It's here (actually it has been for a while) and the news headlines are impossible to ignore. Today, I tackled a story from Winston-Salem, NC and a church whose pastor has delcared "No weddings!" until gays can legally marry in the state with the blessing of the United Methodist Church.
This pastor is not alone. He is joined by a growing number of ordained and commissioned ministers who think that God got it wrong; that gay marriage is a matter of human rights.
First, let's settle that with a New Testament passage:
1 Timothy 1:9-11
New International Version (NIV)
9 We also know that the law is made not for the righteous but for lawbreakers and rebels, the ungodly and sinful, the unholy and irreligious, for those who kill their fathers or mothers, for murderers, 10 for the sexually immoral, for those practicing homosexuality, for slave traders and liars and perjurers—and for whatever else is contrary to the sound doctrine 11 that conforms to the gospel concerning the glory of the blessed God, which he entrusted to me.
Though I have taken it upon myself to study the Bible in three languages over a span of twenty-eight years, I think this set of verses is fairly clear. But, the following passage is the most alarming.
2 Timothy 4:3-4
New International Version (NIV)
3 For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. 4 They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.
That verse explains the pastor in North Carolina and hundreds, if not thousands, of other ministers around the nation. They have chosen to tickle the ears of their congregants; to preach a message that speaks to comfort, not conformity. Sadly, they have created their own "gospel" of one-size fits all faith. Christianity is about a grace that accepts each one as they are, but then challenges them to change.
Thus, the impasse on gay marriage. It is unnatural, it is unGodly, it is unbiblical and if you are part of a church that embraces the concept then you need to run.
