Month: July 2017

JESUS, COLBERT & SAME-SEX MARRIAGE

You’ve probably seen the meme with Stephen Colbert, host of The Late Show on NBC, holding a Bible next to a picture of Jesus saying, “I would like to read to you what Jesus said about homosexuality … I’d like to, but he never said anything about it.”

Colbert ran this gag in 2012 and the debate has moved on since then with most people assuming he was correct. But a young mom passed it along to me this week, asking for clarification and, assuming she represents a larger group, I’m sharing my response with you for your edification.

At first glance Colbert would seem to be correct. Enter the word “homosexual” into your e-Bible concordance, limit the search to the four gospels and you won’t find Jesus using the word.

It is true that, unlike the Apostle Paul, the Lord never used the word homosexual, but he did address the issue of human sexuality and his teaching does more than affirm the traditional view, it is its foundation.

First, Jesus, who never traveled outside of Palestine, was a Jewish rabbi speaking to a first century Jewish audience. Paul, on the other hand, was a Jewish missionary to a predominantly Greek and Roman audience. In Jesus’s culture homosexuality was probably present, but not out in the open, ditto pedophilia which he also never mentions. Homosexuality and pedophilia were notoriously common among the Greco-Romans Paul was teaching, which explains his emphasis on the subject.

Jesus did, however, refer to homosexuality in a different context. When he taught, in Matthew 15:18-19, of the heart as the source of sins he used the broadest term possible — the Greek word is porneia — to describe sexual sin. Porneia is not limited to one particular sexual sin, like adultery, but includes the whole sweep of sexual sin. Any sexual activity outside of the marriage of a man and a woman was considered porneia, including homosexuality.

Second, Jesus affirmed that marriage is between male and female. In Matthew 19:4-6 Jesus explained what marriage is by going back to the original design of God in Genesis 1:27, 2:23 and 24. The union between male and female is the order of creation, God’s design for men and women. This is the foundation of everything Jesus taught about human sexuality. Same-sex marriage is a direct contradiction of his teaching on sex in general, and marriage in particular.

Third, Jesus condemned homosexual practice in his condemnation of Sodom and Gomorrah. In Matthew 10:15 Jesus explained to his disciples that in the judgment to come the towns that refused their message would suffer a greater judgment than Sodom and Gomorrah. Again in Matthew 11 Jesus denounced Capernaum telling the people, “It will be more tolerable for Sodom on the day of judgment than for you.” Some say that Sodom was only judged for its brutality to strangers but you have to ignore the clear meaning of multiple Old and New Testament texts to arrive at that conclusion. Sodom and Gomorrah are bywords throughout the Bible for sexual perversion, especially homosexuality. Jesus, though he had many opportunities to do so, did not upend the teaching on Sodom and Gomorrah in the Old Testament. He affirmed it and quoted from it.

When we dig a little deeper we find, as with most things surrounding homosexuality and same-sex marriage, that the truth is more profound than a five second night show gag.

NEXT – GEN CULTURAL NAVIGATION: Stonestreet & Kunkel’s Practical Guide

NEXT – GEN CULTURAL NAVIGATION: Stonestreet & Kunkel’s Practical Guide

News broke this week that noted evangelical leader Eugene Peterson, famed for The Message paraphrase of the Bible and many other works of spiritual theology, had come out in support of same-sex marriage. Then he backtracked but, as they say, the toothpaste was out of the tube and believers all over the country were flummoxed.

Can anyone be depended on to steer a true spiritual course through our tumultuous cultural waters? And how can we equip ourselves to stand with grace and truth when so many, it seems, are falling?

Many books are available to equip believers to think with the Biblical worldview. Among them are Chuck Colson’s master work HOW NOW SHALL WE LIVE? co-written with Nancy Pearcy; THE GOOD LIFE, also by Colson and a little more accessible; Pearcy’s solo effort, TOTAL TRUTH; Abdu H. Murray’s GRAND CENTRAL QUESTION; Russell Moore’s ONWARD: Engaging the Culture Without Losing the Gospel; the works of Ravi Zacharias and Os Guinness for those of a more intellectual bent, and of course the Breakpoint daily podcast.

All of those are helpful but none of them, save the Breakpoint daily, are as easy to digest and practical to use as A PRACTICAL GUIDE TO CULTURE: Helping the Next Generation Navigate Today’s World, by John Stonestreet and Brett Kunkel. The book is targeted at parents and Christian leaders who are tasked with equipping teens to face the pressures of our cultural moment, but it is useful to wider audience.

Stonestreet is the president of the Colson Center for Christian Worldview and well-known, with Eric Metaxas, for the daily Breakpoint podcast (www.breakpoint.org). Brett Kunkel, who has over twenty-five years working with junior high, high school, and college students, is the student impact director at Stand to Reason, and founder of a new organization called Maven (www.maventruth.com).

Their book is broken into four sections: Why Culture Matters; A Read of the Cultural Waters; Pounding Cultural Waves; Christian Worldview Essentials. All four are clear, concise, and easy to navigate. Each chapter concludes with four discussion questions. But for those who are secure in their worldview essentials yet still need practical tools for the day-to-day cultural situations being thrust upon us, section three, Pounding Cultural Waves, is worth the price of the book.

In it, Stonestreet and Kunkel take on eight hot-button issues every believer faces in all manner of environments including the hookup culture, sexual orientation, gender identity, addiction, entertainment, and racial tension. Each topic is further broken down into four sections that, in turn, reveal the false cultural narrative about the topic, restate the biblical view of it, suggest practical action steps, and forecast hope.

Christian high school and college students, professionals, educators, business leaders, government officials, and all manner of other believers stemming the tide of this cultural moment have reason to feel somewhat like Elijah of old, when the corrupt culture of Ahab and Jezebel held sway. When the knees of trusted leaders seem to buckle in the surf resources like this remind us that God has far more than seven thousand who have not bowed to the pressure.

I encourage you to read it, study it together with your kids and friends, and strengthen your knees.

 

BEARTOOTH PASS And the Glory of God

BEARTOOTH PASS And the Glory of God

“Every time you ride the pass you have to have a plan A, plan B, and plan C, and be ready to execute either one of them at any moment,” said my new friend and guide, Associate Pastor Rob Griggs of Word of Life church in Billings, Montana.

I soon had reason to appreciate his humility and respect for nature.

Rob grew up riding the Beartooth Highway, sixty-nine miles of winding road, stunning views and terrifying terrain that tops out at 10,947 feet between touristy Red Lodge, Montana, and the Northeast entrance to Yellowstone Park. It opens Memorial Day weekend, or as soon as they can get the snow off, and can close any day of the year for weather.

Rob’s words became prophetic as we rode out of the sunlit lowlands and into the pass. The sky grew dark and menacing, wind buffeted, rain threatened and the treeless, rock-strewn landscape felt more and more forbidding. Miss your footing or worse, overcook a turn on that road, and you are in for a thousand foot plunge on rock-strewn slopes.

But it was more than that. The power and proximity of the weather, thousands of feet up into the atmosphere and exposed as we were with no trees or buildings for shelter, the barren, austere peaks and fields of granite took on spiritual significance. Psalm 104:3 kept playing in the back of my mind:

He makes the clouds his chariot

and rides on the wings of the wind.

4        He makes winds his messengers,

flames of fire his servants. [1]

“I’m for plan B!” I said as we took a photo break near the summit. I was wearing summer riding gear: mesh jacket and fingerless gloves, and was already cold. The churning mass of dark cloud and rain pounding the peaks a half mile to our west made it clear we were also about to be wet.

He grinned and said, “I agree! Here, you might want these on the way down,” and handed me a spare pair of gloves. We beat a hasty retreat to some welcome shelter and hot food back in Red Lodge.

Fast forward a few days and the pass was a completely different experience as our family drove in a borrowed Suburban from the Cody, Wyoming side, up the Chief Joseph Highway, and northeast into Montana along the Beartooth. Bright blue skies, puffy white clouds, and gentle breezes brought out all the majesty and beauty of the peaks. The big SUV made the road less intimidating, the chill air less penetrating. Yet still, these mountains have a presence, a personality, a power that will not be taken for granted, that demands respect and not a little humility from the people that play on their slopes. “Enjoy me,” they seem to say, “But do not take me for granted.”

Beartooth Pass teaches me spiritual lessons. It makes me think about the maker of heaven and earth, who rides upon the wings of the wind. It reminds me to enjoy him, but not take him for granted. And it makes me want to take my friends to see him in all his terror, glory, majesty and beauty.

[1] The Holy Bible: New International Version. 1984 (Ps 104:3–4). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.