Homosexuality: Is it the way a person is born?

Well I would ask a question of the Question asked in the OP of this thread.

Is it relevant in regards to Jesus and salvation if one is born with the tendancy to homosexual sexuality or if it develops later in life by other causes?

If the question was modified to: Is a pedophile born that way does that then justify their desires for childeren?

It is a Christian teaching that we are all sinners because of our fallen state, We are as it where sabatarged creation via the infection of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. But does our sin suddely become Good/Justified just because we are born into faulty flesh as hopeless sinners?

No. Sin is sin and it is wrong and we must aknowledge the message of God that reveals what sin is.


So we now have the Atonement of the Messiah Jesus on offer to all sinners (and thats everyone) a Gift of Forgivness and all we need do is accept Gods will and believe in the Work of Jesus to have eternity with God.

But what happens when people reject Gods forgivness for their own personal favourite sin, by declaring it no longer sin because "i was born that way"?

Sorry but it is not going to cut it in eternity. We are all born sinners but that justifies non of the sins we do or think about doing. We must aknowledge Gods revelation of what is sin as truth and accept His atonement for all our sins to have eternity with Him.



All Praise The Ancient of Days

Adstar said:

But what happens when people reject Gods forgivness for their own personal favourite sin, by declaring it no longer sin because "i was born that way"?

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Severe punishment for the Christian. Eternal damnation for the sinner.

but that's just me, hollering from the choir loft...

What if the answer is 'yes. homosexuals are born homosexual' ? What are the ramifications for how we view people who are homosexual? Does it change the way we understand homosexuality? Would you treat homosexuals differently?

What if Jesus healed a homosexual instead of a leper?

....

aspen2 said:

What if the answer is 'yes. homosexuals are born homosexual' ? What are the ramifications for how we view people who are homosexual? Does it change the way we understand homosexuality? Would you treat homosexuals differently?

What if Jesus healed a homosexual instead of a leper?

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-- Then he would have told the homosexual to "go and sin no more."
And that would pretty well confirm that homosexual behavior is a choice then, wouldn't it?

Romans 1:20 says God is known by His creation, ALL are without excuse (no such thing as born atheist). Hence, anyone who has ever seen a baby and has half a working brain knows that babies are not born gay. Anyone with the ability to tilt their head down can see their sex and God's will for their sex lives. Nobody has an excuse for being gay, it is your will to rebel against God.

Homo-sexuality is an EXTREME sin. If my wife watches porn and then thinks of other men it is bad. If my wife has a ''once off'' night with another man it is very bad! If my wife has a 6 month affair it is terrible and will immediately be a divorce. This is what being gay for a continuous period is to God. It takes actually being a Christian to discern this. We are to see ourselves as engaged or married to Christ. We need to work out your salvation daily in fear and trembling before a holy God. How could our spouse justify adultery for 6 months? They have had a complete CHANGE of heart. We have to let them go. As does God with Christians continuing in homo-sexuality. It is a clear sign that the flesh is in full control.

Rom 8:13 For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.

How Christians get this confused is beyond me. There has to be ulterior motives. We don't need to wait for science or the pope to tell us its wrong. God gave us eyes to see and a brain to judge / discern. We have no excuse.

1 Cor 6:3 Know ye not that we shall judge angels? how much more things that pertain to this life?

They opened themselves to possession.

Severe punishment for the Christian. Eternal damnation for the sinner.

but that's just me, hollering from the choir loft...

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Rom 6:23 For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

God is equal opportunity, He freely gives salvation to those who repent and are baptized and also puts to death those who won't. It is really not that complicated.

Foreigner said:

-- Then he would have told the homosexual to "go and sin no more."
And that would pretty well confirm that homosexual behavior is a choice then, wouldn't it?

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All people Jesus healed and spoke with and ministered to were sinners because we are all sinners. Why not try answering my questions in your response to my post?

Homosexuality. “Homosexuality” means “same or like sexuality” and derives from the Greek word homoitas (likeness, similarity, or agreement). Sexuality is the God-given drive in every person toward wholeness and includes emotional, cognitive, psychological, and spiritual dimensions. This drive is expressed in adult human beings emotionally through intimate communications, physically through touching, and genitally through foreplay and the act of sexual intercourse. Sexuality and spirituality are interrelated in complex and multifaceted ways.
A homosexual orientation is to be distinguished from a homosexual act. A homosexual act is any sexual activity between two individuals of the same gender. A homosexual orientation describes an individual whose sexual drive is directed toward an individual of the same gender. Thus a homosexual orientation involves emotional attractions toward the same gender and may or may not involve homosexual acts. Most sociologists agree that the concept of homosexual orientation was not present in the culture of biblical times (Greenberg, 1988). Most evangelical psychologists believe that most individuals who own a homosexual orientation have not made an initial choice to direct their sexuality toward their own gender.
Homosexual and heterosexual orientations are not mutually exclusive categories. Since the landmark study by Kinsey, Pomeroy, and Martin (1948), psychologists commonly refer to the Kinsey scale to describe a person’s sexual orientation, which can range from zero (0) for exclusively heterosexual behavior (behavior is defined to include dreams and fantasies) to six (6) for exclusively homosexual behavior. Any individual rated at different times in life may demonstrate a shift in orientation. More recently the Kinsey Institute has amplified this finding by describing sexual orientation as multidimensional, situational, and contextual.
Although as many as 40% of males and 20% of females may have had some homosexual experience after puberty, estimates of those claiming a primary or exclusive homosexual orientation range from 1 to 13% for males and 1 to 5% of females. Various surveys disagree on percentages and on methods of defining and measuring homosexuality, but all surveys agree that there are fewer female homosexuals than male homosexuals.
Diagnostic Criteria. Homosexuality traditionally was considered by Western medicine to be pathological and therefore a diagnosable mental disorder. However, in 1973 the American Psychiatric Association voted to remove the general category of “homosexuality” from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. In the DSM-III (American Psychiatric Association, 1980), the category of “ego-dystonic homosexuality” was introduced subsequently as a still diagnosable mental disorder. An ego-dystonic homosexual is one who has consistent and marked distress about having a homosexual orientation. Therefore, according to DSM-III, individuals who are ego-syntonic (those who accept the homosexual orientation with minimum distress) are not mentally disordered.
In describing ego-dystonic homosexuality, DSM-III notes that the individual often has made unsuccessful attempts at heterosexual relationships. Associated features are loneliness, guilt, shame, anxiety and depression. Dysthymia (a chronic, low-grade depression) is often a complicating factor. Given negative cultural attitudes about homosexuality, anxiety, shame, and depression would be expected responses. There is usually mild or no impairment in the ego-dystonic homosexual person occupationally or socially. The primary impairment is interpersonal and sexual.
Researchers are divided over whether homosexuals as a group (both ego-syntonic and ego-dystonic) are more or less mentally healthy when compared with like heterosexual populations. For example, the landmark study conducted by Hooker (1957) that found no difference in mental health between heterosexuals and homosexuals has since been challenged on a number of points: her subjects apparently were not randomly selected and represented only high-functioning homosexuals (Goldberg, 1992), and the raw data reanalyzed did reveal differences that Hooker regarded as surface only (Fine, 1990). However, other contemporary researchers have shown that homosexuals are not more mentally disordered on average than are heterosexuals (Ross, Paulsen, & Stalstrom, 1988).
In 1987 another shift occurred in the diagnostic criteria of DSM III-R when the diagnosis of ego-dystonic homosexuality (302.00) was removed. Instead, under the category of “Other Sexual Disorders Not Otherwise Specified” (302.90), one type of this kind of NOS sexual disorder is listed as “persistent and marked distress about one’s sexual orientation” (American Psychiatric Association, 1987, p. 296). Through another revision of the DSM, this definition or placement has not been markedly changed.
The International Classification of Diseases (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1992), after defining homosexuality, instructs “record homosexuality as a diagnosis whether or not it is considered a mental disorder” (p. 383).
Evangelical Christians have shown and expressed strong disapproval of the APA decision to remove homosexuality from the category of mental disorders. (Note that homosexuality can still be diagnosed if the person shows marked distress about his or her orientation.) However, many homosexuals are able to function successfully socially, mentally, and occupationally while their dysfunction may be interpersonal, marital, sexual, and possibly spiritual. While moral, ethical, and mental wrongs do at times overlap, they are also distinct categories, depending upon the issues. For example, a person who commits adultery may be morally and ethically at fault but not mentally disordered. Therefore, [6 highlights] the evangelical community may do well to address homosexuality not as a mental disorder but as primarily a spiritual and sexual issue that Christians may have tools and power to treat through God’s Holy Spirit.


Baker encyclopedia of psychology & counseling. 1999 (D. G. Benner & P. C. Hill, Ed.) (2nd ed.). Baker reference library (571–572). Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books.

To answer the OP, it doesn't matter. It may be both but it doesn't matter if it is or isn't.
All people are born from the sinner Adam, of whom we all inherit the desire to sin, as well as inherit death.
If one chooses to be a homosexual, or another was 'born that way' as some say, it doesn't matter.

What matters is that when we come to know right and wrong, good and evil, that someone preaches to us the Gospel of repentance and baptism into Christ. THEN we have opportunity to repent and be baptized into Christ's death and resurrection. Some do, most don't. Most of whom do, fall away and back to their particular sin(s) regardless of what it might be. That is why it was important to Christ and the Apostles to tell us continually to go and sin no more and persevere clear unto the end, and overcome our natural evil with Christ's dynamic active righteousness in us. This can only happen, of course, if we know Jesus as the Holy Glorified Spirit born from the dead, and ask Him to Come and dwell in us as promised, so that He can even now presently raise us up from the dead and walk in Newness of Life and go and sin no more. Now we have power over sin, just as Jesus did when He walked the earth as a man. This is good news indeed You won't hear many "theologians" knowing or teaching this. The path to righteousness is narrow and few find it.
Peace

aspen2 said:

All people Jesus healed and spoke with and ministered to were sinners because we are all sinners. Why not try answering my questions in your response to my post?

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-- I am curious. When exactly did Jesus tell His mother Mary, "Go and sin no more?"

I did answer your question. You just didn't LIKE the answer. And you liked it even less when you realized you walked right into it the answer.

Your exact question - and I am quoting - was: "What if Jesus healed a homosexual instead of a leper?"

That would have meant:
1. Homosexuality is a sin that can be cured.
2. Both Jesus and the homosexual knew it was a sin.
3. It wouldn't be acceptable for the homosexual to continue that lifestyle, whether he "chose" that lifestyle or he was "born that way."
4. Jesus would have said "Go and sin no more" meaning He expected the homosexual to no longer engage in that activity.
5. If that homosexual had chosen to continue in that activity - even after Jesus healed him - he would have gone to hell.

But most importantly, Jesus also said that those true Christians who followed him would do even greater things than He did.

That would have meant that all Christians from the time Christ walked the earth until today would be able - through the Holy Spirit - to heal homosexuality.

That would have meant that all Christians from the time Christ walked the earth until today would be able - through the Holy Spirit - to heal homosexuality.

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Let's not forget that the leper initiated the conversation by asking Jesus to heal him.

If he had not wanted to be healed, Jesus would not have forced healing upon him.

He wants a bride who is fully consenting to purity.

-- Then he would have told the homosexual to "go and sin no more."
And that would pretty well confirm that homosexual behavior is a choice then, wouldn't it?

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And so is walking in Love??

In all His Love

Yup. And there is no better way to show someone you love them than to help them avoid eternal damnation.

Just remember this..

1Pe_4:17 For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?

So lets hope you have judged them Righteously, which one cannot do if one is not Christ.

In All His Love

Agreed.
I want to be left in a position of God asking me why I was silent while I knew specific people were going to hell.

See the problem I have is that I dont know that for I dont know what work Jesus is doing on there hearts, and I will not be one get gets asked" why did you turn them away from me by calling them sinners when you knew I had forgivenj them too".

In all His Love

Hi MJR,

See the problem I have is that I dont know that for I dont know what work Jesus is doing on there hearts, and I will not be one get gets asked" why did you turn them away from me by calling them sinners when you knew I had forgivenj them too".

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If you look carefully at John Baptist's ministry, unless a person received his baptism, their sins were not remitted to them, even though it was the heart of Father God to remit everyone's sins through the forthcoming death of His Son, Jesus Christ, the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.

In the same way, once Jesus had died, risen and ascended, only those who come to Him for His baptism (fire and the Holy Spirit), will experience their sins being remitted.

This is clear from John the apostle's call from the end of the first chapter of his first letter, reading straight over into the second chapter - even for Christians.

There is an absolute need for non-Christians to comprehend that there is a Saviour who offers them eternal life instead of eternal damnation (condemnation - same word), to Whom they must apply personally for the remission of their sins.

And that is only the beginning. Millions of Christians have done that, but they do not take up their cross and follow Christ. They live a carnal life. Paul addressed this in almost every letter he wrote to churches, (apart from Philippians) and every time he mentioned sins to them, he pointed out that those who practised sin would not inherit the kingdom of God. He was being loving, in warning some to repent, (even as Christians).

Any evasion of this aspect of preaching truth, is a watering down of the meaning of Christ's death. Christ died to release men and women from the POWER of sin. That is the starting point. Then, believing men and women are to live in the POWER of an endless life.

Only those sinners who grasp how radically God intends to change them on the inside, will embrace the cross and head for the promised land of the world to come, wherein only dwelleth only righteousness.

The whole of this life is a test to hearts - whether claiming to believe or making no such claim at all - to find out where our affections really lie.

You may well have been called to a ministry of loving sinners into conviction, but it would be Biblical of you to afford those who have been called to a different ministry - preaching, proclaiming, debating (in the way Paul did, to show that Christ is the Messiah), teaching and pastoring - to obey God's calling on their lives, without accusing them/us of being unloving. The very first word in Jesus' own ministry was, 'REPENT'.

Remember that? You might say He wasn't calling people sinners, but the meaning of His message is just as if He was (calling people sinners).

I think this thread needs a theme song


"Born This Way"

[Intro:]
It doesn't matter if you love him, or capital H-I-M
Just put your paws up
'cause you were born this way, baby

[Verse:]
My mama told me when I was young
We are all born superstars
She rolled my hair and put my lipstick on
In the glass of her boudoir

"There's nothing wrong with loving who you are"
She said, "'Cause he made you perfect, babe"
"So hold your head up girl and you'll go far,
Listen to me when I say"

[Chorus:]
I'm beautiful in my way
'Cause God makes no mistakes
I'm on the right track, baby
I was born this way
Don't hide yourself in regret
Just love yourself and you're set
I'm on the right track, baby
I was born this way

[Post-chorus:]
Oh there ain't no other way
Baby I was born this way
Baby I was born this way
Oh there ain't no other way
Baby I was born this way
I'm on the right track, baby
I was born this way

Don't be a drag ‒ just be a queen [x3]
Don't be!

[Verse:]
Give yourself prudence
And love your friends
Subway kid, rejoice your truth
In the religion of the insecure
I must be myself, respect my youth

A different lover is not a sin
Believe capital H-I-M (Hey hey hey)
I love my life I love this record and
Mi amore vole fe yah (Love needs faith)

[Repeat chorus + post-chorus]

[Bridge:]
Don't be a drag, just be a queen
Whether you're broke or evergreen
You're black, white, beige, chola descent
You're Lebanese, you're orient
Whether life's disabilities
Left you outcast, bullied, or teased
Rejoice and love yourself today
'cause baby you were born this way

No matter gay, straight, or bi,
Lesbian, transgendered life,
I'm on the right track baby,
I was born to survive.
No matter black, white or beige
Chola or orient made,
I'm on the right track baby,
I was born to be brave.

[Repeat chorus + post-chorus]

[Outro/refrain:]
I was born this way hey!
I was born this way hey!
I'm on the right track baby
I was born this way hey!
I was born this way hey!
I was born this way hey!
I'm on the right track baby
I was born this way hey!

[Fade away:]
Same DNA, but born this way.
Same DNA, but born this way.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wV1FrqwZyKw