| |
Letters
August 7, 2007
|
Editor:
At the risk of beating a dead horse or alienating a Moderator who I respect, I feel the need to add one final note about Moderator Joan Gray's recent letter.
It appears that Rev. Gray has failed to define her terms. Is she referring to homosexual orientation or homosexual practice? As Presbyterians, we've been talking about this subject of homosexuality for more than three decades, long enough that it should be clear by now that it's necessary to make the distinction between orientation and practice.
If Rev. Gray is talking about pastors or congregations barring homosexual persons who are courageously celibate or striving to be so with God's help, I would fully agree with her. But if she is talking about delaying membership for practicing homosexual persons who presently have no intention of quitting and no patience for those who counsel them to do so, then I would disagree.
In the second instance, we really ARE dealing with a problem of profession of faith in the LORDSHIP of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ cannot be LORD if one's libido is put in his place.
I think that we today generally have little concept of what Jesus being LORD means. That's the crux of many problems. Self-will, self-determination, independence, personal rights, desires, "what I think" – all of these have become lords of our lives, in the place of utter abandonment to the will of THE LORD JESUS CHRIST.
That's the problem. And it's a problem for straights and gays alike. However, the problem really comes to the fore in our conversations about homosexuality, because an entire group is contending mutually contradictory professions: that Jesus Christ is their Lord and Savior AND that they can do whatever they jolly well please when it comes to homosexual practices that God has proscribed.
May God bless pastors, sessions, and congregations that care enough to teach that obedience to God's sovereign rule in one's life is a sign of the genuineness of one's profession of the LORDSHIP of Jesus Christ.
James D. Berkley
Director of Presbyterian Action
Bellevue, Washington |
| |
|
