gracEmail
Edward Fudge

SEXUAL STANDARDS -- NOW WHAT?

The most recent gracEmail stated my conviction that the Bible prohibits intimate sexual conduct between persons of the same gender. After that piece went out, I strongly sensed that the Spirit led my mind to our Lord's condemnation of the Pharisees as reported in Matthew 23:4. Speaking of those ancient "religious police" whose very name we now consider a synonym for hypocrisy, Jesus warned: "They tie up heavy loads, hard to carry, and put them on men's shoulders, but they themselves are not willing even to lift a finger to move them" (NET Bible).

It is far too easy to proclaim how people ought to live, then to suppose our obligation is over. This verse in Matthew tells us that Jesus will have nothing of the sort. If someone dares to declare God's standards for living, he or she especially has a duty then to assist and encourage others who commit, with God's help, to living by those standards. The Pharisees, on the other hand, went about announcing the divine rules (to which they added their even-more-strict human interpretations) -- loading down their hearers nearly to the breaking point -- then sashayed away to seek their own interests, thoroughly oblivious to the struggles of the poor souls they now so flippantly and easily abandoned.

The principle applies when we teach concerning sexual holiness but also when we teach on everything else. Jesus said far more about the sin of materialism than he did about sexual sins of every kind combined. Today most Christian teaching weighs out in exactly the opposite proportions. It is easy to denounce sexual misbehavior -- especially a kind to which the denouncer is not personally tempted. (In fact, there is often reason to suspect that the person whose denouncing lacks the gentleness, humility and broken-heartedness of the Savior is secretly indulging in the same sin or something similar.)

We say that God endorses and celebrates sexual intimacy within the context of loving, self-giving, monogamous, heterosexual marriage and that he restricts it to that context. Will we now come alongside to assist the person -- whether straight or gay -- who is sincerely trying to conform to that divine ideal? Do we offer genuine friendship in place of loneliness? Can we provide a non-judging ear for an honest admission of failure? Are we willing to give a word of assurance of God's forgiveness? A holy "pep talk" to get up and try again? Sinners are not "them" in contrast to "us." They are specific individuals with names and lives and histories and burdens. Jesus knows and loves each struggling sinner, and that includes every one of us.

For more on sexual issues, click here.