Why this is the PERFECT speech...

The Church Versus the World in the Gay Marriage Debate

The trap that we're falling into in this debate is looking at the church through the eyes of the world rather than through his kingdom. If the world is against the truth, then I am against the world.

Did I get some omni? That bomb went off quick.

Bam!

Two brides is what we're looking at here. The church is attempting to marry itself.

And the question that you have to wrestle with is, will I submit to God's design or not?

That means either I am wrong, and Christians have been teaching incorrectly for the last two thousand years,. Or, we have church leaders attempting to drug the church into apostasy.

And that's what you need to show these folks, that they fail at being good Bible readers. If they were trying to tell you that 10 times 5 is 406, ask them to show you their math. Because when they put pencil to paper, that's when their error becomes abundantly clear.

Introduction to the Speech Reaction

It's a new day, and it's time to party. I'm your excellent host, Nate Sala, and this is Why Is Disciple What We're Helping You Become the Effective Christian That You Were Meant to Be. If this is your first time here, welcome.

I'm so glad that you made it. I hope my channel blesses you. Hey, have you seen this Calvin Robinson guy? I'm a little late to the game, okay? I recently reacted to his debate on Unbelievable with a queer theologian, but boy, Robinson is making the rounds.

I didn't know that on my birthday, February 15th of this year, Robinson got up and gave a speech at the Oxford Union Society. And this thing has just blown up. Some are saying it's the perfect speech against same-sex marriage.

So let's go through this together, and I'm going to react to the speech, maybe talk about it from maybe a debate perspective or a speech perspective, but also definitely talk about it as a pastor. At the end, I want to share with you a helpful biblical passage that reminds me of what we're up against when we engage the culture on this particular issue.

So stay tuned to the end for that, but let's get right into it.

Apostasy, Church Authority, and the Need for Credible Sources

Why do I feel anxiety about this? Well, we are up against the authorities. Three bishops from the established church. That means either I am wrong, and Christians have been teaching incorrectly for the last 2 ,000 years, and Jews and Christians for the last 4 ,000 to 6 ,000 years, or we have church leaders attempting to drag the church into apostasy.

Ah!

What?

Did I get some Omni? That bomb went off quick. Either the church has been wrong for thousands of years, or we're slipping into apostasy.

Bam!

What a brilliant way to raise the stakes for this kind of discussion. And by the way, that's exactly what's at stake.

Neither way is good. The consequences are severe. This debate is not just happening in this chamber. This debate is happening in real time in the house of bishops as we speak. There's a growing number of vocal bishops who want to change the church's teaching on.

Well, that's happening in the U .S. as well. And I think that explains the love that many of us have for Robinson and for his comments. That's why he's blown up. It's happening across the pond here as well, guys.

Apostasy isn't just relegated for those British, isn't it? That was horrible. I'm going to edit that out.

The results being the spiritual neglect of Anglicans up and down this country. Now, I may have trained at the last remaining sound Anglican seminary up the road at St. Stephen's House, but I am a newbie deacon.

So perhaps I am wrong on this. Let's consult people wiser than myself, starting with the church fathers.

Mm.

There you go. Develop your arguments and ground them in credible sources. That's what you're supposed to do. I don't know. So this probably is not a debate per se. This just seems like a speech that he's gotten up to say and then he's going to sit down and others are going to get up and make speeches.

So that's fine. Some of these rules for debate apply to speeches as well. He shifts nicely here, Robinson. It sort of began with a personal touch, right? He said, well, maybe I'm wrong, right? But that was merely to set the stage, so to speak, and show everyone what's at stake in this kind of disagreement.

But now we have to turn from the personal and ground the argument in good evidence with credible sources, which, by the way, he should not only cite the church fathers, he should go to the Bible as well.

And if he can, he should try to cite sources that are friendly to the opposing side but support his stance. You know, maybe some kind of postmodern thinkers, maybe somebody in the LGBTQ community who is a scholar or an expert who also happens to agree with Robinson.

Marriage, Scripture, and the Authority of the Bible

St. Thomas Aquinas in his Summa Theologica quite clearly identifies matrimony as being between one man and one woman, beneficial for begetting of children and for the good of offspring for both educational and developmental purposes, necessary for the perfection of the community and for the worship of God.

St. Paul describes marriage as, therefore, a man leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife and they become one flesh, in which he is mirroring the language of Genesis where God tells man and woman to be fruitful and multiply.

Both Aquinas and Paul refer to matrimony as a sacrament, a holy mystery in which one man and one woman are joined together in conjugal union with the potential to be blessed by the grace of God with children, to start a family for the worship of God.

People will often argue in this debate, we know more about homosexuality now than we.

Did then.

Maybe so. But are we really going to suggest that God knew less then than we know now? For either all of scripture is God-breathed or it isn't. Either we believe

There it is. So much of progressive Christian and LGBTQ theology, woke theology, trades on the notion that the Bible is not God-breathed. That when 2 Timothy 3 .16 clearly teaches that scripture is God-breathed and traditional Christians have pointed out that this means God is the one who creates and shapes the very words of scripture that we hold in our hands today, that we have in our Bibles.

In the same way that he breathed on the dust and he created mankind. This therefore shows that the words of scripture cannot be dismissed as merely the writings of ignorant, patriarchal, backwards-thinking men, right?

But it was actually the product of men being moved along by the Holy Spirit and speaking from God. That's 2 Peter 1, right? Progressive and woke and LGBTQ theologians, they have to say, no, that's not true.

The Bible is simply the product of backwards-thinking individuals who had an experience of God and expressed those experiences in problematic ways. Ways that must be understood that dismiss all those problematic teachings so that it actually says what we think is good and right and true.

All of that hinges on how to take 2 Timothy 3 .16, how to understand it. So Christians, you need to study up on what 2 Timothy 3 .16 is actually saying. You need to understand it, you need to be ready to articulate it, because I think that is the basis for a lot of these disagreements.

So are we looking to alter the catechism of just the Anglican Church or the Catholic Church.

Too?

Should they all get with the times? 2 ,000 years of Christian doctrine cannot be altered at the whim of a few liberal bishops. What is God-ordained cannot be adjusted to suit our new liberal progressive views.

Marriage is heterosexual and monogamous and should be open to the possibility of children. The Bible backs all of this up. It's very clear throughout on this matter, whether it's 9 verses or 32 ,000 verses, marriage is between one man and one woman for the purposes of procreation.

Sex outside of marriage is a sin. And that is the same for heterosexuals as it is for homosexuals. Although the Bible is quite clear that same-sex relations are abhorrent. And before some smart aleck starts asking me the question of whether I'm wearing mixed fabrics, there is a difference between the moral laws and ceremonial laws.

The Christ did come to fulfill the old laws.

I was just saying this in a previous video. Well done. Well done. You know, so far, so good. Robinson is really doing a great job. Again, the tactic, so it seems, coming from the progressive woke side is let's squash all of the laws together in a manner that completely lacks the understanding of what God was doing with the Israelites in the desert when he gave them those laws.

Then let's treat all the laws as the same in order to suggest that there is some inconsistency with Christians when they talk about God's design for sex. This betrays a fundamental lack of understanding of the Old Testament, of how to read it, of what God was doing with the Israelites to make them a kingdom of priests.

It ignores the foundation of church history, of even the Jewish understanding of Torah, just so you can justify sin. This is talked about in the other Calvin Robinson video that I did. I reacted to his unbelievable debate with Justin Brierley there.

So you should check it out because we kind of get into it a little bit further, but such a good job. Calvin Robinson is killing it.

Christ, the Bridegroom, and the Church as His Bride

Both the issues of marriage and homosexuality, however, are still addressed in the New Testament, in Paul's epistles, but also in the Gospels. Jesus does talk of marriage in Mark and Matthew, both in the context of heterosexual union.

So my question to the bishops would be, do we not believe in the authority of scriptures.

Anymore?

Can we pick and choose which parts of the Gospel we adhere to? The church, after all, is Christ's bride, as we heard earlier. Jesus is described as the bridegroom, so that we may know how he relates to us.

Two grooms would be pointless. Christ is already in union with the Father and the Holy Spirit. It's us he's inviting in. Two brides is what we're looking at here. The church is attempting to marry itself and to leave Christ out of the picture.

We are directly talking about undermining God's plan as he has revealed it to us.

That is such a good point. To stray from the bridegroom's expectations of the bride. The Bible says Jesus is the bridegroom, the church is his bride. To stray from Jesus' own teachings is the bride marrying herself, and loving herself, and setting her own expectations upon herself.

This is why I said before, progressive woke folks, whatever you want to call it, right? All that. They will try to say, well, you know, Jesus never said anything against homosexuality. As if to imply that therefore he affirms it.

That's not at all how this discussion should be framed. Jesus condemns living for self, which is exactly what LGBTQ and progressive folks do. They elevate their own selves to then live by their experiences, then they try to approach the Bible in this way.

And because they do that, they reject teaching that forces the individual to submit their selves to the Lord. This is teaching that comes directly from the mouth of Jesus Christ. It's funny, because if you consider what the criteria is for a progressive woke theologian to say that various aspects of the Bible are unacceptable, it really does track along the teachings that force individuals to submit to the Lord and deny the self.

That's where you'll find the dividing line. But in order to do that, you have to violate every command that Jesus gives for his followers to die to self. And that's the bride marrying herself. I love that line, man.

That is so good. Robinson is doing an amazing job. By the way, if you've been tracking my videos for a bit, I hope that I've earned your subscription. If you haven't already, please hit that subscribe button.

Maybe even consider sharing this video in order to help me get this channel out to more and more people.

Polygamy, Sexual Ethics, and the Meaning of Love

We're replacing his authority with our own. If marriage is no longer between one man and one woman, are we open to the idea of polygamy? We disregard the heterosexual aspect, so why not the monogamous aspect too?

If love is love, as we keep hearing, who's to say that three men loving each other is not more love than two men loving each other?

Shame!

Regeneracy!

It doesn't just stop at polygamy either, right? What about pedophilia? What about bestiality? What about necrophilia, right? These are all acts that entail sex. If we become the authority over God and his design for us, where is the line?

Because I guarantee you that you're going to find somebody weird enough and desperate enough to suggest that there's nothing wrong with pedophilia, with bestiality, or necrophilia. Some of you I know right now, you're like, get real.

Nate, come on, I'm serious. Just give it time. With what's going on with the hypersexualization of our culture, particularly with our kids, just give it time.

And I'm sure someone in this chamber has echoed the words love is love tonight, and this is not about love being love, this is about marriage, the sacrament of holy matrimony. It is directly connected to love, but it's not the definition of love.

Too many people utter those words and confuse the meaning of love. Agape.

That's right. If love is love, and by that phrase, you get to decide whatever that means, not God, then what can stop certain folks from defining love as simply getting off? That's what love is, just getting off.

Well, then guess what? If that's true, pedophilia can be love, bestiality can be love, necrophilia can be love, right? And if you're thinking to yourself, well, wait a sec, consent is important when it comes to love.

Who are you to say such a thing? One person or several individuals together in a group, just making up that standard as you go along. Who are you to tell someone else what their truth is? Who are you to stop someone else from living their truth when they want to say love is, according to them, just getting off?

By the way, is it okay for me to talk like this? I think we're to the point where there's no choice. See, that's what happens when you reject the notion that sex has a design that was given to us as a gift from our Creator.

We don't define it as human beings. It was already defined for us. And so in that sense, if sex is intended to remain within the parameters of a marriage between a man and a woman, because it is intended to speak theology, as I've said in previous videos, as well as to produce the next generation, then love is more than just getting off, isn't it?

It's more than just sex. It's more than just living together. It's more than just buying a house together and retiring together. God's intention for marriage is much bigger than that. And the question that you have to wrestle with is, will I submit to God's design or.

Not?

Divine Love, Inclusivity, and the Church's Call to Repentance

The biblical context of love is a divine love. It's a sacrificial love. It's not lustful. People often conflate sex with love. It's very disingenuous. We've heard quite a bit of that. But then, of course, atheists often pirate the words, God is love.

And we've heard that one tonight too, again, without any understanding. Yes, God is love, but he sets the terms, not us. Another one we've heard plenty of is inclusivity. Should the church be more inclusive?

Again, it's a play of words. It's virtue signaling. It's to appear good rather than to be good. The church should absolutely be inclusive. Christ spent time with tax collectors and prostitutes, but it is they who went away changed, not Christ.

We are fallen, therefore we are all sinners. The church is open to sinners. Of course it is. That's the purpose of the church. But it should not be to encourage people to continue to sin. Our duty as clerics is to help lead people to Christ, to lead them away from sin, not to embrace it, not to affirm it.

I know many LGB people. I know many LGB people who live lives in Christ. They abstain from sexual gratification to be closer to God. And it's not easy. It really isn't. It's perhaps not fair, but it is right and it is good.

And these people are being let down. I've had people crying saying, I could have got married, but I did what the church taught me was right. Now the church is saying they were wrong all along. I've wasted my life.

As Christians, we're called to be in the world, but not of the world. The trap that we're falling into in this debate is looking at the church through the eyes of the world rather than through his kingdom.

In the secular world, we already have equality in law. People can enter civil partnerships or even gay marriage outside of the church, and that's their prerogative. However, the faith is inherently discriminatory.

God is discriminatory. He sets conditions on us entering his heavenly kingdom. It is not a free-for-all. We must turn away from sin, repent, and follow Christ.

Boy, this is so good. This is so good. It just reminds me of the nature of the clash that traditional Christians have with progressive and woke and LGBTQ theologians, because you'll find these folks have a developed set of justifications for why they believe what they believe.

And I would argue that you will have a much more productive time investigating their method of interpreting scripture as opposed to their claims about what scripture says. You understand what I'm saying?

Are you having a disagreement right now with someone who's taken with progressive, woke theology?

Right?

Let me say this again. You will have a much more productive time engaging their method of interpreting scripture as opposed to what they actually claim it says. This is why, if you've noticed in previous reaction videos, I typically want to see these folks exegete the scripture.

Why?

Because they fail miserably. And that's what you need to show these folks, that they fail at being good Bible readers. If they were trying to tell you that 10 times 5 is 406, ask them to show you their math.

Because when they put pencil to paper, that's when their error becomes abundantly clear.

I want to specify, it is the sin that is the problem, not the sinner. Every single person is loved by God, and God forgives all of us of our depravity. But we have to turn away from our sins and turn toward him.

And it seems the panel opposite me has forgotten to separate the sin from the sinner. One can denounce sin while still welcoming the sinner. So as I wrap up, my message to the proposing side is, do not lead us astray.

Do not lead people astray. Do not be the wolves in sheep's clothing. Do not be the false teachers that the Bible warns us about. Remember your obligation to defend the faith. Stop teaching about diversity, inclusion, and equality, and get back to teaching about redemption and salvation.

This is spiritual neglect. Help people by telling them the truth. Be kind to people by supporting them through those struggles and reminding them that Christ suffers with them. And be compassionate by leading them to Christ when the world tries to lead them away from.

Him.

The Church's Decline, Same-Sex Blessings, and Christian Counter-Culture

The church is imploding, and the faithful masses have stopped turning up on Sundays, and we are seeing the most rapid decline of Christianity in this country that we may have ever seen. Do not accelerate it with heresy.

You do not have the authority to bless sin. When I hear the Bishop of London on record saying these new prayers will mean priests can bless same-sex relationships, some of which may be sexual in nature, I hear the devil at work.

Bishops are promoting the idea of sacramental sodomy. Let them be anathema. Repent. And to the rest of you, I have no doubt that some of you will consider me a bigot or a transphobe or a homophobe, but I am neither of those things, none of those things.

I am simply a follower of Christ, a Christian, and we are naturally counter-cultural. And if so-called liberals were truly diverse and tolerant, they would embrace us just as they embrace everyone else.

Not right now, I'm just wrapping up. And the point has been made, but the growing Christophobic attitude around this public debate and the ugly level of hypocrisy is that we really see people hold Muslims and people of other faiths to the same expectations that they hold Christians to.

Who is calling, except my good friend here, for Islam to embrace gay marriage? Who is calling for the Quran to be updated to modern societal norms? It is the same, mind your language, it is the same patronizing attitude of people that treat other faiths, patronize other faiths, while being intolerant towards Christians at the same time.

It's a shame, but in the words of Saint Athanasius of Alexandria, if the world is against the truth, then I am against the world. Thank you very much.

Wow.

Yeah.

So good. So good. In closing, I want to share with you a Bible verse that hopefully will guide you as you think through how to engage this issue with folks who are taken with progressive, woke theology.

John 3:16-19 and the Problem of Loving Darkness

I was talking to a friend of mine about Latter-day Saints recently, because I get the feeling that progressive folks are the new Mormons. Have you ever thought about that? I think that's true. And my friend was telling me that there are some key ways to quickly and effectively flesh out the differences that Mormons have with Christians.

And a couple of ways are to ask these questions. Number one is, you're Jesus, my Jesus. And the other question is, what is the ultimate goal of your religious efforts? I don't want to spend too much time on Mormons, maybe that's another video, but the point of asking questions like these is, the Christians' answer to those questions are God-sized.

The Mormons' answer to those questions are creature-sized. They're worldly-sized, which betrays the underlying bedrock of their beliefs. When you ask a Christian what the goal is of their religious efforts, the answer has to be something like, to have right relationship with God by accepting His gracious forgiveness through the blood of Christ, right?

When you ask a Mormon what the goal is of their religious efforts, the answer is exaltation. Again, probably another video for another time, but if you have no idea what I'm talking about, you should look it up.

The point is, the ultimate goal of a Mormon's religious efforts is not to be forgiven of sins and to be right with God, it's to achieve exaltation, which is a completely different answer. The same can be said of progressive woke folks.

What is the ultimate goal of their religious efforts? Maybe you should just straight up ask someone when you see them the next time, right? I guarantee you that the answer will not be God-sized, it will be creature-sized.

Jesus told Nicodemus, you know, here's the problem with people who reject God. It's not a problem of enlightenment. It's not a problem of being patriarchal, or ignorant, or not woke. The problem is our desires for the wrong things.

In John 3 .16, Jesus famously says, For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. So far, so good. But notice what else He says.

He keeps talking. Verse 17, For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. Now, if you stop right there, you might think to yourself, hey, what an awesome, pro-friendly, pro-LGBTQ verse.

This is very non-condemning, this is a very loving God who won't spew hatred, He won't spew judgment at folks. He just wants everyone to love each other, right? Except wait a second. Verse 18 says, He who believes in Him is not judged.

He who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. Now here's what I want you to see, because this explains what we're seeing right now in today's culture.

Jesus says, verse 19,. And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and men love the darkness rather than the light, for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds be exposed.

But he who practices the truth comes to the light so that his deeds may be manifested as having been done by God. Immediately, you have a dichotomy. Jesus versus the world of men. And what happens when men reject Jesus?

Which means they're rejecting their Creator, right? What happens? Jesus says it's because they love the world. You want to know how to have productive conversations with progressive and woke theologians?

Don't ask them to tell you their claims, because they're very happy to talk all day long about their claims and what they believe. Instead, ask them about their warrants. Ask them to explain how their claims are justified.

In other words, ask them to show you their math. Now I'm not saying you'll always be prepared for their answers, but I am saying that's where you're going to find the best kind of clash. That's where you will expose that their theology is based on themselves.

The bride is marrying the bride. And that's where you will have the best shot to challenge their worldview and compel these folks to change their mind by the power of the Holy Spirit. What did you think of Calvin Robinson's speech?

I loved it. He had some amazing, memorable one-liners. He sought in the beginning to ground his arguments in credible sources. And when he got to the Bible, he represented it expertly. He did not shy away.

He was bold. I mean, this is a speech that is near perfection. Let me know what you thought about him. Drop those comments below. I would love to interact with you. As always, I pray that this video blesses you and that it got you thinking so that you can not only understand these issues well, but you can also get out there and engage others for Christ effectively.

I will return soon with more videos for you. But in the meantime, I'll say bye for now.