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nChrist
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« Reply #1 on: July 12, 2007, 07:35:54 AM » |
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READER QUESTION:
In recent times there has been a propensity (at least apparently) by Christians to assign a classification to sins. Being gay, for instance, has taken on an aura of particular evil. My understanding of the Word is that all sin (save blaspheming the Holy Spirit) are the same to God. They all separate us from communing with Him. Could you clarify this with your insight and understanding.
VW ANSWER:
It is true that "sin is sin". Jesus clarified that hatred is as bad as murder, lusting as bad as adultery; and that swearing by the altar is the same as swearing by the sacrifice on the altar, etc.etc.
However, there seems to be a greater emphasis where the purity in genetics of human life is concerned. The basically 'only' command God records after the flood is regarding murder (and eating blood), which is due capital punishment. (Gen9:4-6) God also re-states the covenant to
"be fruitful and multiply" (vs1,7)
One of the evils for which reason God sent the flood was the perversion of the generations. The demon world was cohabiting with humans (Gen6:1-4) and the book of Jasher expands on that, saying that they were doing intermixing of species. (Jash4:18 ) And one reason Noah found favor with God was because he was "perfect in his generation" (Gen6:9) Or as we might say it: Noah's family "genetics" were still untampered with. God had created man in His own "image and likeness" (Gen1:26) And in a very real sense, satan was trying to change the very nature of God by changing human genetics, and as a result, how man would perceive God.
So, when homosexuality goes "contrary to nature" (Rom1:26), it is not something relatively 'innocent' like lying or stealing.... but it strikes at the very core of God's nature. God created things, by design, to reproduce. Homosexuality goes contrary to that.
It was perverse enough that God destroyed the world with a flood, and obliterated Sodom and Gomorrah. And the way they are playing around with stem cells and genetics today.... God's judgment again is not far off. There's cloning, and the implanting of genetic material into
embryos of other species, etc. Recently I read someplace where they had implanted a pig embryo with human DNA, to where the expected outcome would have been a "pig-man". But the embryo was 'terminated', I believe....this time.
Homosexuality is apparently a 'special' category of spitting in God's face.
In the OT, Israel was to stone those who behaved in such a manner. (Le20:13) But that doesn't mean that we are to practice similar militancy, because the OT in Israel also had the death penalty for many other things that "Caesar" does not prosecute in similar fashion. We are under "Caesar" (Mk12:17) and follow Caesar's laws (Rom13) But this does not mean that God will not have His -day- regarding it. His "wrath" will be poured out. (Eph5:6, Rom1:18 )
However, also: such people who do those things are not 'beyond' God's grace if they repent. Paul lists these things and says to the Believers he is writing to, "And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God." (1Co6:9-11)
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