10/09/2011 LOVE & TRUTH

LOVE & TRUTH

The 5^TH Sermon in the “You Ought’a Preach That” Series

            In 1968, two strands of a similar theological movement came together.  One strand, Methodism, from the brothers Wesley & Bishops Asbury & Coke, was predominantly British.  The other strand, Evangelical United Brethren, from Albright, Otterbein, & Boehm, was predominantly German.  Those two American Christian denominations united 43 years ago to form the United Methodist Church.

           One issue has dogged & divided us for those four-plus decades.  That issue is homosexuality.

            In the interest of full disclosure, I think it important to note that in my extended family there have been four homosexual persons.  To my know-ledge, none of them is seeking, nor in, a relationship with Jesus Christ.  I also have friends & acquaintances who are gay.  I’m curious, how many of you have family members, friends, acquaintances, co-workers, neigh-bors, or fellow students who are gay?  Would you raise your hand, if you do?  It helps me to know that I’m not preaching to an isolated few.

            Most United Methodist pastors are pretty nice folks.  Get us on the subject of homosexuality, though, & that pleasant demeanor too quickly vanishes.  Rancor, name-calling, & division become the order of the day.  One group condemns their opponents to hell.  The other resorts to & retorts with mean-spirited ad hominem attacks.[1]  On too many days, behavior on both sides has been shameful. 

In this era, far more than the inflammatory matter of abortion, the issue of homosexuality breeds the most impassioned emotions.  It receives blame for tearing asunder three American mainline Protestant denomina-tions: the Episcopal Church USA, the Presbyterian Church USA, & the American Baptists.  While other denominations have not endured any formal splits, they have suffered losses regarding this matter. 

            Let me state that the disagreements & divisions manifested within the Church of Jesus Christ are not properly blamed on homosexuality.  We give sex way too much power in this culture.  I would say the same about abortion, slavery, & a host of nettlesome issues that the church confronted over the centuries.  None of those issues, alone or together, has the power to divide.  The (real) division comes from our view of the Bible, our emphases & interpretation of scripture, our doctrine of what exactly God’s inspiration of these sacred texts truly means. How our view of biblical inspiration plays out is what makes or breaks us.  It plays out along the lines of love & truth. 

One side of the gay debate employs the heart & says that love should always prevail.  Gee, I can’t disagree with that.  “God is love” we heard in John’s first letter.  And if Christians don’t love a brother or sister, then we cannot love God, those verses add.  Do you believe that?  I do.

The other side of the debate employs the head – the mind of reason & intelligence God gives us -- & says that truth is the crux of the matter.  Jesus boldly proclaimed that he is truth when he announced, “I am the way & the truth & the life.”[2]  I believe that, too.  Do you?

Love is a biblical truth & truth is found in love & loving.  So, how can love & truth be separated?

Yet, each side asserts that their position has the most weight/clout.  “Love.”  “Truth.”  “Love.”  “Truth.”  “Love!”  “Truth!”  And the unflattering shouting only gets louder with each side unable to hear, let alone realize, that they’re both right.  God is love & God’s Son is truth, the truth that will set us free – all of us free.[3]  I honestly have a hard time picking one over the other.  “Truth devoid of compassion (love) can be sharp & damag-ing….  Love devoid of biblical standards (truth) can be soft & deceptive.”[4]

Let me put it simply & succinctly.  I am called to serve Christ by loving all people – all people.  I also vowed to uphold the truth of holy scripture & genuinely believe that it is the inspired Word of God.  As St. Paul wrote: “I am not ashamed of the gospel; it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who has faith.…”[5] 

I am not going to wish hell upon the gay person, or anyone for that matter.  I’m not going to disregard the Bible’s teachings about human relationships.  I cannot dismiss holy scripture as some mere mythological collection of human writings that have relevance only within their exact context, such that they cannot speak to us today.  An emasculated gospel is neither what I believe, nor preach.

Having spoken to my love of God’s Word, I confess that I’m not happy with everything in the Bible. (Gasp!) I don’t brag about that, but that’s why it’s a confession.  There are some hard passages that I spend a lot of my waking hours attempting to learn about & make sense of.  Two examples: 1) I earnestly try to reconcile an all-good, all-powerful God with the pain & evil our free will causes in this world.   2) I think I’m finally getting a handle on how the scientific view of the universe being 15 billion years old & the seven literal days of creation in Genesis are both true.  I’m thrilled to reach new understandings & discoveries of scripture, but I haven’t got it all figured out, yet.  Thank goodness not all passages are so hard in their complexity. 

Other passages are hard in their simplicity.  They’re clear, they’re simple, & that’s the problem, because they run contrary to my sinful nature.  I often wish they had been left out.  I wish a few fibs were allowed, especially when one of the females in my house asks, “How do I look?”  And, in the grand scheme of things, is coveting Jeff Shreck’s electric blue Shelby Mustang really so bad for a guy who drives around in an outdated funeral cruiser?  But real life isn’t just about me & what I want.  Despite whatever blessings & goodness with which God endowed me, this human creature doesn’t know better than my Creator. 

Plus, if I take out the Bible’s lines I don’t like & you take out the lines you don’t like & everyone else follows suit, what’ll be left?  [Go ahead & take out the stuff about weeping & wailing & gnashing of teeth.  Take out the wars & hellfire & brimstone.  I can tell you, though, some folks don’t like the warm & fuzzy stuff, either. If they had their way, the wrath & damna-tion would remain.  They’d remove acts of mercy & forgiveness.]  Martin Luther wanted to get rid of the entire book of James!  Thomas Jefferson excised Jesus’ miracles.  The Jesus Seminar nixxed the Lord’s Prayer!  You can’t please everybody & God knows better than to even try.  Wise!

We, humans, are not good, reliable, & trustworthy with this stuff.  Even when I doubt God’s right on something, I have to admit that God has more experience & expertise, than I do.  To reach any other con-clusion seems a bit arrogant on my behalf.  Although many theological scholars have tried to explain away the verses they don’t like, I can’t join them in handily dismissing whatever I find troubling.  There’s a self-serving, self-righteous dishonesty in that approach.  It’s highly suspect.[6]

So, love, truth, what to disregard, what to revere….  Here’s what I believe. 

I quote a Presbyterian colleague who wrote, “I believe that if Jesus walked the earth today, he would minister to gays & lesbians.  And of course he is alive today, in us, wanting us to have the humility to follow him as he shows us how to put both spectrums of the faith (love & truth) together.”[7]  That’s not easy.  Ministry is hard.  Ministry is messy.  As blood dripped from his wounds, Jesus knew that messiness better than any of us, all of whom are ministers.  I’m the pastor, but you’re a priesthood of believers.

When Jesus cast seeds in the parable of the sower, he was broadcasting God’s Word & let it fall where it may.[8]  Some self-selected.  Some got damaged.  Some grew by 30-, 60-, or 100-fold.   It was, ultimately, God’s call.  Likewise, Jesus didn’t purify his group of disciples, clear sinners that they were before they joined his band & while with him.  The only persons he said should not be forgiven were those who blas-phemed against the Holy Spirit.[9]  And the only persons who should be removed from the faith community were not specific kinds of personalities or sinners, but ones who set out to hurt other believers.[10]  The sower of the weeds & wheat,[11] as well as the fisher who cast a wide net,[12] both let it up to God to deal with the good & bad seed, & the healthy & rotten fish.  I don’t believe judging others’ eternity is in our purview, but loving others into eternity is a clear command.[13]  If we talk to gay persons about a relationship with Jesus, rather than condemn them in the name of Jesus….

            Into the church come people who are deeply serious about the things of God & people who are looking for a pretty sanctuary in which to get married.  People show up who are hungry to do righteousness, & people come because their spouse sings in the choir & they can’t figure out what to do with themselves.  The life of God’s people is wonderfully nondiscriminatory.  Everybody is welcome to come along for the ride; the job of sifting the serious from the frivolous, the authentic from the fraudulent, is left to the angels.  In the meantime, the grace of God flows freely & hopefully.[14]

 I also believe that science is of limited help to us in these matters.  So much of the research is a mixed bag.  With arguments for a “gay gene,” as well as other research making the case for one’s environment, we are again left to other means of deciding.  Genes strongly influence, but do not, in every instance, dictate behavior.  It’s a lot like alcoholism & other addictions.  While we know there are genetic predispositions for  alcoholics, we also know the power of conscious choice & reliance on a “Higher Power” to remediate their brokenness.[15]  

I don’t know if my friend, Tom, who possesses multiple addictions, is more influenced by DNA or life as it comes.  He’s faithfully in church every week, an active disciple.  He’s made some great strides, but has a long way to go.  I can’t see in his heart, if he really wants to recover.  I just love him.  So does the rest of my family.  So does his wife.  So do his kids.  So do his friends, & his Christian brothers & sisters.  He’s going on to perfection by working out his salvation relationship with fear & trembling, as the scriptures state.[16]  Whether that pace is fast or slow, one step forward two steps back, the fact that he genuinely loves Christ is what matters most.

I, personally, know gay persons who swear they’ll never change & won’t even try.  I know some who earnestly tried, but failed.  I know some who changed with God’s help & it took time.  I know one who would never set foot in a church & credits secular psychotherapy for her change.  Let’s not get hung up on research, arguments, situations, & exceptions.  We’re talking about God’s children here, not statistics & anecdotes & clinical research cases.  We forget the souls behind the stories & labels

[Many homosexual persons don’t like being labeled solely by their sexuality.  How many “straight” persons answer, “Heterosexual!” in response to “Who are you?”  The first thing out of my mouth isn’t, “I’m straight.”  It’s, “I’m Kira & Krista’s dad.” Or, “I’m a pastor.”  Or, “I’m Deb’s husband.”  Or, “I’m Pennsylvania German.”  We all usually list those types of identifiers before our sexuality.] 

There’s more to gay individuals than their sexuality.  So many of them, like many of us, are souls searching for a safe, supportive environ-ment in which they can open their hearts & share their stories with trusted Christian friends who are willing to walk beside them & support them on their journey of growth in Christ.[17]  Don’t hear me endorsing some profligate “anything goes” ethic.  I struggle with these matters, too.  I’m just saying that if persons are seekers after Christ, so were we.  So are we. 

In everything I say today, let me be clear, I don’t want to devalue one’s agreement or disagreement on these matters.  I’m called, & try, to love everyone.   I do want to suggest, however, that we listen to one another on a deeper level, beyond the cliché, beyond the enmity, beyond the shouting.  If persons seek healing & wholeness, our calling as Christians is always to minister grace to them.  If persons are not ready for such a move, then still, “We cannot dehumanize our brother or sister in the name of the gospel.”[18]

We each experience brokenness in our lives.  As your pastor who hears your confessions & knows your hurts & secrets, & possesses my own transgressions, my heart breaks many days at the power of evil.   Indeed, “All have sinned & fall short of the glory of God.”[19]  Jesus commanded every one of his followers to be holy & perfect,[20] not just our enemies or persons who are different than us, but everyone of us.  He reserved his harshest criticism for the religious authorities, not the pagan Gentiles.

Becoming & being Christian are not easy.  We share that in common with each other & with the person we define as “other.”  It is a struggle to honor & bring glory to God with our lives.  By God’s mercy & grace we try.

In the Name….                  Copyright 2011 by G.D.Knerr in Lansdale, Pa.  All rights reserved.