We are considering one of the latest, and most favorably reviewed, books supporting Christian gay marriage, Matthew Vines’ God and the Gay Christian: The Biblical Case in Support of Same-Sex Relationships
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At this point, the defense rests. We could move on to other arguments made by Vines, but this is more than enough to make the point.
Vines does make additional, thoughtful arguments, but they just don’t matter if Romans 1 says what I believe it says and 1 Cor 6:9-10 says what I believe it says.
Paul lived in a culture that was very well aware of male and female homosexuality. In fact, the cultures that surrounded the Jews approved homosexual conduct by and large — even celebrated it. It wasn’t just the Greeks and the Romans. It was also the Egyptians, the Babylonians, and on and on. The Jews’ total rejection of homosexual sex marked them off from their neighbors just as surely as their food laws and circumcision — perhaps even more so.
The trend in the Bible is toward greater strictness, not less, regarding gay sex. The Torah says nothing specifically about lesbianism. Paul specifically condemns the practice. There is no sense in which the NT is less strict than the OT on this subject. There is no trend toward greater homosexual freedom. There is nothing in the NT that points toward approval of the practice or to the possibility that there might be exceptions to the broad condemnation found in scriptures. In fact, while the OT simply prohibits the practice, the NT offers a theological basis for the prohibition — making the case all the stronger. Continue reading →
I suppose we should start by asking what it means to be saved and to be lost.
