No Grace without Jesus

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No Grace without Jesus

No Grace without Jesus

30 October 2014, 11:57

There’s a new move away from the church these days. If that’s all it was, I wouldn’t be concerned. The church needs to get its act together in so many ways. We went from stuck in the past to stuck in the market. But I think that will happen over time. I think the church will return to the place and the message it should have.

What concerns me about this move away from church is that it is also a move away from Scripture and away from the Lord. The people who have made this move act like they are having a lot of fun, with new moral standards and new goals, but many of them are empty and hurting. And many of them are angry. The anger I read against the church on Facebook these days is sobering.

But anger indicates that something is unresolved. The pain that led to the separation is still there, still hurting. The confusion and feelings of betrayal and injustice continue to churn within the heart. The unresolved emotions look for cause and explanation and see the answer in the church.

What is particularly sad to me is that much of this is coming out of the grace community. Some have found freedom, but little else. They threw away their formulas and standards, left behind the condemnation and shame, and went out to enjoy life their way. And, I confess, that was all that was offered to some. They were shown the futility of striving to measure up, then set free to try to make sense of life on their own.

It is natural to chafe against the structures of religion. The rules and the expectations are binding and shaming. Who wouldn’t want out of that system? So, when the Scripture is made clear that no one ever accomplishes their own salvation and no one can earn God’s love, the human heart rejoices. Many people attend church every week only to hear how bad they are and how they should work harder. Then, when they work harder, the goals are shifted and they find that they are still lacking. When they hear the message of grace, their hearts are lifted up. They jump at the acceptance and forgiveness and freedom that is offered.

But the grace message isn’t about freedom. It isn’t even about acceptance. The message of grace is about Jesus. Freedom and rest and acceptance and peace and joy—all are found in Him. But the center of the message, the real heart of our proclamation, is Jesus. And I am afraid that Jesus is sometimes left out.

Without Jesus there will be no freedom. There might be lack of control, lack of guidance, lack of wisdom—but no real freedom. It’s like the little kid who runs away from home. Hiding under the tree, he is free of his parents’ rules, free to do whatever he wants. But without money or wisdom or the means to get what he needs, what kind of freedom will he enjoy? Instead, he becomes prey for whoever or whatever offers to meet his needs. Freedom apart from Jesus only opens people to a new bondage.

I used to have a little framed note directly across from my desk and I had to look at it all the time. It reflected the words of some people who came to Philip in John 12. They said, “Sir, we would see Jesus.” I wanted to remind myself that the people of my church didn’t need me nor did they need lessons on how to work harder. They came with longing in their hearts and only one message could truly satisfy. Whether they understood their needs or not, they needed Jesus.

Church without Jesus is a waste of time.

The Scripture without Jesus is a burden.

The message of grace without Jesus is a lie.

Freedom without Jesus is just different bondage.

Listen: if the message of grace that you have heard has not brought you into a deeper and right relationship with Jesus, a personal relationship where you are learning to walk with Him day by day, then you have not heard the true message of grace. You are not meant to be alone, left to wander in your own wisdom until the predators find you. You were set free from the bondage of legalism and performance so that you can walk hand in hand with a Friend who loves you and will guide you. The only right grace message is the message of Jesus.

Dr. David Orrison has been a pastor for over 30 years and is now the Executive Director of "Grace for the Heart," a ministry dedicated to proclaiming the sufficiency of Jesus Christ for all aspects of the Christian life. Dave has served in the Evangelical Free Church and in the United Presbyterian Church, and he holds a Ph.D. in Theology from Trinity Seminary. Dave has unique insights into the struggles of what he calls “performance spirituality,” as he has worked extensively with people who are unsure of their relationship with Jesus because of the burden of legalism and the hopelessness of a “works-based Christian walk.” David has lived in Loveland, CO for 25 years and is happily married to Alice. They have eight sons. David blogs on a regular basis at http://graceformyheart.wordpress.com.

All articles on this site reflect the views of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of other Recovering Grace contributors or the leadership of the site. Students who have survived Gothardism tend to end up at a wide variety of places on the spiritual and theological spectrum, thus the diversity of opinions expressed on this website reflects that. For our official statement of beliefs, click here.

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65 Comments

"Hannah" October 30, 2014 Reply

"What concerns me about this move away from church is that it is also a move away from Scripture and away from the Lord. The people who have made this move act like they are having a lot of fun, with new moral standards and new goals, but many of them are empty and hurting. And many of them are angry. The anger I read against the church on Facebook these days is sobering.

But anger indicates that something is unresolved. The pain that led to the separation is still there, still hurting. The confusion and feelings of betrayal and injustice continue to churn within the heart. The unresolved emotions look for cause and explanation and see the answer in the church."

Isn't this basically what people said about all of us when we left ATI? This sounds like very similar condemnation, just the same mantra in repackaged form.
- Don Rubottom October 31, 2014 Reply
  
  Aren't we even now working to resolve it? I don't think it is all resolved. The fact that I am angry and they condemn it does not mean that they are not responsible for my legitimate anger. I don'tthink he is saying that the alienation is unwarranted.
  I think he is saying that substitute gospels are not fulfilling. And he is saying that "go on sinning that grace may abound" is not the freedom of Christ. Freedom in Christ must not leave us permanently wallowing in anger but overcoming it in joy flowing from the Person to Whom we have turned in love and thanksgiving.
Elizabeth D October 30, 2014 Reply

For as long as I remember, there has been a wooden strip attached to the back side of the pulpit in my church, about eye-height to anyone sitting in a chair behind it. The words, "Sir, we would see Jesus" are painted on it, and I am very grateful for those who have stood there and made Him known over the years.

Thank you, Dave, for your insights on grace and legalism. They have helped me more than I can say.
- Chuck Eddy October 31, 2014 Reply
  
  Beautiful words. Thank you.
- Julia Fetters October 31, 2014 Reply
  
  That is so good. It is going on my desk as a constant reminder. You are fortunate to have church leaders who keep that thought at the fore. We have the same in our church. Thank you for sharing that, Elizabeth.
Nancy2 October 30, 2014 Reply

This article reminds me of a song from my younger days.

Consider the Lilies
Consider the lilies they don’t toil nor spin
And there’s not a king with more splendor than them
Consider the sparrow they don’t plant or sow
But they’re fed by the Master who watches them grow

We have a Heavenly Father above
With eyes filled with mercy
And a heart filled with love
He really cares when Your head is bowed low
Consider the lilies and then you will know

May I introduce you to this friend of mine
Who hangs out the stars
and tells the sun when to shine
And kisses the flowers each morning with dew
But He’s not too busy to care about you.

We have a Heavenly Father above
With eyes filled with mercy
And a heart filled with love
He really cares when Your head is bowed low
Consider the lilies and then you will know

When we are thrilled/humbled by God's great love, when we are thrilled/humbled by the love of His Son on the Cross, when we are thrilled/humbled by the gift of the Holy Spirit to guide us through convictions motivated by His mercy and love, we become obedient to Our Heavenly Father for the right reasons. Obedience is our response in love for love given. Of course Grace is grounded in Jesus. Everything rests on Holiness, but only the Holiness of Jesus. Our very obedience rests in the conviction prompted by the Holy Spirit that Jesus is love and Jesus is holy. To know Him more leads to further obedience.

It can be difficult to find a church that lifts up His Holy Name, and teaches others who He is.
- LLB November 2, 2014 Reply
  
  Your final paragraph -- "When we are thrilled/humbled....." -- was beautifully worded, and it is spot on.
Jeff Gill October 31, 2014 Reply

I agree with "Hannah", and so I'm going to push back a little bit.

It took me a long time to believe that God gave me a brain, that it works fairly well and that I don't have to be afraid to use it. As I live as a free, autonomous adult human being in a healthy community of other human beings, I'm not wandering in my own wisdom until the predators find me. I am functioning as I was designed to function.

I'm not impressed with the appeal to fear:

— You must be in a 'right' relationship with Jesus. Who gets to decide that? It seems like Dr Orrison and those who agree with his interpretation of the bible.

— And if you don't have the predefined right relationship with Jesus, you are just a little child who's running away from his authority structure into 'new bondage'

— While you are living in this 'new bondage' you will inevitably become 'prey' and be found by 'predators'. We don't know who these predators are, but they are definitely scary and dangerous to little runaway children.

I can't see this message drawing anyone back to church, no matter how many times Jesus is invoked, because it is infantilising and fear-based.

Having written all that, I am very open to being shown that I have misunderstood Dr Orrison, By all means push back at my pushback.
- Nancy2 October 31, 2014 Reply
  
  I think the way I would approach what I believe Dr. Orrison saying is to ask a question, "Who/What holds the affection of your heart?" Everyone has their own primary affection. There is nothing scary about recognizing where one places their affection. There is value in recognizing the truth of what is the driving force behind our decisions.
  
  I don't follow a list of rules. I allow the convictions of my heart to determine my decisions. For me personally I hope my decisions reflect my love for Jesus, and my understanding of His nature and character. I also trust the Holy Spirit to prick my conscience when I am moving in a direction contrary to my heart's affection/Jesus.
  
  I know many who have chosen a different affection than mine. They are very up front about who they are and what is important to them. Our worldview is different. Yet both of us understand we have a worldview and it guides our choices. Jeff Gill are you saying people do not have a prime affection that impacts their decisions?
  - Jeff Gill October 31, 2014 Reply
    
    Thanks for your perspective, Nancy. I take no issue with what you wrote. At the same time, I strikes me as having only the barest connection with what Dr Orrison wrote above. (I stress the word 'above' because I'm only responding to this post. I can't remember any other of his posts that have struck me as anything other than full of grace.) As for your question to me, of course people have a prime affection which impacts their decisions. People also have a number of secondary affections, senses of duty, etc which affect their decisions. I don't know what I wrote that would have given you any idea I thought otherwise.
    - Nancy2 October 31, 2014
      
      Jeff, recently our family moved and have been trying to find a church home. I think my response is mostly influenced by what we have experienced as we visit different churches. I have been amazed at how often the motivation to "right living" coming from the pulpit is something other than the work of the Holy Spirit convicting our hearts concerning Jesus' love for us.
      
      My question to you was to understand further what you were feeling was an "appeal to fear" because I didn't read his words as having the same intensity as your three points.
      
      This portion is what I was commenting on.
      
      "Without Jesus there will be no freedom. There might be lack of control, lack of guidance, lack of wisdom—but no real freedom. It’s like the little kid who runs away from home. Hiding under the tree, he is free of his parents’ rules, free to do whatever he wants. But without money or wisdom or the means to get what he needs, what kind of freedom will he enjoy? Instead, he becomes prey for whoever or whatever offers to meet his needs. Freedom apart from Jesus only opens people to a new bondage."
      
      Because Jesus desires our freedom we are free in Him. Other things we are affectionate toward places us in bondage to those affections. So for me approaching those things that are secondary affections through the understanding of Jesus my primary affection keeps me from putting too much emphasis on things that might hinder me from living free.
      
      Jeff I have always appreciated your responses. I love that you think deeply, and turn over thoughts that I never think to turn over. I lack a depth many here at RG have. I only asked to understand what you were seeing that I didn't.
    - Jeff Gill October 31, 2014
      
      Hey, Nancy
      
      I think there is a good chance that today I could have done with more thinking deeply before typing.
      
      I never stop being amazed at how much of Christianity is about men (it'a almost always men) who feel the need to decide what 'right living' is for everyone else, stamp the authority of God on their opinions and sell them to their acolytes as 'gospel'. I thought Dave had strayed into a very kind version of that in his post. He clearly hasn't, as his reply to Hannah and I explains.
      
      I did read his words with a lot of intensity because they are strong words and appeared throughout the post. I'm pretty (over)sensitive to those kinds of words because of
      
      — my time in ATIA
      
      — my charismatic and 'word of faith' background, where this is a culture that requires you make sure your behaviour, words and feelings are right all the time so the devil doesn't get you and and so you can get your miracle from God.
      
      — the exposure of Bill Gothard, Mark Driscoll and a number of other so-called ministers as greedy, controlling, self-serving, etc.
      
      Don't dismiss yourself as less deep than others! I'm not actually a deep person; I just play one on the internet.
    - Nancy2 October 31, 2014
      
      Thank you Jeff for helping me understand.
      
      My background was a pretty easy. Love Jesus. Pay attention to uncomfortable feelings in case the Holy Spirit is trying to grow you in understanding. Enjoy life.
      
      My father use to always say, "Beware when men attempt to make something difficult that God intents to be simple. My heart breaks for those who have had the simple beauty of God's redemption so devastatingly altered by men as you have described.
    - Rachel October 31, 2014
      
      Jeff and Nancy2-- this was a beautiful exchange-- thank you both for your honesty. Nancy2, I really appreciate your sharing the simplicity of your faith, and your dad's words. Very encouraging and practical.
- Aila H October 31, 2014 Reply
  
  Hi Jeff,
  I don't believe Dr. Orbison is saying what you think he is saying. It appears to me that he is talking about churches where there are buildings, youth activities, music programs, social justice events, and all kind of social activities, but Jesus is missing. I've attended churches like that. At first in the busyness, you might not be aware that he is missing. But when you do, you realize the futility of all these programs . Jesus is the one who calls us to come to him. He is the one who can give us rest. There are lots of pastors who get more excited about the church growth strategy, than they do about pointing people to Jesus.
- Bad ATI Dad November 2, 2014 Reply
  
  Jeff you have an unbiblical worldview.
  You say your are autonomous "one who gives oneself one's own law" and that is a serious problem.
  Please let me explain the reality of sin.
  If we sin bad things will happen to us.
  God loves us that's why he doesn't want you to sin.
  It's not about becoming righteous by our own effort but that is another topic.
  We have lusts and we want to sin.
  So you use mental gymnastics to justify what we want to do.
  Professing ourselves to be wise we become fools...
  Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:
  That's in Romans I recommend you read the whole book for a complete explanation.
  God wants us to be free FROM sin but we want to be free TO sin.
  Formulas work and God set the standards not man.
  Here's a formula:
  Every day read 5 chapters of psalms and 1 chapter of proverbs.
  Will this formula save you? Make your righteous in God's eyes? Make God love you more? No. But it could make you wise and prosperous in this life and avoid doing stupid sinful things that will bring pain and suffering into your life and the lives of those you love.
Dave October 31, 2014 Reply

Hannah and Jeff - I Hope it is okay that I address you together, even though you bring up different concerns. First, I understand and accept your criticisms. The focus of the post, which was presented in the context of my blog, was to address what I believe is a faulty message of grace and not to challenge those who have made choices different from mine. Your comments remind me that whenever I write or speak publicly, I should remember that there are those who do not view see things the way I do. To flippantly disrespect their perspectives is to depersonalize them. Frankly, it is my belief that American Christians have lived in the safety of a Christianized culture for so long that we simply assume that those who disagree have some issue that needs to be cured. We are learning and, as this safety dissipates, we may come to understand that thinking and caring people sometimes come to disparate conclusions.

At the same time, it is important for Christians to examine ourselves to see if we have misrepresented the truth we claim to love, either by our teachings or our actions. One of the reasons I so strongly support RG, for example, is because I believe Gothard grossly misrepresented the Christian message. My primary concern, in this post and in my heart, is to present what I believe is the “right” message of God’s love in Jesus. Will that be biased by my own beliefs? Obviously, and I readily own that. But I would lack integrity if I did otherwise. Once that message is presented, however, I don’t need to make any assumptions about those who disagree.

Any time someone presumes to interpret the emotions of another there is a depersonalization, a generalization, that discredits the assumption. I certainly cannot say why there is anger in any individual’s heart, but I do believe that anger reveals pain. The anger I see on Facebook, from within an identifiable group often called the “grace community,” comes from something. My assessment, as I read posts and teachings, is that the cause has been an incomplete and unhelpful message presented within that community.

So, this post was not meant to reveal why people leave the church, nor was it meant to draw people back to the church. I very much agree that presenting those who disagree as “runaway children” and potential victims is both disrespectful and ineffective as an argument against that disagreement. What I wanted to communicate is that we must own the extensions of our message. The legalists must own the abuses and defeats that come with their message. There are also effects of an incomplete message of grace. As wonderful as that freedom sounds, it is insufficient apart from Jesus. While I understand that a “right relationship with Jesus” may bring back the feelings of controlled interpretation we received from Gothard, my consistent message is simply to present Jesus as a real Person and allow the varieties of expression any real relationship would have.

I honestly appreciate these comments and I apologize for the judgments and disrespect within the post. You are welcome to ask other questions or bring up other concerns. I will try to monitor this thread. Just understand that I will answer out of my perspective. To do otherwise would be neither helpful or honest.
- "Hannah" October 31, 2014 Reply
  
  Thank you. I just know I have dealt with a lot of pain and anger, and sometimes I still feel angry. And it wasn't from a lack of Jesus in my life. Anger was simply a normal human emotional response to the things that were done to me. It comes and goes and definitely is not of the same explosive intensity as it once was. In my own personal journey, time has been the biggest healing factor.
  
  But yes, a person should be allowed to own their emotions for what they are, without being told they have the wrong message of Christ. I would think this would be the first psychological rule to apply to the situation. The "cause" of the emotions is for the individual to unravel.
- Jeff Gill October 31, 2014 Reply
  
  Dave,
  
  First of all, the gracious openness of your response to my fairly stark criticism is a model of good online dialogue. Thank you!
  
  Second, I agree that 'presenting those who disagree as “runaway children” and potential victims' wasn't the best writing you've done.
  
  Third, your comment is a hugely helpful clarification. Without the 'ineffective' metaphors and with the additional context, the meaning is a lot clearer to me. The context especially helps. I'll also happily blame a good chunk of my misunderstanding on my being dense.
  
  Third, in our church several years ago we had a group of the 'grace community'. They were not theologically gracious people. In fact, I am convinced that their 'freedom' was a 'new bondage'. Life got a lot easier when they decided they couldn't stick around because we didn't understand grace.
  
  Fourth, YES to this: 'my consistent message is simply to present Jesus as a real Person and allow the varieties of expression any real relationship would have'.
  
  Thanks again for taking the time to read and respond.
Don Rubottom October 31, 2014 Reply

I wish there was enough safety here to address particular issues to give light to the different perspectives raised by this piece. Confined to generalities, I am afraid that I am having a difficult time understanding some points of reference being expressed.
I, for one, do regularly see much hostility of those who condemn any enclave of the church that resists approval of believers engaging in homosexual conduct (or other sexual immorality; such religious aggression has been rampant in favor of fornication and adultery for generations). (I won't judge whether there is anger behind such hostility, it may as well be a calm, studied, sincere will to overcome the "prudes".) Yes, we are leaving behind an age in which homosexuals were socially scorned and humiliated. Yes, I understand that members of the church wrongfully engaged in such scorn and humiliation. Yes, it is true that people have been hurt and alienated from the Gospel by such "Christians". But does this disgraceful history nullify I Cor. 6:9-20? Do these wrongs mean that grace and freedom are not found in the full covenantal communion with Christ described in I Cor. 6:19-20? These are the thoughts that pop into my head as I consider the discussion.
It seems to me that Romans 2-8 might be outlined as follows: 1) Not law, but faith; 2) Not licentiousness, but death-and-resurrection-embracing devotion; 3) Not my strength, but Christ; 4) Not defeat and condemnation, but overcoming victory! For:
"he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit"
Does anyone here hold that we can yet walk according to the flesh? I did not draw any such inference from Dave's post.
- Jeff Gill October 31, 2014 Reply
  
  Hi, Don
  
  Your comment on this post raises a question in my mind – and this is an honest question upon which I hope you and others can shed some light:
  
  What is the deal with evangelicals and sex?
  
  In a lot of the evangelical church there seems to be a lot of grace for a lot of the ways humans can screw up. There seems to be a lot of trust in the work of the Holy Spirit in people's lives when it comes to things like gossip and gluttony and unforgiveness. There is a willingness to wait and let God transform people's lives over time.
  
  But not when it comes to sex. Especially not gay sex. We are compelled to let people know (in love) that the sex they're having is wrong. We are obsessed with how people's body parts (don't) fit together.
  
  Why, when it comes to sex, are we not content just to introduce people to Jesus the Person and trust that God's Spirit will work in their lives? Why is our grace so conditional when it comes to people and their genitals? Is it that we don't trust God with other people's sex lives, as if that was too difficult a situation for the Almighty? Are we secretly jealous because we think 'sinners' are having more fun than us? Is it because 'sex sells' just as well inside the church as it does outside? Is is something else?
  
  Please understand, I am not advocating that we ignore what the bible has to say about sex or that we don't teach people who want to be taught about the beauty of sex protected within a marriage covenant. Nor am I accusing anyone here of doing what I have described. I'm wondering, honestly, why we, the evangelical church, are so ungraciously obsessed with shoving our ideas about sex in the face of basically everyone.
  - Nancy2 October 31, 2014 Reply
    
    I was visiting a Sunday School Class a while back and this subject came up. I asked, "Aren't you expecting restoration without reformation?" Everyone stared at me like deer caught in the headlights.
    
    As an evangelical my personal convictions concerning homosexuality or for that matter any type of sexual immorality has nothing to do with the sex act itself. It has to do with the picture presented in Ephesians that is to represent Christ and the Church. My convictions are that I should live that picture.
    
    I do not expect others to conform to my convictions. But you are right the Holy Spirit will move them forward in His perfect timing. As I read Romans 1 I know to be patient with others as they may be further from understanding than I could possibly know. My job is to pray, love, and often times listen.
    
    Jeff you hit on one of the things that keep us from visiting a church a second time.
  - Nancy2 October 31, 2014 Reply
    
    A few weeks later we visited a different Sunday School Class and they asked, What is the first thing that you think of when you read Galatians 5:19 The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; 20 idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions 21 and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.?
    
    I said, "That is me. Praise God for the Blood and Resurrection of Christ, and that He sent the Holy Spirit to help us."
    
    Many gasped and were offended by my statement. I still don't understand. What did they want the answer to be?
    - LynnCD October 31, 2014
      
      Wow, Nancy, I liked your answer!
    - Nancy2 October 31, 2014
      
      Thank you LynnCD! I didn't know how much I needed to know someone understood my statement until I read your post.
    - Jeff Gill November 1, 2014
      
      Heaven forbid that you say anything honest in church, Nancy! Every single human being can find themselves somewhere on that list. That's why Paul said the acts of the flesh are obvious. I love the way he lumps the 'really bad' stuff in with the everyday stuff in one big non-hierarchical list.
      
      I really hope you can find a church where you feel like you fit and can be real. That can be a daunting task. We ended up starting one with some friends eight years ago after six years and four churches.
    - Nancy2 November 1, 2014
      
      I love the way the list ends with "and the like" just incase someone believes they could or have transcended the list under their own strength. The verses above it and below it makes it clear that without the Spirit to guide us we will live somewhere within that list. I never want to deceive myself concerning how far The Lord had to reach down to love me.
      
      Jeff, you are right church hunting is daunting. Praise God for the unique way He answered your need for a church home.
    - LynnCD November 1, 2014
      
      Nancy, if they were truly offended by your remark, you understanding that apart from the Lord Jesus, Paul's list of the sins of the flesh describes you, then they remind me of the Pharisee who prayed and thanked God that he was so good, gave tithes, was not like this tax collector, etc.. And the tax collector stood off and prayed for God to be merciful to him, a sinner! And we all know what the Lord thought of those two men, now don't we?
    - Nancy2 November 1, 2014
      
      I think what they were offended by is I identify with what they considered "the worst of these". And yes LynnCD it was one of those times that I felt like they looked at me as different than them, and not in a good way. But I also am concern about using that Scripture and pointing figures that they are the man in the front, because as do on as I do I will find myself seated with that same man.
      
      Like I said I don't know what they wanted the answer to be. The conversation took off in a direction that was obviously not the intended direction. There was a lesson planned that was never taught that morning.
    - Nancy2 November 1, 2014
      
      The easier response for my husband and I was to thank The Lord for another opportunity yo worship Him, ask His hand to be on those in attendance and look for a church that is more in line with our hearts.
  - MatthewS November 1, 2014 Reply
    
    With apologies for not fleshing this out any more, I'd say I think it is more complicated than that.
    - Jeff Gill November 1, 2014
      
      It's a question regarding humans and sex, so I'd say you're on pretty safe ground there, Matthew. I know time doesn't always permit the crafting of long answers, but I'm hoping that some people will have the time and the inclination.
      
      And to reiterate, my motivation for asking is purely to understand more. I'm not out to try to convince anyone of my own view. I do think evangelicals in general approach sexuality in a different and, it seems to me, less gracious, less connected to Jesus way than other areas of life. I'd like to know what's behind that. I'd like to especially read the views of people who don't see it as less gracious – what do you think I'm missing when I ask this question?
      
      Thanks.
  - Don Rubottom November 1, 2014 Reply
    
    Jeff, I am not sure what evangelicals have to do with the issues I raised. Those enclaves I mentioned include the Roman Catholic Church and all Eastern Orthodox. So while I appreciate that your question has some validity, I am afraid your attention to Evangelicals is far too narrow to uncover a useful answer.
    A question I have been asking myself most of my life is why sex is such a big deal to almost everybody. It was a big deal to Hugh Hefner. It was a big deal to the Sexual Revolutionaries. It was a big deal to the origination and perpetuation of Planned Parenthood. It is a big deal to the Rappers. It is a big deal to prudes. It was a big deal to the "greatest generation" and it is a big deal both major American political parties. It was a big deal in the chick flick I saw last night: "The Best of Me".
    I want to share that as I have searched for the answer to my question of why is sexual conduct is distinguished from other conduct a key truth appears in I Cor. 6:18 "Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body." I think this helps address the substance of your question if it might be rephrased as a "why" to this key statement of Paul. Why is this category of sin different? For me, John Paul II's Theology of the Body offers one convincing answer: our sexuality is fitted to God's design for marriage uniquely revealing IN OUR BODIES the interpersonal, communing, fruitful, covenantal nature of the Trinity. Mankind, as created, images God not merely in individual moral personhood and intellect, but in full, free, fruitful, faithful, "male and female" communion that some call nuptial love. ("In the image of God...male and female created He them.") This idea helps to explain Jesus's pointing to Genesis 2:24 when asked about divorce and Paul's pointing to the same verse when disclosing the Mystery in Ephesians 5.
    I can only assume Evangelicals squirm over sex for the same reason that most people do. It is overawesome in its power and its perfect design and overawefully twisted by the Fall.
    I do affirm that I am content to introduce homosexuals, adulterers, abusers of themselves with mankind, drunks, thieves, murderers and the like to the Person of Jesus and encourage them to know HIM (intimately) and thereby know Freedom from all bondage. What I am not content to do is something I inferred Dave's essay to hinting at which is to embrace all manner of unrighteous behaviors indulgently in the name of grace. It's one thing to give up a hate for the sin in order to love the sinner. It is quite another thing to take up a love for the sin, to affirm the goodness of behavior that distorts the image of the Triune God, and to deny the multitude of Scriptures that call the children of God to flee such temptations and all such conduct.
    Now, as to the subject that I raised, hostility directed at any church over it's resistance to embracing homosexual conduct, I would turn your question around a bit and ask why a church's critics do not get as torqued up about the church's intolerance toward thieving, murdering, lying, elder abusing, child abusing, "and the like"? What's the big deal?
    I appreciate your genuineness and pray that you may be able to appreciate my own sincerity.
    - rob war November 1, 2014
      
      that was beautiful Don. I agree 100%
  - Don Rubottom November 1, 2014 Reply
    
    Direct answer to two of your questions supplemental to my longer answer in moderation:
    1) People tend to not trust God with their own sex lives, why should you expect them to trust God with others'?
    2) Of course sex sells inside the church. It sells everywhere! It sells so well that it sells other things like cars and beer in addition to selling itself 24/7. It sold Adam so well that his response in Gen. 2:23 originated human poetry!
  - Jeff Gill November 2, 2014 Reply
    
    Don,
    
    Thanks so much for taking the time to write your thoughtful response. I've written a few things back. They are somewhat disjointed because I don't have a point to make, rather I'm sifting through what you wrote.
    
    — — —
    
    I do think that evangelicals as a whole have a particular type of response to people whose sexuality is outside what they consider normal and that it is less gracious and welcoming than they tend to be to people with whom sexuality is not an obvious issue. This is particularly apparent when comparing evangelicals to the rest of the protestant church. (To take one specific strand of sexuality as an example, the Church of England has welcomed LGBT people to fairly full participation for quite some time. A number of mainline denominations in America have gone much further and they ordain openly gay people in non-celibate relationships.) I don't know enough about the Catholic and Orthodox churches to make any kind of comparison.
    
    There are, of course exceptions to my generalisations. One example I know of is Woodland Hills Church in St Paul. They are very welcoming of LGBT people as fully human and have many who are members, yet they have a conservative interpretation of the scriptures which talk about homosexual sex and teach a lifestyle of abstinence for gay people.
    
    — — —
    
    Having written the above, I don't think it's a bad thing to widen the discussion. As you wrote: 'sex is such a big deal to almost everybody'.
    
    — — —
    
    I think it is interesting that Jesus and Paul, as you mentioned, point to and affirm a pre-fall conception of marriage, bypassing all the polygamy, concubines and women-as-property in Israel's history.
    
    — — —
    
    I wonder if you see any support in scripture besides 1 Corinthians 6:18 for the idea that 'sexual conduct is distinguished from other conduct'? There are a number of places where it is lumped in with all kinds of behaviour, but are there other places
    where it is clearly singles out like this?
    
    — — —
    
    You wrote : 'as I have searched for the answer to my question of why is sexual conduct distinguished from other conduct…'
    
    I'm curious. Did you start with the question, Why is it different with sex? Or did you start with the question, Is sex different? If it's the former, can you pinpoint where the assumption of difference came from, or was it just there? Would you say that 1 Corinthians 6:18 and the Theology of the Body convinced you that sex was in a different category or that it affirmed what you already believed?
    
    These aren't trick questions. I think a lot of people – maybe me included, I'm not sure – put sexual conduct in a unique category. I'm trying to get my head around whether it was already unique and so we look for reasons, or whether we have made it unique
    for some other reason(s).
    
    — — —
    
    Finally, you asked: 'I would turn your question around a bit and ask why a church's critics do not get as torqued up about the church's intolerance toward thieving, murdering, lying, elder abusing, child abusing, "and the like"? What's the big deal?'
    
    I don't think people criticise the church over these things because people in general are against 'thieving, murdering, lying, elder abusing, child abusing, "and the like"', so there is no quarrel.
  - Don Rubottom November 2, 2014 Reply
    
    Jeff, I don't find your response disjointed, but organized and well put.
    I do encourage you to look beyond WASPy America's present engagement with the issue of homosexuality and consider the wider cultural and historical response of Christendom to the broad diversities of "sexual immorality". You will find that what you describe as evangelical is not unique or distinctive to that branch of Christianity.
    I believe I already addressed the distinction between loving the sinner and embracing the sin so I won't address putative churches that incorporate openly practicing homosexuals (or open adulterers and fornicators) into leadership and ordained ministries. I Corinthians is all the response needed to such a state of church affairs.
    Your last comment clarifies that people in general become hostile over what they disagree about. So at least on the point of "everyone agreeing" I think we have established that sexual immorality differs from other sins in a way that confirms I Cor. 6:18. Other Scriptural support would be what you have stated, it is treated differently in some places even while it is lumped in with other sins in other passages. Uniquely, it is found at every turn: Gen. 2-3 transition (naked and unashamed but then alienated); Malachi (your prayers are not heard because you have broken covenant with the wife of your youth, echoed in Peter "that your prayers be not hindered"); various passages about fleeing this sin, all the way to the short list of sins in the last chapter of the Bible. To my thinking, focusing on the homosexual variations of sexual immorality misses the big picture. Our increasingly pagan society has been much more accepting of adultery for generations now, so I see little reason to consider the L, G, B, T and all the other new lettered immoralities as anything other than progressive social acceptance of sexual immorality. There is nothing new under the sun, but Western society forgot about some of these behaviors during the Christian era, so we are presently in a period of rediscovery. In my opinion, it will not end well for social cohesion, peace between neighbors or safety for children and women (or small men). But I have no expectation for you to accept my prediction.
    I can't say for sure where my search began. I do know that after 25 years of marriage, I was beginning to feel like there was a missing something, possibly a rationale. Surrounded by people in failing marriages who justified divorce and remarriage, committed to fidelity but not experiencing bliss, I wondered what it all meant. I have fought, with greater and lesser success, against sexual immorality in my own life, but not seeing spiritual benefits in that fight. (Purity, in loneliness, can look like isolation.) And yet, the distinctive kind of temptation involved screams out that something in me uniquely wars against sexual purity in a way that I do not war against respecting other people's lives and property, speaking the truth or even coveting my neighbor's house. Only one commandment seems to war "in my members" against my sinful nature.
    My daughter and we were invited to a Christopher West seminar on TOB at the local Catholic Church. That opened my eyes to the "WHY" of it all: that my sexual, spousal nature images and therefore reveals God in His faithful, fruitful, full, and free Love, between and among the Three Persons, God for mankind and Christ for the church. It was the most glorious explanation I'd ever heard. It makes sense of all temptations, all perversions, all disorientations, and moreso, made sense of the intensity of our desires and our calling by design to love and be loved. Every love song ever written reflects this part of our nature. Every lover's spate, every unrequited affection, every hope and sorrow make sense in light of this picture of our "spousal nature". This presentation put me on a path to study everything the Bible says about sex and marriage and that study did confirm this vision for me. I discovered in the Law, the meaning behind Paul's use of "bondage" or "enslaved" in I Cor. 7:15. I discovered that headship is about unity, not authority. I discovered the reason that remarriage is adulterous: we are called to covenant (from Malachi) and the only way out of a covenant is death. I discovered that Jesus said, "what God has joined together", reflecting Malachi 2:15. ("Did He not make them one?"). I discovered that the proscriptions on incest in Numbers and Leviticus are not blood based exclusions (too many in-laws and step-siblings are excluded), but they rather reflect "leave father and mother" as the necessary foundation for "cleaving". I also discovered that the submission passages each have distinctive context that is either evangelistic, or Christ oriented. (I.e. submit to Christ-like love (Eph. 5), submit to win a soul (Peter).) I learned that Jesus could not have married because he would love a woman enough to die for her sins before any wedding would occur. (Most loving husbands would die for their wives, but few would be willing to die before their wedding night.) I learned that the punishment for fornication in the Law is (get this!) marriage! I also learned that God is very gracious, protecting women through paternal oversight in case of fornication, divorce certificates, levirate marriage for son-less widows, superior rights of a first wife and first born in cases of polygamy and remarriage, full legal rights for divorced women and other things. I learned that priests could not marry divorced women or prostitutes and the High Priest had to marry a virgin. I learned that the "exception clause" in Matthew explains the "righteous" nature of Joseph's intention to divorce Mary before their marriage was consummated. I learned that Jesus never truly answered the divorce question in Matthew and Mark but redirected the questioners' attention to Genesis 2. I won't go on, but I've written a 250 page book about all this.
    I believe that I confirmed that the Mystery Paul discloses in Eph. 5 is the TOB of JPII: Our SPOUSAL nature reveals the Love of God, in all it's redemptive, communing and life giving goodness. Yes, Jesus and Paul pointed to Genesis 2, because that is where the children of God are told the reason for our sexuality. It is glorious, it is Godly, it is sanctifying and it is called Marriage, meaning a covenant unto death, a death pact of mutual submission, co-regency, co-generating of life itself: a full communion of persons. An image or picture of the Trinity.
    I don't think my questions were different in kind from those of most human beings. I don't think there is anything about us as humans that is more confusing, ambiguous or uncertain as our sexuality and our own thoughts and feelings about it. I honestly can't tell you exactly the source or purpose of my questions. I can tell you that the Bible has no other answer to such questions. Those who wish the Bible had different answers are willfully closing their eyes to the answer it offers. The Ten Commandments do not say "Thou shalt not commit sexual immorality (or homosexual acts, etc.)" It says, "Thou shalt not commit adultery". The purpose and use of sexuality is spousal, covenantal, God imaging. Everything else is a twisted or deluded effort to access what only Godly celibacy or Godly marriage can supply: fully and fruitfully living for an other.
    I hope this assists you in putting all the "issues" into a broader framework. We now live in a pagan culture. Christians can no long acquire their understanding of marriage and sexuality from their experience in society. They must acquire it from God's Word. If evangelicals or other legalists had never existed, these same issues would permeate human existence. Our nature guarantees this.
    May God Bless your questions with His answers.
    - GuyS November 2, 2014
      
      Jeff and Don, I have learned a lot from you two. Thank you for the time and care invested, so the rest of us could eavesdrop.
      
      Don, I went to Amazon to buy your book, but the nearest I came was "RUBOTTOM'S Home Brewed Moonshine Stretched Canvas Print!" My credit card is out, and I am ready to buy it. Let me (and I am sure others) know.
    - Don Rubottom November 3, 2014
      
      Guy, thank you so much for your interest in my unpublished book! If I can ever get my pastor to wade through it and give me some feedback, I would very much like to make it available to anyone interested! Until then, your getting the best I've got in comment format. I am thankful that you are encouraged by the discussion.
    - GuyS November 3, 2014
      
      Thanks Don, You might tell your pastor (no pressure :-) that I want one for myself, but also several for family members.
  - Jeff Gill November 3, 2014 Reply
    
    Don, again thank you for taking the time to write and for the personal background to the insight you shared.
    
    — — —
    
    When you wrote 'If evangelicals or other legalists…' it made me wonder a tiny bit if we mean the same thing by 'evangelical'. I have been referring to Evangelicalism, a very broad movement which includes millions of people who would be hard to classify as legalists (and also plenty of legalists). Again, just for clarity, I've been thinking about the evangelical response to sexual issues, not so much the existence of the issues themselves.
    
    I grew up in a charismatic evangelical church. I fully embraced the quite conservative teaching that I received about sexuality. In many ways it serves me very well. I've been very happily married for 18 years. My wife and I are best friends and deeply in love. Once we started thinking for ourselves – I mean this in a growing up sense, not a we-used-to-be-brainwashed sense – we came to some very different conclusions than the dominant views within evangelicalism. I'm asking questions here because I want to understand the thinking of people who have done the grown up thinking and have come to conclusions that still fit within the dominant views of evangelicalism. (I realise that the church is much bigger than the evangelicals, but these are my roots and it's good to understand your roots.) So I'm really grateful, Don, that you have taken the time to explain your understanding.
    
    — — —
    
    I tend to be sceptical of any theory or theology that appears to explain everything because too often it turns out that it doesn't.
    
    I do find the idea of understanding people as made in the image of God to be an incredibly important and useful starting point for the way I understand and live with people. I had not considered the idea of that imaging having a 'spousal' character. It is worth mulling over. It has resonance with both male and female being made in the the image of God and so both male and female reflecting different aspects of who God is. It does make singleness seem like second best though. You and I, being married, may not be in the best place to understand how a person with a spousal nature can find fulfilment within a life of 'Godly celibacy', but as Theology of the Body was written a single, celibate man and you are familiar with the work, could you share your understanding of how singleness fits within this framework? I presume JPII didn't see it as second best?
    - Don Rubottom November 3, 2014
      
      Jeff, please forgive me, I took your critique of evangelicals to be directed at a legalistic response. I know of no other evangelical response to sin to which your objections might apply. Yes, Evangelicals are not particularly legalistic. (To my mind they are quite liberal on the issue of adulterous remarriage, if not the practice of homosexuality.)
      To help me understand what you are saying, it might be helpful for you to describe what you mean by the dominant views of evangelicalism vis a vis sexual immorality. I may have wrongly assumed you meant a kind of puritanical response to fornication and homosexuality--me wrongly ascribing the "legalist" tag to that.
      It would also be helpful for you to disclose the "very different conclusions" to which you refer. I am also curious of the basis of your conclusions. Your statements imply that your conclusions are based in experience and reason, having referenced no Scriptural basis for any disagreement between you and the "dominant" position, whatever that is.
      -----------
      I am glad that my comments have opened up some new ideas for you. I hope you don't discount the teaching of Jesus and Paul due to their unmarried states. You may be surprised to learn what TOB teaches about singleness and celibacy, but I strongly recommend that you read West's book yourself. I think the celibacy teaching is consistent with much Catholic teaching from Augustine on down; I consider the unique offering of JPII (and Deitrich Von Hildebrand before him) is a re-elevation of covenant marriage to a spiritual dignity equal with religious celibacy (priests, monks, nuns, etc.). I think this re-elevation is not a minute too soon in light of Western culture's abandonment of the prior Christian consensus on sexual expression. I have not digested the teaching on celibacy as much in my own soul as I have TOB's reflections on marriage. I can say that it is in harmony and upholds a celibate lifestyle as honoring of the spousal nature, following the example of Jesus and Paul in sacrificing sexual fulfillment for the welfare of others, whether they may be extended family members, spiritual disciples or a world full of neighbors.
      Thinking about celibacy brings Mark 10 to mind. In that chapter, Jesus responds to the question about divorce, then he pronounces on the preciousness of children and the goodness of accepting them, then he interacts with the rich young ruler who had a problem with possessions. Immediately after these he responds to the inquiry of the disciples regarding their own sacrifices. Jesus responds in vv. 29-30:
      "Truly I tell you, there is no one who has given up and left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands for My sake and for the Gospel’s who will not receive a hundred times as much now in this time—houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions—and in the age to come, eternal life."
      Read with I Cor. 7's repeated recommendation of singleness for the Kingdom and I think you can get the flavor of the rewards of celibacy, even in the form of "children".
      Isa. 49:21-23 evokes a similar compensation for the "barren" Israel:
      "Then [Zion], you will say in your heart, Who has borne me all these children, seeing that I lost my offspring and am alone and barren and unfruitful, an exile put away and wandering hither and thither? And who brought them up? Behold, I was left alone [put away by the Lord, my Husband]; from where then did all these children come?
      Thus says the Lord God: Behold, I will lift up My hand to the Gentile nations and set up My standard and raise high My signal banner to the peoples; and they will bring your sons in the bosom of their garments, and your daughters will be carried upon their shoulders.
      And kings shall be your foster fathers and guardians, and their queens your nursing mothers. They shall bow down to you with their faces to the earth and lick up the dust of your feet; and you shall know [with an acquaintance and understanding based on and grounded in personal experience] that I am the Lord; for they shall not be put to shame who wait for, look for, hope for, and expect Me."
      Celibates give up natural children and intimacy for spiritual children and fuller spiritual intimacy. But the ultimate teaching of TOB is that GOD is wooing mankind into an intimate spousal relationship with Himself. In that light, celibacy by-passes the temporary flesh and blood icon (human marriage) in favor of the ultimate Reality (Communion with God), just as the Book of Hebrews describes the supplanting of the icon of the tabernacle for the Reality of God's Eternal Tabernacle. (In fact, I Cor. 7 seems to be a thorough response to Christians asking whether all Believers should choose the path of celibacy.)
      I look forward to your reflection and response.
    - Jeff Gill November 3, 2014
      
      Thanks again, Don.
      
      I've replied at the bottom to get a bit more column width. I wrote 1200 words this time.
J.B. October 31, 2014 Reply

@Hannah and Jeff:

Just reading Dave's other pieces on RG (and his response here), I don't think there's any question that his viewpoint is grace-based. But I can definitely see how some of the wording in this article might function as a trigger for those who grew up in very legalistic environments. Many "law-based" teachers and preachers have used similar terminology about leaving the church and abandoning morality, particularly if they're interested in maintaining some level of control over their flock. Then, when it comes to grace, it's almost always accompanied by a "yes, but..." in an attempt to "balance" it with law. I don't think this is what Dave is trying to say here - but rather that grace is too rich and too valuable to be a catalyst for us to create our own version of the law by which to live or be a law unto itself, and that understanding the depth of grace provides us with more reason than ever to love Christ.
Jeff Gill October 31, 2014 Reply

Just in case anyone cares, said I with an inflated sense of self-importance, I wrote a really nice reply to Dave that kind of answers some of the comments to me, but it's stuck in moderation.
- Jeff Gill October 31, 2014 Reply
  
  i.e. 'Your comment is awaiting moderation.'
- LynnCD October 31, 2014 Reply
  
  Jeff, I sometimes can only think in general terms. What I took from the article was - WHATEVER message you heard, whether it be from church or IBLP or any other place, if it left out Jesus, it's empty.
  
  If you left such a legalistic or licentious church or group and went somewhere else, either literally, or in your mind, but left out Jesus, you are lost.
  
  Jesus and the message of redemption through his blood, freely offered, without any good works on our part, is what grace is. He is central, and to leave Him out is to be in a place where all is "vanity and vexation of spirit." Because this is what I took from the article, and because I totally agree with it, I don't understand your objections, but please keep talking.
- Don Rubottom November 1, 2014 Reply
  
  And mine to you is awaiting moderation so don't feel alone there.
Jeff Gill November 3, 2014 Reply

Hi, Don

> What I mean by the dominant views of evangelicalism vis a vis sexual immorality:

I think I explained it pretty clearly in my original question when I wrote,

'In a lot of the evangelical church there seems to be a lot of grace for a lot of the ways humans can screw up. There seems to be a lot of trust in the work of the Holy Spirit in people's lives when it comes to things like gossip and gluttony and unforgiveness. There is a willingness to wait and let God transform people's lives over time.

'But not when it comes to sex. Especially not gay sex. We are compelled to let people know (in love) that the sex they're having is wrong. We are obsessed with how people's body parts (don't) fit together.

'Why, when it comes to sex, are we not content just to introduce people to Jesus the Person and trust that God's Spirit will work in their lives? Why is our grace so conditional when it comes to people and their genitals?'

Just a bit of additional clarification.

— I put 'in love' in parentheses above because too often, I think, the church's version of the truth is shouted so loudly the love is nearly invisible.

— I would add that it's not that the church has a sexual morality teaching, but that it seems obsessed with what people are doing sexually in a way that is not evident when it comes to other behaviours. Two examples are 1) virgin/purity culture, purity balls, silver ring thing – an obsession with Making Sure Teenagers Don't Have Sex to the exclusion of helping them grow into mature followers of Jesus – and 2) the shaming of LGBT people in a way that is stronger than and unlike any other thing that the church views as sin. The statistics and stories that I've seen show that both these examples have the opposite of their intended effect. Christian teens keep on having sex. LGBT people are driven away from Jesus.

— — —

> my very different conclusions.

I'll preface this section by stating that I'm not trying to convince anyone to adopt my views, nor am I interested in people trying to 'convert' me. My reason for bringing this up in the first place was, and still is, to try to understand another point of view.

First, what I think we have at least somewhat in common.

— People are made in the image of God. One thing that means to me is that the body isn't yucky or shameful. It's not just a house that we inhabit until we get out of here. My body is me.

— Marriage is covenant that matters. I think the church has failed badly here. I'm probably more relaxed about divorced people getting remarried than you are, but we the church do a terrible job of helping people marry well and stay married.

— Sex is a big deal. Having sex outside of marriage is, on the whole, a harmful thing to do. At the same time, having sex outside of marriage doesn't decrease your worth as a person.

— Abortion is a tragedy. But if the church in America had spent a lot less time and money trying to change laws that weren't going to change and more time showing people the transforming love of Jesus, working to lift people out of poverty, helping people get good education, not trying to keep people from having birth control, and adopting more babies from crisis pregnancies, many more lives would have been saved.

In the above examples my view is not really different than the majority view of the church, but I think the church has not been interested in doing what is actually effective to help people. (I'm writing with sweeping but, I think, broadly accurate generalities.)

Now, the thing I'm sure we disagree on.

— Homosexuality is an orientation that is almost always fixed before birth or early in life. Gender is (kind of) a spectrum not two opposite poles. A small percentage of people are simply not heterosexual. There is nothing inherently sinful about being LGBT. These people should have full and equal rights to marry. The extension of marriage to gay people is a good thing in that is promotes family, monogamy, stability, faithfulness, sacrificial love, etc. Marriage equality threatens the picture of Christ and the church as much as the existence of four leaf clovers threaten St Patrick's illustration of the trilogy. As with straight people, celibacy for LGBT people is a calling not a requirement.

I've said I'll not try to convince and I won't, but it may be helpful for you to know how I came to this view.

First, I realised that growing up I'd been told a lot of lies about homosexuality by the church. (All gay men are paedophiles. Gay people are never monogamous. People choose to be gay or become gay because that are abused.)

Second, I realised that the damage done to me in ATIA because my following Jesus didn't preclude wearing good clothes and listening to good music and watching good films, and I began to empathise with the vastly greater damage done to people who are told by the church that their unchangeable sexual orientation is evil. I realised I wasn't sure what I believed about homosexuality, but what the church thought about it certainly didn't look like anything Jesus would do.

Third, I got to know some gay people. Turns out, they're just people.

Fourth, I read some theology. This piece by Walter Wink was especially helpful.

I came to my views based on experience and reason and also the best scientific and anecdotal evidence and also, I'm convinced, the trajectory of scripture.

A brief note re: the trajectory of scripture. When what Paul wrote in Galatians about how in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave or free, male or female is compared with Paul's rules for women in his churches, it seems clear that in his zeal to reach people with the gospel within his culture he wasn't able to take the practical outworking of that egalitarian concept as far as he would have liked. I believe the project continues. Slavery wasn't done away with until the 19th century. America still lives with he repercussions today. There is still a way to go with race and gender.

I know that gets me in a lot of trouble with a lot of Christians, but there you go.

— — —

A statement to all readers: I would really prefer to not get into the typical flame war that happens when homosexuality is discussed in the comment sections of Christian websites. Based on the normal high quality of dialogue here, we should be all right. But I won't be trying to defend my views. As I've said before, I'm writing what I'm writing here to learn from others, not promote my viewpoints.

— — —

What you wrote about celibacy is pretty much what I understand the calling of celibacy to be. It's the 'spousal nature' concept that threw me. I was a bit lazy there asking you to write what I could have googled.
- Don Rubottom November 3, 2014 Reply
  
  Jeff, thank you for responding fully. I am sorry that I missed this earlier:
  'In a lot of the evangelical church there seems to be a lot of grace for a lot of the ways humans can screw up. There seems to be a lot of trust in the work of the Holy Spirit in people's lives when it comes to things like gossip and gluttony and unforgiveness. There is a willingness to wait and let God transform people's lives over time.
  'But not when it comes to sex. Especially not gay sex. We are compelled to let people know (in love) that the sex they're having is wrong. We are obsessed with how people's body parts (don't) fit together.
  'Why, when it comes to sex, are we not content just to introduce people to Jesus the Person and trust that God's Spirit will work in their lives? Why is our grace so conditional when it comes to people and their genitals?'
  I did not take that as your description of evangelicalism in general but more of a wondering out loud about some sense of unfairness or singling out of homosexuality, possibly even a caricature. I am sorry. I should have been more attentive. I do believe that a lot of churches are content to allow sexually immoral people to grow into freedom, but less willing to deny or suppress the truth that sexual immorality is sinful. (I do not deny that there are some logs in the eyes of some who take note of splinters, but that does not change those splinters into vision enhancing contact lenses.)
  I think you greatly discount the efforts of Catholics and Pro-life Protestants to support crisis pregancy centers, support and promote adoption, support social services, education and anti-poverty efforts. Confusing support for government programs with support for people is a great fallacy of the left. Or else it is outright slander. I do not know one church, even Catholic, who works to keep anyone from accessing contraception. But there are very good reasons to not support the promotion of contraception as a public good. There is more contraception than ever before, even compulsory purchase of contraception insurance coverage, and the unwanted fatherless children are a greater percentage of births than ever before even after a million abortions annually. Every trajectory of this culture is hostile to young women and their children. Listen to the sexual assault debate on secular university campuses to see the high place to which women have "advanced" since the sexual revolution took hold. Sterilized sex and abortion solve no problem. They are intended to cover them. (1 in 7 couples who want children can't have them. There is a shortage of healthy babies available and eligible for adoption in the U.S.)
  I see from your present views that you think as your generation has been taught to think by our culture. I understand it, I just don't agree that our experiences or reason can trump what God tells us clearly. I do not see it gracious to ignore that sin is sin, any more than to be "tolerant" (dismissive) of some sins and not of others. I agree with you that Christians can lack grace in response to many circumstances, but what I see occurring today more and more is sexually immoral people wanting to enter into full fellowship not merely as weak sinners seeking freedom, but denying their sin in ways that gluttons, gossips, drunks, thieves and the unforgiving do not deny that they are sinning. So I think that accounts for some of the differences in how they may be treated. I think the well examined "yuck factor" also explains some of the disparate treatments. Divorcees used to be scorned, but today: come on in, marry whoever you like, there is no sin when LOVE is in the air! Your generation is not grossed out by homosexuality. You have been bombarded with it in the entertainment media your entire lives. It's all cool. That's the way we were about marijuana: it's all cool. But cool has nothing whatsoever to do with right and wrong, truth and delusion. Read I Corinthians and study their culture. Paul was not cool.
  I go beyond you, however, in noting that all forms of sexual immorality seem to find champions and defenders in ways that other sinful behaviors are never championed or defended. Pornography (soft, of course), adultery (after civil divorce, of course), fornication (between consenting adults, of course), giving in to passion (because we are made that way, of course) all find protectors, defenders and advocates inside the church. When no one confronts these views is when the church is most sick. Paul had to address incest in I Corinthians--someone was arrogantly sporting a behavior that had to be confessed or removed from the fellowship. John the Baptist had a few words to say about Herod's adultery (and Herod was outside the believing fellowship). As I've said, sex is and always has been a big deal.
  I do agree that we should not get into a big argument here about homosexuality per se. I will attempt to address the rest of my comments to a few of your other statements.
  I believe we are all born sinners. Most of us are born sexual sinners. That does not allow us to deny that sin is sin. You claim that you want sexual sin to be dealt with more graciously, like gossip and gluttony. I could share your desire. However, your actual arguments tend toward a conclusion that either sexual immorality is not sinful, or God is really, really unfair to allow some people to be born hopeless sinners. My Bible has no such trajectory. I believe that both Jesus and Paul pointing to Genesis 2 offer us hope that in this life, in expressing our sexuality, in our various experiences and "orientations" we can know reconciliation with God's holy design, an untwisting of our fallenness, and some degree of fulfillment in male-female spousal communion or in celibate communion with Christ. You see, if my sexual appetites keep me from communion with Christ, my sexual appetites have to go. Augustine reflects this sense in abandoning his concubine and becoming celibate. (I wish he had married her, but at least he sinned "no more".) Grace liberates from sin. It does not pat on the back and say, "that's OK, it's just the way you are."
  History shows the trajectory of culture transformed by the Christian message was away from concubinage, infanticide, polygamy, slavery, adultery, divorce, abandonment, abuse and homosexuality all of which were very prominent in pagan cultures. Interestingly, NONE of these practices that declined as a result of Christianity were ever approved in Scripture. The notion that slavery and polygamy were approved by Scripture is false. Read Philemon and tell me that Paul told him to treat the returning slave like anything less than visiting Apostle! The Mosaic law made polygamy unworkable and unprofitable to second wives, deterring it. Divorce certificates were to protect women from unexplained singleness without intact virginity. (Of course, we know that the law is powerless to make us righteous or pure.)
  I have homosexual friends. I have friends whose marriages have been destroyed by their "orientation" and their children's identities and security have been badly damaged by their father's deluded pursuits. I have acquaintances who've been arrested for soliciting in public bathrooms. I have both homosexual and heterosexual friends who are in sexual relationships that are not full, free, fruitful and faithful. I am beginning to think of such as concubinage. They are deluding themselves about the Holy and righteous nature (apart from sin) of their sexuality. Pornography destroys intimacy, communion and contentment. Sexual immorality is a sin against our own bodies and the fact that different people might have atypical lusts and unholy desires does not change that their lusts and unholy desires, when acted upon, are sins against their own bodies. There is no trajectory of Scripture that departs from this simple truth. There is no glorious, grace filled, holy, sexual immorality. In my opinion, all sexual orientations (mine is probably polygamous, or at least ravenous of pornography) are changeable in the sense that the Grace of God can deliver anyone from enslavement to any orientation to sin. (I may retain a vestige of desire to steal other people's money but God's Grace is cleansing me of that desire.)
  I am not talking about repression and suppression. I am talking about deliverance and freedom. It is difficult to conceive but it is what the New Covenant is about. Exodus from slavery.
  I will stop there. You have made a number of broad statements that you expected to be disagreed with. I will leave the rest to others. I hope you appreciate that I am not singling out homosexual orientation and conduct but have for a very long time tried to hold, understand and teach a perspective that all sexual immorality has the same attributes. I cannot convince you that what you have accepted from present culture is false. I will comment that it is lacking in logic: who are the B's and T's supposed to marry in this "marriage equality" paradigm? (Don't feel targeted. I ask the same question every time the President recites "LGBT" like some mindless mantra. I hope people realize that most politicians have not thought deeply about any of this but just go along or against the latest fads to be cool or contrarian.)
  I can ask you to keep your eyes open the next 50 years and see how all this social freedom and compulsory equality plays out. The culture is abandoning marriage as any kind of serious commitment and will soon abandon civil marriage as a burdensome inconvenience. The West is abandoning childbearing as a burdensome inconvenience. The culture will soon abandon parental responsibility for live children allowing the state or charities to assume all childrearing responsibility. This is not a healthy culture, no matter how cool it may get. None of that is a defense of the church's poor response to the cultural turmoil, but it does address the demands that the culture is making on the church. The church cannot comply with those demands any more than Paul could in Corinth. My hope is that confronting them will help the church think in a more scriptural way about all it's hangups and sinful indulgences and begin to look and act more like Jesus and Paul, who were murdered by the pagan, sexualized culture of the First Century.
  - Don Rubottom November 4, 2014 Reply
    
    Jeff, I apologize for the long-windedness of the above. I apologize for getting preachy. I have thought long and hard about these matters for years. I hope you can dismiss any preachy tone and discern how I think about these things as you stated you wanted to learn what others think.
    I did read the Wink article last night. I did not find it persuasive. Eisegesis, dismissals and speculative cultural contexts cannot successfully undercut the clear teaching of Scripture. It is cohesive and consistent from Gen. 1 to Rev. 22. It expands upon "leave and cleave" and "one flesh" and it reveals of the intimate and interpersonal nature of God's covenant love. The frequent Scriptural parallels between sexual immorality and idolatry and the application of "hard heartedness" to both broken communion with God and broken communion between spouses expand and clarify this revelation. The many allusions and references to fruitfulness, the clear teaching on faithfulness, these all explain WHY sexual immorality is antagonistic to God's Character. This is what I see in the whole of Scripture, read in the context of Scripture. It is not oppressive. It is gloriously liberating.
    Christians throughout the ages have attempted to make sex only about this life rather than the Love of God. That is where we first went wrong. All our confusing and angst today flow directly from that error. The Westminster Confession says marriage is "for the mutual comfort of the husband and wife". That is hogwash. Tell that to a man whose wife is in a coma. I embrace Catholic teaching about marriage except I believe it is a primordial sacrament, rather than a sacrament of the visible church. In Malachi 2 God says HE joins them together, not the congregation of the faithful. god joined Adam and Eve. God joined me and my wife. God joined you and your wife. And all so joined have the opportunity to experience the sacramental nature of the union in a life giving, God revealing covenant. May He be Glorified in our bodies.
    - Jeff Gill November 4, 2014
      
      Please don't feel bad about getting long-winded or preachy, Don! I have really appreciated this exchange and your gracious frankness throughout.
      
      I hope to have to time to reflect and write a proper reply Wednesday evening (UK time). I imagine it will be fairly short. I'm mostly out of things to say.
      
      Just two quick notes for now.
      
      — My dad didn't buy the Wink article either.
      
      — I love, love love the phrase 'primordial sacrament'. It shows both the divine gift and deep humanity of marriage. It reminds us that marriage doesn't belong to the church or the state. And because marriage is a primordial sacrament, I think it has a better future than you fear.
  - Jeff Gill November 5, 2014 Reply
    
    Don,
    
    I have used very broad brushstrokes to paint a picture of how I see evangelicalism addressing issues of sexuality, so it is inevitable that I have missed details, lacked nuance and misrepresented some people and individual churches. But I do think what I've written is a fairly accurate big picture.
    
    You asked about marriage equality for bisexual and transgender people. Basically they can do what heterosexual people do – live life, meet people, fall in love, get married (if they are legally allowed to). For bisexual people that means they will probably date both men and women until they meet the right person. Transexual people have a bit more figuring out to do and life for them seems to be a bit harder. But once they understand who they are, the process is the same as it is for everyone.
    
    You wrote that you are not singling out homosexuality. I am. This is the one area where we genuinely disagree. I don't think a person's natural sexual orientation is any more sinful than blue eyes or red hair. What people choose to do is an entirely different matter. Outside of an exclusive monogamous relationship of two people in love, things seem to get messed up pretty fast.
    
    Which leads me to what I've learned through this exchange.
    
    — Understanding takes work. I mean, I knew this, but taking the time to read and reread a lot of words, trying to understand a different viewpoint sympathetically and not so I can refute it – I experienced expending the energy to do this work. It's a richer kind of knowing.
    
    — it's easy to talk past each other. I've been frustrated a few times when you have inferred positions that I don't hold. (I imagine I did the same.) I have no doubt these misunderstandings could be cleared up with time and talking, but, at the risk of repeating myself ad nauseum, I wasn't really interested in putting my views forward other than defining the issue as I understand it. Initially, I think it is easy for people to talk at their idea of a person with an opposing view rather than the actual person they are talking with. It takes time and effort to get past this phase.
    
    — Time spent listening enables me to see the person, not merely their ideas.
    
    — Getting a taste of some Catholic theology about marriage was enriching and very interesting. (The only Catholics I've read so far are Raymond Brown and Richard Rohr, both of whom have benefitted me tremendously.)
    
    — I was afraid that when you asked me to share where I was coming from that my views on homosexuality would unleash a torrent of abuse. It didn't. I didn't expect rudeness from RG's regular commenters but thought shouting would emerge from somewhere. This speaks well of RG's readership.
    
    — I have a long way to go when it comes to learning how to listen well, but it is a really freeing feeling to converse with you knowing that I was not going to try to pick apart your points.
    
    — Other stuff. My brain is tired.
    
    Thanks, Don.
    - Don Rubottom November 5, 2014
      
      Jeff, thank you for your patience and respect. You are an excellent example for all of us to emulate. I confess to launching without listening carefully in many points and I ask your forgiveness. I am very grateful that you accepted my approach as not distinguishing homosexual from other sexual immorality. I am delighted that you are intrigued with some of what I offered.
      I must respond that it seems likely that many more believe themselves to be naturally oriented toward multiple partners, so any hope that marriage "equality" might end with state favoritism of monogamy just doesn't seem likely to me.
      The word "natural" can have a number of distinct meanings in light of Genesis 3.
      Allow me to leave you with a couple of my notions that might delight rather than crush your brain:
      -Marriage is a cure for lust like a banquet is a cure for gluttony.
      -In Genesis 2, when Adam saw Eve and got excited enough to recite poetry naming her "Isha", he took for himself a new name: "Ish". In Hosea 2:16, God says: "You will call me 'Ishi', you will no longer call me 'Baal' [Lord]."
      Blessing Brother. Thank you for the dialogue. May it continue into eternity when we will be forever learning the glories of Love.
A 1970's "big red notebook" alum November 3, 2014 Reply

I believe there is only one thing the church and Christians cannot overemphasize: Our Lord Jesus Christ! Many--if not most--debates ("quarreling over words," in Paul's words to Timothy) can be traced to overemphasizing some biblical truth to the neglect of some other biblical truth. But it is impossible to give Jesus too much glory! The only thing that I would add to David's original post is the reminder that the church's Book, especially the New Testament, reliably documents the message of Jesus. At the center is his crucifixion and resurrection, and his revelation of a loving Abba Father.
- rob war November 4, 2014 Reply
  
  I think there is a misconception out in Christianity that if we just only focus on Jesus, all these other issues and conflicts etc will go away. That view isn't even supported in the Bible. The apostles had conflicts among themselves even with Jesus being right there in person. Acts. records different conflicts and opinions throughout the book. Deacons were established to deal with conflicts. The first Counsel of Jerusalem was dealing with conflicts. Paul split from Barnabas over including Mark. The letters of St. Paul, St. John, James and Jude were all written dealing with issues and conflicts. It isn't a matter that if we all just focus on Jesus, we will all get along. Yes, we all should focus on Jesus but it is unrealistic to think that a lack of focus on Jesus is the cause of conflicts and issues.
  - A 1970's "big red notebook" alum November 4, 2014 Reply
    
    Great point, Rob. What a focus on Jesus Christ as Lord CAN do, at least for me, is to "relativize" all those other issues and conflicts. It makes them less important, not unimportant. And actually, we WILL one day "all get along," because Jesus will be in the room!
rob war November 4, 2014 Reply

thanks to Don and Jeff for an in-depth and mature exchange.
nicole gardner November 5, 2014 Reply

I'm fascinated by this exchange. RG is the only place I've ever witnessed people speaking their minds about their convictions without sounding like they're launching verbal attacks or even getting huffy. Fascinating. This seems like a safe place for me to learn how to interpret the Bible into faith to be lived out in the real world. Something I never learned in IBLP.
- rob war November 5, 2014 Reply
  
  That is a very sad statement but also a very hopeful one in that we should be able to discuss ideas and convictions and points of view in a mature Christ like fashion. There is freedom in this for all and hopefully for you the more steps you take, the stronger you become and then you can run in true freedom and grace.
- GuyS November 5, 2014 Reply
  
  Nicole Gardner, "Something I never learned in IBLP."
  
  Exactly. I never learned this in IBLP/ATI either, or from my home or various Churches. It is a new chapter in a life, when there is a give and take exchange with truth spoken in love. I am grateful RG makes room for us, as we make room for others. Very few places understand the wasteland many of us experienced.
  - J.B. November 7, 2014 Reply
    
    A few years ago, there was a guy I met in college named Chris. He was a missionary kid from Japan who was incredibly mature for his age and had some very unique (at least among our entire school) views on politics, theology, and other controversial issues. I didn't get to know him as well as I probably should have at the time, but what I'll always remember - and still see today whenever he surfaces on Facebook - is that he is very diplomatic among those with whom he disagrees. (I still have much to work on in that department!) He even facilitates discussions with people who stand on opposite sides of certain issues so that he can get to understand their point of view more, all the while establishing healthy boundaries within the discussion.
    
    Of course, we still disagree on plenty. But I can at least say with confidence that he would at least hear me out despite our disagreements because he tries to listen to understand, instead of listen to respond. It's such a far cry from the very fear-based defensive posture that IBLP (and much of the modern church in general) tends to advocate with respect to people who may think differently, even by a very slight margin. We were always told never to take any philosophy classes for fear of being exposed to those other belief systems. I'm thankful that even in human imperfection, God still finds ways to work.
    - GuyS November 8, 2014
      
      J.B. Great story about Chris. What a great way to be remembered.
      
      "...even in human imperfection, God still finds ways to work." It's wonderful how He does that.
nicole gardner November 8, 2014 Reply

Amen, amen, and amen! And the on-going dialogue here means there's continuing opportunity for these things without convos ending with any turned backs and stomping off.

Ha-ha, I'm glad I looked up the reference for Gothard's "be grateful FOR all things" [In his pastor's flock-beating instruction book if not also IBLP]. I see that the Bible says in a couple places to be grateful IN all things and to express gratitude directly to God FOR all things. (God never sins or tempts anyone to sin, so this is opposed to thanking or enabling an exploiter). So, as I'm thanking God IN my continuing circumstance of coming out of IBLP, I finally get up enough faith to thank HIM for having allowed it to His purpose. (But more so for getting me out).

And it's true; having been in and having come out means I've found RG! So it was worth it, after all! (Probably Gothard wouldn't want me thankful for RG, but I am, and it's a clear blessing not a hindrance).
- GuyS November 8, 2014 Reply
  
  Nicole Gardner, "...In his pastor's flock-beating instruction book..." Hahaha, I love this!

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