 Thank you gosh I get tired out just hearing all that stuff man alive well I want to tell you I'm going to start out like this I love Calvary chapels you guys are fabulous I've spoken at Calvary chapels all over the country and also in the UK and every time I go I meet a passive parcel of people that just love Jesus they're overflowing with Christ very committed and it's just fabulous to be with you in fact you most of you probably don't know this but I became a Christian almost 49 years ago September 28th 1973 and that was a Friday night and two weeks later the very first church that I crossed the threshold of was Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa hey now that wasn't my home church at the time but I went up there for a conference and I actually was in a conference it was a concert you know they had the Friday night's concerts during Jesus movement all of that stuff and that explosion of the Jesus movement that Chuck Smith and Calvary chapels were so central to and it was just magnificent now to show that God has a kind of a sense of humor the irony is in that same building that holds 2,000 people for the last six or seven years in the last week in the September stand a reason has been hosting a youth conference and actually before the government interfered with our attendance we had 2,600 students on campus there at our apologetics conference that we call reality so wow there were more kids that we were able to put into that chapel in in their gym than were there that night that I first attended so I am absolutely awed by that what God has done and also what he continues to do through the Calvary chapels all over the world so it's really a treat for me to talk with you you guys here and incidentally I did a conference yesterday in apologetics and we sold out almost all the books and then discovered another box of books that were underneath the table so if you tried to get a hold of the tactics book a game plan for discussing your Christian convictions and you weren't able to we still have about 20 more on the table out in the back so you can grab it on your way out if you like to or you can grab it if you don't want it either that would be fine with me a number of years ago when Bruce Jenner walked across the stage there in that blue gown and received the Arthur Ashe Award for courage at standard reason we began getting a lot of emails from Christians who were confused and so my staff began to press me about why don't we do a video where you respond to the Bruce Jenner issue and the broader issue of gender dysphoria etc and I I said well why why do we need to do that because it seems to me the issues are fairly clear but it turned out more and more Christians in our broader standard reason community were asking about this and wondering and seemed confused so I went ahead and I made the video and it was a very simple principle that I offered them and what I said was Bruce Jenner tragically is confused Bruce Jenner is a broken human being that will be broken for the rest of his life it's a terrible circumstance for him Bruce Jenner is confused Hollywood is confused the educational establishment is confused they're all confused but that doesn't mean that we need to be confused but lately I've been mystified not just about confusion on that issue but mystified by what appears to be a trend of confusion by a lot of people within the body of Christ on a number of different issues these are these are people who identify themselves as Christians but are are completely comfortable with the idea that some people believe in other religions and that's just fine Jesus is their way of salvation but other people have their way of salvation that's okay they tend to be sexually active especially a single persons it's not a problem to them they are generally gay affirming and gay friendly and I don't mean just friendly to gays that's totally appropriate but they are affirming of the lifestyle it's not troublesome to them alternate sexualities no problem and they're consequently okay with same sex marriage and they tend to be pro-choice as well so there are these with now I'm talking about within the body of Christ people who identify as Christians and these are all these things that they're going along with with I see it's like what they're hanging out and all these critical issues and they believe just like everyone else outside of the church believes and I'll tell you why this troubles me I'm distressed because they've fallen into a trap that the apostle Paul warned about in Colossians 2 Paul says do not be taken captive by philosophy an empty deception now he's not talking about philosophy in general I have a master's degree in philosophy it's helped me tremendously as a follower of Christ he's not concerned with the discipline of philosophies concerned with something else do not be taken captive by philosophy and empty deception according to the traditions of men according to the elementary principles of the world rather than according to Christ in other words what he's saying is there's basically two ways to look at the world you could look at it Jesus way or every other way man's way characteristically and human beings get it wrong especially on the critical issues but way the ways that they get it wrong are appealing they are satisfying there's social pressures that entice us to go along with it and Paul says don't be taken captive don't be taken captive have your guard up be careful and I'm kind of mystified by this whole trend because with regards to these issues and more there's actually no good reason biblically for the confusion because scripture speaks with clarity on these issues I understand there are a lot of theological issues we have differences of opinion on the age of the earth the book of revelation sovereignty free will all kinds of things that are legitimate areas of discussion and maybe some uncertainty among Christians we knock it around we still all get around we all get along but on these issues these aren't ambiguous these aren't gray areas I mean the fact is on a host of culturally charged moral and spiritual issues faithfulness for Christians is not theologically complicated faithfulness is not theologically complicated and that's the title of this talk and I think it's a really lousy title not in clever about it all right but it's apt it's appropriate because people are confused why are they confused and I think there's two reasons here one of them is that there are many who claim to be Christians who are foundering on fundamentals because they don't know the fundamentals they just are not biblically literate they are not taught how to understand the Bible in their context which by the way I think is a strength of Calvary chapels you guys get it verse by verse by verse you don't do all these topical stuff you do these books you know in chapters you get it and so that protects you but there are a lot of people that don't do that they pick and choose and they find the things that sound good to them and they misunderstand it much of the time no theological depth but there's another reason too it's not just that they're untutored in the basics but a lot of Christians and especially those of the younger generation sadly care more about what their friends think about them than what Jesus thinks about them now each of these failings the lack of spiritual depth and caring too much about what other people think individually are dangerous but in combination they are spiritually deadly so I want to talk about those five things that I think Christians unfortunately are confused about today and I want to erase the confusion what I'm not going to do is I'm not going to do apologetics here that is I'm not going to talk to you about how you as a follower of Christ can make sense of these ideas to the rest of the world that's a different project I just want to show you from the text from scripture that the bible is not ambiguous on these concepts all right and hopefully maybe some of the clarity that I offer from the text will lessen the confusion and maybe breed some courage and some of you that are just a little bit frightened about facing the culture which by the way I understand completely it's tough out there and so the temptation is to hide or maybe modify our views with other people a little bit instead of simply standing tall doesn't mean we have to go out and start fights with people that's not what I'm talking about I'm just talking about being faithful in our own convictions about what the bible teaches is actually true in these controversial areas so let's start first things first and I'm going to talk about Jesus and salvation and that Jesus of Nazareth is necessary or I should to be more specific putting your trust in him is necessary to escape the judgment of God for your rebellion and crimes against him is gospel bedrock it is the foundation of Christianity if we remove the idea of Jesus being the only way of salvation there is nothing left if Jesus is just our flavor if it's like try and see if you like him if you don't like him try something else maybe like that but I like Jesus Jesus didn't come here so that you would like him God came down from heaven to rescue you from the wrath you deserve for breaking his law now that's pretty unvarnished I'm just making it clear that is all through the scriptures unless you believe that I am he you will die in your sins he who believes is not judged but he who does not believe the wrath of God abides on him that's Jesus this is serious business and sometimes we talk about it like yeah well we all know we all messed up you didn't mess up you've rebelled every single day of your life against the holy sovereign of the universe and by the way I'm with you in that we all have we didn't just mess up and Jesus came to rescue us that's why he said I am the way the truth and the life no one comes to the father but through me that's not ambiguous and if you think it is that statement at the end of his ministry John 14 6 how about this what he said at the beginning enter through the narrow gate pretty straightforward for the gate is wide the way is broad that leads to destruction strong word Jesus meek and mild that leads to destruction and there are many who enter through that gate but the gate is small in the way is narrow that leads to life and there are few who find it you see Jesus wasn't a pluralist you never notice that all these other religions want to get Jesus on their team they all want to make Jesus Jesus the prophet of Allah or Jesus one of the many gods in Hinduism or or an avatar or new age avatars they all want Jesus on their team Jesus doesn't want to be in anybody else's team all who came before me are thieves and robbers you didn't have any respect for that why because he understood what reality was like by the way it wasn't just Jesus who said these things but those who Jesus trained to follow after him right after Pentecost within a couple of months of Jesus being crucified Peter's out there preaching the gospel and he's telling Jews now keep in mind these are really religious people they got their own religion why don't we leave them alone because they're not safe from God even in their own religion why because they've rejected the Messiah that God has provided for their forgiveness and so Peter says there just so there's no confusion about this fellas there is salvation and none other for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved and if you don't like it lump it well it's kind of a paraphrase but he does say something like that and you have to decide whether it's right to obey God rather than we can't stop speaking that which we've seen and heard by the way it's interesting what Peter this in Acts chapter 4 Peter doesn't say we cannot stop talking about our faith he didn't use that language nowadays of course it's very easy to dismiss Christians faith their belief well you have your little leap that and what Peter says Peter says we cannot stop speaking about what we have seen and what we have heard and of course largely what they communicated was the resurrection of Christ in other words they were offering evidence they weren't offering just their feelings of faith just a little aside the apologetics angle and this kind of claim you can find throughout the text actually it's the other reason we have a little red booklet get it online we sold a bunch of them yesterday they're all gone it's called Jesus the only way 100 verses you know there's a hundred verses in the New Testament that teach that Jesus is the only way there are nine lines of argument that the New Testament pursues on that personal issue is that controversial sure this is probably the most annoying thing for non-christians regarding Christians you think you guys are right yeah we do that's what Jesus said and if I followed Jesus then I say what Jesus said on important issues but there's a reason for it it wasn't bigotry it wasn't hate it wasn't narrow-mindedness it wasn't intolerance there's a reason why Jesus said he was the only way and the reason is he's the only one who solved the problem let me say it again it's really important the reason Jesus is the only way is because he's the only one who solved the problem singular problems like this problem of evil often have singular solutions if you're in medicine you know what i'm talking about even if you're not in medicine you know what i'm talking about it's common sense some problems are so deep and so bad that there's not a plethora of different options for you there's one option get the operation or die your choice maybe that's what the doctor will say because that's reality same thing here you don't want jesus all right i get it you're going to stand before him and give an account for your life and guess what that's not going to be a pretty picture because he's got this book and he's going to open this book and you know what's in the book every single thing you ever did wrong it's right there revelation 20 i call it the books of death he's making a list and he's checking it twice he doesn't miss anything and what you're going to get is perfect justice which is punishment for everything you've done wrong and god misses nothing now there's an alternative and he offers it he offers it now not them and the offer now is perfect mercy forgiveness for everything you've ever done wrong and god misses nothing it's up to you then there it is choose this day you want life or you want death it's up to you either jesus pays for your sins or you do that's the calculus controversial yeah confusing absolutely not it's right there in black and white there's only one answer to the philippine jailers question what must i do to be saved paul gave it believe in the lord jesus and you will be saved simple straightforward uncomplicated unambiguous don't be confused number one okay two i'm going to start this section introduce a little few statistics that you might not have thought about on september 11 2001 which by the way you have to be 25 years or older to even have a recollection of that isn't that amazing because i know for some of you this is like it happened yesterday 2977 people were murdered in one day by muslim terrorists here's something you don't know more than that 2977 more lives than that have been taken every single day for almost 50 years since row versus wade through abortion i want you to think about 21 316 9 11 days of death back to back in america there are 388 000 blacks black africans who were enslaved over two and a half centuries americans killed that many children through abortion in 109 days and i can go on and on with comparisons i realize that scripture does not address abortion directly but it does weigh in decisively and so i want to sketch that out for you i think the issue of abortion falls under a broader biblical injunction it's the sixth commandment you shall not murder now there's a reason we should murder and it comes before the law in genesis chapter nine verse six if man sheds man's blood then by man his blood shall be shed so that's capital punishment for in the image of god god created man so right there in genesis nine after the flood we have a declaration of capital punishment for murder because human beings are really special they are made in the image of god and by the way that idea goes all the way back to the first chapter that god created them in human beings in his image because we are image bearers we have transcendent value and our lives are infinitely valuable and ought to be protected so here's our question with regards to abortion our unborn human beings also image bearers in the sense that god was referring to in genesis okay that's our question or maybe another way of putting it is in god's eyes and this is what we're trying to figure out from god's perspective now in god's eyes our humans before they are born the very same individuals as they are after they are born because after they're born if they're protected by the six sixth amendment i'm sorry the sixth commandment and they are the same ones before they are born they should be protected in the same way because they're the same individuals just in a different location still made in the image of god now that's our question and i want to answer that question biblically because you may be surprised to discover that scripture does give a definitive answer to that question that is clear unambiguous and decisive taking you look in your bibles to luke chapter one now you might wonder why is he going to the birth narratives to talk about abortion because normally we go to the old testament in proverbs or in psalms or something like that you know forget about that that's too ambiguous i want to give you a rock solid biblical argument regarding this issue that's why i'm going to the birth narratives in the luke chapter one we have zacharias first going in the temple receiving a revelation that he is going to bear a son who will be a forerunner to the messiah and that son will be filled with the holy spirit while still where it is mother's womb and then we see mary actually elizabeth does conceive and then six months later mary is visited by gabriel and she has promised a miraculous conception and she conceives jesus she's told that elizabeth also is pregnant and so she goes to see elizabeth now remember elizabeth is in her second trimester six month mary is in her first trimester when mary and elizabeth greets something amazing happens and it's recorded in luke 141 through 44 when elizabeth heard mary's greeting the baby wait the what the baby no doubt right leaped in her womb this is elizabeth's baby and elizabeth was filled with the holy spirit now who is this baby this is the baby that was prophesied to zacharias who would be filled with the holy spirit while what still in his mother's womb this is a fulfillment of that and she cried out with a loud voice and said to mary blessed are you among women and blessed is the fruit of your womb the what fruit of your womb what's that keep reading and how has it happened to me that the mother of my lord not the future mother the mother of my lord according to elizabeth filled with the spirit what is the fruit of mary's womb the lord and who is that the lord jesus how is it that the mother of my lord would come to me for behold when the sound of your greeting reached my ears the baby leaped in my womb for joy okay watch this mary comes to elizabeth mary calls out to elizabeth elizabeth here's the words the baby john leaps in her womb for joy for being in the presence of the lord jesus omg now we usually say g for gosh but wait a minute no it's omg like the capital g oh my god that's why john was jumping for joy he was in the presence of god in the person of jesus so my question again john the fetus filled with the holy spirit leaping with joy in the presence of the embryo jesus were john the baptist and jesus the same cells before they were born as they were after they're born of course according to god's word they were that means if mary or elizabeth would have had an abortion then mary or elizabeth would have killed jesus or john not a future jesus or john not a possible jesus or john not a potential jesus or god they would have killed jesus and john therefore abortion is a violation of the sixth commandment abortion is murder in god's eyes now i have to add something here because i'd be a fool if i thought there weren't dozens of people in this room that have not been directly and personally affected by abortion in their life and so i want you to understand two things first of all i want to i want you all to understand the gravity of this issue and for those who have whatever experience with that i am not going to protect you right now i would not be doing you a service if i did and maybe you're feeling really bad about the first thing the point i made that's why i want you to hear the second thing is murder forgivable absolutely sol was a murderer i mean sol of tarsus he was the greatest of sinners he said but was forgiven so that this would demonstrate how the mercy of god towards others i have a favorite psalm verse that is going to be on my tombstone i've said it so many times publicly and on the air that my wife can't miss it everybody's going to be mad because they've heard me say this psalm 130 verses three and four and there it says and you want to think about this no matter what your background it says lord if you would mark iniquity if you're keeping track who could stand oh lord who could stand if god is keeping track of my sins i have no hope that was the point i made a few moments ago and then the psalm says but there is forgiveness with you so that you might be phrased is there guilt yes there's guilt we're all guilty of one thing or another some more than others but enough to result in our everlasting separation from god and that's why mercy is necessary for all of us and it's available even for those who have taken the lives of other human beings mercy forgiveness so that god would be praised do not be confused the culture is confused there's no need for you to be confused on this this takes me to the next issue but i want to start out this way by acknowledging or noting that there's something that everybody knows about the world no matter how uh where they live or when they lived everybody knows that the world is broken we call this problem call this the problem of evil we all know that something is wrong with the world but it wasn't always like that there was a time before the world was broken when god had made the world a particular way and everything was just the way it's supposed to be and it was all working together just so before the darkness before the evil descended and genesis tells us the way that world was the way god formed it so that we would flourish as human beings a world that he called very very good and here's what we read in genesis 127 and 28 god created man in his own image in the image of god he created him that's what we were talking about a moment ago male and female he created them full stop pay attention male and female he created them god blessed them and god said to them be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth i want you to notice that in god's world sex is binary this is not politically correct but it is reality by the way you do not need to have a bible to know this everybody has known this for thousands and thousands of years because that is the way human beings can be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth right i feel embarrassed to even talk like this because it's so obvious i feel silly but this is the culture is really confused on this now there is a sliver of the population on almost infinitesimally small sliver that struggles genuinely with gender dysphoria it is virtually non-existent but it is there and it is tragic these are people who need to be loved and cared for and graciously treated but it's not a condition to be encouraged yet in this culture that whole thing has become a cause celeb right and now it is a what's called a social contagion it is a fad and it is being encouraged all over the country not just by hollywood but by our entire educational system from the top to the bottom la usd it's all built in right now in all their curriculum it's not just in the academy it's in kender garden what business has the government in sexualizing our children down to kender garden this is political indoctrination there is no excuse for it and you know who are really really mad about this you'll never believe it bill marr you know bill marr the comedian politically incorrect he's not a leftist he's a liberal he's not a christian he'd unlike christians but he is hopping mad about this at about a month or five weeks ago some of you might have seen it he did a 10 minute or whatever rant and it was really funny you can find it on youtube it's not hard to find me just say just go and type in bill marr rance against lgbtq or something like that and you're going to get it and it's funny but he's saying it like it is and everybody's laughing because it's so obvious and what he is saying is we are experimenting on our children sexually and we should not be doing that so this is a very big issue right now in culture but it's important for you to see that even though there's confusion in the culture there's not a confusion in the scripture every male in the bible is called a he every female is called a she sex is binary by the way there's no difference between a physical sex and a in a in a sense of psychological gender and scripture they are synonyms because they're synonyms in reality i had a conversation i'm always a little reluctant to say this but it makes a point i'm having a conversation with the pastor i was back on the east coast with the pastor is driving me to church and his 14 year old daughter is in the back seat we're talking about this back and forth and i'm just saying it's so obvious that gender is binary sex is binary and the gal 14 year old gal in the back seat pipes up and she said yeah i just tell my friends to check your pants now it's a little course and i don't mean to be disrespectful at all but it does make the point that even a 14 year old can figure it out because it's obvious and again you don't need a bible to know this god's plan is that men and women were made both physically and emotionally different from each other in order to fit together in a complementary way a suitable helpmate this is a good plan it's not a bad plan it's a good plan things can get a little rough a little bit in that relationship i get it but it's a good plan it it promotes human flourishing and when we go against god's good plan then we don't flourish scripture is not ambiguous or unclear on this which is why no one christian or otherwise has been confused for thousands of years gender is not fluid in the way that people say it is imaginations are fluid not gender okay google says 50 genders well why not a hundred why not a thousand again i i please understand i'm not trying to be disrespectful to people who disagree with me i'm just i'm making an appeal in on the one hand to common sense and on the other hand two followers of christ to the text this is not hard don't be confused now binary sexuality is also key to understanding god's purpose for something else that culture has been confused about and i want to point you to matthew 19 verse four and five so you can mark that and turn there if you like because jesus was asked a question about marriage actually was asked a question about divorce so he gave a he answered the question about divorce by giving a characterization of what god intended marriage to be he doesn't just deal with the problem he says let's go back to the beginning let's go back to where god set the whole thing up the system that god made that he called good that was for the purpose of human flourishing and here's what he says to the Pharisees who raised the issue or actually kind of trying to trap him a little bit because there is a provision in the mosaic covenant for divorce meant to protect the woman but it's there because of the hardness of heart of the men this is what jesus is saying but from the beginning it hasn't been that way now listen to his words have you not read okay let's pause for a minute have you not read so there's a chastisement right out of the gate here because these are religious folk that are supposed to know better because right in the very beginning the basic plan is laid out so there's a sense in which with regards to the the confusion in our culture about the nature of marriage jesus could say to the culture at least to the church have you not read have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female binary sexuality and he said for this reason a man shall leave his father and mother binary sexuality and be joined to his wife and the two shall become one flesh that sex by the way they leave they cleave become one flesh implicitly actually it's like stronger than implicit sex is for marriage for that union so let me sum up jesus understanding of marriage here in a very easy way to remember it here's what he said one man with one woman becoming one flesh for one lifetime one man with one woman becoming one flesh for one lifetime now what's curious about this formula which is a summary of what jesus just said is that it covers all the alternate sexualities people say well jesus never said anything about homosexuality we actually don't know that because most of what jesus said isn't recorded what you could say is well jesus we don't have any record of what jesus said about homosexuality but come on he's a Torah observant Jew you think he's really going to march in a pro-gay parade i mean this is not realistic and again i'm not being disparaging but think i'm just thinking of jesus you know he told the woman caught in adultery go and sin no more he didn't say that's a good alternative sexuality but in that statement every single thing that the bible prohibits is excluded the bible prohibits adultery it prohibits fornication it prohibits homosexuality and it prohibits bestiality all of those four things are sex with someone other than your lifelong spouse do you ever figure that out it's all right there in jesus words it's all captured he he does it all in one shot now there's a reason why marriage is restricted or that's not even the right word jesus not does not restrict marriage what he does is tell us what marriage is so that anything else is not a marriage now just for clarity's sake and i've been writing on this for 20 years long before a berger fell supreme court decision 2015 trying to figure out a way to make sense of this to people because everybody had their different ideas about what marriage is first thing i want you to see is that no same-sex couple has ever been prohibited from cohabiting together having sex together now that was used to be illegal a long time ago but i mean just generally in this era having sex together walking down the aisle together pledging their troth until death do them part kind of thing setting up housekeeping all the liberties that same heterosexual couples had same sex couples had the liberties they could do all of that now what they didn't get is the recognition that their relationship was the same as a heterosexual relationship and there was a reason why they didn't get the recognition because they're not the same well we love each other marriage is about love really ask any married couple it's not about love love may be the reason that you got married it isn't the reason for your union but there is a reason why cultures characteristically have privileged and protected heterosexual marriage okay and here's the reason why it took me a long time to work these words out to cover all the pushback there's a reason why i gotta find it here so i get it all right the reason why is that as a group as a rule there are exceptions by nature it's the way bodies work and i'd say by design so i'm throwing in the divine element but you don't even need that to make the point as a group as a role by nature long-term monogamous heterosexual marriages produce the next generation and culture cares about that and this is why they protect it with laws and they privilege it same sex unions don't do that they don't provide that for culture there's no reason to privilege it and there's certainly no reason to say that it's the same as because it's not the same and what a burger fell did in scotus in 2015 is they made marriage into nothing but names on a piece of paper that's all it is it's just names on paper that's all it is and of course when you take an axe to a critical foundation of civilization you're only going to get trouble one of the supreme court justice during the discussion in 2015 said you know what maybe we should slow down a little bit because the idea of same-sex marriage isn't even as old as the cell phone maybe people in the past had a good idea about things and i think they're right there's nothing ambiguous about jesus view there's nothing ambiguous about the scriptures view culture is confused don't you be confused and this being to the last point i have to move quickly on this one because we're almost out of time but according to jesus in marriage a man cleaves to and becomes one flesh with a woman his wife their physical bodies are joined in a deep and profound sexual union of body and soul and that's the good plan of god this is why paul says in first carinthians that you shouldn't get involved in with a harlot because your body is a temple of the spirit now most christians frankly misunderstand that they think well my body is a temple if your body is a temple of the spirit why you make it into a pizza hut you know that kind of thing well it's not talking about physical health it's not talking about your diet it has nothing to do with that the way your physical body is physically has nothing to do with your spirituality if that were the case every sick person would be a bad temple that's silly paul is talking about something else he said you do not join that body with a harlot because when you become joined with her you become one flesh with her and you are a temple of the spirit that means you're joining your spiritual union with christ with a harlot don't do it that's the rationale there and unfortunately in our culture right now it's an anything ghost culture well here's what i want you to see this is the main thing i'm going to talk about homosexuality in just a minute but i want you to see this is symptomatic of a larger concern god made sex for a particular purpose in a function a certain way so that it would be safe and it would allow for our flourishing i just got to do a sidebar here we got this is the last service right my flight doesn't leave till wednesday anyway so yesterday i got a text yesterday i got a text from my son who is a 40 year old er nurse so he stays on top all the medical stuff the text was from the new was a piece from the new england journal of medicine nejm they just did a big study on the monkey pod virus the new thing that is sweeping the world this is the new catastrophe what did they find 98 percent of those who have monkey pod virus are homosexuals or bisexual men 98 percent guess what no women no women that suggests that maybe two percent we're lying but this is going to be the new deal you know the sky is falling government is going to come in and lay down i could be wrong about this but you know i just have a sense this is what's coming but it's what it's it's because of behavior that is inconsistent with god's plan for human flourishing that this disease is now coming upon us in any way the point is is that god made a plan and all of these variations are violation of the plan so any of these variations whether it's homosexuality or whether it's adultery or whether it's for fornication or whether it's bestiality i mean these are the group it's a way of saying no to god no no no no no no i want what i want i'm going to do it my way now i'm going to look at homosexuality i'm going to look at one verse because this is characteristic of this this refusal to do things god's way and this is precisely what paul says in romans chapter one so you can turn there now i'm reading out the new american standard bible and i'm using the new american standard because there was a nuance of translation that some of the other translations do not get and it creates confusion and ambiguity so i'm going to read to you from chapter one verse 26 and 27 but let's step back a little bit look what's going on there in the last half of chapter one of romans paul is talking about the revelation of god to all of humanity so not not everybody knows about jesus but everybody knows about the father this is what paul is saying it's obvious but what what is the response of sinful human beings they suppress the truth with unrighteous motives they don't want god they're going to suppress it they're going to worship the creature rather than the creator and one of the ways they do this is in their sexual behavior and what's kind of interesting paul says when they push away from god to do their own thing god pushes them away from him you get that those phrases he gave them over he's not causing them to do it he's releasing his restraints so they can just they can stew in it but when he does that what is the characteristic well they are sexual pardon the word perversion this is i'm using the word advisedly it's it is a perversion of god's perfect plan and it's it's not just one kind of it's all these other prohibited sexualities are a perversion of the plan but he looks specifically at homosexuality and it does mention lesbianism too it's the only place in the bible where it's mentioned romans chapter one so let me read these verses 26 and 27 god gave them over to degrading passions notice how he characterizes it these are degrading passions the men abandon the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another they abandon the natural function now this is where the ambiguity comes up in some of the translations the word function there is the greek word creases creases means function paul is talking about plumbing he is not talking about natural unnatural desires he is talking about the way god made the bodies to fit together and paul is saying god made a woman to satisfy a man sexually they fit together they function that way well and men said no and burned in their desire towards one another and women said no and burned in their desire toward one another all of this is saying no to god's plan and since the natural desires go with natural functions the sexual passion that exchanges the natural function of sex for an unnatural function is what paul calls a degrading passion and it's not just homosexuality it says white scripture has nothing positive to say about homosexuality it has nothing positive to say about adultery it has nothing positive to say about fornication it has nothing positive to say about bestiality these are not part of god's purpose and here's paul's sobering summary and this is to the church you find in first carinthians chapter 6 verses 9 and 10 do you not know sounds like jesus right have you not read do you not know wait a minute wake up carinthians that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of god and then he goes on with a list of sins so i got ellipses in my own citation here because i'm just looking at the sexual things he mentions because that's my point right now but there's a lot of other things you can read it for yourself verse 9 and 10 of chapter 6 but here's my short version focusing on the sex do not be deceived neither fornicators a fornicator is somebody who is having sex outside of marriage and neither partner is married to anyone people who live together are fornicators if they're not married that's what paul's talking about here do not be deceived neither fornicators nor adulterers no homosexuals will inherit the kingdom of god if this is your lifestyle paul says you are on the outside you are not in the inside this isn't workspace salvation he's saying you are living just like the world that's because you are like the world spiritually it's an indicative another way of putting is if you're living like hell you're probably going there this is a strong exhortation by paul about the lifestyle of people or the Corinthian church it's just not right but it's interesting he follows just like i did a few moments ago we're saying this is where some of you were like but you have been washed you have been cleansed there's a way out of this and it's by the grace of god it's a willingness to say i am a christian and i am going to follow jesus because i love jesus and so i'm gonna do that he tells me the things that he tells me to do and so i'm going to stop doing the things that i want to do and i'm going to live the way he wants me to live that's being a follower of jesus and by the way that is what gives us the confidence that we're really in the lord that's what james is talking about jame james chapter two you talk about your faith you show me your faith without your works i'll show you my faith by the way that i live god's solution for satisfying our sexual appetites is marriage this is not popular right now and it's not easy even for married people and everybody who's married out there you know exactly what i'm talking about not a panacea it is like magic you got to work at that relationship but that's where it's supposed to be done because that's a safe place for it to happen for the rest of your lives and it's also safe for kids so let me close with a i hope to be a sobering image i want you to turn to mark chapter 15 verse 15 now this is a passion narrative jesus is on trial pilot is there trying him and he does not want to execute jesus because he knows jesus is is innocent his wife has been crabbing at him she's been having dreams don't mess with this guy but he's got a job to do and so he's trying to think of a way out he knows that the jewish leaders are are are angry because they're they're jealous of jesus and he says all right this is the time of year where i let somebody go i got jesus i got barabbas who do you want he's hoping they're going to say jesus but what happened is the religious leaders had already worked up the mob to call for barabbas and that's who they call for and pilot says well what what should i do with jesus and the crowd says crucify him mark 15 verse 15 says this market wishing to please the crowd wishing to please the crowd he released barabbas and had jesus scourged and crucified dear friends many in christianum today are taking their cues from pilot they are more concerned with satisfying the crowd than being faithful to jesus they champion the criminal and turn their back on their savior don't let it be you the culture is confused don't you be confused faithfulness to our lord is not theologically complicated father we thank you