What Is the Matter With Homosexuality

Transcript

GRM 1140
07/05/2015
What Is the Matter with Homosexuality?
Selected Verses
Gil Rugh

If you were here last week, you know that we were talking about the subject of homosexuality and we're going to continue that discussion today in light of the fact that it does pertain to much of what is going on that impacts our country and impacts us as believers.

We're not surprised the world functions in rebellion against God. We just have to be careful that we as God's people are clear and firm on our own understanding and appreciation of the Word of God. The concern I have is the church gets caught up in what the world is doing and we begin to move the same direction that the world moves. In past studies I have shared with you articles and this is an article that is over twenty years old. I pulled it out of my file as an example of how things continue to grow. Twenty years ago this article appeared in a magazine, Homosexuality Debate Strains Campus Harmony. Homosexuals at Christian colleges press for acceptance. Again, this is over twenty years ago. Homosexuals at Christian colleges press for acceptance, in Christian colleges, acceptance as Christians. One college, Calvin College, Grand Rapids, a bitter debate lasting several weeks because someone who was opposed to homosexuality was invited to speak. Gordon College in Boston, Massachusetts; Wheaton College in Illinois; Christian and Missionary Alliance Nyack College in New York. Just examples of pressure being applied to schools and what they note here. Whatever strategy they choose, few evangelicals seem open to considering the position of some people that homosexuality is an immutable sexual orientation, that homosexuals should aspire to marriage-like commitments and that homosexuals should be affirmed in their same-sex behavior. Most of the schools involved in the recent controversy either officially make or are considering the distinction between homosexual orientation and homosexual conduct. And you start trying to discuss this, a homosexual orientation versus homosexual conduct, and there is differing conduct and what desires you would like to have in your mind, to be sure.

A more recent article that I shared with you in the past as well, and this is not true of just one school, but Wheaton has now an alumni group for homosexuals. And they are not just trying to be there under the radar. At the football game, it was noted in this article, they would be wearing t-shirts emblazoned with LGBT—lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual—the rainbow on it. They want to stand out, they want to be accepted. Wheaton and other schools do have positions on this but the position begins to soften. The pressure is on, it will only grow now that homosexual marriage has been declared a right and will be viewed as other things that have been resolved on a court level.

I'd like to say before we go any further, we want to make clear our feelings are not a reliable guide to what is acceptable conduct. For the world they have no objective standard. They look and see what the opinion poll is, how many people seem in favor, do these people seem intensely sincere. I mean, our Supreme Court, upon what basis do they have to make a decision? These people love one another, they have strong feelings for one another; therefore, the law should justify their feelings. I listened to one report of three people who turned up at a court where they went to get a marriage license. They said, we can't give three of you a marriage license to marry each other. Why? We've been together for quite some time and we love each other. The article was noting the quandary that that created.

I want to look at two passages on our feelings before we move into the subject. Come to Psalm 51, the psalmist writes, verse 5, “Behold I was brought forth in iniquity and in sin my mother conceived me.” Not saying conception was sin, saying he has been a sinner since conception. I was brought forth in iniquity, he was conceived in iniquity. That's dealing with the sin that Adam brought upon the human race. This tells us something, from birth sin is present. Now this is in the context that David has recognized the graciousness of God, His lovingkindness, His compassion to blot his transgression. But David has been a sinner from birth.

Turn over to Psalm 58:3, “The wicked are estranged from the womb. Those who speak lies go astray from birth.” Now he is not saying that there are two kinds of people, people who are sinners and wicked from birth and people who are not. All are in this condition because all have sinned and there is none righteous. The psalmist is indicating our condition from birth.

We are looking at this because just because people say I have feelings or attractions or desires does not mean those feelings or desires are acceptable. Understand we have been corrupted by sin and so desires comes. People have all kinds of desires and not all people's attraction to sins are the same sins. We can be thankful for that. Some people get drawn to certain sins and become involved in them and consumed with them. We have blurred it because we don't have sins anymore, we just have addictions. You know you have a gambling addiction. Why some people go, not saying it is right or wrong, but they'll bet $10 and go home and be fine. Some people aren't happy until they have lost their house and their job and embezzled money and everything. Why did you do that? There are people who have kleptomania, they steal; they steal sometimes things they don't need and aren't even worth hardly anything. Why would they do that? We are born with a bent toward sin, and as we grow up those sinful desires express themselves and manifest themselves. So we don't want to argue. People say, are you born a sinner? Are you born a homosexual? Are you . . . Well, you are born a sinner and your sinful desires may take you one direction, another person's sinful desires may take them another. And sin has the characteristic of enslaving. So we find a sin we really enjoy, we find ourselves more attracted to it, more drawn to it and soon we can be enslaved to it. Sin by its very nature as sin is enslaving. The Scripture is clear to that. Jesus said, “he who sins is a slave of sin,” we've looked at that. Romans 6 also makes it clear.

So we want to be careful we don't get drawn into this. Well, I've had these desires since I was little. I don't doubt that. That doesn't make them right. I read an article where they were saying that men by nature are not monogamous. Well, I don't doubt that, either. You just have to understand it's a sin nature. So we want to be careful we don't get drawn in. We get to thinking we feel badly, these people seem nice people, they seem caring. Their desires just take them this way. We want to be careful. That's why the only objective authority is what God has said. We want to be careful we don't move because the church gets moved by a desire to fit into the world. We don't want the world to look at us as narrow, negative, intolerant, unloving. I can't have the world look at me any other way without compromising the truth of the Word of God. The way to life is narrow, the gate is narrow, the way is narrow, Jesus said. Yes, we are narrow. Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life, no man comes to the Father but by Me.” That's narrow. I can't change that. And no one is going to heaven who does not place his faith in Christ. That's narrow. It's unacceptable in the world. You are intolerant. Well, I live with people who disagree, but for the church and its position it has to be firm and clear.

We have looked into the Word of God. The beginning point is Genesis 1, creation, Genesis 2. There God's plan is established. Churches, evangelical churches, gave up Genesis because science says that you can't have a literal creation like Genesis 1 and 2. God says this is how He did it. Now evangelicals got in trouble in our evangelical schools, and some of the professors at these schools like Wheaton have written books, scathing books attacking those who would take a literal interpretation of creation in Genesis. Well, they've opened the door. If Genesis is not literal, what is your foundation for marking out the distinction between male and female? The world has been on a crusade to blur those distinctions. Our country in everything they do, they want to break down any distinction between male and female.

I watched the news a little bit this morning. I like to see if something has erupted in the world while I was sleeping. Didn't wake me up but I like to find out about it. And they were talking about this problem they had in a prison where we had two prison escapees, and they were talking about female guards and most of the guards there were female, they said. And they can't understand how there was sexual involvement between the men in the prison and the guards. And they were interviewing a person, and we're going to be doing more studies. Well, I remember when I was a kid, my dad told me how that worked and warned me. We put men and women together in the military and every place, and I can't understand what they did. Do you know why? They don't want to acknowledge there are real basic differences between male and female. And we're going to fight against that no matter what we have to do because we will not recognize those distinctions. And the church gets involved in it and says we don't want to be anti-women, we don't want to be viewed as the church against women and so of course we break down. There is spiritual equality but we were created differently from the beginning. Once we give up these things we don't realize we've given up the war. We think, now we've adjusted, we'll fit more. We don't fit anymore, you can never give up enough.

So we start in Genesis, God created man as male and female. Then Genesis 2 said how He did it, He created the man, then He created the woman. He created the woman to be the counterpart of the man, fitted to the man. We looked at Matthew 19 when Jesus was asked about marriage. What did He say? Have you not read the Scriptures? He who made them in the beginning created them male and female, then He joined them in marriage. What God has joined together, let no man separate. Just took it just at face value, a literal interpretation of Genesis 2. And I should say He was just buying into the lack of knowledge of His day?

Turn over to 1 Corinthians 11. Here Paul under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit is writing about men and women. It was a problem back in the church at Corinth. He'll come in talking about the order established in the church. Verse 3, “I want you to understand Christ is the Head of every man, man is the head of a woman, God is the head of Christ.” Then he's talking about head coverings and down in verse 8, “For man does not originate from woman, but woman from man. For indeed man was not created for woman's sake, but woman for the man's sake.” That's because of a literal interpretation of Genesis 2. How does it get by in the evangelical world, you can just wash that out and say it was never meant to be taken literally. You understand you are undermining the teaching of the New Testament that is based on the clear revelation of the Old Testament.

Come over to 1 Timothy, Paul's letters to Timothy, 1 Timothy 2:12, “I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man but to remain quiet.” Now note, verse 13, “For it was Adam who was first created, then Eve. And it was not Adam who was deceived, but the woman being deceived fell into transgression.” Where does this come from? Genesis 2 and Genesis 3. The masterstroke of the devil was to get evangelical, Bible-believing Christians to accept the fact that science has indicated Genesis 1-3 should not be taken literally, when the New Testament consistently takes them at face value.

So once you destroy the foundations, what do you have to go on? They are floating out here, waiting for science to tell us what is next. And they tell us you are born homosexual, or you are born (fill in the blank). It is not sin, it's just the way you are born. Where will this stop?

Let me take a sideline here. I clipped this article, A Desire to Remove the Stigma for Pedophilia. A group of psychiatrists and other mental health professionals say it is time to change the way society views individuals who have a physical attraction to children. We don't even like to talk about this publicly but what do they say, this group? Stigmatizing and stereotyping minor-attracted people inflames the fears of minor-attracted people, mental health professionals and the public without contributing to an understanding of minor-attracted people or the issue of child sexual abuse. They had a meeting, it included professors, psychiatrists from Harvard University, John Hopkins University, the University of Illinois, and the University of Louisville. The speakers in attendance concluded that minor-attracted individuals are largely misunderstood and should not be criminalized, even as their actions should be discouraged.

So what they want to do is they want to change the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders, or for abbreviation, DSM. Now the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders is put together by the American Psychiatric Association, it's the guidelines on mental health. It started back many years ago when they removed homosexuality from being classified as mentally deviant. Now you see where we are going. Now we have to declassify this. Where does it go? I've shared with you a Harvard graduate psychiatrist being sentenced to prison, he said, why can't you people accept that I was born this way? Going to prison for underage sexual activity. I was born this way. Where does it stop?

So we come to Scripture for our authority. Come back to Genesis 19, you know we have to go to Genesis 19. The opening chapters of Genesis established the pattern, God created man as male and female. In Genesis 3 man as male and female rebelled, the woman taking the initiative in that rebellion. Sin came into the picture. That sin would be passed on to all of their descendants. That's what David said in Psalm 51—“I was conceived in sin.” The point being not that conception is sin, but sin is present from conception, which tells you something about when life begins—at conception. With the corruption of sin then you have man rebelling against God.

In Genesis 19 you have the account of Sodom and Gomorrah. It's an unpleasant thing to have to look at, but it's reality. The account, Abraham who lived about 2000 B.C. and his nephew Lot lived in the same land. And Lot and Abraham separate, Lot moves to the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah and they are sinful cities. So in Genesis 19 two angels come to Sodom because God in His mercy and grace is going to deliver Lot and his family before He destroys Sodom and Gomorrah. And they come to the city and they didn't have hotels and motels. So what you did, you came to a city on your travels, you went to the city square and you waited there. Like in many of our small communities, sometimes when Marilyn and I have been out and we stopped in a small community for lunch. You go into the restaurant there, everybody knows you are an outsider. It's because they just know everybody in the community. Well, that's the way here. You have this city center, they see the person sitting here, they must be travelers. And Mideast hospitality of the time, you invite them to your home for the night and hospitality required then that you provide for them and they are under your protection. The absolutely worst thing is that someone you have taken into your home as your guest should suffer harm.

So that's the setting. The angels come to Sodom, they are sitting there at the gate which would be the city square in other cases, and Lot sees them. In verse 2 he says, “Now behold my lords, turn aside into your servant's house. Spend the night, wash your feet, then you can be on your way in the morning.” They said, no, we'll stay here. Now these angels, obviously, have come for Lot but they are carrying this out. “He urged them strongly, they turned aside. He prepared a feast for them, baked unleavened bread, they ate. Before they sat down,” verse 4, “the men of the city, the men of Sodom, surrounded the house, both young and old, all the people from every quarter.” The whole city is taken up in this. “And they said, bring them out that we may have relations with them.” Wicked city. We know they are talking about immoral conduct here, sexual conduct, because Lot offers them, verse 8, “I have two daughters or virgins, I'll give them to you.” Such an action is such that we just have a hard time even identifying who would do that. But it tells you the depth of the importance they held on their responsibility for a guest that came into their house. You would sacrifice your own family for the protection of that guest.

Verse 9, “They said, stand aside. Furthermore they said, this one came in as an alien and already he is acting like a judge.” You know what people always want to say, you want to act like our judge, you are judgmental. That's what the people of Sodom said. You are implying that our conduct is wrong, you are saying we are doing something wicked. “He said,” verse 7, “please, my brothers, do not act wickedly.” Who are you to tell me this is wicked? You are not my judge, in fact you are a newcomer to the city and you think you can judge us. Some things don't change at all.

It's the wickedness that is bringing the judgment. Back in Genesis 18 God had told Abraham that He was going to go and destroy the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. In Genesis 18:20, “The Lord said, the outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is indeed great, their sin is exceedingly grave.” We talk about people and cities and countries ripening for judgment, Sodom and Gomorrah are ripe for judgment. Over in Genesis 19:13, the angels tell Lot, you have to leave the city “for we are about to destroy this place because their outcry has become so great before the Lord that the Lord has sent us to destroy it.” We have a statement that gets bantered around—justice delayed is justice denied. Biblically that's not true. Justice delayed is never justice denied before God. It seems like there is nothing happening, that's because it is not God's time yet. For Sodom and Gomorrah it is time. People say that's an Old Testament story, it has nothing to do with today. For us as believers it has everything to do with today.

Come back to the New Testament, 2 Peter. We've been studying 1 Peter, come to 2 Peter 2. Here he is talking about wicked people, sinful people. Verse 1 is talking about false prophets and false teachers being among you, believers, “introducing destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them. They will bring swift destruction upon themselves, they will cause the way of the truth to be maligned,” because of their corruption, “in their greed they will exploit you.” Then he gives examples of God's judging sinful people or sinful beings—the angels, the flood of Noah. Then verse 6, “If He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes,” now note, “having made them an example to those who would live ungodly lives thereafter.” The judgment on Sodom and Gomorrah was recorded and serves as an example of the judgment God will bring on the ungodly. It's a judgment that will take place in time in history, but the ultimate judgment will take place at the Great White Throne in Revelation 20 when the wicked are sentenced to hell. But all the previous judgments are a reminder, you don't escape the consequences of sin. Do not be deceived, God is not mocked. Whatsoever a man sows he shall reap. So a reminder, Sodom and Gomorrah is recorded there. It's not just a story and people can treat it however they want and discard it, it is an ongoing testimony to the fact, down to those to our day who have lived since then, God will judge the wicked. Some of that judgment comes in this life, the ultimate judgment of that will come at the Great White Throne.

Jude 7 says basically the same thing.

Come back to Leviticus 18. Now I am aware we are in the Old Testament, we are under the Law. We do not live under the Mosaic Law but what is recorded in the Mosaic Law is for our benefit. We learn from it. Certain things in the Law had application only to that time, certain things in the Law are ongoing principles and truths. We'll see that as some of these things are recorded in the New Testament as well.

In Leviticus 18:22, “You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female. It is an abomination.” Then in all these lists of sins he says in verse 24, “Do not defile yourself by any of these things for by all these the nations which I am casting out before you have become defiled. The land has become defiled, therefore, I have brought its punishment upon it. The land has spewed out its inhabitants.” God sent Israel in and said don't spare a man, woman or child. It's the ‘day of judgment.’ Remember when He talked to Abraham in Genesis 15 He said you can't go into the land of Canaan for 400 years because the Canaanites are not yet ripe for judgment. Now they are ripe. God is warning His people, don't you adopt their practices, don't forget it's that sinful rebellion against Me that has brought My judgment upon this land. I viewed the people in the land as defiled and they are to be removed. Why? Look down at verse 30, “Thus you are to keep My charge, do not practice anything abominable because it has been practiced before you. You are not to defile yourself. I am the Lord your God.” That's the point, you belong to Me. Back in Leviticus 18:5, “You shall keep My statues, My judgments by which a man may live if he does them. I am the Lord.” By virtue of the fact that you belong to Me, these kinds of things are out of bounds, if you will, something not to be practiced by you.

Turn over to Leviticus 20:13, “If there is a man who lies with a male as those who lie with a woman, both of them have committed a detestable act. They shall surely be put to death.” Why? Back in verse 7, “You shall consecrate yourselves, therefore, and be holy for I am holy. You shall keep My statutes and practice them. I am the Lord who sanctifies you.” Down in verse 26, “You are to be holy to Me for I the Lord am holy. I have set you apart from the peoples to be Mine.” Rereading a book this past week and he's talking about the history of the decline of evangelicalism during the '40s, '50s, '60s when evangelicals began to make compromises so they might be more acceptable among non-evangelicals, liberals. Not viewed so narrow, judgmental, separatist. Interesting, when people die their letters become available and even some of the liberals wrote in their letters that have come to light after their death, how amazed they were that the evangelicals would make such compromises. They compromised nothing but said they would accept the evangelicals as the evangelicals compromised and toned down their convictions. And they were happy to do it. Any time the church loses its focus of pleasing God and desires to be accepted in the world, they begin to make compromises that leads us away from God's truth.

Come over to Judges 19. You can remember these two chapters—Genesis 19 is Sodom and Gomorrah, Judges 19 is Sodom and Gomorrah in Israel. Here you have a similar account. These are not angels in Judges 19, you have a Levite, one of the tribes of Israel, who is traveling. We'll just pick up the story, you can read the full account. He has his concubine, he has been at his father-in-law's house, the father of his concubine. So he is traveling back to his home in Bethlehem with his servant and his concubine. And it gets late at night, the day is going, and they are near the city of Jerusalem, but it is still under the control of the Jebusites. So it's still a non-Jewish city. His servant says let's turn in here for the night. No, we have to go on to an Israelite city. So they go on to the city of Gibeah which belonged to the tribe of Benjamin. And they end up doing the same thing we saw in Sodom and Gomorrah as far as staying the night. Verse 15, we're told at the end of verse 14, “Gibeah belongs to Benjamin. They turned aside there in order to enter and lodge in Gibeah. They enter, they sat down at the open square of the city, no one took them into his house to spend the night. An old man was coming in from the field from his work, in the evening.” Verse 17, “He lifted up his eyes, saw the travelers in the square of the city. The old man said, where are you going? Where did you come from? We are passing from Bethlehem in Judah to a remote part of the hill country and now we are going back to Bethlehem.” I'm going to my house. “No man will take us into his house.” The man says I have enough food, straw and fodder for my animals and food for my concubine and my servant so we won't be any trouble if we have a place to stay. The old man says no, you must come and stay at my house and let me make provision for you. Again, this is part of honor. We hear about honor killings in Mid-eastern families, and some of that tradition, honor continues. Some of that has been expressed where people say we can't give you these people who are with the enemy because they have come under the protection of our home. Some of that remnant continues.

So he brings them into his house, takes care of them. Verse 22, “While they were celebrating, behold the men of the city, certain worthless fellows, surrounded the house, pounding the door. They spoke to the owner of the house, the old man, saying, bring out the men who came into your house that we may have relations with them.” If you just read that verse you would say that's the account of Sodom, isn't it? This is a Jewish city in the land of Canaan that God has given to His people. Remember what we read in Leviticus? Don't you begin to adopt the practices of those people, don't you begin to do what they do. Now here you have a city, same thing going on. And this old man makes the same offer—I will give you my virgin daughter to protect this man. Ends up the man gives them his concubine and they sexually abuse the concubine and when he comes to the door in the morning, she is at the doorway, dead. He takes her home, cuts her body into twelve pieces, send it to the twelve tribes of Israel. They are appalled, they want to know what all this means.

So he tells them. Judges 20:6, “They have committed a lewd and disgraceful act in Israel.” Now it's amazing, you would think that the people of Benjamin would say, that's disgusting, these men have to be punished. Do you know what? When they ask for those men who did that to be turned over for just punishment, the tribe of Benjamin says, no. They are so committed to it, they go to war, 25,000 soldiers from the tribe of Benjamin. Do you know how committed they are? They are going to take on the 400,000-soldier army that the other eleven tribes come with. You just say, are you out of your mind? You see how committed they are to their sin? And not only that they were involved in being part of the group that practiced it, but they will defend to the death these men who practiced that sin. Nothing is new in the world. The tragedy of all this, these are the people who are supposed to be holy for God is holy.

You know the end result of this story. There are 26,000 Benjaminites, men of age who go to war, and 25,100 will die. The tribe is almost annihilated, a few hundred men left. In fact the other tribes have to come up with a plan to keep the tribe of Benjamin from disappearing. You see when it comes to sin there is no rationale. And see how here it is Israel is in the land God has promised them, taken it from the people who lived there because of their sin and now here you are with a Jewish city totally involved in it. And 25,000 if the 26,000 men will give their lives to defend the right of these people to indulge in that perverse behavior that God has condemned. Never underestimate the power of sin. It is an enslaving power.

All right, we have to come to the New Testament. Come over to 1 Timothy 1, and Paul in this letter is writing to Timothy who has been left to correct false teaching going on in the church at Ephesus. There is a constant battle to keep the church faithful, faithful in doctrine and purity in conduct. It is relentless. He says he left Timothy at Ephesus in verse 3, “that you may instruct certain men not to teach strange doctrines, pay attention to myths, endless genealogies,” false teachers of the Law. Don't you pay attention to myths, either, those who would twist the Scriptures. Well, don't take that at face value, you don't take that literally.

What has happened? Verse 6, “Some men straying from these things,” the goal of Paul's instruction, “have turned aside to fruitless discussions.” They want to be teachers of the Law, they don't have a clue what they are talking about. They make confident assertions but they don't have a clue. Amazing the impact, somebody who says it confidently, can have. Then he goes on to say the Law is good. We are not under the Mosaic Law but that does not mean the Mosaic Law is bad. We learn from the Mosaic Law. One of the things you learn is that the Law has a place for unrighteous people. “We know the Law is good if one uses it lawfully, as God intended. Realizing the Law is not made for a righteous person but for those who are lawless and rebellious.” It's a characteristic of all law, it was a characteristic of Mosaic Law. We read parts of the Mosaic Law in Leviticus, he was telling people the unrighteous conduct they shouldn't do and the righteous conduct they should do. Why do we have laws? We are glad for laws unless we break one.

I was in another state and got a parking ticket. My first thought was they didn't have anything better to do. They spend time here and go around and give tickets to people who are good citizens. Then when I drive around and can't get a parking place, why do we let these people park here when the meter is expired? Why don't they give them a ticket, get them out of here? So we do massage the law but basically we're glad we live in law. In some of the countries of the world they were talking about no one goes out of their house after the evening. Why? They'll find your body in the morning. We are glad for laws, laws serve to restrain conduct. Traffic speed limits, we all can recognize that, but when someone passes you on 84th Street going 100 mile an hour, what is your first thought? Where are the police when you need them? They ought to be enforcing the law. But when they stop you for going 15 miles over the speed limit, they don't have anything better to do with their time. They should be out catching criminals.

But we are glad for the law, when it comes down to it law is good. But it is intended to restrain lawbreakers. That's what the Mosaic Law was for. “The Law is made for those who are lawless,” verse 9, “rebellious, ungodly, sinners, unholy, profane, for those who kill, fathers and mothers, murderers, immoral men, homosexuals, kidnappers, liars, perjurers.” Homosexuality is just one of the sins we are talking about because it is being so openly promoted in our country, but non-homosexuals, that doesn't mean they are acceptable to God. But you'll note it is among the sins here and one of the sins the Law forbade. That was the purpose of the Law. And it is for “whatever else,” the end of verse 10, “is contrary to sound teaching, according to the glorious Gospel of the blessed God with which we have been entrusted.” It is to reveal sin and sinners, God's Word reveals us as we are. Sin is contrary to sound teaching, to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Those who promote sin, it ought to be revealed, it ought to be intolerable in a school that claims to be a Christian school that we have an organization. It ought to be clear it is not acceptable, not on this campus, not in this school. I mean, when I was in Bible school it was a little tighter. If I went to a move, I would have gotten kicked out. I got kicked out for getting married. That was a bad law.

I love where Paul goes here, verse 12. He has pointed out the sin of others. The danger is we become self-righteous because we become good at pointing out the sin of others. We have to be careful as believers, we may be accused of being judgmental and self-righteous, but we better not be. And so Paul goes on, “I thank Jesus Christ our Lord who has strengthened me, put me into the ministry even though I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, a violent aggressor.” Verse 15, “It is a trustworthy statement deserving full acceptance, Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all.” Do you know what Paul kept in balance? He pointed out strongly, firmly, clearly the sin that had to be dealt with, but he never forgot that I was just like you. In fact I was worse than you. He lists all these sins as though Paul is so self-righteous that he wasn't a homosexual, he wasn't a kidnapper. He said I was worse, I was the foremost of sinners. I was a blasphemer, a persecutor of believers, a violent aggressor. But Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. Indeed. We proclaim that people are sinners. We don't proclaim it from a position of being above them and better than they are, but we can tell them I was like you and worse. But Christ came to save sinners. I am one of those who was saved by His grace and you can be one of those who is saved by His grace as well..

I cannot get unbelievers to not think I am narrow, bigoted, judgmental, intolerant, but I still must tell them the truth. But I need to be careful that I don't become self-righteous in doing that. It's easy to become expert in other people's sins. We're talking about homosexuality and I don't even like to work with them, I don't like to be around them. It just makes me feel dirty. Maybe you need to go back and look at yourself in the mirror of the Word again. We were no different.

Come back to 1 Corinthians 6 and we will be done. We have one more week, I saved the strongest for last. Come to 1 Corinthians 6. Paul is trying to correct the Corinthians. Do you know what the Corinthians have done? What the Jews did, Israel. They have adopted some of the things of the world. Paul is writing to tell them, you will note repeatedly, you may have it marked from when we studied 1 Corinthians. In 1 Corinthians 6 you have a repeated expression, do you not know. Verse 2, “do you not know;” verse 3, “do you not know;” verse 9, “do you not know;” verse 15,” do you not know;” verse 16, “do you not know;” verse 19, “do you not know.” I mean, repeated. Kind of like a question you ask your kids, don't you know any better? You're not asking them to say no, I don't; you are telling them you know better, there is no excuse. That's what Paul is telling the Corinthians. What in the world is wrong with you? You are acting like the world.

Verse 9, “Do you not know the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God. Do not be deceived.” Evangelicals have come to the point, we don't want to be judgmental, they say they are Christians, they say they believe in Christ, they say they have trusted Him. “Do you not know the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived, neither fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, effeminate,” effeminate is a word that refers to men who are playing the role of the female in a sexual relationship with another male, “homosexuals,” their practice, “thieves, covetous, drunkards, swindlers, revilers. None of them will inherit the kingdom of God.” Don't be deceived. If this sin is how you live or what you practice, you won't be in the kingdom. We say you are not going to heaven, from the standpoint we often equate heaven with that final destiny. We will go to heaven when the Lord comes to get us or we die, but the ultimate end will be the kingdom He will establish on the earth and the church will rule and reign with Him in that kingdom. If you are living in these kinds of sins, don't be deceived.

What is the hope? The hope is verse 11, “Such were some of you but you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and the Spirit of our God.” You can't live like you were. Remember when we were in 2 Corinthians5, we are reconciled by the death and resurrection of Christ so we would no longer live the way we lived. So we are not just railing on homosexuality or any other sin, we're pointing out sin is sin and do not be deceived, God is not mocked. Whatsoever a man sows he shall reap. Don't think I live in sin, doesn't mean Christians can never sin, they can commit any of these sins, but you need to examine yourself. Don't be deceived, the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God. Do not be deceived, God's truth stands, God's judgment stands. But praise God His mercy and His forgiveness, you can be washed, sanctified, justified in Jesus Christ and the work He has done for you.

Let's pray together. Thank You, Lord, for the riches of Your Word. Thank You for its clarity. You gave it so we would understand it, not just that we would understand it but we would believe it and live it. And Lord may we be careful not to be subtly drawn in to the world's way of thinking and acting. May we be faithful to You and your truth in these days. We pray in Christ's name, amen.