Homosexuality, Marriage, and the Church: Biblical, Counseling, and Religious Liberty Issues

by Roy E. Gane; Nicholas P. Miller; H. Peter Swanson

Publisher:

Andrews University Press

, 2012

Overview

Some religious leaders, taking their cue from popular culture and current politics, are trying to make a case for biblical support of the practice of homosexuality and same-sex marriage. Their efforts create serious confusion while challenging the church’s ability to sensitively address one of the most explosive spiritual and public policy issues of our time.

In this volume, Christian scholars offer a deep resource of material—biblical, clinical, and legal—to untangle the complex web of questions surrounding this contested topic. The authors first provide a frank and rigorous explication of the Bible’s clear teaching. Then they lay out the implications for counseling and the religious liberty of the church and its members. And through it all, they make an impassioned call for love and care for those who are being misled into a walk down a dangerous path. The book includes moving testimonies from several Christians who have lived and struggled with homosexuality in their personal lives and can praise God for empowering them to live for him.

In the threatening environment facing the church and society today, every Christian administrator, attorney, teacher, counselor, pastor, and congregational leader should read this book.

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Key Features

• Includes a preface by Nicholas Miller
• Provides several personal testimonies
• Offers clear biblical teaching

Contents

• Section 1: Theological Issues
  • Homosexuality in the Old Testament
  • The Scriptural Case for a Male-Female Prerequisite for Sexual Relations: A Critique of the Arguments of Two Adventist Scholars
  • Some Attempted Alternatives to Timeless Biblical Condemnation of Homosexual Acts
  • Return to Innocence
  • Homosexuality and the Bible: What Is at Stake in the Current Debate
• Section 2: Legal Issues
  • Should Adventists Care about Protecting Traditional Marriage?
  • Wake Up and Smell the Equality: Same-Sex Marriage and Religious Liberty
  • Northern Exposure: How the Church Is Faring under Canada’s Same-Sex Marriage Regimen
  • Freedom and Marriage
  • Same-Sex Marriage and the Declaration of Independence
• Section 3: Counseling Issues
  • The Pastoral Applications of a Three-Tier Distinction between Same-Sex Attraction, a Homosexual Orientation, and a Gay Identity
  • Ex-Gays? An Extended Longitudinal Study of Attempted Religiously Mediated Change in Sexual Orientation
  • The Psychological and Spiritual Care of a Gay Man Who Chose Celibacy: A Case Study
  • Sexual Orientation and Skin Color: Deconstructing Key Assumptions in the Debates about Gay Marriage and the Church
  • Good News for Adventists Attracted to Their Own Sex
• Section 4: Testimonies
  • Homosexuals are God’s Children, Too!
  • Into His Marvelous Light
  • “Born that Way” and Redeemed by Love
  • Bondage to Freedom: From My Plan B to God’s Plan A
  • By Beholding His Love
  • To Know His Love

Top Highlights

“‘We must express our disapproval of homosexual practice in the context of our own sexual fallenness.’¹⁰³ We must acknowledge that we are all in need of grace and healing in our sexuality, including especially the heterosexual sin of hatred toward homosexuals. We must make a careful distinction between homosexual practice and orientation; if tendencies and temptations to lust are not acted upon or harbored, homosexual orientation is no more condemned by Scripture than a heterosexual sinful nature with its tendencies to lust if not acted upon or harbored.” (Pages 36–37)

“‘the inclination of the human heart is evil from youth’ (Gen. 8:21). Thus the point is made from the very first hint of homosexual tendencies in Scripture that not only the actual carrying out of the homosexual act but also the harboring of lustful thoughts and imaginations of sin.” (Page 11)

“The basic meaning of tôʿēbâ is an ‘abominable, detestable, offensive thing.’⁴⁷ The fact that among the list of specific prohibitions of sexual acts in Leviticus 18, the word tôʿēbâ is mentioned only regarding homosexual intercourse gives an indication of the degree of revulsion associated with homosexual activity. Indeed, in the entire Pentateuch, the only forbidden sexual act to which the word tôʿēbâ is specifically attached is homosexual intercourse.” (Pages 16–17)

“Through no fault of their own, people are born with a host of overpowering tendencies to varying degrees. But an innate drive alone does not justify acting upon it.” (Page 170)

“May God help us to be a community of believers who welcome them into our midst and who minister God’s grace and healing in their lives, while allowing that same grace to heal our own brokenness and insensitivity.” (Page 205)

Contributors

• Nicholas P. Miller
• Richard M. Davidson
• Robert A. J. Gagnon
• Roy Gane
• Miroslav M. Kiš
• Alan J. Reinach
• Gerald Chipeur
• Scot Zentner
• Gary V. Wood
• Mark A. Yarhouse
• Carlos Fayard
• Inge Anderson
• Ron Woolsey
• Lisa Santos
• Winston King
• Jonathan Smith
• Virna Santos
• Wayne Blakely

Product Details

• Title: Homosexuality, Marriage, and the Church: Biblical, Counseling, and Religious Liberty Issues
• Editors: Roy Gane, Nicholas P. Miller, and H. Peter Swanson
• Publisher: Andrews University Press
• Publication Date: 2012
• Pages: 600

About the Editors

Roy Gane (PhD, University of California, Berkeley) is a professor of Hebrew Bible and ancient Near Eastern languages at the Theological Seminary of Andrews University (SDA). He is author of a number of scholarly articles and several books, including God’s Faulty Heroes, Altar Call, Ritual Dynamic Structure, Cult and Character: Purification Offerings, Day of Atonement, and Theodicy, and NIV Application Commentary: Leviticus, Numbers.

Nicholas P. Miller is an associate professor of church history and the director of the International Religious Liberty Institute at Andrews University (SDA).

H. Peter Swanson is an assistant professor of pastoral care and the director of the office of assessment at Andrews University (SDA).