Into the Fire

. . . you just have to speak up. It’s a risk. Hot-button issues send emotions soaring. Doesn’t matter. Sometimes it’s wrong to remain non-committal and quiet.

It doesn’t matter who you know, how much you love them, how close you are to them, how you’ve come to “understand” them, some things can’t be justified and declared “okay”. Of course if you have no standard for measurement of conduct, morality, behavior, respect, then anything goes. Right? Without standards anything goes. This isn’t new. It’s always been this way. Cain killed Abel because Cain was cheap, jealous, angry, insincere, and selfish. He became murderous. Sodom and Gomorrah celebrated perversity in all kinds of sexual behaviors. People haven’t changed. The landscape changes, old religions get new names with similar practices, the culture goes back and forth even as technology roars to new achievements, but the state of man remains the same. Sinful.

I’m speaking specifically of homosexuality today. I admit it’s difficult for some of us to believe it’s on a par with promiscuous heterosexual behavior, but it is. It’s just lust in a different form. Those Christian men and women who struggle with either sin best not try to justify it because there’s no point. We’re all sinners. We can’t rationalize any of our depravity. Nor can we pretend it’s alright to continue in unrepentant behavior.

I would imagine a man who desires another man wonders why at some point? Same with a woman who desires a woman? Even speaking logically or biologically, it’s incongruous. In the year 57 A.D. Paul the Apostle wrote these impacting words as he was instructed by the Holy Spirit:

“The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
“For although they knew God, they neither glorified Him as God nor gave thanks to Him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.
“Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
“Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.
“Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed, and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they are senseless, faithless, ruthless. Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.” Romans 1:18-32 (NIV)

Could there be a more apt description of today? This is a current picture of mankind as a whole without God, without standards, without principles, with man-made goals and strivings. If you find these characteristics attractive in any way, you are hell-bent. These are not admirable traits in anyone. The worship of the earth as if man can determine its end or save it from disintegrating—it’s ludicrous and the arrogance is unequaled. The craving of homosexual marriage as if it’s “natural” and normal and the persecution waged against those who speak of it as perversion? The argument is unsustainable. The slaughter of unborn children disguised as some innate female right to murder the child conceived in them? Championed and uncompromised by the Democrat party? What could be more ruthless?

Is anyone else repulsed by men holding hands and kissing each other as lovers? With women looking longingly into each others’ eyes with one of them playing the male? Is there really any argument for this? It’s perversion.

Homosexual people are attractive, kind, decent, creative, lovable, skilled, professional, and every other complimentary description assigned to individuals. They happen to be sinners, too. Just like the rest of us. Their sin no greater than any of ours. But sin nonetheless.

I’m tired of hearing the unmarried Brad Pitt proclaiming his choice not to marry until all couples can marry. I’m tired of seeing photographs of a very disturbed young Lindsay Lohan cuddling up to her older female paramour who looks like a young boy. Does anyone see there’s something inherently wrong with all of this?

Sin is sin. It kills. Eventually. Worse than any drug or disease, it’s fatal for sure. Without Jesus, it condemns even into eternity. Jesus doesn’t care what horrid sin you’ve done: He forgives. What a deal! He was brutalized and killed so you don’t have to be. He’s our only hope of escaping an eternity of torment. But it remains a choice. Your choice. My choice.

“Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is here.” (Matthew 4:17) Your breath is the courtesy of God Almighty. Don’t waste it.

God, I pray for each one of us. I ask that we be sensitive to you, willing to change our lives, surrendering our sinful ways, desiring to be obedient to you and your design for us. With your help, Holy Spirit, we can draw closer to Jesus and be more like Him. We’re desperate for you, God. We truly are. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.