Warning All Churches

Over this year, there have been a number of news reports on another movement in the church advocating for the acceptance of homosexual behavior and same-sex relationships. Matthew Vines, an openly homosexual 23-year-old student at Harvard University, posted a video on YouTube of a speech he gave on homosexuality and the Bible. In the talk, he claims repeatedly that God’s Word does not condemn monogamous same-sex relationships.

Now, a recent report from the Christian Post highlighted the amount of compromise happening within the church on this issue. The headline of the article explains, “50 'Hand-Picked' Christians Trained To Convince Churches To Re-Interpret Scripture's Gay Boundaries.” Vines apparently hosted a training conference recently in his home state of Kansas for Christians who want to convince their churches to accept same-sex relationships.

Vines explained, “The goal of the conference was to be training Christians who are in churches that don't currently support LGBT people and to give them the biblical tools and knowledge that they need to go back to their churches and have constructive, persuasive conversations with other believers on these issues.” Sadly, all this training and effort these Christians are going through is based on a false interpretation of Scripture. Vines’s ideas are founded on eisegesis (reading man’s preconceived ideas into Scripture) rather than exegesis (starting with the Bible to understand what it says about something).

In another article, Vines said he was looking for a single resource that would address all his concerns about homosexuality—so he created his own, first in the form of his talk, and in the form of a forthcoming book. Sadly, in his research he turned to many other resources and arguments (likely from pro-gay Bible scholars). But he didn’t turn for answers to the single resource given to us directly by the God who created the universe—the Bible. It’s the Bible that has the answers to life’s big questions.

You see, Scripture is very clear on the issue of homosexual behavior. In that single resource, man’s fallen nature and sinful desires are addressed, and there’s no mistaking the conclusions God’s Word comes to about gender and sexuality. Many of the key verses Vines attempts to refute in his talk are addressed on our website. Steve Golden (AiG–U.S.) explains the arguments made by homosexual advocates in his article “Pro-Gay Theology: Does the Bible Approve of Homosexuality?”

Vines has started an organization called the Reformation Project, intended to teach people that the Bible “never addresses the issues of same-sex orientation or loving same-sex relationships” and “to reform church teaching on sexual orientation and gender identity through the teaching of the Bible.” But this mission of the Reformation Project is fundamentally misguided—and churches need to be warned about it. The Bible does address the idea of sexual orientation and gender identity—from the beginning, God made humans male and female, and He intended marriage to be between one man and one woman for life (Genesis 1:27; 2:24; Matthew 19:4–7).

I urge you to pray for Matthew Vines and all the other professing Christians involved in this conference, that their hearts would be turned back to the authority of Scripture in the area of sexuality and gender. And I urge you to lovingly share the gospel with unbelievers dealing with sexual sin, that they might repent and believe the good news of the gospel of Christ.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken

Steve Golden assisted in the writing of today’s blog post.