A Seattle pastor argues that Christians ought to be more open to the possibility that God doesn't come down so hard on homosexuality after all.  He says:

Not only does such personal experience seem persuasive to many, but there is evidence of something very much like this in the Bible itself. Often overlooked in the debate about homosexuality is, arguably, the central issue in the early church and in much of the New Testament. That is, the inclusion of the Gentiles. The early follows of Jesus were, like Jesus himself, Jews. As these early followers fanned out into the Gentile world, the church faced a challenge. Could non-Jews, Gentiles, be part of the emerging church? Could you be a Christian without the mark of the covenant, namely, circumcision?

Scripture argued clearly and decisively, from Genesis on, the importance of the rites and rituals of Judaism, including circumcision. Yet in the New Testament, particular the Book of Acts, the story of the early church, experience supersedes the Bible, in the Bible itself! At the famed Jerusalem Council of the early church, Paul and others report, "these Gentiles have received the Holy Spirit." God, reports an astonished Peter, is doing a new thing....

I have a friend who organizes matters and questions before him in three piles. There is "Accept," and there is "Reject." But there is a third possible category. He calls it "Awaiting Further Light." It seems to me that people of faith, who by definition know that God is God and they are not God and that they therefore lack the full, complete and absolute Truth, might more regularly employ the "Awaiting Further Light" category. We might, then, come to the contemporary debates on this issue, as well as others, with a greater capacity to listen, to listen to views not our own. If there is one quality that might characterize faith and religious people in our day, my own vote is for a greater measure of humility.

Clearly, we mere mortals have no claim upon knowing the deepest truths about God or how He operates. The Lord even states as much in Isaiah 55, saying, "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways."

However, the passages regarding homosexuality are hardly ambigious or lacking proper context, a point that the writer of the above article does not dispute. When Paul includes homosexuality among his definitions of sexual immorality, he leaves little room for debate about what activity he is referring to. Thus, the only alternative to dispute the Almighty's view of homosexuality is to question the veracity of Scripture itself.

The Seattle pastor chooses to de-emphasize the harsh proscription of Paul (and of the Torah) by suggesting (1) that many homosexuals are good, decent people, thus how can their lifestyle be so unGodly?, (2) that precedent exists for the mandates of Scripture being usurped by new revelation, namely the New Covenant replacing the Mosaic one, and ultimately (3) that we are not yet enlightened enough to know what God really thinks about this issue.

The problem here is that none of these arguments can stand without first conceding the Bible to be less than the inerrant Word of God. Instead, we are left to rely on the fickle and unstable grounds of human emotion. No one argues that a good number of homosexuals are caring and productive citizens, but can this really be a means for determining the appropriateness of their lifestyle? How "nice" a person seems does not justify everything they think or do. Most nice people are, in fact, sinners unworthy of an audience before God Almighty (yours truly included). And those who want to follow Christ should seek diligently to know and do what He wills. "If ye love me, keep my commandments."

The second issue follows its own presumptions, namely that the New Testament is mutually exclusive from the Old. While this might be a valid debate regarding many Jewish rituals and mandates, God's displeasure with homosexuality is reiterated multiple times in Paul's Epistles (written to Gentiles, no less), so it isn't really relevant to this particular discussion. That notwithstanding, the covenant with Moses and his people was never meant to be the ultimate solution to man's sin problem -- it was merely set as a foreshadowing of God's complete fulfillment of His promise, embodied in Christ and His sacrifice on the Cross. Every ritual, every feast, and every sacrifice ordered by the Lord in the Old Testament pointed forward to the one who was not meant "to destroy the law, or the prophets...but to fulfill."

The world changed following Christ's ministry, but God didn't. In fact, I would contend that the "finger of God," which inscribed the Law to Moses, was none other than Christ Himself.

The condemnation of homosexuality, however, was not merely a tradition or Old-Covenant idea. "From the beginning of the creation," Jesus said, "God has made them male and female. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife."

But again, this hermeneutical discussion is not the real issue. Much more foundational is whether the Scripture is ordained by God as a guiding light for His truth. If it is, then we already know where He stands in regard to homosexuality, and we don't need to await "further light" on the matter. And if the Bible really is just a relic of a distant age, with no relevant application for modern day, then we are left to the wiles of our own impulses and experiences.

Yet even if the Scripture were not God-breathed documents, to the extend that they record an accurate picture of God's character, that image remains the same for all time, because the eternal one cannot change. Thus God's very existence implies a foundational basis for absolute truth -- including moral truth. Cultures may change, but the essential reality of God's moral law is unmoved. And His clear design has always been for man and woman to unite in marriage. Any sexual activity beyond that institution necessarily violates that structure.

Now, don't get me wrong, I understand that homosexuality is a heavy, complicated, and difficult issue among Christians and non-Christians alike. Many well meaning people struggle with sexual temptation that they neither asked for nor want. And I wholeheartedly agree that we must come before God with humility and selflessness when confonting this topic. But it seems to me that the truest humility is to submit to His revealed will and seek to change ourselves to obey His plan, rather than to question His direction circa our own differences of opinion.

This article originally appeared as a post on Outer Space.