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Cohabitating with Special Privileges

Here is a quick thought about the churches and homosexuality. It is something that people who oppose the present teaching by churches on homosexuality and those who support it can both agree on.

 

Why is it that churches feel a need to work so tirelessly against homosexuals and “their agenda”, while at the same time welcoming couples who are unmarried and live together into their congregations and making no mention of it.

 

The reason I compare these two is because – according to an important factor of church dogma – they are the exact same thing. Sex out of wedlock is the issue in both cases.

 

Gay couples are “living in sin” in part because they are engaging in intimate relations with one another and doing so outside the bounds of holy matrimony. But the same can be said about the preponderance of couples in modern society who live together and who are not married. I would say that almost a quarter of the young couples I marry these days have children together before they get to the altar. So, there is no way that they are cohabitating chastely.

 

There are only three solutions to this mess, as I see it, and all require a greater degree of consistency on the part of the church and it’s witness to the world.

 

First, admit that cohabitation is not a sin and so homosexuality (or at least the cohabitation argument) is not a sin either.

 

Second, admit that homosexuality as cohabitation is a sin and so is all the other cohabitation going on. Kick the straight couples out church, refuse to marry them, preach against them, and require more discipline among the elect of God.

 

Third, admit that they are the same thing – bad, but not the end of the world. Most preachers and churches do not condone cohabitation, but they spend very little time fighting it. After all, there are two wars going on, the rich are getting richer at the expense of the rest of us, we have a lawless president in the White House, two parties who like to complain but do nothing about it, an education system that does not correlate to our wealth, abusive relationships, child molestation, widespread meaninglessness and hopelessness, and so much more. Perhaps as a church there are more important things we can worry about. We’ll get to this other stuff when we are ready to take a breath.

 

 

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Jerry Falwell

Rev. Jerry Fallwell collapsed at his Liberty University office today and died. He was 73.

It maybe goes without saying that Rev. Falwell and myself were on different sides of the aisle on almost all major social and political issues. However, I wish him God’s speed all the same.

He was a dedicated follower of Christ and a believer in the power and renewal of the Church. He understood the centrality of scripture and the feedom that the Holy Spirit gives each and everyone of us to become true children of God. He and I may have had totally different ideas about how all that plays out, but at heart we were Christian brothers.

I have taken more than a few occasions to preach rebuttals to his crusades. But I will always appreciate one talk he gave on Larry King Live about ten years ago. He was asked if he had any regrets about his long career as a public theologian and preacher. He said he had a big one. When the civil rights movement was in full swing in the 50s and 60s, he was approached by several Black Baptist churches to join in their cause and he said “No, that’s not right.” He did not say it out of prejudice, but out of his support for the traditional conviction that Baptists support the separation of the Church from the world. He said that night on Larry King that he had made a terrible mistake and had missed being a part of a great work by God in the world. He used the word “repent”.

Many will applaud the death of Rev. Falwell, but by doing so they show themselves to be lesser men than he was. He showed more humility, more willingness to change, and more concern for all God’s children than most people suspect - even if he went about it differently than say I would.

Jerry, I’ll miss thinking you were wrong, but wondering how we talked so much alike. Thank you for reminding me the Church is bigger than my own wisodm. Peace be upon you. For all our differences, I pray you will be greeted in heaven with the same words I hope one day to hear: “Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!” (Matthew 25:21)

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