Dear Editor,
Imagine the following. You are a church leader. One day an active homosexual turns up; he says he is a Christian. He asks your opinion about it and wants to join the church. What do you say?
The pastoral response is just the same as for anyone else who claims to be a Christian, but lives a sinful lifestyle.
Suppose a young unmarried man comes to see you, he sleeps with many women. He says he is a Christian, that the church’s views are old-fashioned, as now contraception is available; and by criticising him they hurt his feelings, they are excluding him, and are not acting towards him with the love of Christ. ‘You are being judgmental’, he says.
Two young women are on holiday together, sunbathing on a beach. One points to an unsightly spot on her skin, and asks the other what she thinks. Her friend is a nurse and from her training knows the spot is cancerous and probably life-threatening. But she doesn’t want to upset her friend so she says: ‘Put some of this cream on, then it won’t notice.’ Is that really showing Christian love? Surely a Christian friend would tell the truth.
The truth is that fornication, according to the teaching of Jesus and the apostles, is a sin; and all sinners are under the wrath of God. But Jesus died for our sins, and if we repent, he will forgive us and give us a new heart and a new, pure, life.
I am just being honest with you. I am telling you the teaching of Jesus and the Bible. You don’t have to follow it if you don’t want to. I am not giving you a mere personal opinion, it has been the teaching of the church for 2000 years that sexual immorality is a serious sin. Jesus said: ‘No-one comes to God except through me’. If you want to find God, it may be a difficult road, but I will gladly help you on the way.
That is a good pastoral approach to any enquirer with a sinful lifestyle.
The issue today is whether homosexuality is or is not a sin. Even homosexuals admit that the Bible appears to condemn it; is there any evidence that God has changed his mind in the last 50 years?
Or is it that the secular world is putting pressure on Christians to change their minds about the authority of Jesus and the Bible?
Yours sincerely,
