Originally Posted by
MacG
Hey All,
Out here in California we have Proposition 8 being that a yes vote will ammend the cons***ution to define marriage as being between a man and a woman.
Do gay folks have a secular right to a state marriage vs a marriage "in the eyes of God" meaning the church?
MacG
The votes in California are in. And the count continues. Prop 8 has a 450,000 vote lead thus far. And if this proposition p***es, California (and in my estimation America)has dodged a mine field.
Marriage is the first government of man, preceding any form of ancient regional or national government. The former was commissioned by God. The latter was formed by man. So when marriage becomes a mockery or is made to be a mockery, it is God who is being mocked by man.
The reason it has been allowed by God for America to have to fight for the sanc***y of marriage is because heterosexuals have been making a mockery of marriage for at least the last 50 years in America. And at least half of those heterosexuals who have been doing so have been Christians. Look at the divorce statistics. Divorce rates are virtually the same for the "churched" as the "unchurched." And at times, it has even been higher for the "churched." That is not only a shame it is a testimony to the sad state of affairs in the Church... a testimony that causes the "unchurched" to further mock God.
I am among those who felt the need to reach out to the unchurched by appearing less churched to them. The Apostle Paul spoke of precisely this in:
1 Corinthians 9:21 To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law.
But we must be careful, we must be very careful in our efforts to remove the sanctimonious rebuff unbelievers sometimes feel around believers... not to forget the middle portion of that same verse. At times I have... to my shame. Because to do so is to devalue the Gospel, to make Christianity appear to be just another religious choice among the rest. To make it seem like the cause of Christ is worth little since we haven't even bothered to change our lives to accommodate him... how could that apparent insincerity appeal to a possible convert?
And this (in my estimation) is how the Church has been forced into the closet the past 50 years. We tried to seem as worldly as the next guy... then we became as worldly as the next guy. And the humanists began pushing on issues we were hard-pressed to oppose (given our worldliness and lack of moral capital)... like open ****sexuality... ****sexuality in the military... ****sexuality in the schools... ****sexuality in marriage.
At each juncture the Church (that's us) failed to oppose the red ribbon tide... because we have been too much like them. This is why the Bible warns against worldliness and sex sin. Any deviation from God's commands are a perversion of them... and we who are deviant in heterosexual sin are on the same road as those who are ****sexual (they are just further along the same road). And since we have the truth... the Bible... the Spirit of God living in us... and therefore a reason not to have any deviousness (and the unbeliever knows none of these reasons to show any restraint)... it is we who have the greater sin... we who have the log in our eye who so often point the finger of accusation at those who have but a speck in their eye.
We in the Church have dodged a mine field if Prop 8 p***es. But this is not a time to sigh with relief and then return to our life styles that got us in this predicament... it is time to repent! It is time to pray and seek God's face! It is a time to get our own house in order so that we can oppose the crimson tide of evil.
Judgment must begin in the house of God (1 Peter 4:17).
Look at the evidence of how we have mocked God and have made a mockery of him to the unsaved...
For Heaven's sake... Repent!