October 14, 2013
-
EXCERPT FROM MY BOOK
FROM CHAPTER 5
"This leads to another realization God taught me through hookers: Whether conservative or liberal, Christians don't want to deal with the brokenness in sexually broken people. Condemning and merely swallowing sins are different sides of the same coin. The truth is we don't want to deal with "those" people.
Condemnation and acceptance are the way we get past, around, or avoid people Jesus came to serve and save. The Religious Right removes Jesus Christ from his cross so the sinner may be crucified in his place. The Religious Left removes Jesus from the cross, because where there is no sin there is no need of a suffering savior. Jesus says in Matthew 23:13, "You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people's faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to." And again in Matthew 23:24 , Jesus says, "For they bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers." Sexually broken people deserve the opportunity and invitation to know, "...Jesus and him crucified." Condemnation and acceptance add up to the same thing: People are refused Christ. When we deflect broken people through condemnation or acceptance of sin then we, without thinking, have shut the door of heaven in the faces. We are tying up heavy burdens for these people because we demand they free themselves, or by demanding that they merely accept their sin because of the specious argument that "nature" made them that way. Their sin is to heavy for the to carry, but Jesus says, "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest." We can't say to the hooker "Lilly", or the LGBT person at work or school, "You made the choice, so make a different choice," and we also can't simply say, "Well God just made you this way, so you need to just accept that." Jesus says the opposite of what Both the Religious Right and Religious Left say. Jesus came to open the gates of the kingdom of heaven and to take away the heavy burden. "
Can you help a brother out? Does it make sense? Are you getting the gist of what's written here? Do you agree or disagree, and why do you agree or disagree? Do you think the verses from Matthew 23 fit the context or can rightly be fitted to the context of the excerpt?
I'd honestly appreciate your input!!
Forgive the formatting error, I don't know how I did it and I don't know how to fix it.
Comments (8)
Yes, this passage you've written makes a good deal of sense and moves in a logical, orderly manner to make its point.
I would remove the ellipses from before "Jesus and him crucified" and also make sure to use the correct "too" in "their sin is too heavy." These are very minor considerations - overall the passage is extremely well-written.
I would perhaps consider removing the "without thinking" as it interrupts the sentence's flow a little, unless it contributes to a greater point outside of this paragraph.
"And for this post: so what happens to this fellow who wrote one page and stapled blanks instead fulls? Is this a work in progress or was this the final draft for this project?"
RYC: It was the final draft! His rough draft was also very bad, but it at least had text on it. I asked him about it and he clearly did it intentionally. On to the next big thing, I guess.
Perhaps remove the "without thinking" and add a separate, short sentence which indicates that this is generally unintentional.
Maybe something like:
When we deflect broken people through condemnation or acceptance of sin, then we have shut the door of heaven in the faces. This is true regardless of our intentions. We are tying up heavy burdens for these people because we demand they free themselves, or by demanding that they merely accept their sin because of the specious argument that “nature” made them that way.
You've gotten feedback from a pro, so I won't add anything.
How have you been, friend? We need to call and catch up!
Last I heard you are a pro yourself, Dr.GreekPhyique. I know your specialty is math, but you had to do some writing in all that too.
Lonnie,
I the religious left would say, "Society made you that way, so let's reform society." But, that is a minor quibble : )
Your main point, that we don't want to deal with real people, is very true. Sin is messy. It's much easier to put a mask on and pretend that life is easy. But if we do that, we're also short circuiting any real life and growth.
How's things?
James
I see from your comment that I need to explain what I'm saying a little more carefully. When I talk about "sexually broken" people I'm talking about homosexuality, promiscuity, porn addiction, and other sins which Christians find most troubling today. I've learned that sexual brokenness is the result of the break down of relationship. The flavor of the sexual sin is really more a result of greater or lesser degrees of confusion. The root to all sexual sin is exactly the same. What Liberal Christians do is swallow all the nonsense the world throws at them about what science 'proves'. Actually, factually, science hasn't proved anything telling about sexual orientation in humans. Not even what we would term 'natural' sexual desire among people is hardwired biologically in human beings. The role of biology is to, more or less, set the stage. Biology cannot dictate complex human interactions, beliefs, lifestyle choices or practices.
An abacus is a human powered computer, but being a computer doesn't give one the sophistication or technologically advanced complexity to download the software for Apple's iTunes. You can try to download the music of The Second Chapter of Acts to your abacus, but it'll never work, and all the human wishin'n'hopin ain't gonna make an abacus into an iPod or iPad. Human biology can't dictate how we will express our sexuality any more than iTunes can be downloaded to an abacus. Biology doesn't have the sophistication or complexity to make people gay or transsexual. Biology doesn't even dictate heterosexuality. Biology certainly does stack the deck toward heterosexuality with the drive to propagate the species. You and I properly understand this drive to be the procreative drive (too often mistakenly called the sex drive) God gave us when he created us. Even atheist Evolutionary Biologists like Richard Dawkins have to acknowledge that humans have a drive to propagate the species.
I've said all that to say, "Liberal Christians" have bought into the false claims of very bad pseudoscience. The modern version of the snake oil salesman are those who support poor, terribly biased science fiction dressed up as valid scientific inquiry and discovery. The Liberals excuse sexual immorality by saying, "It's okay, you're just born this way." Liberace was a gay piano player, but he wasn't born to either. Biology dealt the hand and the people in Liberace's life, during his early formative years, influenced greatly, how he played those cards. He'd likely be alive today, if he'd had something more like a family instead of controlling manipulating opportunists who wanted to use him. The sexually broken person has accepted for him/herself, at some level, that they exist to be used, and to use. Biology has nothing to offset something as awful as something which looks like a family, but is in fact a toxic waste dump.
Thanks again James!
Lonnie
Lonnie,
Thanks for the clarification, but I'm not sure that Liberal Christian is the same as the Religious Left. There are many on the Religious Left who are not liberal in their theology.
According to the definition of Liberal Christian that Roger Olson gives (and I think it is the best one), a liberal christian is one who puts society's current mores above biblical ones and interprets scripture accordingly. The religious left contains some of those, but it also contains people such as Ron Sider and Jim Wallis who would not buy the explanation you are giving. But, they would still say we have to reform society because that's why you are the way you are.
Does that make sense?
Grace & peace,
James