Homosexuality isn't sin

[lesnes]

the old covenant and the old testment are quite often confused... he never meant to abolish the old law

without the old testement you cant understand the new testement the way it was meant to at least there is some confusion on that issue i know, and i would be glad to hear more if anyone knows what im talking about.

 

[Ashton]

You're right to say that Christ fulfilled the whole Law, because He did. But you are gravely mistaken to say that man is free to sin, since we are no longer under the Law.

[FONT=&quot]As the Apostle Paul asked in Romans 6:1-3, "[/FONT]What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase? May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it? Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death?"

If you are truly born again, you are washed, sanctified, and justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Holy, and Righteous Spirit of God; therefore, you will not, you can not, by your new nature, continue as you once lived, living after the flesh."Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come." -- 2 Corinthians 5:17

So the pertinent question I keep asking, that is going unanswered is this: is the Spirit of God carnal? No. So then, "How shall we who died to sin still live in it?" -- Romans 6:2

Christ did not fulfill the Law so that we may serve sin more abundantly. While the Law was fulfilled by Christ, the Spirit was given to us so that true righteousness may abound, so that we may not serve sin! It is only through the power of God, through His Holy, and Righteous Spirit, and through the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ that the chains of sin no longer have dominion over us!

My original position was just me playing devil's advocate. I've already stated in a previous post to clarify this. I believe homosexuality to be a sinful nature and homosexual acts to be sin. With this in mind maybe you could reread my post. Because I am arguing for the observance of every bit of God's law - not just abstaining from homosexual acts. What you are saying when you say we are no longer under the old law is a mistake. You advocate lawlessness. We are not under the law of sin and death which was slavery to legalism. We are still under the law of Christ which is the Torah based in love.

 

[lesnes]

amen ashton

 

[Ashton]

Interesting. I see what you were doing getting everybody worked up about something you knew was wrong, and in doing so you got them to bring up Old Testament Scripture as a way of proving that some of it is still important. The Scripture that has its basis in love.

For all the law is fulfilled in one word,even this; thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Galatians 5:14

Now take that Scripture and aply it to the Old Testament to see if it works.


Can you kill someone if you love......no

Can you committ adultery of fornicate if you love...no because you will condemn yourself and the one your with.

Can you be gay and love......no (because of the above reason)

Can you love and stone someone if he commits adultery....no, that is an old testament commandment that no longer exists.

can you covet something someone else has if you love.....no, because if you love you will be glad for that person


Can you not keep the Sabbath and still love..........The Sabbath is no Sunday, The Sabath is Saturday and about the only people around my area that keep Saturday as the Sabbath are the Seventh-Day Adventists, Which I believe are pretty much a cult, because they take one thing out of the Bible like all these other cults and emphasis it above all else. If you keep Sunday as the Sabbath then that means you can't kindle a fire, your meals have to be prepared the day before, and I don't think you can even leave your home. Don't get me wrong I try to use Sunday as a day of rest, I think it is good to take one day and stop what we are doing and use it to honor and glorify God. We should glorify God every day of the week esensially. But I am not to judge someone who dosen't do like me because I don't see any Biblical way I can.

Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ. Colossians 2:16-17

See some of these Old Testament commands were a shadow of things to come.

I'm sorry, Humble, but you can very well obey the Torah with love. Even in the New Testament it says that all of the Torah and Prophets hang on love. It's when we stop observing the Torah with love that it becomes meaningless. Take Leviticus 24:20 for example. People seem to think this contradicts love. However, it does not. This law was intended not to condemn but to scare people into doing unto others as they would have others do unto them. And this is the Golden Rule Christ upheld. I honestly hope you aren't implying that the same God of the Old Testament as well as the New is an evil, vengeful god whose sole purpose is to judge those who sin. God has reasons behind all of his commands and they are for his name's sake and his creation's sake.

And I can answer Colossians 2:16-17 for you if you'd like. I've answered it before on another site, but it's getting somewhat tiring. Just tell me what Christ meant in Matthew 5:17-19.

 

[HumbleSaint]

All of the Old Covenant was a shadow of things to come, the entire Law was a shadow. Refer to my post on page 3, a discussion on 2 Corinthians 3, where it speaks about the Ten Commandments (verse 3), which were "engraved on stones" (verse 7) as something that "fades away" (verse 11). In addition, 2 Corinthians 3 also makes reference to Moses putting a veil over his face, as he did at Mount Sinai so that the sons of Israel would not see the end of what was fading away (verse 7), as also shown in Exodus 34:29-35:

"Now He said to them,'These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.' Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and He said to them, 'Thus it is written, that the Christ would suffer and rise again from the dead the third day, and that repentance for forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem." -- Luke 24:44-47

It's not about you trying to achieve your own righteousness, it never was. Righteousness is imputed only by faith (which is a gift of God), as shown in Romans 4:4-6, and in Romans 4:20-24. If righteousness came by the Law, then why did Christ die? There would be no need for His death if we could earn our own way into heaven. Further, the Spirit is given to us so that we may not serve sin. Where the Law had no power to change a man, the Spirit does.

I understand that and what you are saying about not trying to achieve our own righteousness is right. It comes by faith in Christ. When we become a child of God we are Giving the mind of Christ. But if you read Romans 7 you will see that Paul said that with his mind he serves the law of God and with his flesh the law of sin. What I got out of that is that he has a desire to follow God's commands because he has the mind of Christ, but because his flesh gets in the way he needs the law to remind him of what sin is.

 

[HumbleSaint]

I'm sorry, Humble, but you can very well obey the Torah with love. Even in the New Testament it says that all of the Torah and Prophets hang on love. It's when we stop observing the Torah with love that it becomes meaningless. Take Leviticus 24:20 for example. People seem to think this contradicts love. However, it does not. This law was intended not to condemn but to scare people into doing unto others as they would have others do unto them. And this is the Golden Rule Christ upheld. I honestly hope you aren't implying that the same God of the Old Testament as well as the New is an evil, vengeful god whose sole purpose is to judge those who sin. God has reasons behind all of his commands and they are for his name's sake and his creation's sake.

And I can answer Colossians 2:16-17 for you if you'd like. I've answered it before on another site, but it's getting somewhat tiring. Just tell me what Christ meant in Matthew 5:17-19.

So do you leave your place on Saturday. I hope not if your are following the Torah

 

[GraceBeUntoYou]

My original position was just me playing devil's advocate. I've already stated in a previous post to clarify this. I believe homosexuality to be a sinful nature and homosexual acts to be sin. With this in mind maybe you could reread my post. Because I am arguing for the observance of every bit of God's law - not just abstaining from homosexual acts. What you are saying when you say we are no longer under the old law is a mistake. You advocate lawlessness. We are not under the law of sin and death which was slavery to legalism. We are still under the law of Christ which is the Torah based in love.

You're missing the point when you say, "you advocate lawlessness." Not unless you seriously suggest that the Righteous, and Holy Spirit of God is sinful, and unrighteous. For we are no longer under the ministry of death which Moses had brought, but under the ministry of the Spirit (2 Corinthians 3:1-8). But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law (Galatians 5:22-23). The Spirit of God works in you, so then it's not of yourself, but of God working through you.

"I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me." -- Galatians 2:20

 

[DinoDillinger]

Well, I'd like to make one more post before I head off to bed here. I believe that homosexuality is a sinful nature and that homosexual acts are sin. There. I said it. I've been playing the devil's advocate all along to explore the validity of the notion that God's 613 laws as found in the Torah do not apply to us today (Yes, I am one of those "Pharisees" and "legalists" I was calling you folks, because I believe in following God). Many of you have made some great arguments.

Personally, I think Harley_Angel made the best argument with the point that the Law of Love was referring to agape or phileo instead of eros. I was secretly cheering for you! DinoDillinger also deserves honorable mention. I still believe that homosexual men in a relationship with each other are capable of loving each other with a love that is as selfless as any love can get. However, I still do not believe this relationship to be condoned by God or by Scripture. Their love may be respectable, but it unfortunately leads to sodomy - which is a sin according to the Old Testament. I'd also like to point out at this time that sacrifices were also commanded by God before the apparent forming of the Torah. Consider Cain and Abel. Also, God made a sacrifice himself.

I must ask you to forgive me for the ruse I put on, but I'd like you to consider what I was doing. I was debating using the same reason some of you had - that the old laws are not applicable for us today. So those of you who were arguing weren't really arguing with me; you were arguing with yourselves.

To be honest with you I've spent some time debating with another man from a different site on the matter, and the position I put forth in this thread (as well as the same condescending, Spirit-led, enlightened attitude) was pretty much the same position he took. He couldn't back up any of his claims from the Scriptures, but somehow he still claimed to be Spirit-led because he had faith that God wouldn't lead him to conclude anything other than the truth because he was a Christian. And I don't think that God leads us to a lie. But if we refuse to let God lead with his Scriptures, then how are we going to arrive at the truth? Furthermore, would the Holy Spirit lead us down a path that didn't arrive at the Scriptures? So therefore let us examine the Scriptures and not our feelings.

Do you know why homosexual conduct is a sin? God commanded us to abstain from it in his Torah, and we are still to love God by obeying his Torah today. Why? Because the Torah is based on love. After all, it is said the Law (Torah) and all the prophets hang on love. If you took love out of the equation the Torah would collapse and be meaningless. And the Pharisees did just that. They took love out of the Sabbath day of rest, turned it into a bunch of regulations and no one could ever rest on that day again. They were so obsessed with the letter of the law that they failed to see its true intention.

The truth is that all of Paul's teachings on the law/Law can be summed up in this: we are to obey the letter of Torah within the parameters of love, because love of God and love of Man is the driving force behind it. I hope to examine some of the passages of Scripture that we all have concerns with, but I must do it later.

Again, I am sorry for putting some of you through patronizing exasperation. But I'm pretty sure my reputation was the only one on the line. We are all brothers and sisters in Christ. We should treat each other like it. Thanks for not biting back... too hard.

Sweet dreams.

I kinda suspected that when you made the pork comment. If you feel convicted to keep the rituals and governances taught in the Torah we are taught not to look down on those weak in the faith. I myself quit eating pork and shellfish and rest on the original sabbath day as I can. It was something I feel convicted about. I think people sometimes people just ignore the leading of the spirit because they are told it's always legalism when God is trying to lead us away from things that are bad for us and to lead us into blessing. That being said, I don't think we are being made perfect by the flesh and that getting a list of all the commands in the Torah and then trying to follow them all putting yourself in some rigid lifestyle is also foolish.

 

[Grey]

Yes the Holy Spirit says that.

Is it bad that I'm laughing?

 

[Zyax]

I think the real argument here boils down to two things.
1. How tolerant you are of others. This is easy. There's no reason for anybody to force or harass anybody to do anything. Explain your side of the argument and let them make their own decisions. The vehement preachers who would harass homosexuals are flat out wrong in assuming that they have any right to force or enact a certain strict rule of sex/sexual preference/etc.
2. Whether or not they see the Bible as being true. It seems the only arguments in opposition work from within Christian logic. If they aren't Christian then there's no real argument that works against them. In a secular view they can still have sex, adopt a child, etc. with no guarantee that they are truly "devaluing the moral backbone of America" or some other trite phrase.

 

[GraceBeUntoYou]

I'm sorry, Humble, but you can very well obey the Torah with love. Even in the New Testament it says that all of the Torah and Prophets hang on love. It's when we stop observing the Torah with love that it becomes meaningless. Take Leviticus 24:20 for example. People seem to think this contradicts love. However, it does not. This law was intended not to condemn but to scare people into doing unto others as they would have others do unto them. And this is the Golden Rule Christ upheld. I honestly hope you aren't implying that the same God of the Old Testament as well as the New is an evil, vengeful god whose sole purpose is to judge those who sin. God has reasons behind all of his commands and they are for his name's sake and his creation's sake.

And I can answer Colossians 2:16-17 for you if you'd like. I've answered it before on another site, but it's getting somewhat tiring. Just tell me what Christ meant in Matthew 5:17-19.

Scripture tells us what this means, and as I've used in previous posts:

"Now He said to them, 'These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.' Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and He said to them, 'Thus it is written, that the Christ would suffer and rise again from the dead the third day, and that repentance for forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem.'" -- Luke 24:44-47

In this light, we now know correctly what Colossians 2:13-17 is telling us: "When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. When He had disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through Him. Therefore no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day--things which are a mere shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ."

**Italics are of my own.

 

[Ashton]

So do you leave your place on Saturday. I hope not if your are following the Torah

My obedience or disobedience to God is not a prerequisite for his law applying to me today. I'm not here to uphold my own virtues. So we come back to what I was requesting: Just tell me what Christ meant in Matthew 5:17-19.This should be an easy answer. I mean, it seems apparent to me.

 

[Ashton]

I kinda suspected that when you made the pork comment. If you feel convicted to keep the rituals and governances taught in the Torah we are taught not to look down on those weak in the faith. I myself quit eating pork and shellfish and rest on the original sabbath day as I can.

Right. I'd say that I spent a fair amount of time here showing how rejecting the Old Testament while accepting the New opens up contradictions and loop holes in the Bible. These contradictions and loop holes undermine one's faith and make it weak. Fortunately, we do not have that problem.

How can someone say that homosexuality is a sin if we don't have to abstain from it any more because Jesus has fulfilled all of the Law - including this regulation? God no longer cares if we eat shellfish, violate the old testament rule of resting on the Sabbath or participate in homosexual acts. To God all of these things are being done because they're being done in Jesus. So people will have to accept a Law of Asceticism. And this Law of Asceticism isn't explained as one of Christ's Laws. So if we are only told to observe Christ's Law, which they define as some arbitrary notion of love, then they conclude that we must also observe an additional law based on the testimony of the New Testament. Otherwise this asceticism can contradict the Law of Love. And before you say we are to love God, too, keep in mind homosexual acts aren't violating this law because to God this law has come to fulfillment in Christ. So we're only told to observe Christ's Law of Love, but they conclude from the evidence that there is also a Law of Asceticism in effect that they cannot readily define. Why not just accept that this is God's Torah, which is summed up by love, that we are to obey?

 

[MahogonySnail]

Eating pork and not offering any to your brother or sister in Christ is quite shellfish.

 

[Israel]

Right. I'd say that I spent a fair amount of time here showing how rejecting the Old Testament while accepting the New opens up contradictions and loop holes in the Bible. These contradictions and loop holes undermine one's faith and make it weak. Fortunately, we do not have that problem.

How can someone say that homosexuality is a sin if we don't have to abstain from it any more because Jesus has fulfilled all of the Law - including this regulation? God no longer cares if we eat shellfish, violate the old testament rule of resting on the Sabbath or participate in homosexual acts. To God all of these things are being done because they're being done in Jesus. So people will have to accept a Law of Asceticism. And this Law of Asceticism isn't explained as one of Christ's Laws. So if we are only told to observe Christ's Law, which they define as some arbitrary notion of love, then they conclude that we must also observe an additional law based on the testimony of the New Testament. Otherwise this asceticism can contradict the Law of Love. And before you say we are to love God, too, keep in mind homosexual acts aren't violating this law because to God this law has come to fulfillment in Christ. So we're only told to observe Christ's Law of Love, but they conclude from the evidence that there is also a Law of Asceticism in effect that they cannot readily define. Why not just accept that this is God's Torah, which is summed up by love, that we are to obey?

I won't debate on whether homosexuality is a sin or not as the Bible says that ALL have sinned and that the law was for ALL to keep silent before God. I'll only add this. If a person is born a hermaphrodite, will it be a sin for this person to be with either a man or a woman? Christ did indeed fulfilled the letter, but the spirit of the law still stands in the 10 commandments. We still know it is wrong to murder or to steal, but the Sabbath is also a moral commandment. The Bible says that the Sabbaths are a perpetual conenant with His people. It is the understanding of THIS commandment that opens the door to the full understanding of keeping the law.

 

[Happycamper]

I sure hope it isn't. When I prayed and asked the lord about this, I didn't get a response. But Jesus did not say anything about homosexuals in the new testament, so I don't know what to believe. Please someone guide me.

 

[DinoDillinger]

My obedience or disobedience to God is not a prerequisite for his law applying to me today. I'm not here to uphold my own virtues. So we come back to what I was requesting: Just tell me what Christ meant in Matthew 5:17-19.This should be an easy answer. I mean, it seems apparent to me.

Umm, He meant to bring the purpose of the Law to light? If He meant what you think than He would have been contridicting Himself in the next statements. Since if the letter stood as it was then it would still be an eye for an eye, since not one jot or tittle will pass away? I think the law stands as a accuser against us.

Also, the Law was given to the jews, the gentiles were never told to keep all the ordinances and stuff in the Law given to the jews. Jesus also said that God wanted those that would worship Him in Spirit and truth. It is the Spirit that leads the sheep in truth, not the flesh trying to follow the Law. Many jews who believed went out trying to make the gentiles keepers of the law of Moses. The church at that time, in a letter by James did not impose the 613 on the gentiles.

in Acts 15 is the letter, which they gave instructions on things that they might not understand the Spirit's leading on, things offered to idols, blood, things strangled, and sexual immorality. (Which also shoots down the original homosexual love topic baiting)

 

[Browncoat]

Since if the letter stood as it was then it would still be an eye for an eye

No, actually, that's not correct.

Also, the Law was given to the jews

For the purpose of spreading it throughout the rest of the world to all peoples.

the gentiles were never told to keep all the ordinances and stuff in the Law given to the jews.

Except for where Yeshua did tell you that in Matthew 5:17-20

 

[Ashton]

I sure hope it isn't. When I prayed and asked the lord about this, I didn't get a response. But Jesus did not say anything about homosexuals in the new testament, so I don't know what to believe. Please someone guide me.

Hey, Happycamper. What is it your concerned about? Don't just pray. God gave you the Scriptures. Read the Scriptures and pray for understanding. That's the advice I have. I can tell you what I believe concerning the Scriptures, but if you would rather I not, then I won't. No worries, my man.

 

[Ashton]

He meant to bring the purpose of the Law to light?

The purpose of the Law to light? Could you explain, please?