Jesus Venture

Homosexuality and Society, from the lens of an individual

Jake Paysour — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 23:58:18 +0000

I was supposed to write this post several weeks ago. I hadn’t forgot, I’ve been busy but not overly busy, but I just couldn’t think of what to write that hasn’t been written and rehashed a thousand times. Homosexuality is, for whatever reason, a hot button issue among those of religious persuasion. There are those on every side of the issue (and there are certainly more than two to such a complicated debate) who believe passionately that, as a Christian, they cannot believe otherwise. Scripture is cited and interpreted from every angle, arriving at totally different conclusions.
While you can read Joanna’s post below about loving our neighbors regardless of sexual orientation, I’d like to take a step (albeit a small step) in a different direction. It’s interesting that, in a society so often obsessed with personal privacy, we are just as obsessed with who is sleeping with whom. Yes, our sexuality is a defining characteristic of who we are, and I’m certainly not here to argue that we should negate or hide all traces of our sexuality. I am arguing, however, that such traits manifest themselves in ways that need not affect the graciousness with which we interact with others. People are people. It’s a difficult line to walk, to simply treat people as they should be treated, and as you would like to be treated, versus ignoring sexuality entirely. We can’t pretend like it just doesn’t exist, but we can take time to get to know other aspects of the person, such that one is not defined entirely by their sexuality.
I firmly believe that, if we would learn to separate the issues of treatment of those who claim homosexuality and marriage, that the debate would be far less heated. Politically, the debate should not be over the institution of marriage itself, but over the rights and benefits granted therein. Marriage is a religious institution; visitation of a dying spouse, power of attorney, tax benefits and the like are linked to civil institutions. Such things regard treatment of others, on a macro level, and I believe the same spirit governing individual relationships should govern this debate. Perhaps, then, we can at least agree to this, and deal with the issue of marriage itself within the church, outside of the heated political arena.

The Beauty of God Expressed in the Beauty of Human Language: or There Are No Shortcuts as a Christian

Joel Walther — Tue, 28 Jun 2011 23:37:55 +0000

I couldn’t feel more the opposite to Margaret on the 2 Tim 2:1-13 passage. But this should come as no surprise, I rarely agree with anyone on this blog fully. After all, that’s the purpose of this blog. I will credit Margaret with being a “good Methodist.”
What I feel the opposite of her discomfort. The words she lists aren’t hard for me, they are beautiful. This is some of the best poetry in the Bible. Paul is trying to express the all-encompassing nature of living a Christian life and he is trying to express it in as many different ways as possible in order that many more may understand.
And there couldn’t be truer words! Do you not, as a Christian, feel bound to the Gospel at times, just as Paul says? And yet, it is a Gospel that is freeing, as he also reminds us.
I think that Paul is really trying to address “shortcut” Christians. It seems there are those that would desire to have the Gospel without all that it entails. For some, this may mean salvation without then living it out. For others, it may mean salvation without the suffering that may come with it. Paul allows no one shortcuts.
This is the most deeply disturbing thing to me as I progress in my Christian life. I have realized there are no shortcuts. I used to think that if I prayed once in a while, read scripture once in a while and attended worship that I was a Christian. However, now I realize that I must engage in these acts every day, praying each moment, immersing myself in Scripture and continually worshipping our Maker.
Wesley encouraged the frequent use of means of grace (such as communion, scripture, prayer, etc.) not because it’s good for a Christian, but because there is no other way to be a Christian. There are no shortcuts.
This is the only reason I find these most beautiful words of Scripture disturbing. They call me to be a fully-in-Christ Christian, not a shortcut Christian. Just because we do not like war imagery doesn’t mean we aren’t in a constant battle to allow God to make us the best Christian we can be. By His grace, may we stop looking for shortcuts.

mbagwell — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 15:24:46 +0000

2 Timothy 2:1-13- “The Spirit of a Real Christian”

Soldier for Christ. Bound with chains. Die with Christ. Deny. Suffering.

This passage from 2 Timothy includes a lot of language that makes me uncomfortable. I prefer to focus on the positive image of a kind, loving God. Soldiers, death, and denial just doesn’t fit. Further, Paul’s discourse on suffering is complicated. Is he saying that persons who are painfully suffering should just endure? That doesn’t exude the compassion that I associate with God.

Because I’m a “good Methodist” I headed to Wesley’s Commentary on the New Testament for guidance. Wesley writes:
Encourage by this, that “the word of God be not bound.” I endure all things- See the spirit of the real Christian? Who would not wish to be like minded? Salvation is deliverance from all evil; glory, the enjoyment of all good.
I like how Wesley directs our attention away from the idea of present suffering and toward endurance as a characteristic of living a Christian life. Wesley’s refocusing allows us to not dwell on the idea of suffering in this passage, but understand Paul’s words as a call to cultivate our personal virtue. Holiness and happiness characterize for Wesley the life of a sanctified believer. Here we read that in order for us to truly enjoy God’s promises, we must endure in the word. With Wesley’s guidance the uncomfortable and complicated parts of this passage become less important than the command to remain faithful.

Yet our hope does not rest in this passage in our own ability to remain faithful. Verses 11-13 offer statements declaring the certainty of God’s faithfulness. In God, our hope rests. By God’s grace, we are called to practice endurance with God’s faithfulness as guide.

I’m searching for a real love. . .

Joanna Marcy — Wed, 08 Jun 2011 15:21:27 +0000

In the very beginning of it all, we know God looked at all of it and said it was good. Very good indeed. What a wonderful start to a love story. The feeling that it is all very good indeed. The feeling that of complete love, love that makes you feel whole.
In the beginning our sexuality was looked at and called good. Now, let’s not forget that things got broken along the way. Really broken, really twisted. It took tablets from heaven, men in sack cloth (on the good days when they were not naked), threats of plagues, migrating communities, destruction of worship space, and ultimately the hard work of God taking on flesh, living, dying, and rising again to live in communities now just to show the hope to bring it all back together. And the good news. . . we are still waiting for all the King’s horses and all the King’s people (inclusive language) to come back in a GREAT second coming and put it together again. So that is a way too short understanding of theodicy, salvation, and atonement, but maybe we can get the gist. Creation was good, it was broken by us, and we await when it will really really get put back together in New Creation.
But for the now, you and me and the collective church around the world, are trying to do our part. We are trying to love God and love our neighbors as ourselves. Most days I don’t do this very well and to be honest there are days I don’t think the church does it very well. Do we really love all people as God would have us love them?
The way I see it, God loves us through grace in a way that is welcoming, inclusive, and powerful. It is not weak love. It is bold love, radical love, passionate love. It is forgiving love, accepting love, and changing love. It opens doors and invites you into the mystery of all of God. We as the church hold a lot of the keys to the door of God. We hold sacraments, community, and worship in our hands with our power as mortals. But we hold them only in temporary form, because all of these things our God’s. It is the Lord’s table we invite people to join, it is the People of God gathered, and it is word of God shared and proclaimed every time we gather to worship. Not our table. Not our people. Not our word. But do not deny the fact that we hold a liminal threshold into this love.
Praise God that God’s love is boundless. It luckily is reaching people and pushing through our limits of our churches and touching hearts. But it should not have to. We should be about that work too. We should be about the places where God’s love is at the boundaries and be pushing with God to love more people.
Now, here we are skirting around the topic of homosexuality. For many just by being lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or anywhere falling on a sexuality continuum find themselves as beyond the bounds of church, feeling unwelcome not only to our tables of fellowship, but to God’s table. Now as United Methodists we celebrate an open table, a Eucharist, a time of thanksgiving for GOD’S work. We celebrate the way that our doors are open and so are our hearts. We should live that way. Live in a way that is open and with welcome table. That means young or old, straight, LGBTQ, addict, gambler, liar, and priest are all welcome to the table to hear again that God says “taste and see that the Lord is good”, and you too are made whole though Jesus Christ. I don’t hear us saying, “this is the body of Christ broken for you, but not your other friend, you know the one over there.” No, to each person, the body of Christ is broken and shared.
If you would like you could pull out some scripture and we could have a long discussion of sin, brokenness, poor examples of healthy relationships (please someone bring up Britney Spears—because really if anything is degrading marriage I have a theory and it involves her—but I also must admit she was my first concert. Oh Lord hear our prayers. . .), and also you might want to talk about Paul and the New Testament. All of those things are really good conversations and I would like to be part of them.
But first I want to talk about how my sexuality is a gift from God. Yours too for that matter. All of you, reading this, it is a gift. It is a way to manifest grace and to show deep love whose ONLY source is God. Then I want to talk about that word, LOVE. Because all those conversations listed above (Paul or the ones that involve Deuteronomy and how all of us wear clothing of mixed fibers—sinners all!), I can’t really seem to fall into them. I get stuck on that Love God and love your neighbors step. You see, Jesus, my Lord and Savior, told me to do that as the first thing. And like I said, I haven’t mastered that yet. So I am trying, to love God and love my neighbor and the great thing about the gospel is I want you to join with me and doing this. All of you. All means all to me and when we get past this step of loving God and loving neighbor really well, putting the world back together into the wholeness, where we too might step back from the world and call it really good indeed, then I will get back to the semantics conversations. Until then, I will be loving and hope you will be too.

mbagwell — Mon, 23 May 2011 03:44:56 +0000

Sex & Dating – by Josie Hoover, M.Div.

Hmmm – so I am supposed to tell you ‘NO SEX WHILE DATING’ or ‘NO SEX BEFORE MARRIAGE’? What purpose does it serve to share my thoughts on sex and dating in these short (and few) paragraphs? I’m no expert nor do I claim to have any answers but I hope that I can provide something based upon my own experiences and therefore help you think about this as well. And, try to do this without tarnishing my professional image (a big ‘wink’).
In thinking about this subject, I was pondering several questions and approaches to this blog entry. The two questions that resurfaced several times was “how hard or easy is it to live your life for Jesus Christ while dating?” Or, “can your faith in Jesus Christ keep you from being distracted while denying your physical desires?” I can go on and on but I thought I would stop and instead just deal with the issues at hand: sex and dating.

Depending on who you ask, it’s already hard enough to date – period. Then, add your Christian faith to that, well, dating can become even more complicated. When we’re dating, we might do so for the purposes of companionship, to find “the one”, to curb our loneliness or ‘just because it’s something to do ..” But, in all honesty, we can find this companionship or curb our loneliness with our personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Sure, we know that Jesus Christ represents many things to us (i.e. an advocate for the disenfranchised, healer, etc.) but the reality is that a personal relationship with him helps us to make better decisions about whom we choose to date or why we date in the first place.

Now, let’s add sex to the equation, and things become really funky. I cannot sit here and point my finger at you and sound like your parochial school teacher (or your parent) and vehemently say, ‘NO sex before marriage!!” because I realize that we are human and fall short of glory each day we are alive. Now, just because we fall short of Jesus’ perfection doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t strive for wisdom. However, I must again say that if we have a solid relationship with Jesus Christ, we might be able to make wise decisions as it relates to who we want to share our time with and share our bodies with.

Sex is considered one of the most sacred levels of intimacy one can ever encounter. It literally binds souls together in more ways you can imagine. It also makes statements without one word being uttered. Additionally, it creates room for complications and compromise to occur in a relationship. Now, I don’t say that because I am a married person, but I say that out of experience because I haven’t been married as long as I was single.

1 Corinthians 6: 19-20 tells us that our body is a temple and that it essentially does not belong to us. Therefore, we have a responsibility to make wise decisions on whom we’re dating and what we do when we are dating that person. Now, I’m probably not exegeting this particular scripture and this blog entry may not be the place to do so; however, I have always been led to believe that this is a pertinent scripture as it relates to our humanness. Besides, the scripture seems to be quite appropriate for this subject.

If you were to take my question that I presented at the beginning of this blog entry, I can answer in the utmost and confident manner that it can be both easy and hard to date as a Christian single. And yes, your faith can keep the distractions of the world afar from your individual life. I am confident that it begins with our relationship with our Maker; it should be intact or at least in progress. This way, we won’t fall prey to societal pressures and individual pressures to compromise our well-being. So, have fun, enjoy yourself, be responsible and most importantly, keep God first.

John Lucy — Mon, 16 May 2011 20:56:40 +0000

Genesis 22:1-19

The Bible contains many troubling stories that require us to wrestle with them. Not since I was a young child could I accept that God would ask Abraham to sacrifice his beloved son, Isaac. Sure, verses 11-12 seem to suggest that God was testing Abraham, and I could accept that as a child, but I can’t accept the notion of testing anymore.

If God loves us, would God not simply love us? Why would God need to test us? Is God’s love conditional, such that God needs to know if we are worthy of His love? And does God not know our hearts already? What the heck is all this about? I cannot believe in a God that would test us. I cannot believe in a God that acts like a Spartan, sending out all children at a certain age to live alone in the wilderness to see if they can survive. We are God’s creations, and if we are going to believe in a God of love I think we need to struggle quite a bit with this Abraham and Isaac business because it paints the picture of God as a flip-flopping, unsure and demanding tyrant.

I quite honestly don’t know what to do with this passage. But I am struck by verse 8, when Abraham says to Isaac, “God himself will provide the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” I cannot help but think that the ‘point’ of this passage is so that God can point forward to the sacrifice of His Son, Jesus Christ. God will provide a lamb for the burnt offering—Jesus Christ is offered up as the Passover Lamb in the Gospel of John. God will provide the sacrifice so that we need not, we can live in joy and peace and not worry about who or what we will need to sacrifice next.

Personally, I like the idea that God will provide so that we can live in joy and peace, but again I have difficulties in thinking that Christ’s crucifixion was part of God’s plan from the beginning. That would make God a perpetrator of premeditated child abuse, and it would make God a vengeful god that requires a sacrifice to calm His wrath. That is another god that I cannot believe in.

For me, I will never be able to definitely say that this passage means anything. I’m sure it does have a meaning, but I am as of yet unaware of what it could mean that would not transform God into something that I’d feel I need to rebel against. And there’s nothing wrong with that. We say that no person can know God in His infinite and mysterious entirety. I think it is much more honest to take this passage and throw up our hands, saying, “Geez, God, I don’t know what the frick you want me to understand from this, but I’ll keep searching.” We find God in our searching, in our living in the full reality of the confusion of life. So instead of trying to understand this most difficult of passages, keep searching. Keep searching.