Originally Posted by UntoHim
While I certainly fit awareness' ignoble category of "old fart heterosexual", I'm here to tell you that I don't fit the second category of "impossible to understand homosexuality".
I had an older brother who died of AIDS in the early nineties. I now have a very close relative who has come out as a lesbian. I have had a number of gay and lesbian friends, friends of friends, neighbors and co-workers and employees over the past 50 years. I have had civil relations with all of them. The Lord calls us to love our neighbors as ourselves. One of the first aspects of loving someone is to understand them. There is no practical way for us to love our neighbor unless we take the time and care to understand them. In John 4, the Lord Jesus did not immediately condemn the woman at the well, although her lifestyle was certainly shameful and condemnable, rather he engaged her in a conversation which led to her salvation. A few chapters later in John 8, in another confrontation with a woman involved in sexual sin. Again, he did not condemn her, rather he protected her from those seeking to condemn her to death. Yet the story did not end there. The story ended with Jesus telling her "go, and sin no more". The Greek here reads closer to "Go, and from now on, sin no more" (πορεύου ἀπὸ νῦν ἁμάρτανε μηκέτι) While it seems that the Lord Jesus was releasing her from the immediate consequences of her sin, he was more concerned with her eternal salvation..."and from now on".
All this being said, I believe that God has delivered his word to us in the form of the Old and New Testaments. In my view, these Scriptures are clear in the revealing of God's original intention in the creation of human beings - both men and women. I believe that there was an actual fall of Man. This fall negatively affected every aspect of human beings, including, and most especially, sexuality. Some of the negative affects of the fall were addressed in the Old Testament with the Law. The Lord Jesus was very clear in his declaration "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them" (Matthew 5:17) When taken in it's entirety, I believe the Gospel explains, and even illustrates for us, how God is in the process of redeeming every aspect of humanity, including, and most especially, human sexuality.
So here we are on an Internet discussion forum in 2020. I don't think any of us are the woman at the well, and I don't think any of us are the Lord Jesus. Maybe we're like the observers of these events. We all have our experiences. We all have our backgrounds. We also have various environments that we have grown up with and surrounding us today. Most importantly, I believe, we have and accurate, true and complete record of God's intentions in his creation, before the Fall, and his intentions in the salvation and redemption of human beings.
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