I recently read a transcript of an interview between Jen Hatmaker and her daughter, Sydney, over the weekend and I came away sad. 2 Timothy 4:3 came to mind, "For the time will come when they will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear." Here is one exchange I wanted to highlight (full transcript here):
Sydney: [I was], like, this kid who loved Jesus, and I realized I was gay. And I was just scared, and alone. And I wanted to have it all. I wanted to have my family, and God, and my future. And I didn't think I'd be able to have it all.
Jen: Yes.
Sydney: And even though I know that I can now, I still definitely have a lot of work ahead of me if I still want to restore and kind of repair my own faith that I had as a child. You know?
It's the line, "and I wanted to have it all" that really stuck out to me. It's easy to identify with that statement, because who hasn't had that thought at some point, but it is also a fundamentally flawed perspective coming from someone who wants to follow Jesus. In Matthew 16, Jesus says, "Then Jesus said to his disciples, "If someone wants to be a disciple of mine, he must deny himself and take up his cross and continue coming along with me. If someone is set on saving his life, you see, he will lose it. If someone is prepared to lose his life because of me, however, he will gain it. It is really worth it for a person if he gains even all the riches in the world, yet forfeits his very life?" (v. 24-26) In our mostly affluent culture, we don't have much external suffering outside of tragedy and so I think the main way in which we will experience suffering is in the denial of ourselves and our own ideas about what is right and wrong.
Let's take a minute and look at that phrase, "take up his cross". What was the very thing that Jesus didn't want to do? He didn't want to die on the cross! As he is crying, in agony, out to God in the garden of Gethsemane - He is crying out to God for another way ("remove this cup from me, yet not my will but your's be done" Luke 22 and Matthew 26)! The cross represents an instance of Jesus' obedience to God DESPITE the disagreement of his flesh. Jesus, we can safely assume, didn't want to go through the horrific pain and suffering of being flogged, beaten, and nailed to a cross. He also didn't want to go through the extreme pain of being separated from the Father. Back to my point though - "take up your cross" represents obedience to God despite one's flesh. More on this later.
Before I go any farther - I want to be clear; having homosexual or bi-sexual feelings is not sinful. Feelings, in and of themselves, are neutral - I would even go so far as to say that temptation itself is not sinful. It is the desiring and acting:
Before I go any farther - I want to be clear; having homosexual or bi-sexual feelings is not sinful. Feelings, in and of themselves, are neutral - I would even go so far as to say that temptation itself is not sinful. It is the desiring and acting:
"When tempted, no one should say, "God is tempting me." For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when by his own evil desires he is lured away and enticed. Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death." James 1:13-15"
I may have a temptation to let loose, get drunk and just forget my life for a few hours (like I used to do in college), but provided I don't entertain and act on those thoughts, I have not sinned. Those thoughts should be a warning to me - that I need to get on my knees and pray and ask God for strength, but I have not sinned, simply by thinking about it. I realize that 'attraction' is a different thing - and that its consequences for one's life may be far more poignant, but that doesn't mean that the mechanisms involved are different.
I must also say that the mandate from Jesus to 'love one another' places incredible responsibility upon those who would follow Jesus. We are not to use the laws of God as sticks to beat one another - that is not God's intent with the law. Rather, we have a responsibility to love one another as Jesus loved us - namely, that while we were still sinners, Jesus died for us. "There is no greater love than to lay down one's life for one's friends." (John 15:13) This doesn't mean we stop preaching the Truth - it cannot mean that - rather, it means that we walk alongside people, spurring them on in faith and helping them to stay on the 'narrow' path. It means putting others before ourselves unto their perseverance and endurance in the faith.
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One quick aside - it occurs to me that our society has lost sight of what 'love' is. Love, in the sense of loving one's neighbor (or daughter/son, spouse, friend, etc), doesn't mean that we condone everything they do or believe...quite the opposite actually. I talked in my last post about this, posing the question, "if my two-year-old ran into the street, and a car was coming, would it be loving of me to stand there and do nothing?" In a figurative sense, this is what Jen Hatmaker has done. The street is the ways of the world and the car is God's judgement for those who set themselves up in opposition to Him through their actions and beliefs. Standing there on the side of the road, shouting, "I love you, you're doing great!" in this situation, only serves to convince the daughter that everything is fine, when in reality, it is far from fine! Sometimes, love is tender and gentle - other times love is sharp and corrective. Anyone who has little children knows this. Hebrews 12:5-7 says, "And you have forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons: "My son, do not take lightly the discipline of the Lord, and do not lose heart when He rebukes you. For the Lord disciplines the one He loves, and He chastises everyone He receives as a son. Endure suffering as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father?" One of the Biblical images for helping and loving one another is metal rubbing against metal ("iron sharpens iron", Proverbs 27:17).
I actually know someone who has been (and is) in nearly the same situation that Jen Hatmaker is in, but who instead chose to speak the truth. He didn't stop caring for his daughter, but he made it clear to her that her choices have eternal consequences, if she doesn't turn and repent. They currently have an estranged relationship, but that was something he had to risk knowing what was on the line. To him, the loving thing to do was to warn his daughter and try and get her to see the error of her ways, not to coddle and condone.
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We are all burdened by the flesh in different ways. For some food is a comfort beyond satiating hunger...and for them, it is difficult to stop eating. Other people have exactly the opposite issue - because of a body image issue or some other kind of pain, they exert extreme control over eating and practically starve themselves. Some people have personalities that cause them to become addicted to things (drugs, alcohol, sex, etc) easily, some people feel a compulsion to steal things, some are prone to violent anger, some people are born with very little emotional capacity...the list goes on and on and on. Just because our bodies or our minds are telling us something - that doesn't excuse Believers from obeying and following Jesus, provided we want to be his disciples.
I feel like this "you can have it all in this life AND have it all in Heaven" idea is one of Satan's most insidious tools. It takes away the urgency to persevere and endure. It is the denying that is difficult, and it is the denying that is unique to each one of us. We are in the same boat in the sense that we all have to deny ourselves, but the specific ways, for each person, are different. For me, it's control and self-reliance. My flesh wants to control everything around me and doesn't want to rely on anyone for anything. My flesh is also lazy and would rather take the easy way than have to work at something (a very odd dichotomy!). The "I can have it all" attitude also sets us up to create idols in our lives. Money, power, and all of the other things that our society promotes as 'good' become the things we chase after if we don't have an attitude of self-denial.
I can't sit here and say that I know what it's like to be attracted to the same gender. I don't know what that's like. But I know what it is like to war against the flesh of my body - to want something that I know God says is sinful. When I couple that knowledge with the words of Hebrews 10:26 which reads, "if we deliberately go on sinning after we have received the knowledge of truth, no further sacrifice for sins remains, but only a fearful expectation of judgement and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God", then I am left to conclude that my only choice, if I want to be a wholehearted disciple of Jesus (which is the only kind of disciple there is), is to obey Him and to obey the laws of Scripture. Willful sin is unrepentant sin. It is knowing that something is sinful and going and doing it anyway - essentially raising my fist and shaking it at God. Does repentance mean I'm never going to sin any more? Almost assuredly, no. But what is my attitude when the Holy Spirit convicts me - when I realize I have sinned against a holy God? It is to continue on in that sin because it's what I like and my body says "do it" and society says "its ok"? Or, does it cause me to fall on my face, and ask God for his mercy and to decide in my heart not to do that again? I would argue it looks like the ladder, Biblically speaking. So the question is - how can the person who decides for themselves that homosexuality is ok and then goes and lives according to that belief, also have a repentant heart? The two are in direct contradiction. Paul is very clear in 2 Corinthians 6:9-10, "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 men who submit to or perform homosexual acts, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor verbal abusers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God." Paul isn't saying that anyone who ever does any of those things is hopeless. No! If so, who of us would be worthy? He is saying that anyone who continues in those lifestyles and doesn't repent - which is to turn away from sin and toward God with the intention of not doing that sin again - those are the people who are setting themselves up as the enemies of God.
The more I read Scripture, the more I am convinced that there is no "best life now" teaching in the Bible. Jesus very clearly calls his followers to lay down their lives in service of the kingdom of God - with a primary emphasis on spreading the 'good news' of the coming kingdom of God. In both explicit and more veiled ways, Jesus is clear that God's kingdom will not come about with the help of any human hands, but only by the power, might and will of God. Building on that - in passages referenced above and in other founds in the synoptic gospels and in the letters of Paul, it is very clear that as followers of Jesus, we should expect suffering for the message and that we should expect that the ways of God (and thus, our ways, as disciples) will be at odds with the ways of the world. I don't think it means that we will lead joy-less lives as Disciples...but we are going to have to reorient our hearts if towards his Kingdom if we truly want to be joyful.
I can only imagine the difficultly of the position that Jen Hatmaker and her husband were in. However, her desire to sooth her daughter and her daughter's feelings caused her to begin to preach a message to others that is undeniably false. This is what we who are waiting have to guard against. It does not matter whether we understand or like God's law - he is a holy God and has clearly laid out for us what unholiness looks like. Jesus didn't come to sooth our hearts and make us feel better. Jesus came to tell the truth, to show us how to live, and to serve as the perfect sacrifice for sin. He will come again to sit on his throne in Jerusalem, to judge the living and the dead (2 Timothy 4:1) and to bring salvation (Hebrews 9:28). It's that simple.
We are all burdened by the flesh in different ways. For some food is a comfort beyond satiating hunger...and for them, it is difficult to stop eating. Other people have exactly the opposite issue - because of a body image issue or some other kind of pain, they exert extreme control over eating and practically starve themselves. Some people have personalities that cause them to become addicted to things (drugs, alcohol, sex, etc) easily, some people feel a compulsion to steal things, some are prone to violent anger, some people are born with very little emotional capacity...the list goes on and on and on. Just because our bodies or our minds are telling us something - that doesn't excuse Believers from obeying and following Jesus, provided we want to be his disciples.
I feel like this "you can have it all in this life AND have it all in Heaven" idea is one of Satan's most insidious tools. It takes away the urgency to persevere and endure. It is the denying that is difficult, and it is the denying that is unique to each one of us. We are in the same boat in the sense that we all have to deny ourselves, but the specific ways, for each person, are different. For me, it's control and self-reliance. My flesh wants to control everything around me and doesn't want to rely on anyone for anything. My flesh is also lazy and would rather take the easy way than have to work at something (a very odd dichotomy!). The "I can have it all" attitude also sets us up to create idols in our lives. Money, power, and all of the other things that our society promotes as 'good' become the things we chase after if we don't have an attitude of self-denial.
I can't sit here and say that I know what it's like to be attracted to the same gender. I don't know what that's like. But I know what it is like to war against the flesh of my body - to want something that I know God says is sinful. When I couple that knowledge with the words of Hebrews 10:26 which reads, "if we deliberately go on sinning after we have received the knowledge of truth, no further sacrifice for sins remains, but only a fearful expectation of judgement and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God", then I am left to conclude that my only choice, if I want to be a wholehearted disciple of Jesus (which is the only kind of disciple there is), is to obey Him and to obey the laws of Scripture. Willful sin is unrepentant sin. It is knowing that something is sinful and going and doing it anyway - essentially raising my fist and shaking it at God. Does repentance mean I'm never going to sin any more? Almost assuredly, no. But what is my attitude when the Holy Spirit convicts me - when I realize I have sinned against a holy God? It is to continue on in that sin because it's what I like and my body says "do it" and society says "its ok"? Or, does it cause me to fall on my face, and ask God for his mercy and to decide in my heart not to do that again? I would argue it looks like the ladder, Biblically speaking. So the question is - how can the person who decides for themselves that homosexuality is ok and then goes and lives according to that belief, also have a repentant heart? The two are in direct contradiction. Paul is very clear in 2 Corinthians 6:9-10, "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 men who submit to or perform homosexual acts, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor verbal abusers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God." Paul isn't saying that anyone who ever does any of those things is hopeless. No! If so, who of us would be worthy? He is saying that anyone who continues in those lifestyles and doesn't repent - which is to turn away from sin and toward God with the intention of not doing that sin again - those are the people who are setting themselves up as the enemies of God.
The more I read Scripture, the more I am convinced that there is no "best life now" teaching in the Bible. Jesus very clearly calls his followers to lay down their lives in service of the kingdom of God - with a primary emphasis on spreading the 'good news' of the coming kingdom of God. In both explicit and more veiled ways, Jesus is clear that God's kingdom will not come about with the help of any human hands, but only by the power, might and will of God. Building on that - in passages referenced above and in other founds in the synoptic gospels and in the letters of Paul, it is very clear that as followers of Jesus, we should expect suffering for the message and that we should expect that the ways of God (and thus, our ways, as disciples) will be at odds with the ways of the world. I don't think it means that we will lead joy-less lives as Disciples...but we are going to have to reorient our hearts if towards his Kingdom if we truly want to be joyful.
I can only imagine the difficultly of the position that Jen Hatmaker and her husband were in. However, her desire to sooth her daughter and her daughter's feelings caused her to begin to preach a message to others that is undeniably false. This is what we who are waiting have to guard against. It does not matter whether we understand or like God's law - he is a holy God and has clearly laid out for us what unholiness looks like. Jesus didn't come to sooth our hearts and make us feel better. Jesus came to tell the truth, to show us how to live, and to serve as the perfect sacrifice for sin. He will come again to sit on his throne in Jerusalem, to judge the living and the dead (2 Timothy 4:1) and to bring salvation (Hebrews 9:28). It's that simple.
