A Mending Shift

Jeromy,
I agree. The more we “war” against something, trying to add “law,” “law,” “law” the less relationship occurs. What Christ-followers truly need to be doing is loving homosexuals out of their sin, rather than berrate them marginalize them and attack them.

That’s what Jesus did. He understood that we are not to condone or accept their sin, but to LOVE THEM by having relationship with the people who are carrying out the sin.

If we look at both the stories of Nichademus and the prostitute, we can see this very thing occurring. Jesus LOVED them and poured out His grace. He did not need to go on and on and on telling them what they were doing was bad and sinful. They already knew in their hearts. Jesus LIGHT which occurs from loving someone in relationship does the job of shining so brightly on the darkness of sin, one is bound to “see” it. But by loving a those two, they, themselves stopped doing their sin. We hear Nichademus saying, “I will stop” (paraphrase) before Jesus really had a chance to say anything “confrontive.” Because Jesus stepped into his life…..because nobody else would (Pharisees especially) and loved Him, Nichademis automatically desired to stop his tax schemes/stealing from others because he knew in his heart it was in-line with Love…in line with what Jesus wanted for him to do.

Great post, Jeromy.

Blessings,
~Amy
http://amyiswalkinginthespirit.blogspot.com

Hello Jeromy,

Thanks for your post. I would like to reproduce a passage from Zizek’s latest that is entirely relevant to this post:

“William Butler Yeats’s “Second Coming” seems perfectly to render our present predicament: “The best last all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity.” This is an excellent description of the current split between anaemic liberals and impassioned fundamentalists. “The best” are no longer able fully to engage, while “the worst” engage in racist, religious, sexist fanaticism.

“However, are the terrorist fundamentalists, be they Christian or Muslim, really fundamentalists in the authentic sense of the term? Do they really believe? What they lack is a feature that is easy to discern in all authentic fundamentalists, from Tibetan Buddhists to the Amish in the U.S.: the absence of resentment and envy, the deep indifference towards the non-believers’ way of life. If today’s so-called fundamentalists really believe they have found their way to truth, why should they feel threatened by non-believers, why should they envy them? When a Buddhist encounters a Western hedonist, he hardly condemns him. He just benevolently notes that the hedonist’s search for happiness is self-defeating. In contrast to true fundamentalists, the terrorist pseudo-fundamentalist are deeply bothered, intrigued, fascinated by the sinful life of the non-believers. One can feel that, in fighting the sinful Other, they are fighting their own temptation. These so-called Christian or Muslim fundamentalists are a disgrace to true fundamentalism.

“It is here that Yeats’s diagnosis falls short of the present predicament: the passionate intensity of a mob bears witness to a lack of true conviction. Deep in themselves, terrorist fundamentalists also lack true conviction- their violent outbursts are proof of it. [...] The problem with fundamentalists is not that we consider them inferior to us, but rather that they themselves secretly consider themselves inferior. This is why our condescending, politically correct assurances that we feel no superiority towards them only make them more furious and feeds their resentment. The problem is [...] that the fundamentalists are already like us, that secretly they have already internalized our standards and measure themselves by them.”

(Slavoj Zizek, Violence, pp. 85-86)

Sorry for such a long quote, I just enjoyed reading Zizek’s perspective on this sort of thing and thought it seemed relevant.

Best,
Colin

Great post, Jeromy. It is shameful the things we rail against.

It is good to hear that the legalization of same-sex marriages didn’t cause you to divorce your wife and ask me to marry you. Although, I will admit that I am upset you haven’t called. lol.

Nice. I agree whole heartedly. You don’t have to look far into this country’s past to know that legislating against vices does nothing to curtail them. I don’t remember Jesus even once trying to get the rules of His day changed.

He simply loved without precondition; or any condition.

I recently read Craig Borsale’s “God’s Gravity” (I highly recommend it). It hits hard on the social aspects that are missing in my own Christian life.

It seems the more I read of Jesus, the more I realize the ones he was most intolerant of were the self-righteous. God, help me to see when I am of that lot.

I’m from NY, so I have no idea. here is more information though. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Proposition_8_(2008)

Well, sooner or later something biblical will be labelled as discriminatory, or hate speech, etc., and pastors will have to be more an more careful about what they preach.
Of course, for home churches the point is moot. Which may be the wave of the future anyway, according to the revival going on in China and elsewhere.

Jim, is any church ever legally required to marry any couple who requests it? 8 or no 8, the answer is no.