Surviving as a Christian business owner when targeted by LGBTs

[JimParker]

See: "A Way Out for Christian Wedding Businesses?"

http://www.gopusa.com/commentary/2015/04/17/a-way-out-for-christian-wedding-businesses/?subscriber=1

 

[pom2014]

Really? Seriously?

So let me see if I'm clear...

There are "Christians" that won't make cakes for gays but will for straights and they don't think this violates the second great command at all?

Am I reading that right?

Then to make matters worse they will extort gays into issues that if a gay baker would do to these "Christians" the latter would feel they are being wronged.

Wow wow wow.

 

[OzSpen]

Really? Seriously?

So let me see if I'm clear...

There are "Christians" that won't make cakes for gays but will for straights and they don't think this violates the second great command at all?

Am I reading that right?

Then to make matters worse they will extort gays into issues that if a gay baker would do to these "Christians" the latter would feel they are being wronged.

Wow wow wow.

Let me get this clear (with a broader application): There are Christians who won't make cakes for those who commit adultery and engage in other sexually promiscuous activity. But they'll do it for those who do not engage in such adultery and promiscuity. And they don't consider this violates the second great commandment.

The two great commandments are articulated in Mark 12:30-31 (ESV): 'And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ 31 The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these"'.

So what does it mean to love your neighbour? Do you want it to mean to endorse their promiscuous sexual activity which God has forbidden, whether that be adultery, sexual promiscuity and homosexuality?

What's wrong with a gay baker refusing to do business with Christians? If that's his choice, then he'll gain that reputation in the town and suburb so that Christians will know not to do business with him.

By the way, what is your definition of 'love' in 'love your neighbour'?

Oz

 

[LightMessenger]

Really? Seriously?

So let me see if I'm clear...

There are "Christians" that won't make cakes for gays but will for straights and they don't think this violates the second great command at all?

Am I reading that right?

Then to make matters worse they will extort gays into issues that if a gay baker would do to these "Christians" the latter would feel they are being wronged.

Wow wow wow.

We are seeing examples of that happening right now. The refusals of service to Gay couples but full acceptance to straights. But of course, those folks are card-carrying "Christians" aren't they?

 

[pom2014]

Let me get this clear (with a broader application): There are Christians who won't make cakes for those who commit adultery and engage in other sexually promiscuous activity. But they'll do it for those who do not engage in such adultery and promiscuity. And they don't consider this violates the second great commandment.

The two great commandments are articulated in Mark 12:30-31 (ESV): 'And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ 31 The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these"'.

So what does it mean to love your neighbour? Do you want it to mean to endorse their promiscuous sexual activity which God has forbidden, whether that be adultery, sexual promiscuity and homosexuality?

What's wrong with a gay baker refusing to do business with Christians? If that's his choice, then he'll gain that reputation in the town and suburb so that Christians will know not to do business with him.

By the way, what is your definition of 'love' in 'love your neighbour'?

Oz

My definition of the second great command is that if I wanted a cake made for me and was denied because I am Christian I would feel very very badly. I would think just because of me being Christian you can hate my faith so much that you won't even bake a cake? Not a cake? What else would you deny? If I fell ill you'd not call emergency services? You'd just let me expire? How absolutely cruel you could be only because I'm Christian?

Then I think if I would not like that for me, could I do it to someone else? The cake is immaterial at that point. My own beliefs, my own ethics, my own consciousness is called into question.

Am I really loving myself by giving up what I know is true just to prove that someone is doing wrong? What of the straight adulterers? Should I hold my love from them? What of the other sinners?

Should I turn myself into something I would detest just to prove the point that I'm more righteous than another? What profit is in that? Sounds like I'm the servant in the parable of a certain king. That I won't forgive the debt of another after mine is. That if I were God I'd only make the rain fall on the just and not unjust.

No.

I refuse.

Completely refuse.

I will not only make their cake. I will make it the best cake I could. I'd give them the most awesome cake. Because despite their choices I love myself to be perfect (teleios) and to love them and treat them as I would want for myself.

The King came for all, not just the righteous. He laid down his life, journeyed to sheol and then came back for the unrighteous.

Least I can do is make a cake.
Least I can do is love as I would desire to be loved.

And then pray that God moves in their life.

Who am I do only show love to those whom love me? I profit nothing from that.

 

[OzSpen]

My definition of the second great command is that if I wanted a cake made for me and was denied because I am Christian I would feel very very badly. I would think just because of me being Christian you can hate my faith so much that you won't even bake a cake? Not a cake? What else would you deny? If I fell ill you'd not call emergency services? You'd just let me expire? How absolutely cruel you could be only because I'm Christian?

Then I think if I would not like that for me, could I do it to someone else? The cake is immaterial at that point. My own beliefs, my own ethics, my own consciousness is called into question.

Am I really loving myself by giving up what I know is true just to prove that someone is doing wrong? What of the straight adulterers? Should I hold my love from them? What of the other sinners?

Should I turn myself into something I would detest just to prove the point that I'm more righteous than another? What profit is in that? Sounds like I'm the servant in the parable of a certain king. That I won't forgive the debt of another after mine is. That if I were God I'd only make the rain fall on the just and not unjust.

No.

I refuse.

Completely refuse.

I will not only make their cake. I will make it the best cake I could. I'd give them the most awesome cake. Because despite their choices I love myself to be perfect (teleios) and to love them and treat them as I would want for myself.

The King came for all, not just the righteous. He laid down his life, journeyed to sheol and then came back for the unrighteous.

Least I can do is make a cake.
Least I can do is love as I would desire to be loved.

And then pray that God moves in their life.

Who am I do only show love to those whom love me? I profit nothing from that.

You didn't answer the issues I raised.

 

[pom2014]

You asked how I defined love.

That's how I define love. I give the same treatment that I'd hope to receive.

If you don't to that, that is your choice. I chose to love not hate. I don't profit from hate.

 

[Axehead]

I don't want to be deceived and hope people will tell me the truth if they see something I am blind to.

Gal_4:16 Am I therefore become your enemy, because I tell you the truth?

Eph_4:15 But speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ:

1Jn_3:18 My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth.

There is always a cost for speaking the truth in love, whether it is to a liar, drunkard, murder, adulterer, fornicator or sodomite.

 

[pom2014]

Axe how does refusal of service equal telling the truth?

So you say I don't agree, when do you need the cake?

Does God not cause the rain to not fall on the unjust?

Why are you exempt when you say you have God in you?

Would you want to be denied service because of your faith?

You see none are making any logical sense. Even God would bake them a cake. Best one ever.

Just to show hey I love you. I'll treat you as I would myself.

These two commands, he lives by them too.

 

[Axehead]

Axe how does refusal of service equal telling the truth?

So you say I don't agree, when do you need the cake?

Does God not cause the rain to not fall on the unjust?

Why are you exempt when you say you have God in you?

Would you want to be denied service because of your faith?

You see none are making any logical sense. Even God would bake them a cake. Best one ever.

Just to show hey I love you. I'll treat you as I would myself.

These two commands, he lives by them too.

You miss my point, pom.

Would you want to violate someone's conscience? Neither does God? The government should not be in the business of forcing people to violate their conscience. It is usually a simple decision by someone who does not want to have their conscience violated. But now, they are being forced out of business so they have to count the cost. Some will violate their conscience, some won't.

Love works both ways. If you know something is going to cause someone to violate their conscience, don't do it. You are causing them to stumble. That is also love.

 

[pom2014]

You miss the point of God.

He doesn't tolerate the unjust. Its against his ways.

BUT HE STILL MAKES IT RAIN ON THEM.

Get it.

God would say I don't like your sin, but I'll still make the cake.

Why should we be different?

 

[Axehead]

You miss the point of God.

He doesn't tolerate the unjust. Its against his ways.

BUT HE STILL MAKES IT RAIN ON THEM.

Get it.

God would say I don't like your sin, but I'll still make the cake.

Why should we be different?

I don't think you have followed this situation very closely. It's not about making the cake. The pizza place said they would serve anyone that comes into their restaurant, they just don't want to be part of the wedding if ever asked. (Who would want pizza at a wedding?).

Same with the Catholic couple in up state new that hosts weddings in their barn. They actually do a complete setup and catering of the whole event. They explained that they really get involved with the couple and want to personalize and make the wedding special but it goes against their conscience and faith to do the same for homosexual couple. The government fined them 13,000.00 after a two year legal battle and ordered them and their co-workers to undergo sensitivity training. I think they were set up as their phone conversation was recorded and it shows me that there is a concerted effort to target people since the gays know they have the government behind them now.

I guess LAMBDA will get civil rights protection next and what sexual group is next? People already have civil rights protection and go and eat in any restaurant they want. Purposely targeting certain types of groups speaks of a wider agenda.

The Giffords draw a line, Trainor explained, between a ceremony that solemnizes a homosexual relationship and a reception that celebrates the union after the fact. To participate in the former, they argue, would be a violation of their own religious beliefs, especially because marriage ceremonies on the farm typically take place in and around the couple’s home, where they live full-time and are raising their two children.

But the Giffords are willing to serve gay couples in other ways – for example, they allowed another lesbian couple to throw a birthday party for their adopted child on the farm.

Trainor said he believes the decision by DHR goes too far in that it seeks to regulate what the Giffords can or cannot do in their own private home, even though state law only requires “places of public accommodation” to adhere to anti-discrimination laws.
“They consider the farm their home,” Trainor said. “They live there, they work there, they raise their kids there.”
Catholic couple fined $13,000 for refusing to host same-sex ‘wedding’ at their farm

Just to catch you up on things, I will help you with some links.
While you condemn all these Christians as unloving, you give a complete pass to the other side. That's kinda weird.

Oregon ruling really takes the cake -- Christian bakery guilty of violating civil rights of lesbian couple
“Individuals are being persecuted and prosecuted using the leverage of the government through these homosexual activists,” he said. “Government has become a weapon that homosexual activists are using against Christian business owners.”

And if you have any doubts about the validity of his claims, just ask the Klein family. They know what it’s like to incur the wrath of militant homosexual bullies. And they learned that in today’s America – gay rights trump religious rights.

Same-sex ‘marriage’ law forces D.C. Catholic Charities to close adoption program

These people should appeal to the Supreme Court since they gave Hobby Lobby a pass. Hobby Lobby is also a business.

Court Holds That Wedding Photographer Cannot Refuse Service To Gay Couples
I would have granted First Amendment protection to an artist wishing to discriminate on the basis of race, or any other protected category. To compel a writer, photographer, painter, composer, or what have you, to put her talent into the service of something that violates their conscience is a serious wrong. If a gay photographer believed in good conscience that he could not photograph the wedding of Christian fundamentalists, then I think he absolutely should have the right to refuse, on First Amendment grounds.

What would happen if a feminist cinematographer was asked to film hardcore porn and refused on the grounds that it violated her politics? Or a religious (not necessarily Christian) cinematographer was asked to film hardcore porn and refused on the grounds that it violated his or her religious sensibilities? Or a cinematographer who was neither feminist nor religious but had ethical objections to hardcore porn? Could any of those people be sued? They are, after all, providing a service, but refusing it to someone on political, religious, or ethical grounds.

 

[pom2014]

Again. they are putting their own desires above the second great command.

God made the whole world and he still allows it to be used for unrighteous things. Because he knows that those things will but abide.

Now what these people, and everyone else, must ask themselves; is your home yours, is your business yours, is your money yours, is your food yours, are your clothes yours?

Or does God give them to you to live?

If.you say its MINE you might want to rethink that.

All we have is through the goodness of God.

We have no right to arrogantly claim its ours.

 

[JimParker]

Really? Seriously?

So let me see if I'm clear...

There are "Christians" that won't make cakes for gays but will for straights and they don't think this violates the second great command at all?

Am I reading that right?

Then to make matters worse they will extort gays into issues that if a gay baker would do to these "Christians" the latter would feel they are being wronged.

Wow wow wow.

<< There are "Christians" that won't make cakes for gays but will for straights and they don't think this violates the second great command at all? >>

You have totally missed the "cake-maker's" point.

They don't refuse to make a cake for anyone but they do refuse to participate in the support of something that is not only a clear violation of God's will but also an overt and intentional perversion of His will..

<<Then to make matters worse they will extort gays into issues that if a gay baker would do to these "Christians" the latter would feel they are being wronged.>>

OooooH Kaaaay.... That sentence is grammatical gibberish.

How does refusing to support the perversion of God's word "extort" anyone??

Since there are many bakeries that will make anyone a cake for anything, no homosexual is harmed by one bakery declining their business?

And it is the homosexuals who are using this kind of ploy to attack any the 1st amendment right of any citizen to the free exercise of their religion. It is the homosexual activists who are using extortion by picking small businesses which do not have the funds to defend themselves against the attack on their constitutional right.

 

[Axehead]

The gays are pawns of the world system that is using them to abolish religion for their own version. One World "Religion".

This is much bigger than cakes or sexual civil rights.

 

[LightMessenger]

My definition of the second great command is that if I wanted a cake made for me and was denied because I am Christian I would feel very very badly. I would think just because of me being Christian you can hate my faith so much that you won't even bake a cake? Not a cake? What else would you deny? If I fell ill you'd not call emergency services? You'd just let me expire? How absolutely cruel you could be only because I'm Christian?

Then I think if I would not like that for me, could I do it to someone else? The cake is immaterial at that point. My own beliefs, my own ethics, my own consciousness is called into question.

Am I really loving myself by giving up what I know is true just to prove that someone is doing wrong? What of the straight adulterers? Should I hold my love from them? What of the other sinners?

Should I turn myself into something I would detest just to prove the point that I'm more righteous than another? What profit is in that? Sounds like I'm the servant in the parable of a certain king. That I won't forgive the debt of another after mine is. That if I were God I'd only make the rain fall on the just and not unjust.

No.

I refuse.

Completely refuse.

I will not only make their cake. I will make it the best cake I could. I'd give them the most awesome cake. Because despite their choices I love myself to be perfect (teleios) and to love them and treat them as I would want for myself.

The King came for all, not just the righteous. He laid down his life, journeyed to sheol and then came back for the unrighteous.

Least I can do is make a cake.
Least I can do is love as I would desire to be loved.

And then pray that God moves in their life.

Who am I do only show love to those whom love me? I profit nothing from that.

Bravo, pom!!

That is exactly what God would expect for you to do and the way to act and nothing less. He would surely bless you more than you could ever know for your act of kindness despite all other things. You would surely be doing as Jesus commanded that you do to Love One Another UNCONDITIONALLY.

The gays are pawns of the world system that is using them to abolish religion for their own version. One World "Religion".

This is much bigger than cakes or sexual civil rights.

Your hate for these people is quite venomous. That is not good and God is not pleased with the way you view those whom He has created. They are not "pawns" and are not being used to abolish any religion. You need to examine your conscience to see why you hate the LGBT community so much as you do.

You also need to read the following and view the video.

Are Christians “Holier Than Thou”? They shouldn’t be!
from United Christian Broadcasters

http://321.revivalmedia.org/are-christians-holier-than-thou-they-shouldnt-be/

You miss the point of God.

He doesn't tolerate the unjust. Its against his ways.

BUT HE STILL MAKES IT RAIN ON THEM.

Get it.

God would say I don't like your sin, but I'll still make the cake.

Why should we be different?

Exactly! I'm glad to see that there's at least one person here presumable from the opposite side who has good sense enough to see it as it is and as God would have it to be.

You asked how I defined love.

That's how I define love. I give the same treatment that I'd hope to receive.

If you don't to that, that is your choice. I chose to love not hate. I don't profit from hate.

Beautiful answer that is very pleasing to God!

 

[ATP]

Christians should follow there beliefs and refuse purchase. As a christian owner, he has the right to do what he pleases.

 

[Axehead]

Your hate for these people is quite venomous. That is not good and God is not pleased with the way you view those whom He has created. They are not "pawns" and are not being used to abolish any religion. You need to examine your conscience to see why you hate the LGBT community so much as you do.

Where have I ever said I hated anyone? I have said and will continue to say that it is wrong for government or anyone else to violate another's conscience much less their religious values, regardless of the religion. Dude, you have gone totally "postal", and are incapable of carrying on a conversation regarding the merits of both sides.

As a Christian, if someone refused to serve me, I would go some place else.

The fact that you have so much animosity towards Christians who want to stay true to their conscience tells me everything I need to know. Would you exhibit that same animosity towards others that want to stay true to their beliefs?

LightMessenger, as I was thinking about your posts tonight, a picture of a radical Muslim kept coming to mind. He was threatening to behead someone and saying "submit or die".

This is figuratively what is happening when you force a person to violate their conscience. This is now what the government is doing on many levels to the American people. In a manner of speaking, "Submit or be destroyed", is the message they are conveying. You have adopted their message.

 

[pom2014]

As a Christian owner you violate the second great command by not treating others as you'd want yourself to be treated.

That's a violation of a direct.command of the King.

 

[Axehead]

John the Baptist should of kept his mouth shut about Herod's brother's wife. Family affair, right? None of his business. How judgmental of him. After all they did get married. John paid a high cost with his life for telling the truth. Or maybe he lost his head for not keeping his nose out of other people's business and "loving" his neighbor.

Submit or be destroyed (lose your business, livelihood). Notice they don't try this with the Muslim community. I guess there are no Muslim gays.

The best manager I ever had is lesbian, married to another lesbian, of course. She also doesn't agree with the targeting of any particular religious group. She commented that normal people want a photographer for their wedding who is really into the wedding and she could not fathom forcing someone to photograph their wedding.

She also thinks there is an agenda today to force people (through penalties, fines) to change their beliefs.

Says there are plenty of photographers that would gladly do the wedding and do a great job. As a Christian I don't feel like everyone has to accept me and do business with me or else. My manager feels the same way about her situation. Thinks it's very draconian to use the law to force people to violate their conscious. Similar to Sharia law.

Because most churches are 501(c)3 organizations which means government has a "foot in the door" and can threaten to pull their tax exempt status, some states are concerned that the government will try to enforce on Christian churches that they should not discriminate and marry same-sex couples.

Tomorrow, Wed. April 22, the House State Affairs Committee will have a public hearing on HB 3567, that protects Texas pastors, churches and religious organizations on the issue of marriage.
The Pastor Protection Bill, authored by State Rep. Scott Sanford (R-McKinney and a pastor himself), makes it clear in state law that the First Amendment rights of clergy, pastors and churches in Texas apply to the issue of marriage. The bill ensures that the government may not force a pastor, a clergy member or church to perform a marriage or related ceremony that would violate their sincerely held religious beliefs.

Pastors and churches should not have to live in fear that the government will force them to perform marriages that violate their religious beliefs. With the Supreme Court set to take up marriage later this year, many faith leaders are now concerned about the threat of continuing government intrusion and infringement on these issues. HB 3567 makes it clear that Texas should remain a place where government respects the rights of pastors and churches to hold the Biblical view of marriage.