A few weeks ago I wrote a blog post
that was highly critical of the Southern Baptist Ethics team hosting a
conference on the subject of gay marriage. Specifically, I was critical of the
tone set by the conference. I felt it sent the wrong message at a time when
Evangelicals need their leaders to send a strong message of opposition based on
truth and delivered in love. I was upset with Dr. Al Mohler (a man whom I
deeply love and admire) and the appearance that secret meetings, between Mohler
and Matthew Vines communicated, and the fact that other secret meetings between
certain groups of proponents of gay Christianity and the Southern Baptist
Ethics team members. The main thrust of my criticism was that the overall
message of the conference was confused. I said then that others in secular
media would interpret that conference differently. I said that Christians
needed to be reassured that their continual battle for the truth and in this
case against the onslaught of gay Christianity was precisely what God would
expect from them. Christians needed to know that their leaders were with them,
and that, without doubt, without hesitation, and without wavering. My main
concern was that this conference would fuel the flames of secular media and
give them the ammunition they are looking for to at least cast doubt on the
Evangelical resolve against gay Christianity. According to a recent article in
Time Magazine, my concerns were right on target.
The article points to Matthew Vines
as a gay Evangelical activist and the work he is doing in this area. Now, we
could say that Matthew Vines is about as Evangelical as the pope. We could say
that Matthew Vines is not a true believer. We could say that Vines’ rejection
of the divine revelation is a rejection of God speaking and acting in His
divine self-disclosure. We could say that Matthew Vines is a wolf in sheep’s
clothing. And we should be saying all these things. We should be affirming all
these things. And we should be saying these things in love, but with the
deepest sense of urgency and forcefulness as we can. Matthew Vines does not
know Christ. He is outside the Christian community and his work is not to be
praised but to be destroyed without reserve, and without mercy. We must stand
ready and hopeful that God will grant him repentance and should that happen, we
would receive him into our community with open arms. But make no mistake about
it: the work that Vines is engaged in is as satanic as any work could be. His
aim is the destruction of Biblical Christianity without apology, without
hesitation, and without mercy. You have a grave problem in your thinking if you
believe that Vines work can be categorized in any way other than satanic
deception at it’s core.
It is for this reason that I was so
incredibly alarmed by Al Mohler’s agreement to meet with Vines and then to
refuse to be transparent about the nature of that meeting. If Mohler wanted to
meet with Vines privately, then the fact of the meeting should have been
private as well. No one should have known about it except those closest to
Vines and Mohler. Why? No one should know because it gives the impression of
gay Christianity’s progress into the most conservative ranks of Evangelicalism.
It opens the door to the speculation, as the Time Magazine article said, that
the last dominoes against gay marriage are falling. And those of us who are out
here in the real world standing for truth need men like Mohler NOT to do
anything that might even come close to leaving people like Time with that
impression. If we know about the meeting, we should know about the exchange. I
believe Dr. Mohler called Vines to repentance. I believe Dr. Mohler said all
the right things to Vines behind closed doors. But I want others, outside our
camp, to believe that also.
At a minimum, the conference should
have reinforced the Christian position openly, and without any hint that any
sort of weakening is taking place. Optimally, the conference should have either
NOT taken place or its focus should have been elsewhere. Do we really need to
have meetings about gay Christianity or gay marriage? Are these subjects really
up for discussion? I can understand a conference designed to help Christians
better understand and articulate a defense for the Christian position. I can
understand a conference designed to answer the nonsense we read in books
published by men like Vines. Such a conference would be very encouraging and
very useful. Perhaps there was some of this at that conference. But there were
gay activists at the conference and they were extended the privilege of private
meetings. These are not people who are sincerely misled who are truly searching
for help with what God says about gay sex. No one needs help to understand what
God says about gay sex outside of providing the incredibly clear Scriptures on
the subject. These people spend their life looking for ways around those texts.
Christians, at least those of us living in the West have allowed the modern
phenomenon of political correctness to do its work in our minds. Rather than
see these things as the damnable servants of demons that they are, and rather than seeing these men
as the wolves and vile perverts that they are, we tidy the language up and it
leaves the impression that the attempt to destroy Christianity isn’t so bad,
and neither are the people involved in the effort. Either that, or we are so dim-witted and dull that we do not see gay Christianity as the obliteration of Biblical Christianity. We treat the teaching as if
it is a small matter of disagreement and we treat those pushing it as if they
are sincere people only wanting God’s best for everyone involved. They are ministers
of Satan sent out to deceive and to damn the souls of as many men and women as
they can. And that is how we should view them.
No, there is no such thing as the
Evangelical acceptance of gay Christianity because there is no such thing as
gay Christianity. Secular media interprets evangelical churches accepting gay
marriage and gay Christianity as the evangelical acceptance of these things. It
is not. Rather, it is evangelical churches making a conscious decision NOT to
be evangelical any longer. If a church were to convert to Islam would we say
that Christianity is adopting Muslim beliefs as part of it’s Christianity or
would we say that that particular church is defecting from Christianity? We
certainly would say that latter.
Acts 20:29 false teachers that
bring false teachings are described as savage wolves. In 2 Cor. 11:13-15, false
teachers are described as false apostles, deceitful workers, and servants of
Satan. In 2 Cor. 10:3-5, Paul paints the vivid picture of how Christians are to
deal with teachers that oppose and contradict Christ. He says we are to stop at
nothing short of destroying those speculations and ungodly thoughts. Why is it
then that we extend an olive branch to deceitful messengers, servants of Satan,
and rather than obliterating their vile doctrines, we treat their teachings
with some sort of respect, courtesy, dignity if you will? No one is suggesting
that we burn people at the stake here. But at a minimum, they must be put out
of the community and refused a seat at any table so long as their goal is to
talk about accepting those things that God clearly damns and condemns. We have
no right to do otherwise.
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