A Struggle with Understanding Social Justice and God's Glory

Confession: I’m afraid to enter this conversation. I’d rather sit back and observe. I’m afraid of making a mistake, of saying (or rather writing) something that I’ll later regret. It’d be easier to avoid it all. But what’s the point of following Jesus to be a light in the world if we’re not willing to engage the world? The world, or at least America, is in a tough place right now with homosexuality. I’m not even in America, but I can see a lot of pain and passion in the conversation.

I struggle with “homosexuality and the church” conversations. I have friends and family whom I love dearly who are directly impacted by this conversation. They’re in committed relationships, but suffer intense hatred, discrimination, and condemnation. And the people I know are simply a small, small portion of the multitude. That hurts my heart. That really hurts my heart.

In an attempt to figure out how to reconcile my love for my family and friends and my love for God, I jumped at an opportunity to study the topic of homosexuality and the church while I was in college. I wrote a research paper on Romans 1:24-32, and I learned a lot. Here's the passage (New Revised Standard Version):

Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the degrading of their bodies among themselves, ²⁵ because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.
²⁶ For this reason God gave them up to degrading passions. Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, ²⁷ and in the same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed with passion for one another. Men committed shameless acts with men and received in their own persons the due penalty for their error.
²⁸ And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind and to things that should not be done. ²⁹ They were filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice. Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, craftiness, they are gossips, ³⁰ slanderers, God-haters,^[a]insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, rebellious toward parents, ³¹ foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. ³² They know God’s decree, that those who practice such things deserve to die—yet they not only do them but even applaud others who practice them.

Here are some of the things I learned that are most applicable to this conversation:

• Homosexuality has multiple meanings in our culture. It can refer to either a sexual orientation toward an individual of the same sex or sexual behavior with an individual of the same sex. But the term did not exist in Paul’s time, so his explanation of homosexuality is that “men committed shameless acts with men” (Rom. 1:27). By including the verb committed, Paul clarifies his intention to speak only on the behavior not the orientation or desire.  Following Paul’s understanding of homosexuality as a behavior, I’ll define homosexuality as the behavior unless otherwise noted through the phrase “homosexual orientation.”
• Paul’s condemnation of homosexual intercourse in Romans dwells in the greater context of idolatry and turning away from God. Beginning in 1:18, Paul explains how the wrath of God comes to the wicked that turn away from him; these people turn to worshiping the creation and idols (Rom. 1:25). Their primary sin is turning from worshiping God to gods. The transition from the primary sin of idolatry to homosexual acts demonstrates parallels between the two sins. Both acts are exchanges, one of God for idols and the other of opposite sex intercourse for same-sex intercourse. They are both a denial of God and his evidence in and order of nature.
• After understanding the greater context of Romans 1:24-32, one can recognize that the passage is not just a code of sexual ethics. The verses ending the first chapter are also theological. Paul’s purpose is to explain the wrath of God. His view on homosexuality is to be understood through the lens of the universal fall in which Jews and Gentiles alike are sinners in need of the grace of God. The theological theme of sin is the essential concept, and the list of sins is second to that.
• Homosexual conduct is listed alongside envy, murder, evil, deceit, gossiping, and more (Rom. 1:29-31). Anyone who practices not only homosexual intercourse but also any sin listed in the opening chapter of Romans deserves death (Rom. 1:32).
• Although Jewish texts supported Paul’s writing on homosexuality, Gentile morality disagreed with Paul; he was defying social standards in his condemnation of homosexual practice. His standard in Romans was not the social standard but rather the roles man and woman were created to fill. Examined through this standard, all homosexual behavior would be viewed as opposition to creation and humanity’s roles. Such homosexual behavior would include modern homosexual marriages and partnerships because Paul speaks of not only culture but also creation. Nature is not culture; it is creation and the created order. Paul’s teaching on homosexuality can be transferred through the ages; homosexual intercourse is not acceptable to God because it is against his created order and is to be cast off in repentance.
• Homosexual intercourse is sin, but it is not to be condemned alone. All sinners stand under the judgment of God, therefore believers who do not struggle with homosexuality are not to condemn fellow believers who do (Rom. 2:1 "Therefore you have no excuse, whoever you are, when you judge others; for in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, are doing the very same things."). Paul understands how easy it is for believers to quickly judge others and traps them in their sinful judging hearts in Romans 2. He knows that the individual who self-righteously judges another person practicing homosexuality is just as sinful as the latter. All of humanity is in bondage to sin, and the church must address homosexual acts as it addresses other sins with which the congregation openly struggles. Paul demonstrates how all believers are in need of grace, and the church body should be overflowing with the deeply needed grace.

It’s easy for me to look at that and say, “Okay. That makes sense. Believers have to repent of all types of sin, and the church should lovingly extend that grace.” That’s not a problem.

My struggle begins with the fact that not everyone is going to repent and turn to God. How are we to respond to those who reject God? Do we push for legal rights for marriage, or do we impose upon them the laws of the God they freely choose not to follow?

A big part of me wants to shout, “Give them social justice! Equal rights for all!” I love social justice. It’s why I majored in social work.

I get really frustrated when I think about how I can go and choose sin. America allows us to get drunk, commit adultery and withhold love from a neighbor, and those sins are discussed much more frequently in the bible than homosexuality. Why does America let me reject God without letting some of friends reject God? Lame. So, lame.

So I’ve spent a lot of time being confused. I’ve been silently asking myself and God lots of questions about this topic. Then, one day, I realized that the one question I needed to ask is, “God, how are you best glorified in this?”

To answer that question, I looked to his Word. How is God best glorified in the keeping of his commands while part of his creation will always reject his commands (not only in regard to homosexual behavior but all rejection)?

I still don’t have the answer. I so badly wanted to include the answer that would settle all of my confusion and all of your confusion here. But I can’t do that. Instead, I can share the little that I have learned.

God cares. He cares about his creation. He cares about each time his creation rejects him. He’s grieved by it. He’s angered by it. God is a God with a righteous anger because he cares about his glory even more than those who revere him most. God cared when there was sin everywhere in Noah’s time. God cared when there was sin everywhere in Sodom and Gomorrah. God cared when the Israelites rejected him and built a golden calf in the wilderness. God cared when the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites, and Jebusites were living apart from God in the Promised Land.

God didn’t just care then; he cares now. He cares about the hurt connected with this discussion on equal rights in marriage. He cares about all of the people who are turning away from him because of it. But he doesn’t just care about the people. He cares about his glory. He wants to be glorified in this. He wants the truth about his goodness to be proclaimed during this.

God doesn’t just care about this debate. He cares about his glory in all areas, even the areas in which we’ve settled on an answer. We could be wrong. The conservatives could be wrong. The liberals could be wrong. And I’m confident that we’re probably all wrong on at least one of those issues. I’d like to propose that we may be wrong on some issues because we’re focused more on humanity’s glory than God’s.

What would our answers to all of the questions be if we were more focused on proclaiming the truth about God than pleasing people and building up ourselves? What would America look like if we viewed it as a land meant to glorify God? I have a feeling it wouldn’t promote homosexual behavior, poverty, racism, or neglect of the orphans – to name a few changes.

God is love. God is just. God is merciful. God is compassionate. God is patient. He doesn’t want anyone to perish but wants everyone to repent (2 Peter 3:9).

Let’s not give up on our world. Let’s not give up on our God. Let’s bring him the glory.