CAN YOU BE A CHRISTIAN AND BE GAY?
KEY POINT
At the risk of oversimplifying a very complex issue and theological challenge (and admitting that any proposed brief way to answer such a complex challenge will necessarily have holes in it), perhaps we can sum things up in the following way: Can you be a Christian and be gay? You can be a Christian and battle gay inclinations and actions. You can’t be a Christian and insist that gay inclinations and actions are commensurate with a Christian life or with Christ Himself.
To answer this question, one must first answer a few other questions. What does it mean to be “gay”? First, the word “gay” is used to designate the inclination of a person’s sexual desire toward another person of the same sex. In other words, it is the inclination toward sin (that which goes against God’s definitions). The inclination toward sin comes from the fallen nature. Everyone has a fallen nature, including Christians. Thus, if the inclination to sin (fallen nature) means that you are not saved, then no one is saved. Second, the word “gay” is used to designate one who acts out the inclination. In other words, it is the acting out of sin.
At this point, it should be said that many other words could be substituted for the word “gay”; lie, steal, idolize, lust, carouse, adultery, judge, and hundreds more. For example, it could be equally said that the word “lie” is used to designate the inclination of a person’s relational desire to selfishly mislead another person. In other words, it is the inclination toward sin. This is to say that “gay” is not some especially damning sin. Sin is sin and has the same result regardless of the type; it promotes a separation from God (Romans 6:23). If the answer to, “Can you be a Christian and act out homosexuality?” is automatically, “No,” then the answer to, “Can you be a Christian and tell a lie?” must also automatically be, “No.”
This is not to say that gay activity is not sin. It is sin because “whatever is not from faith is sin” (Romans 14:23) and homosexual activity is not from faith since faith includes the actions of the heart that come from relationship with, submission to, and trust in Jesus; that is, obedience to Jesus and His Word. The Bible clearly rejects homosexuality both in its description of how God created mankind and mankind’s sexuality (Genesis 1-2), and in its direct denouncing of the practice itself (Romans 1). If the question simply was, “Is homosexuality sin?”, then it would be an easy answer. “Yes, it is!”
In addition, one must answer the question, “What does it mean to be a “Christian”? First, the word “Christian” is a word used to designate a sinner who has accepted Jesus as his or her Savior and Lord by giving his or her life to Him. Second, the word “Christian” is used to designate the acting out of that salvation by obeying Jesus’ commands imperfectly. Christians are not perfect people (not before they were saved or after they were saved). The fact that they have an inclination toward sin and that they do sometimes sin does not dictate whether they are saved or not. It is not sinning, or not sinning, that saves you, but the reception of the payment for that sin that saves you. It is not sinning, or not sinning, that does not save you, but it is the non-reception of the payment for that sin that puts you in the category of the unsaved.
And so, the first level answer to the question, “Can you be a Christian and be gay?” is “Yes!” It is “Yes” not because you are gay, but because being “gay” or not being “gay” does not save you. Someone’s gay status or gay actions do not, in and of themselves, disqualify them from salvation because salvation is determined by criteria other than those specific actions. There are indicators of salvation. These are not whether you are inclined to sin or even that, in fact, you do sin. They are more in keeping with what has happened to someone who is saved (someone who is saved is not perfected yet; not until heaven). The saved person is not perfect, but the saved person is being perfected (because his or her “new” born again nature is active). Such a person is filled with God’s Spirit, having been “born again” or born from above.
Without salvation, a person has only one nature that is active; the sin nature. After salvation, a person has a born again nature (spirit is woken up or reborn) that is not fallen, but risen. The unsaved person only has one nature while the saved person has two natures. This causes a lack of a “war” in the unsaved person, and the existence of a “war” in the saved person. Another way to say this is that it causes “conviction” in the saved person, but a lack of conviction in the unsaved person.
Herein lies the difference. The unsaved person is not convicted about their inclination nor their actualization of sin. There is no power that would, otherwise, drive a person away from sin or, at least, make him or her “battle with it.” There is no sense of “faith” for there is no actuality of the source of faith (the Holy Spirit) to move a person toward that faith. The saved person is different. They are convicted about their inclination and their actualization of sin. The “God nature” that exists in them causes a fight between their two natures; a fight that uses the conviction of the Holy Spirit to move one toward awareness of that which is against God and, therefore, toward agreement with God instead of agreement with that which is against God. This conviction moves a saved person toward rejecting the sin in favor of God’s righteousness; that is, His right way of doing things.
This is the difference between a saved person and an unsaved person with respect to sin; that is, any type of sin, not just certain types of sexual sin. The question, “Can a gay person be saved?” must be asked in light of the question, “Can anyone be saved?” Sin is not the revealer of this. The attitude toward sin (inclination toward sin) and the enhanced ability to deny it (acting out of sin) is more of the revealer of salvation. Just like a “liar” who can either be a Christian or not be a Christian (since the criteria for salvation is not “lying” or “not lying”), so too a “gay person” can either be a Christian or not be a Christian.
Prefacing the following proposal of different scenarios with the admittance that no other human being can be a judge of salvation nor is there a certain “package” of rules or a checklist by which one could declare another “saved”, perhaps it can be helpful to offer potential descriptions of how different “gay” people might be assessed with respect to salvation:
Person #1 (more of an indication of being unsaved) = Someone who has “accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior” and who is inclined toward homosexuality and acts out in a homosexual lifestyle, and who wholeheartedly agrees with that lifestyle instead of having some disagreement with it.
Person #2 (more of an indication of being unsaved) = Someone who has “accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior” and who is inclined toward heterosexual deviance and acts out in a heterosexual deviant lifestyle, and who wholeheartedly agrees with that deviance instead of having some disagreement with it.
Person #3 (more of an indication of being saved) = Someone who has “accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior” and who is inclined toward homosexuality and acts out in a homosexual lifestyle, and who wholeheartedly disagrees with that lifestyle, and is turning from it, instead of being in agreement with it.
Person #4 (more of an indication of being saved) = Someone who has “accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior” and who is inclined toward heterosexual deviance and acts out in a heterosexual deviant lifestyle, and who wholeheartedly disagrees with that lifestyle, and is turning from it, instead of being in agreement with it.
Person #5 (more of an indication of being saved) = Someone who has “accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior” and who is inclined toward homosexuality or heterosexual deviance but does not act out in a homosexual or heterosexual deviant lifestyle, and who wholeheartedly disagrees with that lifestyle instead of being in agreement with it.
Person #6, the “saved” family member of the gay person (especially parents), is in some ways the most difficult person to assess since an extra portion of love is introduced into the equation. In any case, the same principles could be applied. How does the family member look at the situation and approach their loved one? This is a painful test of Lordship. Who is Lord? Who do you prefer (love, not hate) when a choice must be made? Is it Jesus, and His definitions of truth, or your love (preference) for your family member (Luke 14:26)? This love, it must be remembered, does not change the way Jesus sees the situation. He says, “I do not condemn you, either. Go. From now on sin no more” (John 8:11). It is both things. Do not condemn. Love. Treat with respect. Seek to promote unity wherever unity can be promoted…seek to bless whatever can be blessed. This love, however, does not mean that you should not love Christ, and His definitions of truth, more (it must be said with Him to “from now on sin no more”). And so, the love of the person includes a preferment and standing for what is right, not what is wrong. The challenge for the “Christian” family member is to both love people and love truth. It is to stand with the sinner and stand for Jesus.
The evidence or indication – and that is all we can have, for only God knows fully the heart of a person – with respect to the question of salvation as it is associated with any one specific sin, is more than anything else, accessed by whether that person is in the “battle” or not. It is the “fight” in the person that reveals whether the “Fighter” is, indeed, in that person. At the end of the day, this is the most visible sign of salvation; “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27). Sin in you is not automatically a disqualifier of salvation for the complete ridding of the doing of sin, this side of heaven, is not what salvation promises (1 John 1:10). To be saved is not to completely no longer want to sin or to completely no longer sin; rather it is to be forgiven of that sin and to want to, and be enabled to, increasingly live a life that is pleasing to God (Philippians 2:12-13). The saved “gay Christian” will increasingly be moving away from gay actions. He or she will fight the good fight (1 Timothy 6:12). The unsaved “gay Christian” will have no desire and no ability to move away from gay actions. He or she will never even put the proverbial gloves on or get in the ring.
At the risk of oversimplifying a very complex issue and theological challenge (and admitting that any proposed brief way to answer such a complex challenge will necessarily have holes in it), perhaps we can sum things up in the following way: Can you be a Christian and be gay? You can be a Christian and battle gay inclinations and actions. You can’t be a Christian and insist that gay inclinations and actions are commensurate with a Christian life or with Christ Himself.
At this point, it should be said that many other words could be substituted for the word “gay”; lie, steal, idolize, lust, carouse, adultery, judge, and hundreds more. For example, it could be equally said that the word “lie” is used to designate the inclination of a person’s relational desire to selfishly mislead another person. In other words, it is the inclination toward sin. This is to say that “gay” is not some especially damning sin. Sin is sin and has the same result regardless of the type; it promotes a separation from God (Romans 6:23). If the answer to, “Can you be a Christian and act out homosexuality?” is automatically, “No,” then the answer to, “Can you be a Christian and tell a lie?” must also automatically be, “No.”
This is not to say that gay activity is not sin. It is sin because “whatever is not from faith is sin” (Romans 14:23) and homosexual activity is not from faith since faith includes the actions of the heart that come from relationship with, submission to, and trust in Jesus; that is, obedience to Jesus and His Word. The Bible clearly rejects homosexuality both in its description of how God created mankind and mankind’s sexuality (Genesis 1-2), and in its direct denouncing of the practice itself (Romans 1). If the question simply was, “Is homosexuality sin?”, then it would be an easy answer. “Yes, it is!”
In addition, one must answer the question, “What does it mean to be a “Christian”? First, the word “Christian” is a word used to designate a sinner who has accepted Jesus as his or her Savior and Lord by giving his or her life to Him. Second, the word “Christian” is used to designate the acting out of that salvation by obeying Jesus’ commands imperfectly. Christians are not perfect people (not before they were saved or after they were saved). The fact that they have an inclination toward sin and that they do sometimes sin does not dictate whether they are saved or not. It is not sinning, or not sinning, that saves you, but the reception of the payment for that sin that saves you. It is not sinning, or not sinning, that does not save you, but it is the non-reception of the payment for that sin that puts you in the category of the unsaved.
And so, the first level answer to the question, “Can you be a Christian and be gay?” is “Yes!” It is “Yes” not because you are gay, but because being “gay” or not being “gay” does not save you. Someone’s gay status or gay actions do not, in and of themselves, disqualify them from salvation because salvation is determined by criteria other than those specific actions. There are indicators of salvation. These are not whether you are inclined to sin or even that, in fact, you do sin. They are more in keeping with what has happened to someone who is saved (someone who is saved is not perfected yet; not until heaven). The saved person is not perfect, but the saved person is being perfected (because his or her “new” born again nature is active). Such a person is filled with God’s Spirit, having been “born again” or born from above.
Without salvation, a person has only one nature that is active; the sin nature. After salvation, a person has a born again nature (spirit is woken up or reborn) that is not fallen, but risen. The unsaved person only has one nature while the saved person has two natures. This causes a lack of a “war” in the unsaved person, and the existence of a “war” in the saved person. Another way to say this is that it causes “conviction” in the saved person, but a lack of conviction in the unsaved person.
Herein lies the difference. The unsaved person is not convicted about their inclination nor their actualization of sin. There is no power that would, otherwise, drive a person away from sin or, at least, make him or her “battle with it.” There is no sense of “faith” for there is no actuality of the source of faith (the Holy Spirit) to move a person toward that faith. The saved person is different. They are convicted about their inclination and their actualization of sin. The “God nature” that exists in them causes a fight between their two natures; a fight that uses the conviction of the Holy Spirit to move one toward awareness of that which is against God and, therefore, toward agreement with God instead of agreement with that which is against God. This conviction moves a saved person toward rejecting the sin in favor of God’s righteousness; that is, His right way of doing things.
This is the difference between a saved person and an unsaved person with respect to sin; that is, any type of sin, not just certain types of sexual sin. The question, “Can a gay person be saved?” must be asked in light of the question, “Can anyone be saved?” Sin is not the revealer of this. The attitude toward sin (inclination toward sin) and the enhanced ability to deny it (acting out of sin) is more of the revealer of salvation. Just like a “liar” who can either be a Christian or not be a Christian (since the criteria for salvation is not “lying” or “not lying”), so too a “gay person” can either be a Christian or not be a Christian.
Prefacing the following proposal of different scenarios with the admittance that no other human being can be a judge of salvation nor is there a certain “package” of rules or a checklist by which one could declare another “saved”, perhaps it can be helpful to offer potential descriptions of how different “gay” people might be assessed with respect to salvation:
Person #1 (more of an indication of being unsaved) = Someone who has “accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior” and who is inclined toward homosexuality and acts out in a homosexual lifestyle, and who wholeheartedly agrees with that lifestyle instead of having some disagreement with it.
Person #2 (more of an indication of being unsaved) = Someone who has “accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior” and who is inclined toward heterosexual deviance and acts out in a heterosexual deviant lifestyle, and who wholeheartedly agrees with that deviance instead of having some disagreement with it.
Person #3 (more of an indication of being saved) = Someone who has “accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior” and who is inclined toward homosexuality and acts out in a homosexual lifestyle, and who wholeheartedly disagrees with that lifestyle, and is turning from it, instead of being in agreement with it.
Person #4 (more of an indication of being saved) = Someone who has “accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior” and who is inclined toward heterosexual deviance and acts out in a heterosexual deviant lifestyle, and who wholeheartedly disagrees with that lifestyle, and is turning from it, instead of being in agreement with it.
Person #5 (more of an indication of being saved) = Someone who has “accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior” and who is inclined toward homosexuality or heterosexual deviance but does not act out in a homosexual or heterosexual deviant lifestyle, and who wholeheartedly disagrees with that lifestyle instead of being in agreement with it.
Person #6, the “saved” family member of the gay person (especially parents), is in some ways the most difficult person to assess since an extra portion of love is introduced into the equation. In any case, the same principles could be applied. How does the family member look at the situation and approach their loved one? This is a painful test of Lordship. Who is Lord? Who do you prefer (love, not hate) when a choice must be made? Is it Jesus, and His definitions of truth, or your love (preference) for your family member (Luke 14:26)? This love, it must be remembered, does not change the way Jesus sees the situation. He says, “I do not condemn you, either. Go. From now on sin no more” (John 8:11). It is both things. Do not condemn. Love. Treat with respect. Seek to promote unity wherever unity can be promoted…seek to bless whatever can be blessed. This love, however, does not mean that you should not love Christ, and His definitions of truth, more (it must be said with Him to “from now on sin no more”). And so, the love of the person includes a preferment and standing for what is right, not what is wrong. The challenge for the “Christian” family member is to both love people and love truth. It is to stand with the sinner and stand for Jesus.
The evidence or indication – and that is all we can have, for only God knows fully the heart of a person – with respect to the question of salvation as it is associated with any one specific sin, is more than anything else, accessed by whether that person is in the “battle” or not. It is the “fight” in the person that reveals whether the “Fighter” is, indeed, in that person. At the end of the day, this is the most visible sign of salvation; “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27). Sin in you is not automatically a disqualifier of salvation for the complete ridding of the doing of sin, this side of heaven, is not what salvation promises (1 John 1:10). To be saved is not to completely no longer want to sin or to completely no longer sin; rather it is to be forgiven of that sin and to want to, and be enabled to, increasingly live a life that is pleasing to God (Philippians 2:12-13). The saved “gay Christian” will increasingly be moving away from gay actions. He or she will fight the good fight (1 Timothy 6:12). The unsaved “gay Christian” will have no desire and no ability to move away from gay actions. He or she will never even put the proverbial gloves on or get in the ring.
At the risk of oversimplifying a very complex issue and theological challenge (and admitting that any proposed brief way to answer such a complex challenge will necessarily have holes in it), perhaps we can sum things up in the following way: Can you be a Christian and be gay? You can be a Christian and battle gay inclinations and actions. You can’t be a Christian and insist that gay inclinations and actions are commensurate with a Christian life or with Christ Himself.
BIBLICAL REFERENCES
For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in[a] Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 6:23
Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin. John 8:11
Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose. Philippians 2:12-13
Fight the good fight of the faith. 1 Timothy 6:12
TRUE NORTH COLLEGE COURSE
Doctrine of Salvation and the Church | Biblical Studies 114
A systematic study of the doctrine of salvation (soteriology) and the doctrine of the Church (ecclesiology). Special attention will be given to the plan of redemption and the contents of the gospel message as it is seen in the incarnation, life, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ. Special emphasis will be on the nature and working of the kingdom of God. The Gospels and Jesus’ teachings will serve as the specific source of the study.