Homosexuality and the Word of God
by
Bishop Francis Waihenya
Charles Ngengi, and Daniel Chege Gichia became the first gay Kenyan couple to wed in London on Saturday 17th October 2009 under the controversial Civil Partnership Act which came into effect in the UK in 2005 allowing couples of the same sex to have legal recognition of their relationship.
I am extremely encouraged by the decision taken by the Kenyan religious groups and The Kenya Committee of Experts on Constitutional Review who rejected suggestions by British MPs to recognize and protect the rights of homosexuals in the draft. The British MPs wanted Kenyan homosexuals and lesbians to be given the right to marry. Although the new constitution is supposed to cater for the interests of both the majority and minorities, the same-sex marriages have been rejected by all religious groups. The Committee of Experts on Constitutional Review received over five thousand memoranda from religious groups which warned the committee that the religious groups will shoot down the draft if it includes the gay rights. The majority of Kenyans are opposed to same sex marriages and anything to do with homosexuals and lesbians because they consider the matter unnatural in Kenyan society.
Recognizing and protecting the rights of homosexuals in the Kenyan draft constitution would mark the first steps to making it a crime to preach on Romans Chapter 1, I Corinthians Chapter 6 among other scriptures or even to discuss them in a Sunday School class. The involvement of churches and individuals at this point in time will keep the government in future from telling the religious leaders what they can and cannot preach and teach about homosexuality.
The consistent deterioration of the Bible as the source of moral truth has pushed the world into a society where people base their choices on their own feelings and the circumstances surrounding them, making them to become independent judges of right and wrong.
Although majority of people are well aware of the fact that only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or should be recognized, numerous events over the denial of rights for homosexuals to marry have resulted in a backlash from the gay community towards the Christians.
In recent years, we have witnessed people especially in the West proposing, supporting or writing to plead with their fellow citizens to let the gays marry and allow them to have and enjoy the rights that married couples have. They are in fact advocating that the gay community be allowed to share in the love, the rights and the privileges of what it is and means to be married.
It may sound loving and right especially when they appeal to our patriotism and humanity, that we let fellow citizens who are our fellow human beings to enjoy life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Yet, to Christians who know their God and their Bible, this is clearly wrong and a violation of God's laws.
What makes this advocacy and appeals complicated is the fact that those people who call themselves Christians and are the ones supposed to be defending the truth are the same people opposing it. They attempt to interpret the Bible from what they call modern perspective by explaining that God may not be as against homosexuality as the Christian might think. They argue that Scripture gives us no good reason why gays and lesbians should not be allowed to enjoy civil and religious marriages and goes further to give a number of excellent reasons why they should. They even go to an extent of arguing that the Bible can also be interpreted as evolving, implying a document which may be continually edited and updated by men.
Yet, by its own testimony, the Bible is in no way an evolving book. The Bible says in Jude that truths contained in its pages have been set down once and are good for all times. I urge you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints. For certain men whose condemnation was written about long ago have secretly slipped in among you. They are godless men, who change the grace of our God into a license for immorality and deny Jesus Christ our only Sovereign and Lord (Jude 3).
Under no circumstances is the Word of God to be edited, added to, or taken away from whether by pen or by the opinions of men. The last verses of the Book of Revelation, warns those who would add to or take away from the Bible:I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds anything to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book. And if anyone takes words away from this book of prophecy, God will take away from him his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book (Rev. 22:18-19).
The Bible is to be preserved and understood as it is as assured by Christ in Matthew 5:18 I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished".
He also declares in Malachi 3:6 that, He does not change and in Hebrews 13:8that, He is the same yesterday, today, and forever". God's laws therefore are the same as they were 2,000 years ago when the Bible was complete, and they will remain the same until the second coming of Christ and beyond. In the same way, the principles of moral conduct just like the Word of God must never be changed with time in the name of tolerance or in the name of human rights.
The Bible contains several reasons why the practice of homosexuality in any form is unlawful and wrong. Simply put, it is sin, and according to 1 John 3:4, sin is the transgression of Gods law. Many scriptures solidify this claim. Homosexuality is labeled as "an abomination" (Lev 18:22, 20:13); "perverted" (Deut. 23:17, Jud 19:22); "unclean (Romans 1:24); "against nature and "shameful" (Rom 1:26 and 27). In 1Timothy 1:8-10, Apostle Paul gives examples of lawbreakers and sinners, among whom are sodomites. He further informs us in 1Corinthians 6:9-10 that, no one who does not repent and turn from this sin will inherit the kingdom of God.
The Bible is therefore neither short nor ambiguous on its denunciation of homosexuality. Death, eternal death, is listed as the payment for this particular sin if un-repented of. This is so plain to see, and these proofs are so undeniable, that many proponents of homosexuality turn to other arguments to make their case. Yet, none of their arguments stands because they contradict God's timeless laws.
Most of the people behind these arguments are what I would call intellectual Christians who use the kind of reasoning and arguments similar to those presented by Greek philosophers around 500 years before Christ (BC) who believed that they could come to know God through their intellectual reasoning and arguments. They reasoned that it is man's nature to ask questions and since God made man so, if men asked the right questions and thought them through, they would force God to reveal Himself. The flaw in this is seen in the fruit it produced. Though it supplied a number of right answers, it did not, could not and will never make men moral beings because such a process could not and shall never change man's nature.
To them, like many gay activists who call themselves Christians today, religion became and has remained something akin to higher mathematics. It was and will remain an intense mental activity, yielding intellectual satisfaction but no moral action. Such are the likes of Plato and Socrates who, for example, saw nothing wrong with homosexuality.
The gods of Greek mythology also reflect this immorality, as they had the same weaknesses as human beings.
When we contrast these Greek methods with the Bible's way of knowing God, we realize that knowledge of God comes, not by speculation or emotionalism, but by God's direct self-revelation. In other words, God Himself initiates our knowing of Him, beginning our relationship by drawing us by His Spirit according to the Word of God in John 6:44, "No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day.
We must therefore, as Bible believing Christian leaders protect ourselves from the contamination of intellectual cynicism by taking our pastoral responsibility to enlighten the consciences of the very people we are called to serve about the threats of this lethal ideology.
It is ironic that despite claiming to be civilized and advanced in every area of life, the same sins that vexed righteous Lot are still plaguing us in the twenty first century and even after having pushed the limits of science and technology, the world has not figured out how not to repeat the societal, moral mistakes of its predecessors. The same sin that destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah has already eroded our culture to its roots and will eventually no doubt lead to its destruction.
As Bible believing Christians, it is critically important for us to continue preparing ourselves to be the bride of Christ at His return as predicted in Revelation 19:7, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His wife has made herself ready".God has given us the Bible as a marriage guide and instruction manual on how to live according to His will. Throughout His Word, God has given us His law, and in the examples written in its pages, He has instructed us on how to live a righteous life.
The Bible culminates in the return of Christ, His marriage to His bride (church), and the establishment of God's Kingdom here on earth. God is very clear in Revelation 21:8 and 22:15 that He will not abide sinners in His Kingdom. He has also cleared any doubts in Matthew 24:46 that, an invitation to the wedding will only be given to those whom He finds doing His will when He returns.
For now, advocates of homosexuality can continue to demand the rights of gays and lesbians as well as appealing for their support. However, we know that when Christ returns, according to Judges 21:25, men will be doing what is right in their own eyes and that as the Bible says in Luke 1:26, those days will be like the days of Noah.
The fate of Sodom and Gomorrah as recorded in Genesis 19:24-25, Then the LORD rained down burning sulfur on Sodom and Gomorrahfrom the LORD out of the heavens, should be a sobering reminder to the world of what happens when people turn from the God who has blessed them to the sinful desires of their evil hearts.
As Christians we continue to marvel at the level of immorality in the society and how gradually political correctness has legitimatized sodomy to an extent that a homosexual Episcopal bishop has been installed and homosexual marriage is being debated and defended within the body of Christ.
It is our responsibility and right to exercise Gods holy anger and categorically and boldly make the world know that, homosexuality is not a lifestyle, but a sin directly against God, flouting God's creation of male and female, perverting the natural use of the human body, and destroying the natural relationship with God.
We should advocate historically, God has taken the strongest punitive measures against this hideous abomination as stated earlier. Homosexuality, as stated by the Apostle Paul, seems to be a function of eliminating God from one's mind, receiving a debased, reprobate mind as a natural consequence. God established and sanctified the marriage union between a man and a woman for the purpose of producing godly seed.
We are aware that there are persons who have formed homosexual behavior, or have that orientation toward persons of the same sex by either poor parenting or hormonal activities during development. We sympathize with persons who have formed such behavior, but we should neither give them any rights nor respect their behavior. We respect them as human beings created in God's image, but we literally reject as God would their pseudo-dichotomy of homosexual orientation and homosexual desires as opposed to the Creator's original will.
Finally, I call on the whole world to disrespect homosexuality and all its privileges by appealing to my fellow Christian leaders to seriously consider ways to protect both our religious rights and the marriage institution; taking responsibility to present the whole truth to the whole world and refusing to accept as a moral good what God calls evil.
Stay blessed
Bishop Francis Waihenya
Tel.: +44 79 0697 9262 (Mobile)
"As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith" (Gal.6:10 KJV).