What if I’m Wrong About Homosexuality?

Posted on January 30, 2014 by sacredtensionstephen
This post and many more excellent post can be found at http://sacredtension.com/

As a gay man, one question more than any other has kept me up at night – the question that draws all other questions into its gravitational pull: what if I’m wrong?

If I believe God blesses gay marriage, and I condone gay marriages among my friends, and I eventually get married to a man myself, what if I’m wrong?

Does that mean I am in grave error, condoning a sin that has very serious consequences on souls, hearts, communities and families? Does that mean I will be held accountable before God as a teacher of sin? Does that mean I am leading people into sin, death, and decay instead of redemption, goodness, and love?

If I’m traditional regarding homosexuality and marriage, what if I’m wrong?

If I’m wrong, I am guilty of condemning an entire people group to never experiencing something central to human life and stability: marriage. I am guilty of standing in defiance to 2000 years of Christian tradition that affirms that marriage is good and that celibacy must never, ever be forced upon anyone, because celibacy is a gift.

I might be guilty of encouraging the culture of promiscuity within the gay community by not believing marriage is a viable route for them. I might be bringing greater instability to the gay community because of my conviction. I am guilty of saying that self-sacrificing, long-suffering, mutually giving, monogamous love is wrong, while serving a God of love, thereby damaging the witness of my faith.

If I am traditional and wrong, I am guilty of perpetuating a ferocious and evil injustice against a vulnerable people group that deserve equality and love. 

If I am wrong (or right), if I am misguided (or totally on track), if my convictions fail me, (or if they prove to be true) there is one – and only one – thing I have left, and that is the Gospel. 

There is only one thing that will not fail, one thing that stands no matter what else may fall, one thing that never changes, no matter how subject to change we are, and that is Christ himself.

In the face of such terrible consequences of being wrong, and in the face of my own intellectual shortcomings that are so prone to error, the only thing I have is Christ’s grace: his Cross and His resurrection, the conviction that He is the way, the truth, and the life. All I have is the assurance that He is good, and that His grace is sufficient, even when our own minds fail. All I have, when all words are written and all questions answered, is the cross. 

My mind – frail and human and prone to delusion – cannot carry me to salvation, or even total rightness. It will shift and grow with time, and will never be fully correct at any given moment, no matter how close I may get. As I’ve prayed and meditated, I’ve realized the depth of the truth that only something beyond myself and my own mind could ever truly save me. 

And this is why, over time, I am becoming less concerned with “sides” and more concerned with the Gospel. Because, regardless of which Side of the gay debate is right, and regardless of how grave the other side’s wrongness might be, its rightness or wrongness cannot save us or condemn us. Only Christ can. 

---