Yes, I think homosexuality is a sin, but so is the way many of us deal with it. We need to be more compassionate when it comes to witnessing to a gay person, and the Church at large should make them feel more welcome instead of making them feel judged or less than. God is their judge...all we should do is speak the Truth to them in the Spirit of love and let God do the rest. They are not mis-fits, they are people whom God loves dearly.
Hi all, I look forward to your responses.
I would like to start with this quote above. I have been to two civil partnership ceremonies of friends who are in same sex relationships. They were very respectful in their invites, 'would we be offended if we were invited' Of course there was no religious elements to the service.The potential new equality laws would enable religious elements and prevent me from going in the future.
I think it is important to consider that the New Testament has many warnings witten to believers, not primarily non-believers. As far as non-believers are concerned as believers we should witness the saving gospel of Jesus Christ which will change hearts and minds. (infact it will either soften hearts to God or harden them, Hebrews 4:12)
But I think this issue is like the point of a spear, there is a lot of shaft behind it. It is the most easily identifiable error and attack on the church and the faith in the western world today.
Firstly, there is no such thing as gay/straight, or homosexual/heterosexual in God's Biblical testimony. Believers have been sucked into this concept which is a lie. There are people who experience same sex attraction and I would suggest that is no worse than any other wrong feeling. But God created male and female (Gen 2, Matt 19, Mark 10, Eph 5 etc) it was for this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be united with his wife and the two shall become one flesh. The Bible only deals with wrong sexual acts and relations.
So there is a debate with non-believers about how God sees those men and women He created in His image, no different from anyone else, loved by God but imperfect and to be made perfect one day through Christ. So there is no such separation as LGBT, LGBT is denying what God has created as man and woman. It is putting fallen human feelings before the truth of God's word.
So beware the language. I heard a Bishop recently say he saw no difference between heterosexual and homosexual marriage!. Think about it, neither can I, a homosexual man can marry a homosexual women.
But the NT warnings (ie 1 Cor 5, Matt 18, Rev 22, Eph 5, 2 Peter 2, Jude 1, 1 Cor 6-7, Romans 1-2 etc) are I think for those who are supposed to know, or claim to know and have turned away from God.
I have not had too much trouble debating with guest non-believers but the problems I have experienced widely on Christian forums is liberal 'Christians'. Yes there is as Comm.Arnold put it "queer army that gets all over everything" agressively trying to force everyone to accept homosexuality, but the difficulty is professing the Biblical truth without supposedly fellow Christians siding with non-believers and telling them we dont have the gospel. This especially as passages such as 2 Cor 11 says unless we stick to faith once delivered we drift to another Jesus and another gospel.
For Christians there is no debate. The Bible only countenances male/female sexual relationships, and only ever describes same sex ones as error and detestable to God. We need to be honest enough to say this isnt a disputable matter, but a lie and treat such people who claim to believe as non-belivers and pagans. We arent to judge them that they might be going to hell or like, that is for God to judge, but they cant be believers if they don't believe. Sadly this is the very thing, acceptance for the relationship that they want.
Consider. The UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights protects man and woman to marry and found a family. (article 16 or 18) There is no mention of any 'gay'. 'homosexual' etc. two people of the same sex cant found a family together. I would suggest therefore that the UN Human Rights protects man/woman marriage by what it says. Yet many politicians such as Hilliary Clinton, President Obama and PM David Cameron see same sex 'marriage' as a human right. We have now got to a situation where people are making up their own human rights contrary to the human rights that already exist, and contrary to other people's human rights.