Did you hear what Carter did not say in support of gay marriage?

To say the Bible or Jesus did not say anything about homosexuality is very misleading and misguiding. The Bible has plenty to say about it. Here’s some examples:
Matthew 19:4-6
I Cor. 6:9-10
Romans 1:24-27
I Timothy 1:10-11
I didn’t look up the references about Sodom and Gomorrha. Those towns were full of guy homosexuals, which God condemned.
You don’t have to change any of the words of the Bible to put words in God’s mouth. Simply read His words, unchanged. I’m sorry, but it’s already there in print.

Jimmy Carter is absolutely right, bully or no bully.

The problem here is that folks don’t really know what “marriage” is, and they keep projecting into Scripture some kind of modern definition that is simply not there.

When the Scriptures reveal that the relationship between Christ and the Church is a marriage relationship, the Scriptures reveal to us that whatever “marriage” is, it is not about sex, and it is not about gender. This revelation, according to Paul, is the very first revelation regarding marriage given in Genesis. That a man shall leave his parents and marry his wife and the two become One, is a prophetic revelation about Christ and the Church, from the beginning of time.

It is not that the Scriptures are silent about supporting homosexual marriage. It’s that they are loudly vocal in revealing that sexuality has nothing. to do. with marriage.

Furthermore, based on further revelation in Scripture, that God is Love, that in Christ there is no male or female, that in the Resurrection there is no human marriage at all, that God supports love based covenants, I’d have to agree with President Carter’s final assessment. Bully or no bully.

Marriage is about society giving its OK to a sexual relationship. It is affirming that everything is in place for a sexual relationship to go forward, since any children who may result from the union will be protected by the two people who brought them into the world.
Thus, “You may kiss the bride.”
(It doesn’t matter whether or not the two people think they are capable of having children. Society has no interest in researching the fertility of anyone, and history shows that some couples who are thought to be infertile do conceive.)
The creative union of Christ and the Church will be awesome to behold. Sexual? No. But sexual union is as close as an analogy can bring us, for now.

If you are a leftist, like Jimmy Carter or the majority of PCUSA leaders, being on the “correct” side of secular trends is far more important than being faithful to the Word.

Good for you Samantha! The Bible is quite clear about homosexuality!! It is an abomination, period and cannot be legislated or interpreted any other way!!!

Carl,
I’m looking at this same-sex/gender marriage issue like Saul hunting down David (1 & 2 SAMUEL). Saul has the nation of Israel to lead and unfortunately falls into a self-destructing spiral, taking many with him.

From the linage of David comes Jesus. The Old and New Testament have no words to support a same-sex/gender marriage.

On those grounds, Jimmy Carter is expressing his own personal belief and we know where that gets us.

“It is not that the Scriptures are silent about supporting homosexual marriage. It’s that they are loudly vocal in revealing that sexuality has nothing to do with marriage.”
 
Mr. Hahn,
 
Have you not read the Scriptures? Exodus 20.14 says, “You shall not commit adultery.” Now what is adultery, you might ask? It’s what happens when two people have sexual intercourse, when one or both of them is married, but not to each other.
 
Or how about Deuteronomy 22.28-29: “If a man meets a virgin (that’s a woman who has never had sexual intercourse, in case you didn’t know) who is not betrothed (i.e., not engaged to be married), and seizes her and lies with her (that’s Bible-speak for ‘has sexual intercourse with her’), and they are found, then the man who lay with her shall give to the father of the young woman fifty shekels of silver, and she shall be his wife (i.e., they shall get married), and she shall be his wife, because he has violated her. He may not divorce her all his days.” Now, ignore the part about the bride-price; that is an example of a Biblical edict that was culturally required in Ancient Israel that has no application to our lives today. Rather, look at the morally relevant message of the text: If a man engages in sexual intercourse with an unmarried woman (presuming that he is not married), the Lord expects him to marry her (unless the woman’s father determines that the man is a scoundrel and refuses to let his daughter be married to such a man; Ex. 22.16-17).
 
Or how about Malachi 2.13-15: “And this is the second thing you do. You cover the LORD’s altar with tears, with weeping and groaning because he no longer regards the offering or accepts it with favor from your hand. But you say, ‘Why does he not?’ Because the LORD was witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. Did he not make them one, with a portion of the Spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking? Godly offspring.” Did you notice that? God brings a man and a woman together in marriage, with a portion of His Spirit in their union, because He wants them to produce Godly children. And how (apart from adoption, which is far less common) do you suppose that He intends for them to produce those children, if not through sexual intercourse?
 
Now if the Scriptures “are loudly vocal in revealing that sexuality has nothing to do with marriage,” surely Jesus would have nothing to say on the matter, would He? But, oh wait! He said, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” (Mt. 5.27-28) In other words, if you just look at a woman, wanting to engage in sexual intercourse with her (and looking at pictures of naked women on the internet counts), you’ve already committed the most serious violation of the marriage covenant in your heart.
 
And if that wasn’t enough, the Lord Jesus also said, “What comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person.” (Mt. 15.18-20) Adultery, the most serious violation of the marriage covenant, comes from the heart, according to Jesus, and also sexual immorality, something of which the Apostles speak of quite a bit in the New Testament. Sexual immorality is fundamentally any sexual expression outside of the covenant of marriage, and it includes such things as incest, adultery, sexual intercourse between two unmarried people, divorce, lust, homosexuality, and bestiality (Lev. 18, Dt. 22, Mt. 19).
 
The Bible is quite clear that sexual intercourse should only take place between a husband and his wife within the bounds of the marriage covenant. This is something that flows naturally from the Scriptures and is not something that modern Evangelicals are reading into it. Rather, it is you, Mr. Hahn, who insists upon “projecting into Scripture some kind of modern definition that is simply not there.” So please, don’t insult my intelligence by insisting that the Scriptures “are loudly vocal in revealing that sexuality has nothing to do with marriage.”

Dick says: Amen, Loren. Things are well defined when you use the Bible as a reference. And of all people, Jimmy Carter should know that.

Really not sure who actually considered him a “public moralist” anyway.

Thanks for your reply Mr. Golden. Hahn’s post really projected some far out, and dangerous, assumptions.

Carl,
Whether a couple is married or not, homosexuality is wrong according to the Bible. The Bible is very clear and strong about that. There can be no other interpretation. It is a physical sin, period. How else can you interpret that a couple who are of the same sex who get married and having sex are committing homosexual acts? The Bible says this is an abomination! I wonder if there are some same sex couples who get married, but don’t have sex? If that occurs, why aren’t they just friends who just share an apartment or house? I don’t know what they do in all their situations. I’ve met a few of these people who I know are ‘gay,’ and they are all very nice people. Maybe they were born gay. I don’t really know. But, I do see with my own eyes, with no interpretation necessary, that the Bible says homosexuality is wrong, so how can a marriage with homosexuals be ok? All this “well, Christ is married to the church, it’s a symbol” does not mean that the actual marriage of people to one another can be any combination and be Biblically correct.
I feel sorry for those who are trying to justify their actions. And believe me, I know, that nobody is perfect. Nobody. We all sin and make mistakes and bad choices. But, God is so forgiving and full of mercy and keeps giving us a chance to make right choices.
God bless us all.
Please keep praying for our country!
Samantha

Dear Mr. Golden,

I am afraid you are just blocking the doorway. Your methodology continues to be highly 19th Century mechanistic and legalistic. It looses the big picture so it’s not surprising that you get the wrong answer.

Jesus did not care for legalism either. More pointedly, he said of people who adopt legalism that “you shut off the kingdom of heaven from people; for you do not enter in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in.”

Jimmy Carter’s position is a perfect example of someone who has entered the kingdom and does not block the doorway for others to enter in as well. We should all endorse it.

Yes, you’ve explained before that you know the most up-to-date exegetical techniques, while the rest of us are hopelessly mired in the past. That’s awesome.

I would be perfectly happy going back to the exegetical style of Jesus and Paul. Just don’t like the 19th Century mechanistic approach. It’s a square peg into a round hole.

“Jesus did not care for legalism either.”
 
You mean the Jesus who scolded the Pharisees, saying, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others” (Mt. 23.23)? What part of “without neglecting the others” do you not understand?
 
Or do you mean the Jesus who told the crowds, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven” (Mt. 5.17-19)? It doesn’t seem to me that Jesus is all that unfriendly to “legalism”—as you define it.
 
To be sure, all that I have written to you must seem to be “mechanistic and legalistic” to someone who holds to an antinomian worldview. But I assure you, the Lord Jesus, whose Word the Law and the Prophets is, is no friend to antinomianism. He came to bring forgiveness, not sanction, for sin—and there is a world of difference between the two. And that, Mr. Hahn, is a crucial point that
 
Jesus forgave the woman caught in adultery, but He also told her, “Go, and from now on sin no more.” (Jn. 8.11) He died on the Cross and rose again from the dead in order that we should be delivered from the penalty, power, and presence of sin in order that we might be free from the sin that separates us from God; He did not deliver us from only the penalty in order that we might be free to revel in it, let alone free to redefine it to fit our antinomian presuppositions. After all, the Law of Moses is God’s Law, not ours; and it is presumptuous in the extreme to take it upon ourselves to say that something that God has clearly stated in His Law offends Him no longer offends Him.
 
Let’s take for example the Prophet Hananiah, who lived in an antinomian age, much like the age in which we find ourselves today. Now the Prophet Jeremiah had prophesied from the Lord that the nation of Judah would suffer seventy years of captivity in Babylon in just recompense for their multitudinous sins, committed over the previous several hundred years (Jer. 25.11, II Chr. 36.21; cf. Dt. 28). Four and a half years into the reign of Zedekiah, the puppet king whom Nebuchadnezzar had set up to reign over “the poorest people of the land” of Judah after he had “carried away all Jerusalem and all the officials and all the mighty men of valor, 10,000 captives, and all the craftsmen and the smiths” (II Kg. 24.14-17), Hananiah said to the remnant still living in Judah, “Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: ‘I have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon. Within two years I will bring back to this place…Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, and all the exiles from Judah who went to Babylon, declares the LORD, for I will break the yoke of Babylon.’” But Jeremiah had something different to say. After saying that he wished that the Lord would do as Hananiah had prophesied, he told the people that all the prophets who had preceded them had “prophesied war, famine, and pestilence against many countries and great kingdoms,” yet if a prophet prophesied peace, it was only when that peace came to pass was he reckoned truly as a prophet sent from God. Not heeding Jeremiah’s word, Hananiah emphasized his words by taking the yoke bars that Jeremiah was carrying and broke them, saying, “Thus says the LORD: ‘Even so will I break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon from the neck of all the nations within two years.’”
 
But then the Lord prophesied through Jeremiah that because of Hananiah’s false prophecies, He would increase the severity of Nebuchadnezzar’s oppression of Judah. And Jeremiah also said to Hananiah, “The LORD has not sent you, and you have made this people trust in a lie. Therefore thus says the LORD: ‘Behold, I will remove you from the face of the earth. This year you shall die, because you have uttered rebellion against the LORD.’” And two months later, Hananiah died (Jer. 28).
 
Similarly, the Lord Jesus had some rather harsh things to say to the churches of Pergamum and Thyatira. To Pergamum He said, “I have a few things against you: you have some there who hold to the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the sons of Israel, so that they might eat food sacrificed to idols and practice sexual immorality. So also you have some who hold the teaching of the Nicolaitans. Therefore repent. If not, I will come to you soon and war against them with the sword of my mouth.” (Rev. 2.14-16)
 
And to Thyatira He said, “I have this against you, that you tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess and is teaching and seducing my servants to practice sexual immorality and to eat food sacrificed to idols. I gave her time to repent, but she refuses to repent of her sexual immorality. Behold, I will throw her onto a sickbed, and those who commit adultery with her I will throw into great tribulation, unless they repent of her works, and I will strike all her children dead. And all the churches will know that I am he who searches the mind and heart, and I will give to each of you as your works deserve.” (Rev. 2.20-23)
 
Now you have said, “Just as the Holy Spirit told Peter to rise, kill, and eat, from a table cloth holding every manner of unclean food forbidden as sin in the OT, because He had declared clean what was previously called in Scripture unclean, so in recent times God has given us a new table cloth of marriage and declared clean that which in previous times we read and understood as unclean. …
“The time has come to put this polemic behind us and move on with the Wind of God’s Holy Spirit to the new beginnings laid out before us.”
 
By this, you are prophesying that it is the Holy Spirit of God who is ushering in a new understanding of marriage, whereby an act declared by God through Moses to be “an abomination” (Heb. toevah, a word more commonly used to refer to idolatry) in His sight (Lev. 18.22) is supposedly sanctified.
 
If I were a Jew, I should be rending my clothes and tearing the hair from my head at what you have said. Have you not read, “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already” (I Jn. 4.1-3)? The spirit that is blowing this wind of change is not the Holy Spirit of God but rather the unholy spirit of this present evil age. It is from the halls of the secular academy that the theories of a “sexual orientation” justifying homosexual behavior has arisen, and it is through the visual arts that homosexuality has been vividly portrayed as morally acceptable behavior. And it is these who have been lobbying in the Congress, the statehouse, the courts, and the churches to persuade the people—even the people of God, if possible—that homosexual behavior is justified by sexual orientation, and that same-gender “marriage” is a civil right. For the secular academy and the visual arts are creatures of this fallen world who deny that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God made flesh. That there are Christians and churches who parrot this message is by no means evidence that it has come from God, but only that these Christians and churches have been deceived. For as the Apostle Paul foretold, “The time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.” (II Tim. 4.3-4)
 
Mr. Hahn, you have believed and are propagating a lie, and I see you leading many astray by it. I implore you, for the sake of your immortal soul, to repent. I pray that the Holy Spirit would enlighten your heart to see the damage you are causing, and that He would grant you repentance, that you might forsake the teachings of the spirit of the age and put your trust solely in the Lord Jesus Christ, as He is revealed in all His fullness through the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, which the Holy Spirit spoke to the men of God who wrote them.
 
You claim that you “would be perfectly happy going back to the exegetical style of Jesus and Paul.” Only if that were true. But the truth is that the “exegetical style” of the great Reformed theologians of the 19th Century—the Hodges, Shedd, Warfield—which you claim to despise, is far closer to that of Jesus and Paul than your own. For they, like Jesus and Paul, approached the Scriptures with reverence and awe, for they recognized the Scriptures to be the very Word of God, as we confess (WCF I). And as John Calvin wrote, “This is the first clause, that we owe to the Scripture the same reverence which we owe to God; because it has proceeded from him alone, and has nothing belonging to man mixed with it.” (Commentary on II Tim. 3.16)

The “canon of Scripture is closed?” God stopped speaking to his people 2000 years ago? Please! I believe in a living God who speaks to us always through the Holy Spirit.

Amen, Carl!

The Bible also says that men having long hair or eating shellfish are “abominations.” Do you eat shrimp, John?

I find it interesting that it is usually the Old Testament used to condemn homosexuality when there is already so much of the Old Testament “laws” that we no longer follow. We eat animals “with cloven hooves.” (Pork being preferable to camel.) Having long hair for a man or short hair for a woman was an “abomination” in the OT. Eating shellfish was also an “abomination.” I know, I know. Everyone likes to say that, well, those were just “food rules” and we know better today. But what about usury? I bet most people borrowed money and have a mortgage on their homes. Charging interest on a loan was considered a sin up until the time John Calvin decided it wasn’t to promote commerce. I find it hypocritical that people who already pick and choose which Scriptures to follow seem to be the fastest to condemn others based on their interpretation of Scripture.

Certainly the Holy Spirit continues to actively engage, inspire and even animate our lives. But the Spirit is not going to reveal some new word from God that is inconsistent or contrary to what God has fully revealed in the person and work of Jesus Christ. God is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. God is perfect and without error. If He is real and He has spoken, and if we receive the Bible not as the words of men but for what it truly is, the Word of God, then when we think we hear a spiritual leading to the contrary we must judge that to be a spirit of the world and not of God. Discerning between the spirits is dealt with in the scriptures. I commend a study of the topic. http://layman.wpengine.com/Files/discerning-between-the-spirits-6-2012.pdf

Well, I admit I was capitalizing on the word of the day coined in the secular press around another matter. Forgive me the indulgence.

Anne – first I would ask that you read Acts 10. Then consider reading this explanation from CNN’s religion blog: http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2012/05/21/my-take-the-bible-condemns-a-lot-but-heres-why-we-focus-on-homosexuality/

French Hughenots had a saying “better the fatherland, than the faith.” This was coined when they lost all rights to worship God in France. They decided it was better to LEAVE the fatherland than to leave the faith. We could learn from them as we are entering a time when we must choose between the two. As Evangelicals lose the right to dissent, we must be prepared to leave the Fourth of July parades to those who have stolen our freedom. (Insert Braveheart quote here). Is America our home? Go read your Bible to find the answer…

Wasn’t being critical if you, Carmen….you are my hero…Just critical of that idea or characterization, which you were absolutely right about…. many in this country did look to him as someone ‘virtuous’ or knowledgable about God. But I guess any of us can make errant judgements…I always thought Bill Cosby was a ‘pillar’ of character who ‘got it”.

There are two Annes in this comment section. Perhaps there should be a way to differentiate.
I will be “Anne M”
I wrote the comment beginning with “Marriage is about society giving its OK…”
The other comments by “Anne” were by someone else.

And this was the President who lost Iran to a Islamic death-cult, domestic inflation at 20%, cities hostages to crack, gangs, and graffiti. And who sent his Secretary of State to the Soviets saying we had no problem with red missiles in eastern Europe.

And now he is dispensing theological advice. OK.

Should we now expect the current one when he leaves office to write a theological commentary to the Book of Matthew? Why not?

“Should we now expect the current (president) when he leaves office to write a theological commentary to the Book of Matthew?”
 
More likely Leviticus, I should think.

God most certainly is without error. Sadly, Man’s interpretation of God’s word is definitely fallible as we have seen all too often.

Thank you for your response and the referred reading. I don’t want to get into biblical exegesis of the greek words used by Paul in this thread, so I would refer you to “God and the Gay Christian” by Matthew Vines. As for the CNN site, the author is a Southern Baptist. Bless their hearts. At least they are consistent vis-a-vis divorce, a sin Jesus actually spoke of in the New Testament.

Mr Golden,

Your missive basically just proved my point, Q.E.D., but our lack of communication just left me with no reply except to sigh in resignation.