Isolation of Mainline Protestant Churches

ISOLATION OF THE US MAINLINE PROTESTANT CHURCHES

Two of the mainline Protestant churches recently had events that not only demonstrate their departure from the historic Christian faith, but will drive wedges into their own denominations both within the U.S. and more importantly outside the U.S.

The Episcopal church elected Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, bishop of the Diocese of Nevada. Ms. Schori is the first woman leader of the 2.3 million leader of the Episcopal church. It is reported that Ms. Schori has taken the position that homosexuality is not sin and that homosexuals were created by God to love people of the same gender. For that, she will be applauded by those who support the gay agenda.

The second was the recent decisions of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (PCUSA) meeting in Birmingham, Alabama. In the process of their meeting, they were able to vote down three proposals affirming marriage. In addition, they able to eradicate national ordaining standards thereby allowing gays and lesbians to be ordained depending on the choice of the local presbytery. Further, various PCUSA organizations have been promoting same sex unions.

It seems that the question of gays and lesbians, and whether homosexuality is a sin, has been and continues in some circles to be a burning issue. The Episcopalians have now concluded it is not a sin whereas the Presbyterians are allowing that decision to be made on a local option basis.

The issue is not whether God loves the homosexual. Instead the issue is whether homosexuality is considered a sin requiring repentance or is not a sin at all. The corollary proposition is whether a practicing and unrepentant homosexual should be ordained to the ministry. (After all, one need not repent from what is not wrong.)

Upfront I will confess my beliefs (or biases, if you prefer). I believe that homosexuality is a sin, just as pride is or anger is. And all of us are sinners. I believe that the word of God is clear on both items. In an effort to deal with the word of God, most proponents simply ignore it, or say that it is uninspired, or was culturally driven. In short you can’t believe that Scripture is mistaken about homosexuality and presumably not about anything else. Ethics becomes moral relativism and the final arbiter is either yourself or some type of majority agreed upon societal norms (unless those norms disagree with something else you believe). So homosexuality is OK for instance but war is wrong. In short there is an internal intellectual inconsistency.

Interestingly, one could also argue that despite what the Bible said about adultery, it was perfectly all right. After all King David should not have been punished for stealing another mans wife. Some men simply find women to be attractive including married ones. They might even form groups advocating adultery. And so they might also petition to be ordained into the ministry saying “I believe in adultery, I practice adultery, I advocate adultery.” Further they might proclaim that they really are nice people, they love others and should be ordained despite what they believe.

I presume based upon what I read that the Episcopalians would gladly ordain them and the Presbyterians would leave it up to the Presbytery.

Therefore I believe the issue is what do we consider to be sin. If we rewrite the Bible and maintain, for instance, that adultery and anger is not sin, we cast out the Scriptures and the Word of God (which seminaries have done for years).

One would wonder based upon all that is said by those promoting the views that homosexuality is not sin, that homosexuality was indeed a unique 20th century development.

Yet obviously, homosexuality is not unique to the 20th century. For instance one could look to the early Jewish story of Lot and his visitors that came to Sodom. To the liberal mind, the story could not be true. Accordingly, surely the story could not have happened. God would never destroy a people just because they were evil. And the story of the men of the city wanting to break down the doors of Lot’s house to have sex with his visitors is fictional. After all, they probably wanted to come in and have tea and read a few scrolls. And so we rewrite the Bible to make sure it says what we want it to say or we ignore it all together. We conclude that Sodom never existed and if it did it was destroyed by a natural catastrophe. Surely God would not have been involved.

And what about Paul and the early Christians. We throw out Acts 15:20 where Christian believers are instructed to “abstain from…sexual immorality.” We invite back the man that slept with his father's wife into the church without requiring repentance and in fact go so far to say that it is not really sin and the person is fit for ordination and to be a spiritual leader. That attitude says volumes about the state of the modern US church.

I remind you of the proposition that I am as big a sinner as any of the above. The difference is that I do not proclaim my sin as being “not a sin” nor do I destroy Scripture to justify my ways. Instead, I ask forgiveness and move on until I need forgiveness again, which seems to be daily more often than not.

Paul wrote from areas that were strongly homosexual. One can hardly postulate that Corinth, Ephesus, or Rome were homosexual free. Moreover we do not proclaim Jesus who did not marry or Paul who did not marry as being homosexual as some gay apologists have written in order to justify ourselves.

I have confessed that I am a sinner. I work with Christians and non-Christians who I respect and like and confess as friends. And the same goes for some that are homosexual. Again the issue is not whether we sin, but whether we will call it “sin” or not.

And yet, I can not throw out or twist Scripture for the comfort of myself nor of my friends regardless of their beliefs or sexual persuasions.

I do believe in the love of God for all of us. But at some point, at some time, we all must repent. We must submit ourselves to the word of God and let it deal with us as it will.

It seems like God reveals Himself (Pardon me, ladies) to those that are poor and humble. I believe God has something to say to Mainline Protestantism in the U.S. from our brothers and sisters in other countries. They are pleading with the U.S. church not to go down these paths that in the name of love and unity lead instead to apostasy and the abandonment of our historic faith. If we are unwilling to listen to the Word of God in Scripture, perhaps we would do well to listen to what they have to say.

And one last word for my friends and neighbors who are gay or lesbian. You are no bigger a sinner than I , and I believe that God does love us both.