No one can argue with "born this way" regarding where we're born, who our parents were, or whether we have XX or XY chromosomes; the final determinant to gender identity. Hair can grow, breasts be enlarged, the voice modified, desires be conditioned, and the appendages altered but gender is genetic. We are all born male or female from a genetic standpoint. There are mutations where aberrant conditions exist but rather than propagate alternate features, people can be helped.
Normal gender roles are also inborn. Christians cannot turn their head to the Creator. Mankind was made male and female, and the two in marriage become one. God commanded male and female to multiply. Re-creation is Design Intent. If people deny what God did, and for the reasons He said, they don't trust God. My suggestion is that those who deny the Creator, deny His ability to save. Hence, trusting God for only half His power is foolishness. Face the facts: denying God as Creator is apostasy. The penalty for that is eternal death.
If you fail to acknowledge that normal heterosexual practices are God's purpose, then you disallow God's truth as anything more than the Word speaking to hear Himself talk! The purpose for genders are an exclusive relationship with each other, and to grow the human race of people. Why did God want the earth to populate? Simply put, to revere, appreciate, and love Him! Those who fail to meet God's purpose denigrate, depreciate, and despise Him.
One might say, "They are merely sinning!" There is no mere sin, but some sins are greater than others. The penalty for sin not covered by Jesus Christ is equal, but the sins themselves vary in degree. If they didn't, over-eating would be as damning as murder. Most Christians would then be hell-bound. On the other hand, any - even great sins can be forgiven but one - blaspheming the Holy Ghost. Blasphemy is "the act of insulting or showing contempt or lack of reverence for God." (Merriam-Webster Dictionary).
It is an insult to God if his Words are denied as truthful, ridiculed or rejected. That's why Adam and Eve died spiritually! Showing contempt for God is understanding His will but doing one's own will. Lack of reverence for God is denying his Almightiness, that He is everlasting, and that He is truth. When one does his own will, rather than God's, that is blasphemy. God's grace is sufficient for any sin including homosexuality, but flaunting a sinful lifestyle in God's face defines reprobation. Because practicing sinners blaspheme God, they damn themselves.
"Willingness" is what makes the difference. If anyone is willing to obey, God gives them credit, and has mercy on them. Unwillingness to obey is "blasphemy". That's what Paul meant when he said, "The Spirit is willing but the flesh is weak." If the spirit of the person is unwilling, the person is cooperating with the flesh. That is damning.
Modernists, even from the pulpit, deny that Scripture pleads to "hate the sin but love the sinner". There is no one verse which quotes that. However, the entire body of truth from Holy Scripture is for that very purpose! If anyone misses that point, they need to review the entire Bible.
Degrees of sin or the definition of sin is not dynamic. God's Law is for the ages. The Ten Commandments are written on stone to be everlasting. One cannot be a servant to sin and to God at the same time. What most people miss when they are "born-again" is that a new person is born. "New persons" have a new character. The sinful things are gone, and just like the Noahic flood, they are washed clean and given a new start. New starts don't commence with the same old sins!
Is homosexuality a "great sin"? You be the judge. God calls it "an abomination" (Levitucus 18:22). "Abominable" things are disgusting things to God. There are, however, many disgusting sins. Sins are the desire to do things of one's own will, and not God's will. We seek to pleasure ourselves rather than God. Living for pleasuring oneself is blasphemy because those who do endow themselves with godhood. Mankind dabbles in essentially three types of sin: the love of wealth, the desire for pleasure, and the acceptance of false knowledge - the wisdom of the world. The quest for these three categories of sin makes sinners as gods in their own eyes.
Some have strongholds, or a spiritual addiction to same-sex relationships. The genetic propensity to sin is manifested in our behavior. Homosexuals aren't "born that way" but are tempted that way. They fall for temptation, and one sin leads to another. Spiritual addiction occurs when one quits resisting. They become their own master, and God is left standing alone again under His tree.
Pedophiles are as addicted to their stronghold as are homosexuals. If homosexuals are to be tolerated, then by the same metric, pedophiles must be as well. Obviously, most people with any morals at all reject pedophilia, and using the same standard they should reject same-sex relationships.
At what point does the strongholds get too perverse? Using the same metric as for homosexuals, anyone would have to be able to do "what is right in their own eyes". Without spiritual regulation and self-control, that's just what disgusting people do! I'm not isolating homosexuality from the pack. All sins are disgusting to God but others are more so because they are beyond the realm of no return - at least without grace. Nothing is too powerful for Almighty God!
What is an abomination to God is the apathy regarding Holy Matrimony. Marriage is holy, and it is defined - one man and one woman. Marriage is a picture of the groom - Jesus, and his bride - the Church. By fornicating with strange sexual practices, it contaminates the Church. We can easily see already how the body of Christ - the Church is already contaminated. If the homosexual community, those claiming to be Christians, snub their nose at the will of God, they will be damned. The gate to heaven is straight: it is guarded to keep people out who don't buy into Holy Scripture. The path to paradise is narrow. Few have the sure-footing and self-control to stay on that path.
Fornicating with others is fornication against God. As bad as homosexuals are those who sexually abuse themselves - which fornication is!
1 Corinthians 6:18 Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body.Fornicators sin against themselves, and God as well. If one uses the logic that if they get married, they longer fornicate, is violating a stiffer rule - blaspheming God by doing what is reserved for man and wife.
Ironically, those Christians who tolerate homosexuality are silently condoning the behavior. Tolerant Christians condemn the ones they claim to love to an everlasting hell. Being "born-again" means having a new spirit - one in harmony with God's. Homosexuals who claim to be born again but have not changed, have died in the Spiritual Womb. They are only poor actors in the play of Christianity. Those who are truly re-born will be spiritually changed. If they are not, symbolically maybe they need a little spiritual water-boarding. Perhaps they should open their eyes and breath a little living water as they are immersed.
People who live a life of sin after being born-again and are baptized are little more than wet sinners. The baptismal waters have no efficacy unless the person immersed allows the Holy Spirit to circumcise the flesh. The flesh is the desire to sin. When that desire is put on the cross by Jesus, it is He who will Comfort, protect, make safe, and handle temptations. What are those born-again to do? Allow God to do the changing by showing a willingness to change. That willingness is manifested as self-control - putting your little god up there on a cross, and allowing the old person to die with his sins on Jesus's back.
Homosexuality within the church should be treated as sinful because it is. To credit it to genes is as bad as crediting bad behavior to disease. Behavior can be treated much easier than a terminal disease. It is best treated by knowing that it can be! Faith in Jesus Christ is the solution to sin. His desire is that "whosoever believes in him should not perish". That includes the sin of homosexuality. Nothing is too hard for Almighty God. The Good Doctor stands ready to heal. All one needs to do is answer His call,
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