Family of God: Re: [Church_of_Christ] Re: Questions on Marriage

C. Shawn Oak wrote:

Greetings Clay,

Of course, I can't speak for Clay ...

Secondly, if citizen is not a Christian, does not subscribe to Christianity’s beliefs and practices, why should we (Christians) be concerned how those people live their lives as long as they are not violating our personal rights or interfering in our Constitutionally protected rights as citizens of this country? Why is there so much emphasis placed on the “Gay Lifestyle” as you say and yet there is next to no mention of cohabitating heterosexual couples. There is no public outcry against the “Shacking-Up Lifestyle”. Why the disparity in how the two groups are treated?

Isn’t our role as believers to share the good news and not to condemn or dictate to others how they MUST live their lives? Is condemning non-believers and dictating how they should live their lives according to the Messiah’s modeling of his interactions with people of the world? Aren’t those regulations assigned to believers and while non-believers are in violation of those regulations, is it our right to require that they subscribe to ours?

Please explain what is problematic with the “Gay Lifestyle” beyond your belief that it is contrary to Christianity?

I agree with you that being upset with the "Gay Lifestyle" without being equally as upset with the "Shacking-Up Lifestyle" is inconsistent of us (but understandable, since more of us are likely to shack-up than to swing-that-way.

Still, to answer your question about why we should be concerned with how non-Christians live their life, and why the "Gay Lifestyle" is problematic: it seems to me in my last few readings of the Bible that sin on the part of a land's inhabitants actually, physically pollutes the land itself, and eventually the land vomits out those inhabitants.

Another way of putting this is to say that we are to be salt - a preservative. We are not to let the world decay around us, but we are to preserve it.

This is a foreign concept for many Christians who deem this world as "passing away" and therefore of no interest to us more spiritually-minded souls, and I'm not entirely sure what I believe on such things.

But it seems to me that if the concept is valid that we are to be preserving our world, then it does indeed matter how the society around us behaves; it is in our best interest, and that of preserving the world, to convert that society into a new society ("kingdom") following a righteous lifestyle, but in lieu of converting the spirit of that society, we can at least exert influence to convert its behavior.

--  Kent West        <")))>< http://kentwest.blogspot.com

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