Same Sex Controversy part 2 of 3: Refuting 8 Revisionist Theories about Romans 1

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White. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth and unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them.

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For since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so they are without excuse.

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For even though they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened.

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Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of a corruptible man, and of birds, and four -footed animals, and crawling creatures.

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Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them.

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For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served the creature, rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever.

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Amen. For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions. For their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural.

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In the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman, and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men, committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error.

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And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind to do those things which are not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice.

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They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful.

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And although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them.

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So began the Apostle Paul, his demonstration of the bad news.

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The bad news, not the good news. Before he could explain the good news in his epistle to the

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Romans, he had to explain the bad news. That is, the need of man in sin.

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Why should we be concerned about the gospel? Why should we be concerned about needing a perfect Savior if we do not understand the need that is ours in sin?

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And so, in the first two and a half chapters of the book, we discover that the

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Apostle Paul has to lay out very, very clearly the need of man in sin.

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These verses have had a tremendous impact upon Western culture. The description of man and his sin has had a tremendous amount of impact upon the laws, even of this land, at least as they were originally written.

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The philosophical worldview that lies behind much of the worldview, much of the society that is ours, was very deeply impacted by the words of the

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Apostle Paul written 2 ,000 years earlier. Why? Well, because these passages give us an insight into the very nature of man, into the way that he sins, into what sin is, and hence, obviously, these verses are under tremendous attack today.

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Liberalism, of course, wants to dismiss Paul as a simply uptight homophobe who simply went off the deep end in a passage such as this, that there's so many things here, such as being disobedient to parents and things like that, that really are just the natural outworking of our growing up, etc.,

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etc., etc. Today on The Dividing Line, we're going to be talking about a subject that may not necessarily be appropriate for the young folks, depending on how young they are.

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We're going to be talking about homosexuality, the reason being I am finishing up work, at least in the initial writing stages, co -authoring a book with Jeff Neal on the subject of homosexuality.

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Many of you know that back in May, I debated Barry Lynn on the subject of homosexuality, and it was an excellent debate in the sense that the truth was clearly vindicated,

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Mr. Lynn was clearly defeated. He as much as admits that in the debate itself, and this book will, of course, present that same information and more of it.

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It is designed to help the believer, the Christian, to understand exactly what is going on when people say that the

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Scriptures do not condemn homosexuality. If you go on to almost any of the internet websites where you can purchase books,

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Amazon, Barnes & Noble, whatever, and start doing a search, you will discover that there is literally a flood of books coming out by, quote -unquote,

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Christians who defend the practice of homosexuality as being something that is commensurate and that is consistent with biblical

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Christianity. And just simply the flood of books might be enough to convince some people that, well, there must be some substance to this, there must be some element to this that is true.

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Why else would this be taking place? How could people write book after book after book if there's absolutely no substance to what it is that they are saying?

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Sadly, there are many people who think that way and they adopt that kind of methodology.

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It's basically those who have the most books wins, and that's understandable in a lot of evangelicalism today where critical thought processes are not something that we are encouraged to have.

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In fact, in many places we are discouraged from having critical thought processes, engaging in theology and the task of the interpretation of Scripture and so on and so forth.

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And so the book is designed to respond to the various arguments, and there's,

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I guess you could say there's no end to the number of arguments that you could present, but obviously the arguments fall into various categories and you can pretty much cover all of them when you choose the major representatives of each category and respond to them, and that is what we have been doing as we have written this book.

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Now, we should point out, I think, before looking at the text, and today we're going to be looking specifically,

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I think, the primary passage, Romans chapter 1. I'm not saying that the

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Sodom and Gomorrah story in Genesis 19 or Leviticus 18 and 20 or 1

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Corinthians 6 -9, 1 Timothy 1 -10, that any of these passages are not vitally important, they all are, but it would seem to me that probably the central passage that is focused upon, especially in the argumentation of the various books that are coming out that attempt to insert homosexuality into Christianity, make it consistent with Christianity, is

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Romans chapter 1, because of specifically the words of the Apostle Paul, where he says, as we saw before in verses 26 -27, for this reason

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God gave them over to degrading passions, for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error.

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That passage, of course, becomes the key passage, because obviously it describes homosexuality in a way that is not something that a

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Christian would want to engage in, though you, I think, may be utterly amazed at what people say about passages such as this.

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But I should note something in passing before we look at the text, and that is we have the freedom today to discuss this subject.

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I don't have anyone standing over next to the door with a baseball bat. I'm not overly concerned that there are going to be stormtroopers coming through the windows of my office or through the door to drag us off to prison.

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We have the freedom currently in our nation to continue to speak the truth, to actually exegete this passage of Scripture and allow it to say what it says.

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And there may be some people who feel that I'm an alarmist, maybe that I'm just not functioning really well when

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I say this, but it is my firm conviction that unless God is merciful to this nation in the not -too -distant future, that our freedoms, our privileges, our rights to speak the truth and to engage in this kind of a discussion will no longer exist.

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We know beyond a shadow of a doubt that there are entire groups of people in our land who are pushing to remove these freedoms from us.

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We know without a shadow of a doubt there are those who wish to have hate crimes legislation used to silence the voices of those who had said homosexuality is in any way shape or form a non -moral action.

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Of course they're the same people who would basically tell us we cannot decide what is or is not moral outside of what they say is or is not moral.

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They are grossly inconsistent, which is basically why they will not engage us in intellectual combat.

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And when they do, they lose because their position is grossly inconsistent and can be demonstrated to be such.

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But they are the media darlings, and as the media darlings they are rarely put in a position where they actually have to engage in any type of meaningful defense of their position.

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And that's why they can get away with what they are getting away with. And so we have the opportunity right now to speak these truths.

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We may not in the not -too -distant future. And so we need to address these subjects now.

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We need to teach on them. We need to preach on them. And we need to realize that there may come a day when we have to make a decision as to whether we're going to continue doing that because what it'll cost us to do so.

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And that is a decision that each person must make within their own heart, praying for God's guidance and God's strength to be faithful to His truth.

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And so we need to take advantage of the time that we have now. We need to be bold and yet do so in such a way that we do not communicate the one thing that we should not possess in our hearts, and that is hypocrisy.

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That is arrogance. That is, well, I don't have sin in my life and so I'm just going to pick on the sin in yours.

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Homosexuality is a sin. So is arrogance and pride and so is slothfulness and so is all the other things the

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Scriptures list as sins. That does not mean that being slothful is the same as committing the sin of homosexuality, obviously.

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However, they are all sins and we address these issues as sinners and we must always take this subject and utilize it as a means to communicate the gospel of grace, that we need to use this subject to demonstrate that God's holy standards still exist, and that is why the gospel is so radical.

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That is why Christ had to die upon the cross, was because of the desperate nature of sin, which is really what is under attack in all of these things.

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So keeping that in mind then, we go back to the text of Scripture itself, and I would invite you to take your

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Bible and work along with me in this passage of Scripture. I truly believe that in the future the primary work of apologetics will not be undertaken by someone such as myself.

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The primary work of apologetics, of defending the Christian faith, not just in the of atheism, which is what historically people have identified apologetics as.

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Once our society expresses itself fully in its hatred of God's law, and in fact our society,

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Western culture, in its hatred of the role that God's law played in the creation of our laws and our society itself, once our society turns in upon itself and begins to eat at itself from the inside, then all the bounds are gone, and it won't just be the issue of atheism.

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Every single element of biblical truth is already under attack and will continue to be under attack.

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And that means the entirety of God's law concerning how we as human beings are to act and how we are to live is under attack and will come under ever more attack in a society that continues bent on its own self -destruction.

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And so I firmly believe that it will not be a national speaker, it will not be an author, it will not be people like that who are doing the primary work of apologetics in the future.

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You are the person who will need to be doing apologetics in the future. You are the person who will need to inculcate these concepts to your children, teach them to your children so your children understand.

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You will need to be able to answer the worldview that is being thrust at your children, at your family members, all around us, whether it's in the media or in any other form of communication that we encounter in our lives.

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It will be up to you to speak to the co -worker. It'll be up to you to speak in the classroom.

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It will be up to you to speak on the bus and provide an answer to the person who is sitting next to you, who strikes up the conversation and you say something that demonstrates that you hold to a biblical worldview.

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And as the enemy continues to use technological means to to spread error ever, ever wider, then it becomes even more incumbent upon the individual

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Christian to be the apologist. And so with that in mind, when you turn to Romans chapter 1,

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I hope that you will do so with the kind of attention that allows you to go, hmm, what if I was in this situation?

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I didn't have recourse to someone else. I didn't have materials with me. I simply had my Bible with me.

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What if I was sitting at a bus stop waiting for a bus to come and pick me up? My car is in the shop and I'm having to go this direction.

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The person sits down and sees I'm reading a Bible and says, you know what, I'm a homosexual.

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And I've heard that that book says that what I do is wrong. Where does it say that?

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I bet you if you look it up you'll see that it's it's so out of date and it's so ridiculous that no one should ever believe that. What do you do?

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Where do you go? How do you handle that? I don't think it's wrong to say to Christians we should be able to respond in those situations.

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I know that's against what much of evangelicalism, which has stuck its head into the sand, thinks we should do.

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I know there's a lot of folks running around saying, well you just repeat the prayer of Jabez 14 times and I'm sure it'll answer all of your questions.

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That's not going to help you. Believe it or not, the prayer of Jabez will not help you here. You need to know what the

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Scriptures say and be able to give an answer for the hope that's within you. So with that kind of thinking in mind, let's look at Romans chapter 1 and focus upon this.

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You may have noticed, I forget how long ago it was, but somewhere along a long line we dealt with Genesis chapters 18 and 19 on the dividing line.

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I don't remember what the date was but we have dealt with Genesis chapters 18 and 19 on the dividing line and that is of course the story of Sodom and Gomorrah.

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We have not yet dealt with Leviticus 18 and 20. We will at some time in the future, I hope, Lord willing. Then the other key passages that specifically mention homosexuality are 1

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Corinthians 6, 9 and 1 Timothy 1, 10, and both those are focused upon the specific word arsonokoites and what that means because that term is used in both of those.

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And then we have Romans chapter 1. Now that is not everything the Bible says.

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Revisionists, and those are people, that's the term that I use, that we're using in the book, revisionists are those who are trying to revise biblical teaching through creative interpretation and revisionists like to say, well the

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Bible says so little about homosexuality. There's just very little mention of it so it's really not an important issue.

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Well the Bible also says very little about bestiality and pederasty and all sorts of other things like that.

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That doesn't mean that they're unimportant issues. There are some things that are just so naturally wrong you don't have to repeatedly say it over and over and over again to get the point across.

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So that is also, there's another thing sneaking in behind that objection and that is, well if there's only six references or something like that then it makes it somewhat irrelevant.

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No. The revisionist who tries to limit the discussion solely to those passages is missing the positive presentation of the

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Word of God on what it itself says, what the Word says, should be mankind's proper sexual functioning.

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That is the role of male and female, the role of marriage, what marriage is supposed to be, what marriage represents.

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You have the story of creation. All of these things are positive presentations that preclude homosexuality as being an activity that can be blessed by God.

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And so don't forget, don't just focus in upon these. We need to be able to answer these because this is the stuff that's being thrown out there.

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We need to certainly look at these passages but don't think that's all there is to it. Don't get trapped into merely a negative presentation when in point of fact there's a very positive presentation, especially in Jesus' teaching on marriage, that can be made here.

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And one of the key issues that can be presented there is the mutuality of marriage.

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And there can be no mutuality in a homosexual relationship. You cannot have a relationship with your mirror if that other person simply mirrors yourself back to you.

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That is not a mutual relationship. It is not a complimentary relationship.

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And that is what marriage was designed to be. That's how it functions.

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A homosexual relationship, by definition, has to be focused on yourself. It cannot be focused upon a fulfillment of God's purpose in human sexuality.

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It's not possible. And therefore it can only promote selfishness.

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It is opposed to everything that God has placed within us as being created in His image.

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And so that's other issues that certainly we are addressing in the text of the book. And if I don't hurry up here,

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I'll never get to Romans chapter 1 because I know I tend to start preaching when I do that. So Romans chapter 1, you need to be able to present—and this is true apologetically in any context—do not fall into the trap of learning

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Bible verses outside of a context. Do not fall into that trap.

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It's very easy to do. There's all sorts of books out there that say, well, memorize this, this, this, and this. And that's fine to memorize verses, but you need to memorize a verse in its context.

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If you're going to point at somebody else, and when they throw James chapter 2 at you, and yet it's obvious they have never read—they couldn't find

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James 2 .20 if their life depended on it, but they're just throwing it out there at you—if you're gonna throw, if you're gonna put your finger out and say, that's misusing

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Scripture, well, we have to avoid doing the same thing ourselves. And so when we look at Romans 1 .26

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-27, the only way to answer the many revisionist arguments is to know how those verses function within the context of Romans chapter 1.

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Okay? And this is what I'd like to do today. Let me try something today. Instead of my just going on and on and on and on, let's go ahead and open the phone lines at 1 -866 -854 -6763.

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And let's invite you to participate in the program today.

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I have an entire list of revisionist arguments.

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That is, I have—let me see how many I have here. I have one, two—you know, they really need to do something with these new fast computers, because stuff scrolls by so fast.

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You try to select a line of text, it selects the rest of the file instantly. It's just really goofy.

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Anyways, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8.

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Okay, I have 8 revisionist objections, 8 revisionist attempts to turn

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Romans chapter 1 on its head and say it is not relevant to the subject of homosexuality.

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And I know there is at least one person in the chat room earlier that I said, hey, why don't you call in?

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Because this particular individual, who lives tremendously toward the south part of our nation, out along the

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Gulf Coast somewhere, where they have things that run around in their sewers and in their storm drains that look like big, huge, ugly rats that they eat, called

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Nutria, this particular individual had made some comment about, oh, responding to what they say on Romans 1, huh?

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This should be a really short dividing line. So maybe that particular individual would like to demonstrate his ability to respond to one of these 8 revisionist methodologies of dealing with Romans chapter 1.

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So why don't you all just line them up there. I know that there's a bunch of you out there.

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And, you know, we can take our usual suspects, but I'd like to have some other folks get involved and call in and see how you do in handling each of these objections.

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And especially, like I said, that one particular individual who felt they were ready to handle any element of this particular passage.

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So we'll just hopefully wait and see who's truly brave. Or if, you know, maybe the sad thing is, you know, this person might be like someone who, you know, beats up on little girls, you know, and just talks big, but doesn't really get around to doing anything.

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So anyways, a little inside joke there. But all right, going to Romans chapter 1 finally, with only four minutes before I need to take a break, we can at least get started.

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We need to know the context. The context is the demonstration of the universal sinfulness of man, which takes up Romans chapter 1, verse 18, through Romans chapter 3, verse 19.

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You say, yeah, do I have to memorize things like that? No, but I can suggest to you that having an outline in mind of books of the

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Bible is a tremendously useful thing. It really gives you confidence in knowing where you're going and navigating through the

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Scriptures. So Romans chapter 1, beginning of verse 18, the demonstration of the universal sinfulness of man.

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The passage begins with the wrath of God. We are told that the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven.

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This is a divine wrath. It is being revealed, and there it has a specific and purposeful object.

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The object is all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. Not just the gross sins, but the entirety of God, of man's ungodliness and unrighteousness is the object of the wrath of God that comes from heaven.

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Then these men are described as those who suppress the truth in unrighteousness.

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These are individuals, their guilt is increased by the fact that they are involved in the suppression of the truth in unrighteousness.

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To suppress the truth is an unrighteous act. One's relationship to truth is a moral issue.

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That is one of the fundamental things that has been lost in our society. In our society today, we no longer have the idea that whether you believe in the truth is a moral thing, it's just a matter of knowledge.

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Truth is just a matter of knowledge, and in fact in some areas of human thought, such as religion, there is no such thing as a final and objective truth.

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But the idea of Scripture is that truth is not just something you believe, it's something you do.

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And to not do the truth is to sin. To not believe the truth is to sin.

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To not love the truth is to sin. There can be no neutrality in regards to the issues of God's truth.

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And so the Scripture describes these ungodly and unrighteous men as those who suppress the truth.

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Now that truth is available to them because the Scripture tells us in verse 19, because that which is known about God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them.

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What is known about God, and we will see in verse 20, his invisible attributes, his eternal power and divine nature, that which is known about God is evident within them.

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And it's not just because they have done some philosophical searching or something. Instead, it is

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God who has made it evident to them. This is an active revelation on the part of God. God has revealed himself.

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In what way? Well, he has done so from creation itself, according to verse 20, in a way that is, has been clearly seen.

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He has revealed his eternal power and divine nature, so, and how has he done so? Being understood through what has been made so that they are without excuse.

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The clarity of the revelation is so clear that there is no excuse left to man for what he is doing in the suppression of that truth.

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Verse 14 says, for even though they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations and their foolish heart was darkened.

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Notice, there is no moral neutral point here. There is no place left in verse 21 to be neutral about God's truth.

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You either honor him as God and give thanks to him, or you become futile in your speculations and your foolish heart is darkened.

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There can be no other option. You say, that's black and white.

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I thought we had outgrown black and white. When it comes to our Creator, there is no other option.

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866 -854 -6763. We're going to take our first break. Waiting for all you brave souls to get on the phone, and we'll look at the various revisionist excuses.

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We'll be right back. We're looking at Romans chapter 1 here on the

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Dividing Line today, and we're dealing with the issue of homosexuality and its teachings. Those who are promoting in a religious context amongst

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Christians, you have the Metropolitan Church, you have all sorts of other organizations like that, who are saying to us today that the

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Scriptures are unclear on this subject at best, or that in fact we can have confidence that they do not condemn homosexuality and homosexual behavior in any way, shape, or form.

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We're looking at Romans chapter 1. We are looking at the teaching that that text contains concerning man and his sin.

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And we had just gotten to the passage that says, even though they knew God did not honor him as God or give thanks, but became futile in their speculations and their foolish heart was darkened.

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I was pointing out that there is no way, there is no possible way, to be neutral in regards to the truth of God.

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You cannot, the pot cannot be neutral concerning the existence of the potter. No pot can sit around saying, well,

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I just don't know if there's enough information to determine whether the potter really exists, etc., etc. We would find such a situation to be ridiculous, of course.

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And that is exactly what Paul says, professing to be wise they became fools. The wisdom of man, wherein he seeks to twist

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God's truth and suppress God's truth. And please realize, please realize that man's wisdom, man's philosophy, if it does not honor

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God as God, means that it is foolishness, means that it is in error.

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And before we can actually get to the text today, I've been told that we have a brave or rich soul, one of the two, who is calling in today on a cell phone.

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Now, you know, it used to be that you went to a cell phone real quick, but if Greg, and it says in Canada, and I would assume this is the same in Canada as well, but up there in Canada, we discover that there's much more government interaction there.

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And so I have like 1 ,500 weekend minutes and so Greg, do you have like unlimited weekend minutes on your cell phone?

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No, I don't. Oh, see, he didn't hear me. I hear you. Oh, good. My phone was just dying. I had to run upstairs and plug it in.

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Alrighty, so were you hoping to get to handle one of the objections that is raised, or did you have an objection to raise yourself?

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No, I do. I don't have any objections, but I just heard you needed a caller, so I thought I'd call in and help you out.

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Alrighty, well, let me express some of the standard responses to Romans chapter 1, verses 26 to 27, and here's one of the most common ones, and let's see how you would respond to it.

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You're stuck on one of the, you're stuck on a cold bus in Canada, and you've had a flat tire, and the guy...

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It's like 90 degrees here. It's like 90 degrees there? 90 degrees. Well, it's not going to stay that way very long, is it?

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Well, it's been that way all summer. We're drying up and blowing away here. It's like the Dirty 30s. Okay, well...

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It's a drought up here. Well, come December, it's probably not going to be overly warm, right? Well, actually, in Calgary, we live on the

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East Slope of the Rockies, and we get these temperature inversions from the West Coast, so you never know.

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It could be, you could be golfing here in December, or you could be minus 35, and your car is frozen.

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Okay, well, I won't... It's one or the other. Somewhere in between. I won't guess Canadian weather then, but you're stuck on the bus, and you have read

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Romans 1 26 through 27, and the person says, well, you just need to understand.

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Really, everything that Paul says in Romans chapter 1 is a mute point, because Paul did not know about inversion.

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He did not know what we know today about how there are people who are born with the natural inclination toward the same sex, and since he had no knowledge of what we know today, then this passage cannot be relevant.

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It was relevant back then, because they didn't know about it, and so a person who engaged in it would be causing difficulty for other

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Christians because of the cultural taboos. But since we now know so much more than they knew then, then there can't be any relevance to this any longer.

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Well, I would answer that by saying that if I have a problem with my computer, I send it back to the manufacturer, because the manufacturer knows better than anybody else how it's built and how it operates.

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And if Scripture is what it claims to be, which is inspired by God, then the picture that we get of the human condition would be accurate, because it comes directly from God.

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Well, let's... I obviously agree with you, but let me sort of roll with it as the, let's say, the liberal

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United Methodist, basically, that would probably be presenting this type of an argument to you. Well, yeah, certainly

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God speaks to us in Scripture, but don't you think that the Apostle Paul spoke from within the context that was his, and therefore, can't we learn more about the human condition today?

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I mean, he didn't know all about all the genetic things that we know today, and on all the rest of that stuff.

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Isn't it possible that he was, because he only knew of a certain kind of homosexuality, that he was only addressing, for example, those who were heterosexuals, who were actually engaging in homosexual acts, instead of dealing with people who are truly homosexual?

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Well, I guess the first thing I would say about that is the genetic link is completely unproven.

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Well, actually, I wasn't... Let's say we could grant that, and we could find some genetic defect, or whatever you would want to call it, that made somebody susceptible, or even prone to homosexuality, that would still not release them from the responsibility of their actions, any more than it would release somebody who said, for instance, was prone to drink alcohol, and prone to become an alcoholic through a genetic defect.

35:36

Hmm, okay. Well, I wasn't really, I wasn't necessarily making the genetic argument, though you're exactly right, that that is what would, that is the way we would respond to that, but I think the point that I was trying to make was, do you really think that the

35:52

Scriptures have this ability to address subjects that were utterly unknown to the authors of Scripture?

36:02

Well, I think I would go back to the original point that I made, that Paul wasn't speaking just on his own, although he was speaking as a man.

36:10

He was speaking also under divine guidance, and God, being the author and creator of us, knows how we are and what we are responsible for, and he says that we are responsible for it.

36:29

So I would answer that way. Good. Well, yeah, exactly, and much of this does go back to the issue of how we view the nature of Scripture.

36:40

Many of those who are writing today are coming at the text of the Scripture from the perspective that these are primarily the thoughts of men that have been given religious authority by the

36:51

Church over time, rather than the inspired Word of God, and certainly in the debate with Barry Lynn, who, interestingly enough, not only did

36:59

Barry Lynn, in our debate, deny the concept of a closed canon, he believes the canon is still open, but he actually, before the entire audience, claimed to receive revelation on the same level as the

37:12

Apostle Paul, and in fact said that Paul had blown it in the book of Galatians.

37:18

So that gives you an idea of where he's coming from. But those who come from that type of a perspective, their primary argumentation is going to be to undercut the authority of the text, and to say, well, you know, since Paul was ignorant of this, this, and this,

37:34

I'm going to assume that he's addressing an issue other than homosexuality, and this way they can say, oh, he was right in his own context.

37:43

He was right to decry, for example, heterosexuals, who are naturally heterosexual, engaging in homosexuality.

37:52

He was right to condemn that, but we are wrong to then expand that out to say that he was addressing homosexuality in total.

37:59

And the problem is, so many evangelicals, having never heard that before, have never thought that through, and are left stuttering and stammering instead of having already heard of this before, and go, no, no, wait a minute, you're assuming a number of things here, and let's go back and sort of track down all the things that you're assuming.

38:17

Well, then there's the exegetical questions as well, but I'm not really qualified as you are to go into those, the questions of the

38:23

Greek, and what words mean what, and, you know,

38:28

I've got a vines and a strongs, and, you know, a few other tools like that that I can use, but you have that stuff committed to memory.

38:38

Well, there are those issues that come up as well, but in most situations, at least with Romans chapter 1, since it's not really, there's only one grammatical or lexical issue, and that is, what does paraphusen mean?

38:53

What does it mean against nature, or beyond nature? What does that mean? That's really the only issue. Over in 1

38:58

Corinthians 6 and 1 Timothy 1, the meaning of arsenokoites comes up, but yeah, those are the other issues.

39:04

Well, hey, thank you very much for calling in, Greg, and I hope that you all get some rain up there. I really enjoyed your book,

39:12

The Potter's Freedom. I'm Mudslide, by the way. Yes, I saw that you were going to make a phone call, and I hope you pick up a copy of The God Who Justifies.

39:21

I'm getting one. I've got two boys going into the ministry, and I'm getting one for each of them, and I'm gonna get one for my pastor as well.

39:28

Excellent! Well, thank you very much for calling in today. Well, myself, I guess that's four now. That's four! Well, we'll be waiting for the call.

39:34

I hope I get a group discount. Group discount, that's right. All righty, sir, thank you very much.

39:39

God bless. All righty. 866 -854 -6763. I understand that my mentioning of people living down near the

39:51

Gulf Coast, people who have rat -like looking things in their...

39:59

Whoa! Hey, that sounded just like Sky Man when he laughs, actually. Yeah, that was very good.

40:06

We should have Java Man call in and do a Sky Man impersonation. I think that'd be a really good thing to do, because it sounded just like what you were just doing, actually.

40:15

And then I mentioned some people who were saying, this is gonna be a really short dividing line, this is gonna be really easy, sort of like how people might beat up little girls, you know, stuff like that.

40:28

That's what I had mentioned before. Now, I don't know if any of that has any relevance to our current caller who will currently remain nameless, but thank you.

40:37

Thank you very much for calling in today. Oh, you're very welcome.

40:46

Yeah, I wasn't quite sure. Of course, the minute I step out, I hear that I'm being summoned, so...

40:52

Yes, you were being summoned, and you, unfortunately, weren't around to be summoned.

40:58

But let me throw one at you here and see how you handle it. Okay. Um, Dr. Robin Scroggs, a biblical scholar, tells us in his book up there, what was

41:16

Scroggs' book, I'm looking, you can sort of tell my head is New Testament and homosexuality, there it is.

41:22

I have some really interesting books in my library these days. Dr. Robin Scroggs tells us that we've completely missed the boat in understanding

41:34

Romans chapter 1. That if we look at the culture, and if we look at the actual situation that was going on,

41:42

Paul is only speaking of pederasty here, not of adult homosexual relationships.

41:48

And here's the argument. The argument is that the Greeks, uh, we well know, and this is a fact, by the way, the

41:56

Greeks were really into this idea of an older man and a young boy being in quote -unquote loving relationships.

42:06

They even wrote poetry about it. And so what Paul is talking about here is this issue of pederasty of an older man and a younger boy.

42:18

And since that's the only kind of homosexuality that Paul would have even been familiar with, then the idea of applying this to adult homosexual relationships is simply a complete misuse of the passage.

42:35

Well, that certainly is an interesting twist. I would go to verse 27, and actually even before that, though, it says that God gave them up to vile passions, for even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature.

42:54

And the implication is men and women, and then it says in verse 7, likewise also the men leaving the natural use of leaving the natural use of the woman burned for one another.

43:08

Men with men. There you go. Doesn't say men with boys, doesn't give it that qualification, committing what is shameful.

43:17

And we know that he's speaking about natural use and natural use of the male and female sexuality as male to female, not boy.

43:26

It doesn't even imply boy within the context of the other verses. Right. Well, you're exactly right, of course.

43:33

It is amazing the arguments that are presented and how they are accepted just simply because someone with the name of scholar behind them has said the words.

43:46

But it is very... Now, basically, normally what happens in this situation is they focus so much upon the assertion that Paul would have been ignorant of male, adult homosexual relationships that they sort of get your attention off of the text so that you don't see that it specifically says that there is a mutuality involved.

44:09

Burned in their desire toward one another, men with men. It's right there. It's very clear. You're exactly right to go back to the text.

44:16

But by taking you off and talking about the Greeks and historical context and things like that, that honestly, most of us don't have the ability to really respond to.

44:28

There are books out there that provide that kind of information. I'd like to mention that James B.

44:35

DeYoung's book, Homosexuality, Contemporary Claims Examined in the Light of the Bible and Other Ancient Literature and Law, published by Kregel, is an excellent work that goes very in -depth on these things.

44:46

And the simple fact of the matter is, by the way, Paul would have known of these things. He would have known of these things because Plato had written about every aspect of modern homosexuality that we experience today.

45:02

He talked about gay pride, and he talked about lifelong partners, and he talked about monogamous people, and he talked about everything.

45:11

Everything that people will tell you Paul would not have known about, Plato wrote about hundreds of years before Paul.

45:17

They just sort of forget to mention that. It reminds me of the same issue when you deal with the authority structure and the design roles of male and female in the church.

45:32

And they love to quote the cultural argument with that and say, oh, you don't understand back then women were second class, etc.

45:40

And they leave out like in 1 Timothy 2 when Paul gives the reason why. And he says because Adam was born first, which is a pre -cultural argument.

45:49

Exactly. Well, one thing I have discovered certainly has been that these books are not written for the sake of a kind, fair examination of the biblical text.

46:05

They are written to support a particular cause and particular perspective, and hence the exegesis and the historical information is normally extremely, extremely poor.

46:15

Absolutely. Well, keep up the good work, brother. Your new book, I'll give a plug here.

46:21

The God Who Justifies is incredible. I'm on chapter three, and so far it's great.

46:26

I've been quoting it to friends, and they're like, what book is that? I said, the next book you're buying, pal.

46:36

Well, good. I'm glad you agree. Long overdue. Excellent. Well, yeah, sadly it was long overdue, actually.

46:42

More ways than one, huh? More ways than one. Thanks for calling, brother. Okay, bye. All right, bye -bye. 866 -854 -6763.

46:50

Let me just mention there's someone in our chat room right now, and I know many of you listen on Archives, and therefore you can't necessarily engage in this, but there is someone,

47:01

I noticed when they came in, when they first came in, they were using the nicos, N -I -C -O -S, but I noticed that their host mask began with inverse,

47:11

I -N -V -E -R -S -E, and as soon as I saw that host mask, the thought crossed my mind that this individual may actually be a one who would promote homosexuality or defend homosexuality.

47:29

This individual has been invited to call the toll -free number, but so far has shown unwillingness to do so.

47:38

Aside from calling me a, I believe, I'm scrolling back here to find out what I was called, I think it was ignorant bigot,

47:47

I think is what it's, if he's against homosexuality and I'm for it, would

47:52

I want to debate? Well, maybe because truth is at stake here, but there was, besides James White is probably some white conservative bigot.

48:02

Ah, well there you go, white conservative bigot, that sounds racist to me, but we're accustomed to it, and that is about all that revisionists have, pro -homosexual revisionists have to do, is to attack us individually as persons, that's about all there is to it.

48:20

So, let's go ahead and take our, actually I see two lights there,

48:26

I'm not sure why I see two lights, but let's go ahead and talk to Tim real quick, and then we need to get back to,

48:32

I actually need to get to the passage sometime today before the program's over, or someone's going to probably really get mad at me, but by the way, before,

48:42

I can hear you Tim, but hold on just a moment, I just think people who condemn homosexuals, just went by me there,

48:49

I think, I just think people who condemn homosexuals are just prejudice, the same as when people in the south discriminate against African Americans.

48:58

By the way, that is one of the worst arguments there is, and a lot of African Americans who have worked in the civil rights movement are very angry that the homosexuals have worked, tried to basically piggyback upon their own work and their own struggles.

49:17

It's amazing that people will attempt to connect their sexual proclivities with something such as the color of a person's skin and their culture.

49:30

That is absolutely, positively ridiculous that someone would say something like that.

49:37

So, anyways, it's a fascinating thing. How you doing, Tim? Okay, well,

49:43

I thought I'd call in and ask this one question. Okay. One thing that I get stumped on out in my evangelistic endeavors is, and I'm not sure if it's mohaphodite or aphrodite, someone that's born with both genitals.

49:57

Oh, hermaphrodite? Yeah. Now, what's your response? I've heard people say, well, automatically they would be a eunuch, or they got to have extra great faith to trust in God and go through that, because obviously the curse of creation and so forth.

50:11

How would you respond to somebody that says, well, what about that? You know, there's a lot of whatabouts. Yeah, well, first of all, that's extremely rare.

50:19

I mean, sadly, many folks focus upon the extreme exceptions and forget about the rules.

50:27

But in a situation like that, I would say that a person who has experienced that kind of medical condition, and it is a medical condition, would obviously, if God by His grace calls them into a relationship with Himself, would seek the counsel of elders.

50:48

Obviously, in most situations, a sexual role has already been developed in their own thinking.

50:55

They've been raised as one or the other. And if there is no possibility of medical intervention, and in many situations, there is a possibility of medical intervention that can deal with this particular situation.

51:11

But if there is no such situation, then a person like that would, I think, be like a person, for example, who has a tremendous disease that keeps them from being able to function in any sexual way or anyone else.

51:24

They have to find their fulfillment, they have to find their belonging, their love in God and God alone.

51:32

As a eunuch, as you yourself said, would probably have to do that in the same way, trusting in Christ and trusting that God will give them the strength to deal with the physical situation that they face.

51:44

But the exception, such as that in a genetic way, in no way, shape, or form addresses the rule for the person who is involved in homosexuality or in homosexual lust because of the fact that those laws are directly addressed to those individuals who engage in those things.

52:03

A person who can't engage in those things, obviously, that's not who they're addressed to. It's talking about those who burn with lust, man toward man, woman toward women.

52:14

And notice it says they exchange the natural use. That means they're capable of engaging in it, but they exchange that natural use.

52:23

So those are the people that are really being addressed here in Romans chapter 1. And I think we just need to refocus the conversation when people try to...

52:33

In essence, it's a tactic of blowing smoke, blowing fog across it to try to make it sound like it's a little less certain than it really is.

52:40

And since most of those folks don't even know anyone like that, that's more of a tactic than it is anything else.

52:48

All right. Well, I appreciate that because it is sometimes a difficult thing to respond to when you're not educated in those areas.

52:56

Well, I'm hoping that the book that'll be coming out from Bethany House called The Same Sex Controversy...

53:01

Of course, it's Bethany House and I'm a co -author, so therefore the word controversy has appeared within its title somewhere.

53:07

There's a wonderful consistency there, I guess. But The Same Sex Controversy will be of assistance to you.

53:14

Yeah, I'll be looking forward to that for the library. All righty. Thanks a lot. God bless. Bye -bye.

53:20

866 -854 -6763. I think we'll do...

53:25

Before we take our break, we'll go ahead and talk to Chris in Long Island and then when we come back from the break, we can try to pull the program back together again because generally once we talk to Chris, it sort of all falls apart anyways.

53:42

That's true. So we'll take our break after we talk to Chris.

53:49

Now, Chris, were you calling because you heard what I said about Skyman or you're calling because you wanted to actually handle one of these objections?

54:02

No, I wanted to ask you a question. Okay, but once I answer your question...

54:08

If I answer your question, can we get a Skyman laugh out of you? Sure. Okay, good.

54:14

Excellent. Because I want Skyman to hear this. I'm sure

54:19

Skyman hears it every day. Yeah, but you never sound the same way to yourself. So anyways, what's your question, sir?

54:26

My question is the frustration that I have with Roman Catholics and even many evangelicals who have this bizarre notion that there's nothing wrong with being a homosexual unless you're not celibate.

54:43

In other words, it's okay to be a homosexual as long as you are celibate. And even the most conservative

54:49

Roman Catholics that I've spoken with agree with that. I even spoke with a

54:55

Lefebvrite Catholic. In fact, you were there with that radio studio waiting room, and he agreed with that notion that there's nothing at all, absolutely zero wrong with being a homosexual as long as you're celibate.

55:10

I wanted you to respond to that notion. Is that completely foreign to the Scripture?

55:15

Well, certainly. I think you see in Roman's chapter, if someone were to ask, where would you go to deal with that very issue, this is the passage

55:25

I would go to, because it specifically refers to the leaving of the natural use of the woman and the burning in lust toward one another, men with men.

55:36

Now, yes, it does say committing indecent acts, but it is an artificial distinction to say that the lust that led to the commission of the indecent acts is anything less sinful than the commission of the decent acts in the sense that somehow that doesn't come from the same level of sinfulness and perversion on the part of the individual.

56:02

I've seen exactly what you're talking about, and to be honest with you, in those contexts with the

56:07

Catholics, I think that part of that has to do with the situation that they're facing with their priests.

56:16

I think that just as it was well known back before the Reformation that the papacy was a debauched place, that not only back 500 -600 years earlier had you had the pornography, but now it was well known that the popes had kids and their kids were made bishops and all the rest of this stuff.

56:38

Today it is well known amongst Roman Catholics that their priesthood is filled with individuals involved in homosexuality, and so it,

56:46

I think, is a sort of a self -defense mechanism for many of them that they can try to continue to respect their priest as long as he's not involved in doing something, but there can be that homosexual desire.

57:01

No, that's... there's certainly no biblical basis, but I think that's probably where it's coming from on a functional basis.

57:07

Yeah, well, what their retort usually is is that, well, we would agree that the lusting aspect is sinful, but as long as the homosexual doesn't think about the activities or do them, obviously what they're doing is they're giving into the liberal lie that it's another gender, that it's an entirely separate...

57:31

I don't know if I would use the word gender, but it's... they're giving into the liberal lie that a homosexual is like an alternative to a...

57:40

a scientifically valid alternative to a man or a woman. Right, right. Well, and that is...

57:47

as soon as we've given up at that point, as soon as we've compromised that point, the argument is completely over, and I think we saw that in a certain radio interview that we did not too long ago.

58:00

We had to attempt to deal with that over and over again, and the opposing side, the homosexuals on the opposing side, clearly wanted to just throw that in there accept it and then use that to beat us over the head, and it wouldn't work.

58:12

It simply would not work. Well, you know, you know, I'm a little concerned, because I just saw flashing across my screen a threat to...

58:25

I saw a threat to the welfare of your personal computer in the future if you followed through with a certain imitation, and I won't mention who did it,

58:39

I mean, because that would be... that wouldn't be nice, but I'm concerned for you. So, you know, it might just be better if that were something that you shared with your close friends in a loving way, you know, at other times rather than on a webcast.

59:02

What do you think? I think that's a good idea. Okay. Thanks for calling,

59:07

Chris. Talk to you later. Bye -bye. 866 -854 -6763.

59:14

We're gonna be taking our break and we'll be right back. And welcome back to Dividing Line.

59:27

Boy, the conversation has gotten going in the chat room today. All sorts of interesting things being said in there, but we need to get to the exegesis of the text, and we started to get to it just a little bit when we started dealing with some of the calls, but let me see if I can quickly get to it.

59:48

We had gotten to the point of speaking of man's professing to be wise in verse 23, then we have the important introduction of the concept of the exchange of the glory of the incorruptible

01:00:01

God for an image in the form of corruptible men of birds and four -footed animals and crawling creatures. Man, as created by God, is a worshiping creature, and therefore if he's not going to worship

01:00:12

God, he must exchange that worship for something else. And so man turns in upon himself, he turns in upon the creation, and instead of worshiping the creator, he worships the creation.

01:00:24

Hence, verse 24, therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity so that their bodies would be dishonored among them.

01:00:33

And so there is a giving over, a judicial giving over of man who refuses to acknowledge the existence of God to the lusts of their own heart.

01:00:43

If they're not going to have the guidance of God, then they are going to have the guidance of the lusts of their heart.

01:00:50

And the result is that they dishonor their bodies amongst themselves. For they exchanged, verse 25, the truth of God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever.

01:01:02

Amen. And so here you have this exchange of God's truth for the lie, literally in the

01:01:10

Greek language. It's not just any old lie, but anything that is not a part of God's truth is the lie, and therefore they then worship and serve the creature, the created order, rather than the creator.

01:01:23

Man will worship. Man will serve. But he does so either in a way that is unrighteous and sinful, or he does so by directing his worship and his service to God.

01:01:34

And by the way, I would just say in passing that this is also relevant to those involved in false systems of worship.

01:01:43

Remember, this is idolatry. And idolatry would not only be the worshiping of a hideous statue in the jungle, but false worship of false gods would likewise be involved in this very same sin that is here.

01:02:01

And then that brings us to verses 26 and 27. We had some discussion of this.

01:02:08

For this reason, God gave them over to degrading passions. For their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural.

01:02:16

In the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned their desire toward one another. Men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error.

01:02:27

There's the key passage. There is the main thing. And to be able to deal with the objections means that we need to be able to explain what

01:02:37

Paul says here. So here's a couple things that need to be said. Point number one, if you might want to jot these down, these are in essence the points that I made in the debate with Barry Lynn and which we made in the chapter on this subject as well.

01:02:51

First of all, Paul speaks of males with males committing indecent acts.

01:02:58

He does not say men with boys, which is a common claim of revisionists who try to say that this is only dealing with pederasty.

01:03:05

This is talking about, in verse 27, males with males committing indecent acts.

01:03:11

These are not just acts that are somewhat outside the norm. These are indecent acts. Number two, this is a mutual reciprocal relationship for it speaks of their burning with desire toward one another.

01:03:26

Hence all ideas of mere pederasty, of gang rape, or cultic ritual are refuted.

01:03:34

The men of whom Paul speaks have sexual desires for other men. Now why do

01:03:41

I mention such things as pederasty, gang rape, cultic ritual things? These again are some of the rich, the revisionist type excuses who say, well, we're only dealing with pederasty here.

01:03:53

Well, we're only dealing with gang rape here. Well, we're only dealing with cultic ritual issues.

01:03:58

Paul is a Jew, is addressing only a cultic ritual type stuff, whatever it might be.

01:04:05

These are the assertions. No, the people that Paul refers to are those who burn with desire toward one another.

01:04:12

These are mutual reciprocal relationships, man with man, woman with woman.

01:04:18

Both male homosexuality and female lesbianism are addressed by these words.

01:04:25

Third, the phrase, the natural use of the male or female, likewise shows that Paul is not limiting his comments to pederasty as assumed by revisionists.

01:04:38

Natural use can only refer to normal adult heterosexual behavior, which is part of God's creative purpose.

01:04:46

And so they are exchanging that natural use. They are abandoning that natural use of the male or the female and burning in lust toward one another.

01:04:56

So again, this is not mere pederasty. This is adult relationships between individuals who can engage in natural relations.

01:05:08

Number four, lesbianism is referred to as unnatural, that is against nature.

01:05:14

And many revisionists will immediately say, ah, but that's not really what it means. It's not against nature in the sense of against God's natural law, because Paul wouldn't have known about such natural law things.

01:05:31

It is against what is common in society. That is the argument that is used.

01:05:40

The problem again is in this particular context when, speaking of this, notice he says, for even their women.

01:05:49

I get the sense that there is something even more unnatural here for the woman to be involved in this kind of thing.

01:05:59

And when someone says, well, Paul wouldn't have known of that against nature, that's just not true. In point of fact,

01:06:05

Paul would have known about natural law and he would have known about the created order because he was, as a

01:06:13

Jewish person, a person who believed that God was the creator and God had given his law, and in that law there was a revelation of the proper functioning of humankind.

01:06:25

And so that objection is mainly based upon the assertion of an idea, a concept, that is meant to be accepted on the part of the

01:06:41

Christian without critical thought. That is, well, Paul wouldn't have been aware of what we call natural law and things like that, so he couldn't have been talking about that.

01:06:49

That is sometimes thrown in so quickly and expected to be taken as a given that we don't challenge it.

01:06:55

We don't say, you're wrong about that. You're wrong about that. You are wrong to say that, because as the

01:07:01

Jewish person, he would have believed that God has given his law and that he is the creator of the nature that is ours, and therefore you are wrong to make that assertion upon which the rest of what you're saying is true, allegedly supposed to be true.

01:07:16

Number five. This is a chosen act on the part of those who commit it.

01:07:24

They choose to leave the natural use and engage in indecent and unnatural acts.

01:07:31

Here's a further refutation of this idea that the natural use is something else. They engage in indecent and unnatural acts.

01:07:39

It was amazing in the debate with Barry Lynn that what he had basically attempted to say was, well, there's two different lists.

01:07:47

There's the list before verses 26 -27. There's the list after verses 26 -27. The list before and the list after are sins, but these are not called sins.

01:07:58

And so I asked him, I said, so, when the passage speaks of indecent acts, degrading passions, and when we talk about the due penalty of their error, is a degrading passion a non -sinful thing?

01:08:18

And someday, Lord willing, you're all going to get to watch or listen to this. We're working on it, and I think it's going to happen in the not -too -distant future.

01:08:27

But I asked him, so degrading passions are not sinful things? And he sort of stumbles and stammers just a little bit and finally says, well, no, it's just not what's seeming.

01:08:40

It's doing something that's unseemly, but it's not really sinful. Degrading passions, indecent acts, receiving their own persons to do penalty of their error.

01:08:53

But none of this, none of this has anything to do with sin.

01:08:58

Is that we're being told? Hardly. That is obviously not the case at all.

01:09:05

This is a chosen act. The people choose this.

01:09:10

They're not forced to do this. They choose to this. They choose to leave the natural use and engage in indecent and unnatural acts and receive the due penalty within themselves.

01:09:23

Finally, number six. Paul says that those who engage in all the sinful acts of Romans 1, chapter 1, verses 20 to 31, know

01:09:34

God's ordinance that those who do such things are worthy of death. They know that those who do such things are worthy of death.

01:09:46

How can a connection directly back to where's the ordinance of God for Paul expressed?

01:09:53

The ordinance of God for Paul is expressed in God's law. Leviticus chapters 18 and 20 speak of homosexuality and Leviticus chapter 20, verse 13 says that the penalty for homosexuality is death.

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How can the connection between Leviticus 20, 13 and Romans chapter 1, verse 31 be missed?

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It is clearly there. So are we going to just dismiss this passage?

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Well, yes. That's what people do. That's exactly what people do. I'm watching someone right now in our chat channel, a

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Dutch individual that has been kicked out more than once because he has a problem with his language at times.

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A Dutch individual who obviously has no concept whatsoever of the idea that God can reveal what's right and wrong.

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That's what has happened in many European nations today. Why is European culture collapsing? It's collapsing because there is no revelation from God as to what is right and what is wrong.

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When you mock objective truth, when you mock objective moral standards, you're left merely with the thoughts of men to guide you and they are never consistent.

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And so I'm watching a person who is now talking about magic, calling himself a magician, unbelievable, who just found the idea of talking about homosexuality to be a witch hunt.

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That is the common concept of Western culture today. And if we dare hold to what

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Paul says in the scriptures, we need to be ready to hear that kind of a response.

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But folks, I want to really emphasize this. Paul finishes this section talking about those who know the ordinance of God, know that the penalty from God is death, and yet they not only engage in these acts themselves, they not only continue in these acts knowing exactly what the penalty of God is, but they also give hearty approval to those who practice them.

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Sinners encourage other sinners. Sinners like company in their sin. And therefore we should recognize that when sinners, knowing the penalty of God, encourage others in doing these things, this is the ultimate example.

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This is the ultimate example of the twistedness of sin. And if anything should prove to us that God must work a miracle of grace in the heart of man, this should.

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Who thinks that by their words they can untwist this kind of twistedness?

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Who thinks that by the method of their presentation they can in some way, shape, or form straighten out the twistedness of the thinking of a person who, knowing they're worthy of death, not only continue in that practice, but give hearty approval to those who practice those same things?

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The only remedy for this kind of twistedness is regeneration.

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The only remedy is powerful grace, not a mere grace that is limited to a wooing and an ineffectual drawing.

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In fact, I would say to you not synergistic grace, but the powerful grace of God that changes hearts and minds.

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That is the only message that can truly be meaningful in this context.

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I don't know if anyone just noted something, but there are two people in the chat channel. One, both of them opposing this discussion of homosexuality.

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And the one just said to the other, I support you! And the other was, thanks! And what do you see?

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They don't realize it. I don't think they're even listening. But they just showed us

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Romans 1 .32. They just fulfilled Romans 1 .32.

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Up against God's law. Up against God's revelation. But they pat each other on the back.

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And now one of them's going to go and get a pizza. One of them's going to get a pizza. God's going to provide sustenance to this person.

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God's provided this person with blessing after blessing after blessing. And they don't care about God's truth.

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Well, that's the way things are these days, folks. Romans 1.

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You need to know what it's about. You need to know the context.

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How to present it. How to defend it. Because it's folks like the folks we're talking to in the chat room right now that will encounter material on websites.

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And they will take a little bit of biblical argumentation, combine it with their hatred of objective truth.

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They'll throw out words like homophobia and sexism. All as a cover for their own personal hatred of God's law.

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But could I make one more statement? You know, it's easy for us to sit around going, oh yeah, boy, just look at the reprobate thinking of those people in the chat channel.

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Let me turn away from them for a moment. We often have to fight legalism when it comes to the gospel.

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We have to fight those who think that there are things that we can do to merit God's grace and merit salvation.

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But sometimes we fall off of the balance and we end up, even in sound circles and sound churches, denigrating

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God's law. You see, the fundamental prohibition of homosexuality comes to us from God's revelation that He is our

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Creator and that He can establish what is right and wrong for us. But we cannot preach the gospel where we do not and cannot, like Paul, preach the bad news that we see in Romans chapter 1, verses 18 through 319.

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And that demonstration of the bad news is based upon the reality of the existence of God's law.

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And when we downplay it ourselves, when we show that we are ignorant of it, when we show that we do not respect it, that we do not love it, that we do not as the psalmist meditate upon it, we prove ourselves hypocrites and we destroy our ability to discuss this issue with meaning and with consistency and with honesty.

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And so one of the reasons that evangelicalism as a whole has been very weak in its response and can simply give, well, acontextual biblical arguments without delving into the text is because we are not consistent in our theology.

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And this is where I want to address those of you who think that my concern about consistency in theology is simply ridiculous.

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There are those who feel that we should not discuss Calvinism and Arminianism. We should not discuss whether Jesus Christ is truly

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God or He is Michael the Archangel. We should not discuss whether there is only one true God. This dogged, dogmatic, doctrinal consistency does not promote love.

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Folks, here is an illustration where when we do not demonstrate a consistency in our theology, it impacts our ability to deal with the very social and moral issues of our day.

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It mutes our testimony, and we are found to be inconsistent when we attempt to say to the culture around us, hey,

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God has told us how we are to live. Oh, just in that area? Is it just in that area that God's law addresses?

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Or does God's law address every aspect of our life? Maybe that is why evangelicalism has not had the loud voice of response and the consistent voice of response that it could have if it was biblical.

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If it, for example, would examine its own love of such things as free will, whatever it means by that.

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I'd like you to think about it. Next week you'll probably have the opportunity,

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Lord willing, barring any major developments in the Dave Hunt situation and the debate, barring any response from Dr.

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Norman Geisler on the subject of the appendix in Chosen but Free, barring any national situation that arises that would be of great interest to us.

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We'll probably go ahead and take a look. At 1 Corinthians 6, 1

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Timothy 1, and maybe go back and pick up Leviticus 18 and 20 as well, the reason being that Paul's use of the term arsenikoites,

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I believe, I'm convinced, comes from the septuagint rendering of Leviticus 18 and 20, specifically

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Leviticus 20 as well. And so I try to tie those things together and that'll give everyone listening at least some idea of what they can be looking forward to in the same -sex controversy as we finish up the writing of that as well.

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So that's what we'll be looking forward to probably next week on The Dividing Line. And I know,

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I know someone asked me just this week, hey, when are you going to do the King James Only presentation? You've had us downloading the thing from your email system and we all have it sitting here.

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When do you go through it? Well, someday. I'll get there. I'm not sure exactly when, but we'll get there and we'll do the

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King James Only presentation. I've got some traveling coming up, heading to Raleigh, North Carolina in a couple of weeks.

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And then after that in October, there's going to be a number of weekends. We're heading back up to the general conference.

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We've got a debate up there, et cetera, et cetera. So lots of stuff coming up and I'm going to need a couple of weeks to do the

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King James Only thing properly. So that's why I sort of put it off for a while. So anyways, hope this information has been useful to you.