I want to express some concern about how some Scriptures are being used in the current discussion about

homosexuality in the church. From the outset, I want to state clearly that the effeminate, [and] abusers of themselves with mankind (1 Cor 6:9; 1 Tim 1:10 KJV)whatever these things may meanare the sort of people that healthy, sound teaching can help and that the Holy Spirit sanctifies. My main concern is the attempt to use Romans 1:18-32 in a loving manner, since it seems that any such use will result in a perversion of the Fathers love. Why such a strong statement? Because in this passage Paul is quoting, at length, the typical kind of speech given by a legalistic, Judaizing Christian teacher. As an account of the beginning of the gospel this speech is intended to completely fall apart. That is, Romans 1:18-32 is a prime example of what Paul says in 1 Timothy 1:5-7: Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned: From which some having swerved have turned aside unto vain jangling; desiring to be teachers of the law; understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm. It is the speech of someone who fails to use the law lawfully (as Paul says we should in 1 Timothy 1:8, we know that the law is good, if a man use it lawfully.) It is very important for us to really understand the misuse of the law in the preaching of the gospel and that misuse is precisely what we find in Romans 1:18-32. Because the tone and the application of the law is so wrong in Romans 1:18-32, Paul himself responds to that very speech in 2:1, Therefore you are without excuse, O man, whosoever you are that is judging others: for wherein you are judging another, you are condemning yourself. Then, in chapters 2-3 Paul has a running debate with this person and shows that with his way of preaching the gospel this person cannot even save himself. What are the problems with Romans 1:18-32? They are many, but I will focus on three: 1. The speech in Romans 1:18-32 focuses on the what instead of the who. It is not just a partial story, it is the wrong story entirely and it gets off to a false start. This is the classic problem of legalism. Jesus is not mentioned at all. The Holy Spirit has no place. Even the loving Father that would send his Son for the salvation of his lost children is completely absent. Instead, the picture of God that comes across in this speech is some distant, self-evident general deity that is known for omnipotence and wrath. This was an ancient pagan Stoic philosophical characature of a creator-deity used by some legalistic Jewish-Christian teachers to scare gentiles into obedience, not the God of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Against this, it must be said that the hall-mark of the true Gospel in a focus on Jesus, the work of the Spirit and the love of the Father. We see that clearly in the way Paul unfolds the gospel of the enemy-loving Father God in Romans 5-8 and in Ephesians 1-2. Yes, there is wrath about the destructiveness of sin in our lives but it is expressed in sending the Son in the incarnation, his death and his resurrection to give us Gods resurrection life in exchange for our death.

2. The speech in Romans 1:18-32 teaches that all people, everywhere know about this God but actively suppress that truth and so they are without excuse and liable for what they know. In fact they have to know a lot of things according to this haranging speech. They even have to know that anyone who does any of the things mentioned in this chapter are aware that God will punish them with death because they are disobeying Gods law, that they also know! Ignorance is no excuse and, in fact they are responsible for the twisted minds they have because they willingly reject the things that the know. The contradicitions involved here are pretty amazing. Notice how Paul argues specifically against these notions in Romans 4:15, For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation. And he extends this argument in Romans 5:12ff just as sin came into the world through one man, and death came through sin, and so death spread to all because all have sinnedsin was indeed in the world before the law, but sin is not reckoned when there is no law. That is the true, terrible state of the lost. They suffer the terrible, destructive effects of sin but they are in ignorance. In Gods mercy, sin is not reconned when people are ignorant of his laws, yet they are affected by sins destructive effects (which is why God gave his laws in the first place, to teach his people how to live in blessing). But even the coming of the law did not heal the sin problem. Rather it increased sinin Israel whether Jews or proselytesbut God increased his grace all the more in response and sent Jesus to reverse death that came through Adam. 3. The false gospel story as told in Romans 1:18-32 leads to self-righteousness not Gods righteousness because it does not rest upon the revelation of the mystery of God. Jesus sees us as "harassed and helpless" not "without excuse." If you clearly see in nature the presence of the almighty One True God and thank Him that worship him (not like the godless pagans), are married to a member of the opposite sex, if you are kind and don't lie, don't kill, don't steal or covet, or gossip, if you are not among 30 slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, contrivers of all sorts of evil, disobedient to parents, 31 senseless, covenant-breakers, heartless, ruthless. Since you think they fully know God's righteous decree that those who practice such things and approve of those who do such things deserve to die, you are feeling pretty smug and secure. The reasoning in this piece undermines the true Gospel, which is 7bGods wisdom, secret and hidden, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. 8 None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. 9 But, as it is written, What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him 10 these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. This account of the gospel is given in Pauls summary of the great book of Romans:

Romans 16:25-27 Now to God who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the proclamation of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages 26 but is now disclosed, and through the prophetic writings is made known to all the Gentiles, according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith27 to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever! Amen. In Romans 1:18-32 there is no mystery hidden for ages. Rather, there is a god that everyone in the world knows exists (1:19-21) and there is a law against all the things mentioned in the speech that everyone in the world knows are worthy of death (1:32). If this and not the mystery revealed in Jesus Christ, is the beginning of the gospel then certain things follow. People are born with a faculty that enables them to know the one true, eternal God intuitively by observing the world around them. They dont need the Scriptures for this knowledge nor do they need the Holy Spirit. They also know, intuitively, that they shouldnt do all the things listed in the speech and yet they deliberately do these things. So, God hands them over to a darkened, depraved mind. But, again, they dont need the Scriptures or the Holy Spirit or even the gospel to know these things. Further, they know that they have a depraved mind and the things that they do are senseless. So, somehow, in their depraved mind, they hold on to some faculty that tells them all these things are wrong and punishable by death. The path of salvation, then would bein the state of their depraved mindto repent in fear of divine punishment and to come back to their right minds. Then, they can, presumably, use the Scriptures to gain more information and, for their past sinsthere is the sacrifice of Jesus Christ if, now in their right mind they believe in him and follow the oracles of God. The Holy Spirit would, presumably, come in to guide them and help them continue to meet the necessary conditions of righteousness to be saved from Gods wrath. The elements of the rest of the false gospel message (after the word presumably) above could be completed in several different ways. It might involve some standard, believing the right things, going to church, reading the Bible, circumcision, things to eat or drink or not to eat or drink. It doesnt really matter, because from the starting point in Romans 1:18-32 one cannot get to the real gospel. It is a false start and will forever remain a false start. Unfortunately, many believers have labored under some such version of this gospel and that is why many struggle with a performance mentality. This so-called gospel condemns people to performance by attributing too much good to them in their pre-Christian state. In fact, Paul teaches that, even in someone who has the law knows that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh (Rom 7:18). And objectively, it does not describe how people, in fact, enounter the gospel at all. People usually encounter God through meeting a disciple of Jesus. They observe a difference in them and see a desirable life. They experience their love and friendship of the Father and, by coming into relationship with them the message of Jesus become more and more plausible as the Holy Spirit works on their hearts perhaps by granting them healing or some touch of the supernatural. That is, the message of

the Father in the Son by the Holy Spirit comes as a complete surprise and they never have to meet the sort of God described in Romans 1:18-32. They come to faith and then they begin to see how lost they really were and how twisted their thinking and living was as they continue to be saved by the sanctification of the Holy Spirit by faith in the truth (2 Tim 2:13). The message in Romans 1:18-32 is intended to be a hopelessly self-contradictory piece of rhetoric and when it is read as the authoritative, straight-forward account of the bad news before the good news, it robs believers of their confidence in the unconditional grace of God by injecting previous conditions to receiving Gods love. When we base the Christian response to homosexuality on Romans 1, it puts us on the wrong footing to begin with and will ultimately pervert our way with homosexuals by misrepresenting God and misrepresenting homosexuals. That concern is that this passage obscures the God revealed as Father, Son and Spirit by representing a philosophical god-construct behind Jesus that is not like Jesus. This would be a god to be saved from rather than a God who saves. My second concern is that starting with Romans 1 in our response to sexual sin, or any sin for that matter, undermines true Scriptural teaching on the radical nature of the bondage to sin and death. And, because it gives a superficial view of sin and leads to a superficial view of salvation, it will inevitably drive sin underground where it will do even more harm in the lives of believers. It is not merely that this presentation doesnt go far enough it starts from the wrong place and ends up at the wrong place inevitably. Paul warned about this kind of presentation of the Gospel in 1 Tim 6:20, Avoid the profane chatter and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge. It is profane because it is full of Stoic, philosophical, Greek assumptions and it depends upon people having the knowledge sufficient to be held accountable when what they need is the mystery of the Gospel revealed in Jesus to give them the knowledge of God through the Spirit in the face of Jesus Christ. Similarly, this is the kind of presentation of the gospel that leads to being led captive through philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the universe, and not according to Christ (Colossians 2:8). This is the wrong footing because it fosters a strict view of Gods justice as retributive and not restorative.