What does the Bible, and specifically the New Testament, teach about homosexuality,
part eight.
Hi welcome to today's little lesson.
I never thought these lessons would go on this long, but we just found ourselves diving
into some really interesting scripture.
And it's related to homosexuality, although when we look at the context of these scriptures
many other subjects are surfacing, okay?
Which is good.
Because again as I've said repeatedly, homosexuals often feel targeted by Christians.
And they are targeted, unfortunately.
And Christians ought to be a little more balanced in saying, "Hey this is just one thing among
many things that God says in his word that are displeasing to him."
We better make sure we have our act together before we start pointing our finger at anybody
else.
So we're in Romans chapter 1.
And if you missed the last two or three little lessons, you're missing all of this context.
But we can't review everything or we wouldn't have any time for anything new, okay?
So, we're talking about here how people suppress the truth in unrighteousness, they know what's
right and wrong in their hearts, they know that God is out there they know that he's
the Creator, they know that he's powerful, they know that he's good, that know that he's
holy.
All these things are revealed a million ways, okay?
Every moment of every day all around us, outside and inside through our conscience and through
the thoughts that our conscience speaks to our minds.
And people suppress this.
And so Paul is describing the judgment that comes as a result.
You ignore God and you don't want to have a relationship with him.
So God says, "Okay, have it your way.
Eat the fruit of your way."
This is a biblical expression.
Eat the fruit of your way.
You chose the way, so you can eat the fruit of it now.
"You want to ignore me, okay.
You're going to miss out on a lot of good things.
And I'm going to use you as an example to show other people to try to warn them, to
try to keep them from going down your path.
Now one of those things is, among many other things, but one of those things is homosexuality,
so let's read it.
Romans 1:24, "Therefore God gave them over in the lust of their hearts to impurity."
Now he didn't say homosexuality, he said impurity.
There's many kinds of impurity listed in the Bible, we read some of them in Leviticus.
Sex with animals, adultery, fornication, all these things that are not God's best.
Now this is the thing, I just wish I could drum this into everybody's head, it just almost
makes me angry at times when I think about it.
Because people are so stupid.
What would you rather have, sex with an animal or sex with someone of the opposite sex to
whom you're committed in a life long relationship and whom you love deeply and intimately and
dearly?
Answer this question.
You see, so when God prohibits sex with animals, is he trying to like ruin our lives and say,
"Oh I'm just a killjoy.
I don't like you having fun.
So I'm going to tell you no sex with animals, no siree, no siree.
Because I'm just a killjoy up here in the sky."
No.
God's saying, "That's not my best, that not my will.
That's a perversion of my will.
My will is sex in marriage, heterosexual sex between two people who are committed to each
other, till death do us part in a covenant of marriage.
That's good, that's beautiful, that's what I want for you to enjoy.
But you want to have sex with animals.
Or you want to have sex with someone you're not married to.
You want to have a quickie.
Or you want to have sex with someone else's spouse, you idiot."
And by the same token, "You want to have sex with someone of the same sex.
That's not my best.
I love you.
That's not what I had for you.
Your penis doesn't fit somebody else's penis, your vagina doesn't fit someone else's vagina
for crying out loud.
That's not what I designed you for."
You say, "Oh, but we're born this way."
Oh I know that you are influenced this way, no doubt about that.
You are influenced this way and you bought into the influence on some level at some point
in time.
But pity the children who are figuring out their gender identity and their parents can't
help them and push them the different direction than what they really...
Oh my goodness.
That's a whole other topic.
Okay, but again, I've already talked about God has mercy on people that are victims,
all right.
So, "They exchange the truth of God for," excuse me.
"Their bodies will be dishonored among them."
Verse 25 ,"For they exchange the truth of God for a lie."
So they could have had the truth, but they preferred the lie, they wanted the darkness,
they suppressed the truth, "and they worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator."
He's talking about all the idolatry and stuff, which we have in primitive cultures, we don't
have it in modern cultures so much.
"Who is blessed forever, amen."
Now listen to this.
"For this reason," this is verse 26, "God gave them over."
So this is building on that same theme.
"God gave them over to degrading passions."
And now he's going to elaborate on those degrading passions.
"For their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural.
And in the same way the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in
their desire toward one another.
Men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty
of their error."
This is what the scripture teaches.
And so when people say, "Well, the Old Testament condemns homosexuality but not the New Testament."
Well, you know, come on.
What did we just read?
What did we just read here?
This is condemning homosexuality.
In fact it's saying this is a symptom of God's wrath where he gives people over to their
darkened, their love of darkness, their suppression of the truth.
He leaves them alone and he just lets them go as they go deeper into their depravity
and their sin.
And this is not the only thing, okay?
This is not the only thing.
Because we're going to read this in context.
There's other things that are indicative that God just gave people over, and he just let
them have their way, and they're suffering the consequences of it.
Well, you know we all have compassion and concern regarding the plague of AIDS around
the world.
I'm involved, I lead a ministry called Heaven's Family, and we're involved in some of the
places of the world where the AIDS epidemic is rampant, like in Africa and so forth.
And we've got all this suffering because of AIDS.
But it's because of sexual immorality.
It's because people love the darkness.
It's because people didn't do what God said, they didn't keep sex in marriage, they had
sex outside of marriage, they had homosexual sex and so forth.
And it spread and it killed off all kinds of people.
Millions of people have died from AIDS around the world and so forth.
And nobody can deny it's associated with sexual behavior that God condemns.
When are we goin to wake up and just admit that.
I don't understand why people say...
What's the best way to prevent AIDS?
Be sexually moral according to the Bible.
This is a no brainer, it's a no brainer.
But no we're going to find the cure and blah, blah, blah.
And we're going to have safe sex and this kind of stuff.
Oh my goodness.
You know, again, people love the darkness.
Well we sure wouldn't want to mention that there's any wrath of God here or that we've
done anything wrong.
And we're getting a dose of God's displeasure.
Verse 28, I'm winding it down now.
"And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved
mind to do those things which are not proper."
Now I'm going to read this list.
"Being filled with all unrighteousness," so he's not just picking on homosexual behavior.
"All unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice,
they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of
evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful," so here's
all the indications that God has said, "I'm leaving you alone, and I'll let you have your
way.
And all the behavior that you say you shouldn't be involved in this because I love you and
this is not God's best because it's not good for you if you are disobedient to your parents,
it's not good for you if you're arrogant and boastful, it's not good for you if you slander,
it's not good for you if you're filled with greed.
All these things you could have a better life and a better eternity if you didn't do these
things.
But I'm letting you do these things because that's why you want.
And that's part of my wrath that's falling on you."
"I'm not stopping you from going deeper into depravity and suffering the built in consequences
which I wish you didn't have to suffer.
But you're going to suffer unless you repent."
Okay, more on this in the next little lesson, God bless you.