I notice that everyone keeps going back to "events" or the issue of Christian vs. gay. In fact, it is the reality of hate expressed by some Christians -- not just the Westboro loonies -- that sets in the mind of the gay person that there is animosity between Christians and gays, even those gays who profess faith in Christ. I'm going to make a statement here many of you aren't going to like, but frankly I don't care whether you do or don't.
Those who are actively engaging in homosexual acts can still profess a valid faith in Christ, just as the adulterer, the addict, the thief, or anyone else in habitual sin can also do. The problem isn't their "false confession." It may not be false at all. The problem is their clinging to sin despite their faith.
There's been a great deal of discussion about the Arizona and Kansas laws that would have established a legal right for the Christian or other person of faith to decline services to someone they do not want to serve due to those closely held matters of faith. Despite my disagreement with the laws, I've never said a person doesn't have that right. My issue with the laws, and with many attitudes found on this board, is the message sent when denying services because of those beliefs.
The fact is, we bring the gay person's expectation of rejection by us upon ourselves. How? By rejecting them! Despite our constant statements that we "love the sinner, but hate the sin," that is not how our attitude is expressed. Just look at the discussion on this thread. We judge them as "being sinners." We accuse them of "having an agenda." We appeal to "conscience." Well, guess what? They are sinners, they do have an agenda,and our conscience is being challenged: Is it centering on selfish resolution of "black and white, wrong vs. right," issues? Is it taking a "my-way-or-the-highway" stance on those issues? Or is it tossing all that self-righteousness aside in favor of reaching outward to a lost world?
Christians encounter a gay person and immediately judge them and their lifestyle without even realizing it, abandoning them to their sin, leaving them hanging because they are in sin, while we mouth platitudes about loving them but hating their sin. Our focus has got to be on a desire to show them that God is love, and that He doesn’t hate them, but rather the sin. The kind of rejection we regularly subject most sinners of all stripes, but particularly gays, does not send a message of love and fellowship. It sends a message of marginalization, discrimination, and denunciation.
Don't you dare go throwing around "it's an abomination" Scripture, because God says that about all sin, not just homosexual sin. Gays are no more separated from heaven than any other sinner, the mere true and sincere confession of Christ being sufficient to overcome even that sin. And gay Christians -- those who have made that confession and fall back into the sin just as addicts, adulterers, etc., do -- are no more an abomination or in danger of "losing their salvation" than you or I are so in danger. We all know, or should, that "losing salvation" is an impossibility, and God doesn't make "special exceptions" for those who fall into homosexual sin.
We can't hide in fear, and we can't hide behind the law, expecting special laws to be written for us. As has been said, the laws in Arizona and Kansas were poorly written, and would have resulted in unintended consequences. We as Christians have an ugly tendency to demand our rights, to expect the world to act like Christ, without ever taking the initiative to show the world Christ in us.
