How Should the Church Approach Homosexuality? | Angel Wilson

The Church’s Blind Spot on Homosexuality and a Better Pastoral Approach

You also said that the church is kind of in the dark when it comes to the topic of homosexuality and approaching the topic of homosexuality, and you really desire to move forward with a different approach.

And so I was wondering if you could talk about, if you feel comfortable talking a little bit about your personal story, but also how you think the church could just be much more effective, much more gracious in this area.

Yeah, I'll be the first to tell you I don't know what approach would be best. But what I do know is that we are moving forward in our generation with culture and with society. And so what worked in previous decades may not work now, because whereas homosexuality, I seem, when I think about it, I believe it was more swept under the rug in a lot of years past.

But in today's day and age, it's in films, it's in TV, and it's a lot more culturally accepted. And so what may have worked in the past, I just don't think works now. And in my own personal story, I didn't get open about that until I got much older with one of my very close pastors at my church.

And he did an excellent job, an excellent job at balancing loving me and answering really hard questions that I had. It reminds me of when Kurt shared his story about how he dealt with church abuse because he opened up about his struggles.

And as sad as his story was, it's not uncommon at all. And I've heard many stories also where people struggle with the exact same things, and they go into church looking to find love and looking to find acceptance.

And they get not even a calm reaction, but the extreme opposites get completely isolated. And I'm just grateful that I saw John 8, that example of the woman caught in the act of adultery with my pastors.

I think my pastor did an awesome job at balancing love for me with making me aware of why that's sin. And I think one of the biggest divides we have with progressive and conservative Christianity is I think conservative Christianity, when Christ says when Christ says in John 8, I don't condemn you, go and sin no more.

I think conservative Christians do a great job with a go and sin no more part. And I think progressive Christians do great with a I don't condemn you part. That's good. The problem is, is that Christ said both.

And until we find a balance with that, I think there's just going to be this huge divide because I do agree with you. I think the video did a great, accurate job of conveying the compassion that the progressive side feels for those that have been abused by extremists that have used the scriptures to bully people.

And I just think balance is what's needed. And one big takeaway that I wish walking in there, I wish I would have done a better job showing Christ instead of being more adamant about defending scripture.

Because when I went in there, that's all I was thinking about was scripture being inerrant and they're going to come against that. But I think if I would have been more intentional about showing the love of Christ, I do think a lot more people that revolve with the progressive side of things in the video and just outside people that deal with all kinds of sin would be more open to accepting scripture as inerrant.

But I just believe a lot of people have used it to bully people. And so that's what I think. But I'm not God. I don't know what we need. Well, I think it's a fair assessment. And I think I'm with you.

Tribalism, Christian Subculture, and Relating to Non-Believers

And here I am trying to figure this stuff out too. Like I said before, I was a public high school teacher. And so every year I would see more and more students, increasingly so over the years, come up and pull me out of the room on the very first day of school, telling me they're transitioning and I should use a new name and pronouns.

And I think initially I refused. But the more I thought about it, the more I think I agree with you that there is a longer game to play than simply just being the moral sin police and saying, I draw this line right here.

I just met you 10 seconds ago, but here I'm going to draw this moral line and totally dismiss any relationship building in order to just stand on scripture. And so I like how you say that to show Christ instead of just simply defend scripture, there is a balance.

And I'm seeking it myself. Would you say this? So this is where kind of my thoughts are going. I'm wondering what you think. Do you think tribalism within the church is a problem? And what I mean by that is from my vantage point, so I'm a leader at my local church here in Las Vegas.

I see a lot of my brothers and sisters at my local church hanging out with each other, but not really going across the street, figuratively speaking, and hanging out with people who are non-believers.

And so when a non-believer walks up to the circle, I guess, they start immediately drawing distinctions instead of making relationship. And that's tribalism. What do you think about that? It's something that I'm working through personally.

I've really, really had the privilege of going through high school, having all sorts of friends, but I noticed a lot of my Christian friends had Christian friends and that was it. And when they would engage with people that had different beliefs, it wasn't even just a spiritual divide.

It just, they spoke different, different things were funny. They just didn't connect. And so you have a lot of people where all they know is church. All they know is Christian culture. All they know is Christian community.

And then they go and try to evangelize to people that know nothing about any of that. And then wonder why it's not receptive. And so I think going back to balance, I think it's just a matter of understanding why people think the way that they do because everyone comes, everyone has their perspective of life framed by many different things, many different things.

And so you have to be really empathetic and really more intentional about understanding the world that we're in. I think so personally. And that's something that I'm still working through. Yeah. And I also see this immediate urge to categorize and dismiss, and that's on all sides.

It's coming from all sides. That is to categorize somebody as, well, you're conservative, you're liberal, you're straight, you're gay, and then immediately just dismiss instead of seeking to understand.

I mean, I grew up with, I'm a little bit older, but back then the virtues, slightly, the virtues of engaging others that are not like you, they were still taught to me in school. I wonder, I don't see that so much now, that we're just a product of the culture.

We try to make things make sense in 30 seconds or less, and if it doesn't, then we don't really think about it, and it affects the way we share the gospel or we share our faith. Yeah, I agree. I think that's something that even I did.

Empathy, Avoiding Snap Judgments, and Understanding People

Even with people in the church, I think, I can't remember where I saw it, but when we see people, we gauge a lot of their personality, and we try to, our minds are always making predictions. And so the moment that we see people, we try to gauge everything about them based off of how they identify, what they identify with, and just the things that come out of their mouths.

But I don't know the full content of what someone's heart is. You don't know what you don't know. And I think that's something that we just have to be more passionate about keeping, keeping in mind when we're talking with anybody.