Christians have hope. We know that we are loved: created by God, died-for by Jesus Christ. When we placed our trust in Jesus, our sins were forgiven. In Christ we are a new creation, freed from guilt and condemnation. God made our spirits alive so that we could now have fellowship with Him. Our lives have purposes: to honor God and to walk in the good works He prepared for us. After this life, we will spend eternity alive again with our Savior, delivered from sin and pain and death.
There are those who do not have this hope. They feel the void from rejecting the love of God. But God is still offering. He offers forgiveness, fellowship, purpose, and eternal life. Then God commissioned us to spread the good news of this offer.
People who lack this hope face serious consequences. Every day they live in rebellion against God, multiplying their sins against Him. This wickedness has consequences now and forever. When life is hard, they want to give up. Many do, and take their own lives. And as they pass from this life, they enter an eternity of punishment for their sins.
“Brethren, if anyone among you wanders from the truth, and someone turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save a soul from death and cover a multitude of sins.” – James 5:19-20
“Men, why are you doing these things? We also are men with the same nature as you, and preach to you that you should turn from these useless things to the living God, who made heaven, the earth, the sea, and all things that are in them.” – Acts 14:15
It is unloving to do nothing as these people continue in sin and hopelessness. To endorse or honor their sin is the least loving thing you could do. It offers them no way out, and demonstrates your own lack of faith in the God whose character and glory are being betrayed. But love must be our motive in speaking to the unsaved: love for them, and love for God.
“But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear.” – 1 Peter 3:15
“Let your gentleness be known to all men; the Lord is at hand.” – Philippians 4:5
“So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath; for the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God. Therefore lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.” – James 1:19-21
“And a servant of the Lord must not quarrel but be gentle to all, able to teach, patient, in humility correcting those who are in opposition, if God perhaps will grant them repentance, so that they may know the truth, and that they may come to their senses and escape the snare of the devil, having been taken captive by him to do his will.” – 2 Timothy 2:24-26
“Walk in wisdom toward those who are outside, redeeming the time. Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer each one.” – Colossians 4:5-6
Humility and grace go together. Humility recognizes that we also would stand guilty before God, but for the merciful sacrifice of Jesus on the cross in our place. We have received God’s grace, and know that for the lost to receive God’s grace as well is their only hope.
But I am writing today primarily to admonish you all to take a stand against the “unfruitful works of darkness” which are the causes for the “wrath of God [coming] on the sons of disobedience.” We as followers of Jesus Christ need to take a stand in two ways: first, in our own lives, to strive for holiness even as He who called us is holy; second, in our witness to others. Christians do not need to compromise with the enemies of God in order to offer hope. There is no hope offered when we tolerate the sins separating men from their God.
“And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of those things which are done by them in secret. But all things that are exposed are made manifest by the light, for whatever makes manifest is light. Therefore He says: ‘Awake, you who sleep, Arise from the dead, And Christ will give you light.’ See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is.” – Ephesians 5:11-17
“Therefore put to death your members which are on the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. Because of these things the wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience, in which you yourselves once walked when you lived in them.” – Colossians 3:5-7
“But fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness, let it not even be named among you, as is fitting for saints; neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor coarse jesting, which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks. For this you know, that no fornicator, unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ
"Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God kingdom of God
Finally, as you may have guessed by my title, I am addressing a specific situation in which many Christians are being tempted to honor sin or endorse lifestyles of rebellion against God. The names we have for these lifestyles today are not found in the Bible. But the Bible is clear in its reproach against what is today called Homosexuality, also “Gay”, “Lesbian,” “Bi-sexual,” and “Trans-gender.”
As you can read above, in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, being “effeminate” is a sin against God for which exclusion from the Kingdom of God
In the Old Testament political laws for the nation of Israel USA
"Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination… For whosoever shall commit any of these abominations, even the souls that commit them shall be cut off from among their people." – Leviticus 18:22, 29
"If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them." – Leviticus 20:13
Lest you be unconvinced that all forms of homosexuality are still abominations to God and sins against Him, read what Paul wrote to the Romans (in the New Testament, after Jesus had risen from the dead):
“Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.
“For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due.
“And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to do those things which are not fitting; being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil-mindedness; they are whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful; who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them.” – Romans 1:24-32
Over the past decade or so, the world has been told that a person’s “sexual orientation” is something he or she was born with. I agree that people may be “born that way,” but only in this sense: that all men were born with a sin nature, spiritually dead and enslaved to the Devil. (See Ephesians 2.) Romans 1:26 tells us that humans practicing homosexuality have rejected “nature.” What they are doing is unnatural. Think, as a Christian, what it means to claim that a person was born with a sexual orientation that is an abomination to God; it means God created them that way! Would He do such a thing? He teaches in the Bible that He did not!
This passage in Romans also warns that there are material and spiritual consequences, in the present life, for a lifestyle of homosexuality. Other teachers have exposited the list of consequences in this section of Scripture, and speculated as to the manifest consequences we see today. You can read God’s list for yourself, and follow up further if you desire.
Finally, the last phrase of Romans 1:24-32 rebukes those who “approve of those who practice them.” Do not be one of those people. Do not honor those who have so rebelled against God. Mourn those who died without repenting. Weep for the destructive toll this sin is taking on our country. And preach hope to them, the hope that comes from submitting to God, who alone ordains salvation and righteousness.
To God be all glory.
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