Homosexual Marriage

As we are studying through the book of Galatians, a few weeks ago, we came to Galatians 5:19, where Paul is speaking of the deeds of the flesh. And he says now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are, and then what follows is a whole catalog of evil telling us of what we're capable of in terms of our sinful flesh. And the first three sins on the list that Paul gives is immorality, impurity, and sensuality. Other things follow, but it's intriguing that Paul begins this list.

with sexual sins in the category of sexual sins, there is homosexuality, and there have been Some recent developments on the political front in our state and in our country and even in around the world, that have put this issue more in front of us, in recent days. And so we have asked, Mike, our associate pastor, if he would come and speak to us on, on this topic. So, Mike, why don't you come and let's welcome our brother. Am I on?

There we go. OK. yeah, the, the topic this morning is titled homosexual marriage. Why should we care?

What should we do? And as I address this topic, I'll just confess right out the gate that, while I've narrowed it, there's no way possible that you could cover all the different facets of this. We've tried to link on, if you go to our home page on the website and you look down below, there, there'll be a link that says, links related to this morning's message, and you click on that and there's going to be about 9 or 10 different resources that'll refer you to. And so I just encourage you to take advantage of that, because no doubt I am going to raise more questions this morning.

then I am going to answer. But I don't have to convince anyone this morning, I don't believe, of the relevance of this topic. We find ourselves today, in a country that is quote unquote, catching up with the rest of the world. The United States has been behind the times, so to speak, when it comes to civil rights issues for homosexuality or homosexual persons.

Europe is well beyond us. Brazil, Canada would be some of the countries that would be called progressive. In these issues, and many in America are wanting us to catch up with the rest of the world. If you are a teacher in the public school, you've no doubt had to confront this issue, perhaps having been asked to actually teach on this subject, the state curriculum.

If you're an employer, you've probably had to deal with the multicultural and sensitivity issues. If you're a student, perhaps you've been in classes that are trying to teach sensitivity and so on to this particular movement. I, in college a number of years ago, I'm getting lots of feedback. Are you guys getting it?

Lots of feedback. Is anybody up there? I was, when I was a student in college back in the late 80s, early 90s, I had a number of different professors that were gay or lesbian and openly so promoted that particular lifestyle in the classes at UCR right over here, you can actually minor in lesbian, gay, bisexual, intersexual, transgender studies. If, no doubt, many of you have talked to a number of people in the congregation that have family members, either immediate or extended, that have struggled with homosexual desire or are in the homosexual community, neighbors, our next door neighbor, we've brought, a little girl to Iwanana a number of times and her her, her, mother is an open, lesbian.

So it's, it's out there. We've even had a handful of counseling situations right here in the church of people dealing with homosexual desire, really wanting to fight it. We've had people who have actually been, we've had at least one instance of church discipline where later the person was actually restored. You can look out in the culture and see movies and TV.

not just adult films, but even children's films. It's surprising how prevalent children's films have this topic. You can even, a film, a soccer film that's geared towards children, Bend It Like Beckham has a cross-dressing a child in it. It's a big theme of the film.

remember the Titans, one of the big themes or subplots of the film is whether the quarterback is straight or gay and so on. And And there's a scene of male kissing in, in a Disney film. Sesame Street has lots of subtle messages. To try to communicate an openness to two fathers or to two mothers.

And so, and there's lots of conflict over this issue. There are many people that believe that the church is behind the times. There are many Christians that believe that the church is behind the times. And so we need to address this issue.

Now, we're going to try to answer two questions, but I want to just give you a couple of preface comments before we get into the meat of the matter. Am I still, there we go. Do I need to stay on this now? Am I honest OK.

Is that better? Not happening. OK. John MacArthur, pastor of Grace Community Church, Several years ago, I received a phone call from a man named David Chastain.

He called and said, I'm in a hospital and I need you to come see me. And John MacArthur went to see this individual. As soon as, as soon as he walked in, he knew that this was a man that was dying of AIDS. his friends were all around him that were evidently homosexual.

And MacArthur walked up to the bed, and the man grasped his hand and said, quote, I have lived a homosexual life for over 20 years. I've, I was raised in a Christian family and a Christian home, in a Christian church, and I know the gospel. And I've rejected it and hated it all my life. Now I'm going to die from AIDS and I don't want to go to hell.

Can you help me? And MacArthur said, of course it can. He began to share with him the gospel of Jesus Christ. And that room was empty in 10 seconds.

He shared the gospel of Jesus Christ with David. David received the Lord, and John had the opportunity to disciple him for 5 days, and then he died, and went on to be with the Lord. And I appreciate John MacArthur's ministry in this respect that he speaks the truth, but he's been involved in love and compassionate ministry. He's not just someone that stands in the pulpit and talks about the truth of the matter.

He's also out there ministering to people that are suffering and dying in this problem. And we need to keep several tensions in mind, biblical tensions as we look at a subject like this, we need to speak the truth in love. We need to have biblical convictions, but gospel compassion. we need to be salt and light, but also recognize that we're citizens of another country.

There's lots of confusion in the church these days, even in the emergent church, which we won't go into questioning whether this is even a problem or not. But without apology, We start with the Bible. The Bible is our authority. Without the Bible, we really would not know anything any better than anybody in the world.

Most people in the world scientifically are trying to figure out. They're looking at nature. They're trying to do scientific studies to look at a fallen world to determine what is normal. There's a big problem before the fall, you could do scientific studies and find out what is normal and natural.

After the fall, all scientific studies are post fall studies. And so any conclusions you come to are going to be. problematic. But we look at the Bible, God has given us revelation about love and marriage and His glory, and we want to think Christianly about these things.

We come at it from a biblical worldview. Now, if you're sitting here this morning, and you are struggling with homosexuality, or you are practicing homosexual, I just want to communicate to you that the Lord Jesus Christ has died for you and that he loves you. There are some things I'm going to say this morning that you might think are cruel, and you might even classify them as hate speech. But friends, many times will wound friends in order to heal them.

And I would just plead with you to listen this morning if you're Listening here, or if you're listening on the internet, to at least give me 40 minutes to talk to you about God's love and God's truth on this issue. Two questions we want to answer, why should we care? And what should we do? Why should we care first of all?

Why should we care about homosexual marriage? If it doesn't really bother me, if it doesn't bother the people in my, the walls of my house, why should it be a concern? I'm still free to practice my faith. I'm still free to believe what I believe.

Why should I worry about what others are believing and what others are doing? Well, I think there's 3 reasons why we should care from a biblical worldview, and number 1 is because the glory of God is inextricably linked to the topic of sexuality and marriage. It does not start. We don't start by talking about homosexuality and homosexual marriage.

We start by talking about the glory of God. God is the one that has created the world, and he is moving this world towards a purpose, towards his own glory. And one day it will all come to an end. And everything will glorify Him in one way or another.

We have been created in the image of God, the Bible reveals, and we have the ability to know that we are made for His glory. The Bible gives us a lot to say on the subject. Look at Genesis chapter 2, if you would. If you don't have a copy of the Bible, there's one in the, in the chair in front of you or next to you, or you could look on the screen behind me.

Genesis 2. Starting at verse 18, I want to just point out a couple of verses here in this section. Where God is the Creator and the inventor. of sexuality and marriage.

Verse 18. Then the Lord God said, it is not good for man to be alone. God is the one that pronounced that it was not good for man to be alone. He says, I will make him a helper suitable for him.

And then God, the story, he brings all the animals before Adam, and there's not a helper suitable for Adam. And so God puts Adam asleep, and he takes a rib out of his flesh, and he forms a woman and brings the woman to the man. And then Adam says, this is bone on my bone, flesh of my flesh. And then in verse 24, we have a Holy Spirit inspired commentary on this section.

For this cause. A man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. In its original design. of marriage.

God is the one that initiated the fact that he did not want Adam to be alone. God is the one that created someone different from Adam, God very easily could have created someone the same, but he created other. God is the one that by inspiration, he gives us this Holy Spirit application and says a man shall leave his father, male, and mother, female, and shall cleave to his wife, female, and they shall be one flesh. Gender is a part of the goodness of God's creation.

We do not need the same, but we need other and general revelation has been clear on this. When you look at cultures throughout the world, even in a fallen world, the vast majority of cultures have ascribed to heterosexual marriage. Now, in a fallen world, you would expect aberrations. But it's interesting that even in a fallen world, even though the image of God has been marred, most peoples ascribe to heterosexual marriage.

And we must be careful not to talk about sex without talking about it in the context of marriage. The moment we talk about sex without talking about in the context of marriage, we move into irrationality. Sex only makes sense in the biblical worldview and connection within the frame of marriage. God's glory is seen in the creation of marriage, and the rest of Genesis plays out the departure from that original design.

In 12 chapter 12 of Genesis, you have adultery. In chapter 19, you have incest and sodomy, and chapter 34, you have rape, and 38, you have prostitution, and then you have polygamy. The rest of Genesis is just the decline of what God had done by nature. Pre-fall Turn to Romans chapter one.

We looked at Genesis 2, because the glory of God is inextricably linked to the topic of sexuality and marriage, we must care about this issue. In Romans 1, we see a New Testament passage that harkens back to the same material, and you're going to see that the same material in Genesis comes up over and over and over again. And starting in verse 18, Paul says, the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. So the topic here is not particularly homosexuality.

The topic is all unrighteousness that includes you and me. To suppress the truth and unrighteousness, verse 19, because that which is known about God is evident within them, for God made it known to them. How did God make it known when, for since the creation of the world is invisible attributes, eternal power to my nature have been clearly seen. And so on.

Verse 22, professing to be wise. Adam and Eve wanted to be wise, they disobeyed the Lord, they took the fruit, they became fools. We have been complicit in their sin, we have committed our own sins, we have become fools in verse 23, in exchange the glory for the incorruptible of the incorruptible God for the image in the form of corruptible man. This is the great exchange.

We wanted Wisdom, we didn't want it God's way. And we exchange the glory of God for what corruptible man, we exchange God for us, we exchange God for our own rule. We don't want things the way he's made it. We want things the way we've made it.

And so therefore, you have 3 different times in this text where God gave them over, gave them over and gave them over. Verse 24, therefore, God gave them over in their lusts of their hearts and impurity. that their bodies may be dishonored among them. God decreed to give us over as a people, so that we would put on display this drama of what has happened in our hearts.

That is, we exchange the glory of God for corruptible man. And so God turns us over, turns mankind over to its own way. We exchanged the truth of God for a lie. And we began to worship the creature rather than the Creator.

And for this reason, God gave them over to create to degrading passions. Now, here's the first place where Paul now begins to turn the subject towards homosexuality. And he's using homosexuality here as an example of this, this totality, this, this thing that has happened to all mankind. He gave them over to degrading passions, for their women exchange the natural, that's pre-fall function for that which is unnatural post fall.

And in the same way, also, the men abandon the natural function of the woman and burden their desires towards one another, men with men committing what is indecent, and so on. Just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind to do the things which are not proper. And so you realize that we're not just talking about homosexuality, verse 29, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malicious, so on and so forth.

You look at the whole list.

Is there anyone who does not escape? No, not one. We've all corrupt, we've all vile. We've all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

Verse 32, and although they know the ordinance of God, And that those who practice such things are worthy of death. They not only do them, but are also, they give hearty approval to those who do them. Folks, this is not a passage about homosexuality. This is a passage about the fall of mankind.

All of us are included in this section of scripture. Homosexuality is merely circled and pointed out as an illustration of what has happened to us all. We have all exchanged the truth for the lie. And God by sovereign decree, turned mankind over and by sovereign decree, allowed a certain percentage of mankind to put on this drama of homosexuality so that we could look at it and see with the the patheticness of our own hearts, that we've exchanged the glory of God for Ourselves.

We didn't want other, we wanted same, we wanted to rule ourselves. And so homosexuality is a sovereign decreed drama that demonstrates all of our total depravity. That's what Paul is directing us towards. Now there are those That would try to undercut passages like this, like termites in a mound with nodding heads and itching ears.

They come up with other interpretations, and you can read about some of those other interpretations online or you can check out if there's any left. There's some pamphlets out at the information booth that give you some more of the details of the exegesis of this passage and some of the rebuttals to homosexual exegies. But you guys know how to read a letter. And you guys know how to read plain language.

If a friend of yours writes you a letter and says, I love you, I miss you, please forgive me. You don't interpret that as saying, I hate you, stay out of my life. what the authorial intent was. And when just normal people who are trying to get the plain sense of the text, look at this verse, they know what it means.

It takes about 6 to 8 years of college and upper division courses to get all that common sense out of you. Take a look at again, some of these messages online to get more into the details of that. So why should we care? Because the glory of God is inextricably linked to the topic of sexuality and marriage.

We see it in Genesis 2, Romans 1. Those are just two examples. But secondly, we should care about this issue because the person of Christ is inextricably linked to the topic of sexuality and marriage. The person of Christ.

Marriage. was created by God. to be a universal, transcultural depiction of Christ's love for his people, both in the Old and the New Testament. Let me say that again, marriage was created by God.

To be a universal, transcultural depiction of Christ's love for his people. Look at Ephesians 5. Ephesians 5, starting in verse 22. Paul says, wives be subject to your own husbands.

I want you to notice how much Paul talks about the church and Christ here. Verse 23, husband, the husband's the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church. Verse 24, but as the church is subject to Christ, also the wives ought to be their own husbands. Look at verse 27, that he might present himself, the church and all her glory, having no spot, wrinkle or any such thing.

Look at verse 31, for this cause, for what cause? A man shall leave his father and mother. We're back to Genesis 2 and shall cleave to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is great.

Paul says, but I am speaking with reference to Christ. In the church This raises an interesting question, which came first in the sovereign decree of God? Was Paul just picking up a cool analogy to get husbands to love their wives, and wives to submit to husbands? No, God had decreed to give to Christ the people.

And in his sovereignty, he created marriage between a man and a woman to showcase the son and the bride. Not just Christian marriages, all marriages. Therefore, any departure from the God-ordained picture found in marriage, the way God designed it is of necessity iconoclastic. That is, it shatters the ordained image established by God and robs Christ of His glory.

Marriage was created by God to be a universal, transcultural depiction of Christ's love for his people. Marriage matters. And Christ affirmed the will of God for marriage. In Matthew 19.

Some folks say that Christ didn't really have anything to say about the subject of heterosexual or homosexual marriage. Look at Matthew 19:4. Jesus says, have you not read? That he who created them from the beginning, made them male and female, we're back to Genesis 2 again.

And he said, therefore, a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. So they are no longer one, but they're no longer two, but one. But therefore, God is joined together, let no man separate. Christ affirms what is said in the Old Testament about the creation of marriage.

He affirms this. The question can be honestly asked, why didn't Jesus say anything specifically against homosexuality? You can read Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and you won't see Jesus address that subject anywhere. And some have supposed that because Christ doesn't address it, then it's carte blanche approval.

Of that particular choice. It's an honest question. I want to give it an honest answer with 3 responses. First, we see here in Matthew 19 that Christ affirmed, the created order established in the Old Testament.

In fact, he puts a stamp of approval on the whole law in other places in Chapter 5. Which strictly condemned homosexual practices. In fact, we would contend that Jesus is the author of the Old Testament. Secondly, there are many subjects that Jesus did not talk about in his visit to the earth.

In his first Advent, he didn't talk about incest. He didn't talk about rape that we know of. He didn't talk about bestiality. Just because Jesus doesn't mention something or it's not recorded in the pages of the Gospels, that does not mean it's OK.

The only alternative to heterosexual marriage Jesus spoke of was celibacy. And he gives celibacy a real good marking, as Paul does, the single life. Thirdly, since Christ's ministry was primarily to Israel, There would have been almost no reason for the subject to be addressed since Jews abhorred the practice. Paul, on the other hand, who ministered to Gentiles, had much to say about the issue.

And with that, as we look at the glory of God and the person of Christ, I think we can come to a definition. A biblical definition of marriage, which is this marriage is one woman. And one man Becoming one flesh by covenant and sexual union. This is a, a good summary of what the Bible says.

And if no one believed it, On the planet It would still stand. Because this is what God has revealed. He is the originator. He is the creator.

Therefore, from a biblical perspective, there really is no such thing as homosexual marriage in the eyes of God. The Bible defines homosexual behavior as dishonorable, shameless, and contrary to nature and Romans. On the other hand, the Bible says that marriage is to be held in honor. Marriage does not produce shame.

Marriage is not contrary to nature. There's therefore no such thing as homosexual marriage in the eyes of God. No matter what the state May say So we should care about this issue because the glory of God is all tied up in it. The person of Christ.

is tied up and linked to the topic of sexuality and marriage. But thirdly, We should care about this because the well-being of humankind. is inextricably linked to the topic of sexuality and marriage. The well-being of you, your children, your family, your neighbors, is inextricably linked to the topic of sexuality and marriage in the Bible, God created us in His image.

He created us to reflect his glory, and to live joyfully in relation to Him. He desires our well-being. He's not willing that any should perish. But there's something in humankind.

There's something in all of us since the fall that is prone towards the destruction of that image and driven towards self destruction. And Satan has ever been willing to assist us in the ruin of our well-being, has he not? Sexuality plays a major role on the pages of scripture, and heaven and hell hang in the balance. God lays before us well-being, life, He also lays before us death.

He lays before us well-being, blessing. And cursing, he's not willing that any should perish. But the reality is what we do with our bodies will put a drama, it will put a display on before the world of what is going on in our hearts. And so sexuality and marriage matters for every, the well-being of every human being on the planet.

Consider Deuteronomy 22. You don't have to turn here, but without even talking about the subject necessarily of sex. The the Torah. says this, a woman shall not wear man's clothing, nor shall a man put on a woman's clothing.

For whoever does these things is an abomination to the Lord your God. When you see the word abomination anywhere in the Bible, that doesn't have to do with well-being. That has to do with the opposite. And God is trying to, because he loves us, he's trying to push us towards wellbeing, and, and to get us away from that death curse stuff.

Some seek to destroy God's image and thus themselves and their own well-being by the way that they dress. We call that in today's language a transvestite. This is not the idea of women can't wear pants. Back in the Old Testament days, everybody wore skirts, right?

Everybody wore robes, you just, but you knew how a man, a man's robe and a woman's robe. It's actually very common all throughout pagan history for people to cross dress, depending on the deity you were worshiping. If you're worshiping a female deity, it was very common to dress up like a female. If you're worshiping a male deity, you dress up like a male, and cross dressing was very common in pagan times.

Today it's very popular. You, don't have to watch MTV for long to realize that bands like to cross dress. Nirvana was one of those bands that crossdressed in their videos and made it somewhat popular. I don't know the name of the band, but there was a band years ago that the whole video was just about a guy cross dressing.

It was about shoplifting and, and cross dressing. I can't remember the name of the band. Brothers and sisters, this hampers, Our well-being God calls it an abomination, but there is still hope. There is hope for those that have fallen into this, Trap, and we'll talk about the hope here a little bit later.

Leviticus 18, Gets a little more specific. You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female. It is an abomination. God talks about how if the Israelites do what the previous peoples had done, they will be spit out of the land.

And so you see that it's not just something God's not just concerned about Israel, but he's actually spitting the Canaanites out of the land for their abominations. He's concerned about this worldwide. Some seek to destroy God's image and thus themselves in their own well-being by reversing the sexual order from different to sameness, from difference to sameness. Instead of looking at the woman God gave the man, he looks in a mirror.

Instead of looking at the man God gave the woman, she looks in a mirror. We twist and distort God's design as a form of iconoclastic self-destruction. You could even talk in the old, we're not going to have time for this, but you can talk in the Old Testament about, ancient sex changes where people would make themselves eunuchs for the sake of their deity. It's happening.

It's happened for hundreds, hundreds of years. It's happening today. People will destroy the image. They're not happy with the way God has made them.

You have hope, even in the Book of Acts, remember the Ethiopian eunuch? what a eunuch is. Yeah, this, this Ethiopian eunuch, probably not by his own self-determination, his parents had probably offered him to the queen to be of service as early as 9 or 10 years old, and he would have been castrated and, and brought into the service of the queen and would have lived in a more effeminate type of way. And he is the one that the Holy Spirit calls Philip to approach.

And what passage does he, is he reading? He's reading in the book of Isaiah. And if you take time to look at Isaiah 56, Isaiah 56 talks about how eunuchs can be invited back into the people of God. And so he reads about the gospel and he is saved that day.

Look at 1 Corinthians 6. 1 Corinthians 6, Paul. Writing to Christians. Says, do you not know that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God?

Do not be deceived, neither fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, effeminate homosexuals, nor thieves, nor covetous drunkards, revilers, nor swindlers shall inherit the kingdom of God. These folks that go on in this pattern of life without repentance will not inherit the Kingdom of God. The good news in verse 11 is such for some of you. Paul is, is writing to a group of people who were fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, homosexuals, thieves, covets, drunkards, so you'd like to be in that church.

Well, you are. You're sitting around them. What's interesting though is in context Paul is writing this section of scripture to people who have been washed but who have been tempted to go back to some of their old ways. If you read what's going on in the earlier parts of chapter 6, these are people who are starting to revert back to their old ways and so he has to remind them, hey, remember, this is what people get judged for.

Remember you were washed, so he reminds them of fear and the gospel, the law and the gospel. And compels them to go forward. So in the Corinthian church, I don't think this is too far stretched, there would have been a homosexual person, no doubt, who had been saved and had been initially washed and had come into the church, but then perhaps had been tempted back with that lust for lifestyle and Paul has to come and say, Hey, you've been washed from that, knock it off. Or other types of sins.

And so we should care. About this issue, because people all around us are going to heaven or hell. And they are putting on display the great exchange in their heart. They've either exchanged the glory of God for the lie, and they're displaying that with what they do with their body.

Or they've come back to the God of the universe, and they've submitted to his rule in their life, and to his order. And so we should care about these people, we should care about the person and glory of Christ, we should care about the glory of God. But what should we do? What should we do in these days?

Especially where we see the rise of Of this movement, this ideology. In the early 90s, the statistics were saying that about 2.8% of men were participate, had participated in homosexual activity, less than 2% of women had participated in homosexual activity. Brothers and sisters, that's going up. It's no longer where it was.

It's increasing much more rapidly among women. And as it becomes more and more chic, more and more cool, the devil has a lot of tricks to to bind people into This thing, what should we do? Well, I want to lay out a list of three things that comes from Joe Dallas of Exos International, a wonderful organization that ministers to people that are coming out of homosexuality, who have already come out of it. I commend their website to you.

but in answering this question, what should we do? I really love, I'm gonna paraphrase what he says. Number one, he's talking to the church here. We must continually and corporately repent of all forms of immorality.

That's the first thing we need to do. Before we sign the petition, before we vote, before we carry a sign, We must repent. of our own sin. We must continually repent.

Why continually? Because we are all totally depraved down to our fingertips. And sin is still indwelling. There is not one of us in this room that does not have some inclination against the glory of God.

You can have been born again for 50 years, and there's still a part of your heart that is inclined to go the other direction. And so we need to repent every day. And we need to repent corporately, not just privately. We, we have a common burden and responsibility for the sins of one another.

We must continually incorporately repent of all forms of immorality. If George Barna's assessment Of a 50% divorce rate among Christians is correct. If Christianity Today's assessment Of the 10% of Christian men surveyed who evidence sexual or symptoms of sexual addiction, If they're correct that 3 out of 10 pastors surveyed use internet pornography. If they're correct that the scandals, just the scandals that we've seen in evangelical leadership over the past two decades.

If that's any indication of what's going on in the evangelical community broadly, then where lies our moral authority to speak. To the homosexual. Where is our authority? Imagine a severely overweight man dressed in spandex shorts.

If you want to get a little concept of this, look at our picture directory of me. It's a little bit dated. And, I have lost some weight since then. But imagine me.

Dressed in spandex shorts, shirtless. With a potbellied glory, selling workout equipment on a televised infomercial, one of those gazelles. Saying this stuff works. You got to buy this.

nobody would, nobody would buy that. Nobody will buy that. Yeah, scorched on the back of my retina. Jesus more, can you ask that from the internet version?

Jesus warned us to remove the log from our own eye before addressing someone else's speck. Not only does it prevent hypocrisy, it enhances credibility. We must, if we're going to deal with this issue, we must exult in marriage. We must win simply, happily exult in marriage, husband and wives loving one another, men leading, wives submitting.

Dads need to take time to invest in the development of biblical masculinity in their boys and biblical femininity in their girls. Dads have the greatest influence. And to help you with that, we've got a book out at the information booth by John Piper. What's the difference?

I want to encourage you guys to pick that up. If somebody wants to buy it for me, this one for me after the message. Men in the church need to help single mothers. If, if men, adult men have the greatest influence on developing the sexuality of children, then those that are single mothers need help, right?

From the church. We need to administer To those To those in our midst who are victims of sexual sin, molestation, abuse, We need to minister to each other. In our own struggles with all kinds of sexual sins and brokenness. Heterosexual lust, homosexual lust, immodest dress.

Coarse joking, pornography. Masturbation Fornication Adultery Robbing our spouses of what is rightfully and biblically theirs. Exposing our children to sin sights and thoughts because we want to be entertained. We need to flee to the cross.

Laying down our idols, cry out for mercy to the Lord, Lord God, we are sorry. For robbing you of your glory, Lord Jesus, forgive us for exchanging the beauty of marriage and the purity of singleness for garbage. Forgive us for spilling and wasting our energy on things that you hate. Forgive us for robbing one another.

Of our gifts, gifts that go unused because we are wracked with guilt and secret sin. It's only when we first repent of immorality that we can then begin to deal with these other struggles, right? That people in our culture are having. Secondly, we must continually and corporately repent of all forms of hostility.

Hostility towards homosexual people. A lot of us in the church have adopted the Jonah syndrome. It's like God has told us to minister to the outcast and the poor and the sinners, the prostitutes. And the Lord called Jonah to go to Nineveh, and he ran the other way and he gets a whale and spits them out on the sand, and then he's not really excited about that, and he just says, Well, God's going to judge you in 40 days.

And then he goes outside the city and he gets a front row seat waiting for God's judgment. And then when God doesn't burn them all, he gets ticked off and starts pouting about it. And that's, unfortunately, the way we can be towards the sin of homosexuality, the Jonas syndrome. God is calling us to reach out to these folks that are trapped.

In sin and crying out for help, and we're running the other way. I was reading a testimony this week of a man who slowly came out of the homosexual lifestyle. And it was largely because of two women. The first gal spent 5 months of friendship, inviting him weekly to come to church, befriending him and ministering to him.

And then he made a profession and then fell back into it and got caught up in all kinds of crazy stuff. And then another gal came in his life, spent about 5 or 6 months of friendship, didn't give up on him. And finally the Lord got a hold of his heart. Two gals who could have very easily said, yuck, I'm not going to do that.

And I'm not going to go there. And now this guy is, Heading towards heaven. A pastor named Ed Dobson, conservative evangelical, began, who used to be a, a, a member of the Moral Majority in the 1980s, began ministering to AIDS patients and the gay community in his area, started finding out about this, and they began attending his services regularly. Not because they really wanted to change their mind.

They just want to hear what this guy had to say. And when he had an opportunity to preach on sexuality, he preached the Bible. He welcomed him and he preached the word of God and he saw. Some of these folks come to know Christ.

I'd encourage you to read the statement by Bethlehem. Baptist, Bethlehem's position on homosexuality that's in your bulletin sometime, I would really commend this to you as an excellent resource that is very well balanced, I believe, on this issue. But thirdly, and we'll end with this. What should we do?

We must continually and corporately repent of all immorality, of hostility, but we must continually and corporately repent of all forms of cowardice. The church must repent of being intimidated by the gay rights movement and reassert her prophetic role. That's a quote from Joe Dallas, former homosexual. There are things that are going on right now in our country that are very, and in the world that are very intimidating.

And some Christians are, some of the wackos you see on the news channels that they always seem to pick up. And then, and then some of us are just backing away and, and going undercover and hiding out, hoping it'll all just go away. And, It's, it's not going to go away. In Maine, Maine is having a similar political battle right now.

An initiative campaign to repeal Maine's gay rights laws and to put in place roadblocks to gay marriages and adoptions was abandoned this last week because they couldn't get 15,000 signatures. And the reason they couldn't get 15,000 signatures because a gay rights activist group was at all the different polling places basically telling people they were homophobic, homophobic and bigots if they signed the The same. So, they've, they've abandoned that cause in Maine. We need to love the sinner, but in a democratic society where we're a government of the people, for the people, we have a right to speak, and also, as part of the church, we have a prophetic role to play, like John the Baptist played before King Herod said you should not have your brother's wife.

And he was a righteous man and so Herod wouldn't mess with him at first, and in fact, Herod liked him. And would listen to him and he was Kinda, kinda tripped out on the guy until Herodias got her, her thing. But we're called to do the John as a church to do the John the Baptist thing. We need to love, we need to stand in the culture while we still have the rights to speak and to vote and to sign petitions to do so with love, to stand for marriage, and it's not contradictory to say that this is a sin and still love the sinner.

It may seem contradictory to them, but are we, are we ready to stand up? In our world right now, James Dobson, his messages when they're piped into Canada, they have to be severely edited of any homophobic comment or hate speech, otherwise, the radio stations will be fined severely. There's a pastor in Canada that was last week fined $7000 for hate speech and for saying nothing more than what I'm saying this morning. The new president in Brazil is the first president who has ever hosted a, a campaign or a big conference dealing with the homophobic issues, and if he has his way, he will criminalize all speech against homo homosexuals.

He will throw in jail anybody that speaks out, whether religious or not. that speak out against this. And, in the gay and lesbian sites this week, they're heralding this as a tremendous triumph and hoping that it spreads across the world. You can read many incidences of things that are happening right here in the United States that are severely restricting freedom of speech, and we need to be willing to stand up lovingly, to stand for the truth, do the best we can to love homosexuals more than homosexuals, love homosexuality.

To help them see that they're not bound to biological determinism, that they can make choices. All of us are fallen. Every one of us probably has a gene that's hurting us in some way anger and lust and this and that. We're all messed up.

But that doesn't excuse our sin. So these are the things that brothers and sisters that we are being called to. I want to end with this story from John MacArthur. Years ago, a man named Robert Lagerstrom.

A leader of the LA gay pride parade, contracted AIDDS, was ready to die. He talked to one of his friends and said, I'm afraid to die. What should I do? His friend said, go to that John MacArthur church.

I hear that guy's pretty cool. And so he went to the Grace Community Church and John MacArthur read a psalm from 107, and there was a verse in that psalm that really hit this guy, and he never heard another word of the sermon. In fact, he couldn't wait till MacArthur stopped preaching, and he came up to MacArthur afterwards. He said, How come you preach so long?

I'm ready to receive Christ and get born again. And that guy received the Lord, and it turned out that his house was right on the, on the, the strip of where they had the gay rights parade. And when he was in there dying, last few days of his life, all of his friends came through to try to talk to him and he just gave the gospel to every last one of them. We speak the truth about the sin in order that we might speak the truth about The savior What are we Excuse me, what are we prepared to do?

God has not promised that the, the culture, That the United States experiment is supposed to last. this is very unique. What we got going on here in the past 300 years is unique in human history. And it may not last.

But what? God will go on. His truth will go on, and the church will go on. I'd like to ask all of us to stand and we're going to pray a prayer.

Instead of our closing song, The prayer of repentance. We've talked about a lot of issues this morning. Just let the Holy Spirit minister to you wherever you happen to be convicted this morning. I want to ask the congregation to read the words that are yellow behind me, and I'll read the other words, and let's pray.

Oh God of grace, you have imputed our sins to our substitute. And have imputed His righteousness to our souls, clothing us each with a bridegroom's robe, decking us with jewels of holiness. Why then do we live as if still in rags? We have no robe of our own to cover our sins, no fabric to weave our own righteousness.

We seem always to be standing in filthy garments and by grace are always receiving chains of raiment. For you do always justify the ungodly. We seem always to be going into the far country, and always returning home as prodigals, always saying, Father, forgive us. And you are always bringing forth the best robe.

Every morning, let us wear it. Every evening, return in it, go out on the day's work in it, be married in it, be wrapped in death in it, sand before the great white throne in it. Enter heaven in its shining as the sun. Grant us never to lose sight of the exceeding sinfulness of sin, the exceeding righteousness of salvation, the exceeding glory of Christ, the exceeding beauty of holiness, the exceeding wonder of grace, in the name of Christ, our substitute, we pray.

Amen. You may be seated. Amen. Guys, let's express our appreciation to our brother.

thank you, Mike, and please, take advantage of the, the links that we have,