19th century the issue of drinking alcohol was a 'hot topic'; these days it's probably certain political issues. Having got this far, I think it becomes clear how I think the church has to deal with the 'Gay' issue (if we assume that gay sexual behaviour is always wrong but the orientation is not sinful per se). The church needs to be clear about its own standards - but not impose them an absolute barrier to membership of the church; if (when?) God challenges the individual on the issue and they are seeking to live as He guides, they will respond to that and come into conformity with the standards. Of course the leadership of the church must live the lifestyle required by the standards. Now we have to work out how to present this package to the various communities that we seek to move amongst. That's HARD, especially given the enormous damage done by other 'Christians' who have used the gay issue to make themselves feel virtuous ('I thank you God that we are not like them....') Of course the reality is that we need to be getting close enough to any given individual that they are able to hear what GOD is saying to them through what we say. One of the problems is that where an individual has heard God's call and is reacting against it, they are likely to be very sensitive about the fact that they are 'under conviction' and react with a lot of anger whenever the fringe of the topic that God is getting at them about is raised. (Remind you of anyone?!) Yet we must ensure that over time the whole package is presented - 'Faith comes by hearing'. And in that context the fact that we believe that Gay relationships are inconsistent with God's call needs to be mentioned - but if it is not the issue that God is bringing conviction on then it should not be laboured. To summarise - it is our job to faithfully proclaim the whole of God's message in a way that enables people to respond to what God is saying to them. To the extent that our own agenda gets in the way, we are obstructing God - but to the extent we faithfully bring that message and reinforce it by what we say and how we live(!), we are doing 'evangelism' and obeying Jesus' words to 'Go and make disciples of all nations'. 'There is much rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents' - and to know, for the rest of eternity, that you have bought another to share in heaven makes the whole effort worthwhile. |
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