Pastor's Couch: Gospel and Sex

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So, Dr. White, I think it's important, as we have this discussion, and we're speaking hard truths at times to the homosexual community, those who are advocates for the kinds of things we're seeing in our culture.

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I think it's important for us as Christians to, I think, show them the love and the concern we have for them, and to communicate the gospel in a meaningful way in the context of, again, hard truths being spoken to them.

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So, say someone's listening to this now. They've listened to our episode, or maybe not, and they're wanting to know now, what's the purpose of this discussion?

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Why are you guys so invested in hurting me? Why are you so invested in coming at the core of my being and my identity?

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What would you have to say to them? Well, that homosexuality is not the core and identity of any individual that God has created, first of all.

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The scriptures say that there were individuals in the early church who had come to know

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Jesus Christ. 1 Corinthians chapter 6 describes these individuals, very clearly describes homosexual individuals, and it says, but such were some of you, but, and then it says, you were washed.

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And I think for the homosexual who recognizes the need to be right with God, recognizes that they want to be pure, that they want to be washed,

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I can't speak to the person who still loves that lifestyle. I can't speak to the person who rejoices in that kind of lifestyle.

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But to the person who, through, I would believe, the work of the Holy Spirit, comes to desire purity, comes to desire a right relationship with God, the fact is, the

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Bible says, that path lies open to them. But it is a path of repentance.

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It is not a path of rebellion. In other words, I see people who want to try to promote the idea that you can be right with God, but you can demand that God allow that on your terms, rather than God's terms.

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The path is a way of repentance. And that's a path for all people. It doesn't matter whether you practice homosexuality or any other sin.

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You can be a swindler, you can be a murderer, you can be a thief, you can be a person who is disobedient to parents.

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All those things are listed as things that separate us from God. Heterosexual adultery.

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Heterosexual adultery. It does not matter. If a person desires to be right with God and to have purity in God's sight, the way is open to everyone, but it is always the path of repentance.

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It is never the path of rebellion. We have to be willing to come to God on the terms that He has laid out, not on the terms that we would demand of Him.

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And I really believe it takes the work of the Holy Spirit in a person's heart for them to come to understand that, and then to come to embrace that idea of repentance.

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But there are some who actually proclaim a message that there is no hope for the homosexual, that they've been given over, that it's too late.

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But it's very clear in Scripture that such were some of you, but God washed them,

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God justified them, God made them new creatures, but only in Christ Jesus.

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And so to look to any place else, to look to any self -help methodologies or anything like that is not the way to go.

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Instead, the Scripture says, you come to Jesus Christ, you cannot clean yourself up, only

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He can do that. The person He's looking for is the person who will believe His claims of who

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He is, that He is the only one, He is our Maker, He is our Redeemer, He's the one who died, rose again on the third day.

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And then that type of faith combined with repentance, a willingness to say,

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I will not place any restrictions, I will believe in God the way

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He has told me I need to believe in Him. That person who will come in repentance and faith is the one who will find

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Jesus Christ to be a powerful Redeemer. And yes, even one who can purify and make clean the individual who desires to be able to have that right relationship with God.

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But there's only one way of doing it. Man's ways will never bring that about. Only God can do that in Jesus Christ.

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So we are not saying as Christians to somebody with these desires that what

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God wants for you to do is to become heterosexual in their salvation. We're saying that Christ is a perfect Savior and He saves people who are sinners and that He redeems them and changes them.

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The change comes about by the work of the Spirit within a person's heart. Many people think, well,

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I've got to clean myself up first. I've got to somehow achieve perfection and then

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I'll be acceptable to God. None of us are acceptable before God. Every single one of us is reprehensible in God's sight.

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The only way that any one of us have peace with God is in Jesus Christ, being clothed with His righteousness, having

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His life. Anyone who tries to clean themselves up first, that's not what repentance is.

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Repentance is not some type of self -cleansing ritual. Repentance is a willingness to go the direction that God would call us to go, a break with the old, a willingness to turn to the new.

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It is in that willingness that God then grants the ability to live in such a way by His Spirit, by His grace, not by anything that we work up within ourselves, that will be pleasing to Him.