Ephphatha

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9 Do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived! Fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes, sodomites, 10thieves, the greedy, drunkards, revilers, robbers—none of these will inherit the kingdom of God. 11And this is what some of you used to be. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.

Here is a different version of the same text- notice the words have been translated differently. I think when we throw out scripture as a defense for any position wehave to understand where the translation is coming from. For instance, the NIV tends to be more conservative minded on many things than the NRSV. I do not see the word homosexuality at all in the version above... Can we truly understand the context Paul was writing from? Unless we can, how can we jump to concusions on what it exactly means?

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My response was to sui generis and on accident I removed her post when I tried to remove my duplicate post. I apologize for the mistake. sui generis posted 1 Cor 6:9-11 from I believe the NIV (correct me if I'm wrong) and it read
"Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders 10nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God."

sui generis let me know if I am accurate.

Something to consider in your ponderation for this coming Sunday's preaching gig: what does the word 'blessed' mean? Are there other better words in English for the Greek word makapioi - such as happy? What does it mean to be a peacemaker, and is that different than being a pacifist, or simply one who loves peace? Are these thoughts for individuals or for communities? If these are for communities, as I believe them to be, do they not include all people - after all we all sin and fall short of the glory of God, regardless of the sin. No sin is greater than another since all sin is humanity turning our back on the Creator. This is true irregardless if homosexuality is a sin or not - we are all sinners! Praise be to the Anointed One who redeemed me and cleansed me from my iniquities!

Hey Justin, it's cool... except that I'm a guy.

sui generis- Sorry about that. Any other thoughts?

"So I wonder, how does one continue to work in this tension?" you ask? With a lot of prayer. I agree with you that homosexuality (let alone within the church!) has become such a circular argument. It feels like nothing will be resolved, though we must continue to hope and pray it will.

Some friends and I were chatting the other day about MLK, Jr and the Civil Rights mvmt. We were thinking back wondering just how people could and would wrap their minds around a notion that a person was less of a person because of their color. It seems unfathomable to us. Eventually most (not quite all, unfortunaltey) of society has come to accept different skin colors as being okay. (Maybe George Hamilton helped with that...HA!)

Yet, society is doing the same today with homosexuals. Some people see homosexuals as a lesser group of people because they don't act the same as the 'majority', that they are being immoral, and they are sinners more than the average Joe. Psalm 7:8 says, "Let the Lord judge the peoples." And it continues with "Judge ME, O Lord, according to my righteousness, according to my integrity, O Most High."

I can only hope and continue to pray that something will happen, hopefully not a martyrdom as with MLK, Jr, but something will trigger in the minds of more people that we are ALL children of God. God created us all - not just those who are sexually attracted to the opposite gender. Lord, hear our prayer.

moe- wise words! I was talking with one of my friends who happens to be gay about the phrase "love the sinner, hate the sin"- and he told me how even though many feel that is a good attitude, one to make the homosexual feel better, it truly does not. In a sense, it puts them down even more. Yet, the tension remains between many different strong world-views, and we must figure a way to work withing this tension to express the Gospel message.

yo. i'd suggest "The Way Forward" ed. Timothy Bradshaw. i think the answer to your question, "What do we do in the face of such opposing views?" is dialogue, dialogue, dialogue. It's the hardest work going. but, we've started, in that our disagreement hasn't degenerated into ad hominems yet. ;)

ap- thanks for the suggested reading- I will definitely check into it. I think you are on to something with the concept of dialogue. Yet, it does not seem that everyone in the church understands that. There tends to be a hesitation to fully engage in dialogue due to a fear- (a fear of vulnerability perhaps)?. Thanks for your input.