There are few questions that more people get upset, offended, angry about today than the topic of homosexuality. It’s clearly a hot topic in our culture. For a long time I have waited addressing this issue. No matter what people say, somebody gets upset, somebody gets offended, relationships get broken. I’m a high school teacher. Many students come to me hurting, to talk about their same-sex attraction. The last thing I want to do is respond in a way that’s not loving. Our culture said that Christians are anti-gay, our culture said that God hates gays. Let me tell you something. It’s not true. I just want to say “I’m sorry.” That’s not right when Christians tell anti-gay jokes and make remarks against gay people that is insulting somebody made in the image of God. God loves gay people and he loves every single one of us.
Really the big question: Has God spoken for the issue of sex? If not, we get to decide for ourselves, but if God has spoken, then there’s a way that we in fact are supposed to live. Through the very beginning, the book of Genesis, God has a certain design and a pattern for us. Instantly, some people are thinking “God is a cosmic killjoy. He’s got rules. He’s got commandments. He’s trying to control how we live.” I used to think that way for a long time. God gives us certain commands and rules for our good.
We look at the beginning in Genesis 1, it says that God made male and female and they were both made in His image. Then in Genesis 2, the man will leave his father and his mother, joined to his wife, clinged to his wife and the two shall become one. Right away there was this pattern that God’s creation involves male and female. And then he set up a sexual relationship to be between one man and one woman, in a committed monogamous, permanent relationship for life. One of my friends pushed back and he said “Genesis is just describing what happened but it’s not setting up a pattern for how we’re necessarily supposed to live.” People often say if you have a problem with homosexuality, you’re hateful, bigoted, homophobic, and intolerant but few people think that about Jesus. Jesus still brings the view of compassion and mercy in our culture. What’s interesting is Jesus spoke about the subject. Jesus had a particular view about the context for sex. Some religious leaders come to Jesus and they’re asking him a question about divorce and they say “Can a man divorce his wife?” He wasn’t asked about homosexuality and the reason was because this wasn’t an issue even on the table; it was understood that marriage is between one man and one woman, and that sex was confined to that relationship. Jesus says “Let me remind you back at the beginning, God made them male and he made them female in His image and the two shall become one, and he says what God has brought together let not man separate.” We see it repeated in Leviticus 18:22, 20:13, Romans 1:26-27, 1 Corinthians 6:9. From the beginning of Genesis all the way to the end, God’s pattern for sexuality was to be between one man and one woman in a committed monogamous relationship for life. We live in a culture that wants to define us by our sexuality: straight or gay or whatever definition we use, it is as if our sexual nature is our truest being. God defines us differently. God sees us as his children, as valuable individuals made in his image. It’s only when we submit all of our lives, including our sexuality, to God do we experience his best, we experience truth.