Make it clear

Whether you know it or not, members of your church are ministering to Christians who struggle with homosexuality. Like the struggle itself, their ministry to those who suffer may be hidden, but it goes on, fueled by love. They are parents, grandparents, brothers and sisters, cousins, and friends of your church members – men and women — who are drowning in the residue of the sin of unwanted homosexuality.

Those who walk with homosexuals share the solitude and isolation that afflicts Christians who struggle with unwanted same-sex attraction. Secrecy fuels this sin in the shadow of the church, the very place where the light of cleansing is harbored. Our fears and limitations quench the power of the Holy Spirit to remove the deception and division and put the family back together. And the truth is, there is no reason to fear; no reason to limit God’s love to these sinners any more than to all the others who worship in our midst. There are plenty of resources, but “the greatest of these is love.”

Make it Clear

Jeff Buchanan, senior director of church equipping for Exodus International, says churches need to know and hold a biblical world-view on homosexuality and present it to their members, particularly in light of recent confusing messages from some denominations, including the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

What is that biblical worldview?

“They (struggler and church) must agree that homosexual behavior, by definition, is a sin and that a homosexual orientation is not sinful, nor is it an individual’s choice,” said Buchanan in a recent interview with New Man Magazine. “If the church believes this and the person struggling understands it, then he or she should be just as involved as any other member of the congregation. That’s how I found my freedom (from homosexuality). My church was accepting of me as a child of God, but not of my actions. They saw the potential of what God could do in my life and what God could make me.”

Buchanan believes that “it is essential and nonnegotiable for a same-sex struggler to be involved in the local church” where members can walk with him or her in the pursuit of freedom and healing and an end to homosexual sin in their lives.

Buchanan obtained freedom from homosexual acting out, as did Mike Goeke, a pastor who helps lead a ministry to homosexual strugglers at Stonegate Fellowship, an SBC church in Midland, Texas.

“It is important to remember that homosexual desires and feelings do not mean someone is a ‘homosexual,’” said Goeke in Homosexuality: Your Questions Answered, published by the SBC Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission in 2005.

“Homosexual desires may lead one to accept a homosexual identity, but every Christian is first and foremost a child of God. Someone who struggles with unwanted homosexual desires is not a homosexual. Someone who practiced homosexuality in the past is not a homosexual simply because of their past struggles. Temptation is not sin and should not be treated as such. If the church takes each person as it finds them and holds every Christian to the same standard, then the church should have no problem finding a place for anyone in the local church.”

It is likely there is at least one struggler in every Southern Baptist Church, yet only a handful of the more than 42,000 SBC churches in America and none of the 1,700 SBC churches in Oklahoma is a part of the Exodus Church Association, which equips churches to help same-sex strugglers.

The SBC has been clear, but some denominations and individual churches have compromised biblical truth, sending a confusing message. Acknowledging the sin and offering the truth of Christ’s redemption need to work hand-in-hand.

“The Christian worldview has been undermined by pervasive curricula that teach moral relativism, reduce moral commandments to personal values, and promote homosexuality as a legitimate and attractive lifestyle option,” said Southern Seminary President Al Mohler in A Challenge of Courage & Compassion: The Church’s Response to Homosexuality.

The church can offer clarity to counteract the confusion of our culture.