ARE HOMOSEXUALS OKAY WITH GOD NOW?

The face of the Latin American pastor is one I’ll never forget. It was as if he felt hoodwinked and then panicked to think he might have to explain something to God.

We were discussing the recent acceptance of homosexuals in the congregations and hierarchy of some US-based protestant denominations. Several churches that sent short-term mission teams to work alongside this pastor and his mission church were under the auspices of those denominations.

He made a comment about how he hopes the visiting churches know about his country’s laws and the evangelical position on homosexuality. He said it with a smile like he wasn’t serious.

But when I mentioned he already hosted at least a couple of openly gay men in recent years, the conversation ground to a halt. He appeared shocked. I was afraid to tell him which teams dared bring homosexual workers with them.

That was a few years ago. Today, even this ultra-conservative, evangelical preacher seems open to all comers. He’s not exactly preaching LGBTQ rights to the masses, but he’s not bothered by the sexual orientation or habits of any of his missionary visitors, either.

My own New Jersey-based church allows same-sex marriage ceremonies, as well as gay and lesbian pastors. At first thought, I’m okay with that. My stance has always been to each his own, we’re all God’s children, and I have enough work getting me to Heaven to worry about what the rest of you are doing.

But I still like to find Biblical justification for changes in doctrine and practice.

I’ve always considered myself Christian. Even during the years when I called myself “an independent Christian” (commonly called a “None” today), I prayed and worried about being alright in His eyes.

But after my divorce, I truly found God and dove into the Bible. I joined a church and Bible study group. Eventually, I felt the call for an adult baptism and missionary work.

When I fell in love again and became certain I was meant to marry my current wife, I was more than a little vexed. The Bible seemed clear about not permitting a second marriage.

After much study and counseling, I was about 90-percent convinced that the second marriage in my circumstance would be okay. Graciously, God provided the final 10-percent validation which would require another long blog to explain.

When homosexuality seemed to come out of nowhere to move past acceptance and right into inclusion for several mainstream denominations, I asked people involved in the decisions how they justified the change biblically.

Nobody could give me an explanation beyond God telling us to love everyone. Now, that goes a long way for sure. When a pastor-friend of mine confided he wasn’t sure what to do about a group of homosexual men who wanted to join his small congregation, I told him truthfully that I can’t see God being happy about denying anybody the opportunity to hear the Word.

But the Word doesn’t change. When a gay couple joined our church, the pastor welcomed them with open arms but cautioned that they might occasionally hear some non-welcoming lines about their lifestyle in a sermon or education session.

So, I read a book and several internet articles looking for Biblical arguments to condone the homosexual lifestyle. I hoped to find gray areas and debatable lines like I found when I sought my answers about second marriages.

For example, there is an oft-cited verse in Malachi that reads, “I hate divorce says the Lord”. God didn’t say he hates divorce until the 1970s when new versions of the Bible changed the line. Prior to that, it said God hated “putting away”, translated from a word in the scrolls that means separation. Even in Old Testament times, putting away was different than divorce.

But I couldn’t find any “outs” about homosexuality. The arguments of LGBTQ advocates mostly fell flat for me. The only thing I agreed with was that Gomorrah didn’t single out homosexuality. But other things, like the theory that eunuchs were a euphemism for gay men, didn’t enlighten me.

Still, it is undeniable that something happened. Gay rights advanced rapidly, even in Bible-based churches. Hearts that were stone-cold against the non-straight community warmed, or at least compromised. (I’m not insinuating that there is not a long way to go, just there was notable and rapid progress for a while.)

This brought me to another realization of our faith. God is in control. If we believe that, why can’t we trust there is a reason our LGBTQ neighbors saw chains broken and doors opened?

God clearly says homosexuality is bad in my bible. But he also says war and killing are bad. Yet, God used war and plagues to punish entire nations of sinners. He even used the evil Babylonian Empire to enforce his wishes.

For quite a while, war was almost a sport. The practice of killing all the enemy men and bringing all the women and children home in captivity eventually led to an overwhelming imbalance in the number of women compared to men.

To fix that situation, God allowed another biblical-sin to become a common and accepted practice. Polygamy helped repopulate the earth and eventually restored the balance between sexes. Some of the Bible’s biggest heroes had multiple wives.

Eventually, many women found themselves ignored along with other less-favored wives. They were neglected and often “put away” while their husbands gave favor to younger or newer spouses. Solomon was wise, but I find it hard to believe he knew how to keep 600 wives and hundreds more concubines happy.

God told Moses to allow divorce in response to the cries of those put-away wives. The purpose of divorce was to allow women to remarry without fear of being put to death, which was the penalty for cheating on one’s husband.

Could it be that God decided now is a good time to promote homosexual relationships? What could that do for mankind?

The most obvious difference between heterosexual and homosexual couples is, of course, procreation. Could God be telling us it’s time to slow population growth? Is God putting forth an anti-global warming plan?

Many of the same-sex couples I know are very interested in adoption. Did God answer the cries of millions of orphaned children by letting gay and lesbian couples enjoy the same marriage rights as others?

Who really knows? No one but God. Not you. Not me.

Our faith tells us that Christians can rely on Jesus eventually coming back to judge us. We trust our faith will prompt Jesus to save us and bring us to the new Jerusalem.

But none of us has any clue as to what God’s plans are for us while we wait. The most common word in our language seems to be “why”. We don’t understand the plan. We never will.

So how can anyone be so sure advancing LGBTQ rights isn’t part of God’s grand scheme? How can we think the faith of a gay man or transsexual person won’t save them, yet be so sure it will save our imperfect selves?

Maybe the lifestyle makes some us uncomfortable, but it shouldn’t make us any more uncomfortable than a world full of war, poverty, intolerance, and cruelty.

We are all God’s children and He has a plan for us. It’s probably best to go with it.