Does the Bible Support Gay monogamous Christian couples?
This is a question that more and more liberal / progressive / modern culture ( <--substitute your preferred term here) Christians are answers with a YES.
Some common names/books recently associated with this intra-church battle include:
Mathew Vines / God and the Gay Christian
Justin Lee / Torn
Vicky Beeching / http://vickybeeching.com/blog/lgbt-theology-2/
So, the question this creates is, are they reflecting biblical reality or just their perception?
Truth is the ultimate battle of our existence. Therefore, I don't seek to find my truths or someone else's truths from the Bible. I seek to determine the absolute Truth by reading the Bible, the word of God.
When studying the Bible for answers regarding any topic, the question we should ask is: What IS God telling us in this passage?
Too often it appears people want to answer the question: What COULD God be telling us in this passage?
Trying to answer the second question often results in the wrong conclusions. I believe this is due to multiple possible reasons. First, asking the second question often indicates a personal bias and a dissatisfaction with what others have determined when seeking "What God IS telling us." Second, dissatisfaction with previous traditional, conclusions often precludes traditional conclusions from being a possible answer. Third, anytime we approach the Bible with a mindset of "could" instead of "is" we are making new non-traditional conclusions much more likely, whether they match reality or not.
In short, people can propose that the Bible supports any view, because they want it to, but that doesn't mean the Bible really says those things. When reinterpreting bible passages to see them as reaching a new, modern, truthful conclusion that conflicts with the traditional conclusion; the interpreter is making one or more of these false, hidden claims (assuming they propose the new interpretation as absolute), either intentionally or unintentionally:
- All previous interpreters over the last two thousand years got it wrong
- God sent his written word to us in such a poor method that we might misinterpret it indefinitely and draw a conflicting conclusion.
- We cannot be sure anything in the Bible was interpreted correctly
- God is not very good at conveying important concepts to his creations (humans).
- Any correlation between the new interpretation and the preferred view of our modern culture is just coincidence. Modern culture did not influence their new conclusion.
- That God intended for us to draw the wrong conclusions until our culture was ready. [This would make God seem deceptive]
- If relying upon "cultural context" to reinterpret multiple passages, then God must have forgotten to include the necessary cultural information in the Bible's text, for proper interpretation, in all the related passages.
other possible claims exist that I can't articulate at the moment.
The main point being, that anyone declaring: "the Bible supports gay monogamous Christian couples." is practicing biblical compromise. Biblical compromise always destroys the integrity and consistency of the Bible. It is more consistent for someone to reject the Bible entirely, then to try and change it. The Bible is either accurate or it is not. You cannot have it both ways.
You might be wondering what value I see in Bible study at all or if I think new biblical revelations can be found in our modern era. Studying the Bible is always a worth while endeavor. I say this because the goal of bible study should be to understand more deeply what God IS trying to tell us. Deeper understanding is a good thing. Studying the Bible with a goal of finding new conclusions that conflict with previous conclusion is a bad thing. This is not true of all information studies, but it is true of the Bible, because the Bible is an authoritative revelation of God's Truth for all humans.
I want to end with two statements. First, in the past and present, the church has handled homosexual desires among Christians very poorly, but that does not change the Truths spoken in the bible. Second, "The Bible may hurt you with the Truth, but it will never comfort you with a lie." --Unknown
References to responses to the Pro-gay relationships names/books:
A response to Mathew Vines' book:
God, the Gospel, and the Gay Challenge — A Response to Matthew Vines – AlbertMohler.com
http://www.albertmohler.com/2014/04/22/god-the-gospel-and-the-gay-challenge-a-response-to-matthew-vines
Justin Lee apparently bends the facts in his book:
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/philosophicalfragments/2013/04/16/is-justin-lee-now-misrepresenting-the-fact-that-he-misrepresented-my-views-on-the-levitical-prohibitions-an-open-rejoinder-to-justin-lee-from-robert-gagnon/