Our nation recognizes two men or two women committing themselves in marriage. We who follow Jesus often resist the norms of society around us; nonetheless, for many reasons the church has moved toward affirming our nation’s stance.
1. Most people today see companionship and intimacy as the heart of marriage. And procreation as optional. Marriage has become less of a contract to protect children and more an arrangement to celebrate and channel romantic feelings. So it seems deeply unfair to say that the nice gay couple down the street should not be married—unless we are missing some essential factor in marriage.
2. Indeed, justice calls us to grant gays the right to marriage; denying them that right feels akin to racism or denying civil rights. Yet the fact that persons should be given the right to do something does not mean that it is the right thing to do or that we who follow Jesus should bless it. For example, we give persons the right to follow Buddha even when we think they should follow Jesus.
3. We instinctively feel the unfairness of insisting that someone forgo the physical closeness they are somehow built to desire. Celibacy seems a burden too hard to ask a same-sex attracted person to bear. Or do we see celibacy as a burden because, as children of our culture, we assume that sex is necessary for human flourishing, that we have the right to enjoy pleasure and avoid any hard road? The life of Jesus and the lives of countless men and women through the centuries counter any notion that one needs access to sex to be a full human being. The mere fact of something being hard does not mean that asking it is wrong. Our faith frustrates and challenges our natural impulses again and again; if we avoid all things that bring suffering and even death, we can also miss new life from above.
4. We can point to gay and lesbian couples who show human flourishing in many ways, including faithful self-giving love, and we can assume that only prejudicial, ill-willed persons would fail to affirm such relationships.
However, a community decides whether a category of behavior is good, not by looking at whether some examples of it are good, but by observing the overall pattern.
It may be a long time before we are certain about a pattern here—whether there are intrinsic factors in male-male and female-female marriage that affect human flourishing. A huge amount of data needs to be observed over multiple generations. Plus, any negative inferences on gay marriage will be very slow in surfacing—researchers hesitate to give stats against the choices of LGBTQ+ persons, even though there indeed are general patterns of lack in same-sex partnerships.
5. Christ-followers read and try to apply Scripture to life. As we do, we note some ambiguity in the words of biblical sin lists that refer to same-sex relations; we cannot be totally certain that they refer to the loving, mutual relationships found in today’s same-sex marriages.
Indeed, Scripture—and all writing except what our lawyers draw up—has ambiguity. But most often it is clear enough. Including in this instance. Though scholars can—and do!—raise questions about the pertinent words in the lists in Rom. 1 and 1 Cor. 6, they never inject more than minor uncertainty into the meaning of these words. The historic understanding of these texts—that they apply to all same-sex relationships, even loving, committed ones—remains the most natural reading. For instance, in a sin list in 1 Cor. 6:9-10 Paul uses a compound word (formed of the words for male and coitus found in his Greek version of Lev. 18:22 and 20:13) that was so rare that it could not have, through use, developed a meaning beyond male-male sex in general. And in a sin list in Rom. 1, as Paul refers to same-sex relations (vv.26-27), the language of mutual desire (“for one another”) suggests that he had in mind something consensual; and the mention of female-female relations shows that he was not limiting his thoughts to exploitive forms like pederasty; so the strongest reading is that this text covers all same-sex sex.
We now can return to the idea of an essential factor in marriage. Scripture suggests male-female as an essential element. The creation accounts in Genesis 1 and 2 present male-female unions as the divinely designed pattern, a pattern Jesus himself reaffirms (Matt. 19:4-6). Is this only a general pattern for which there may be same-sex exceptions? The law of Moses did not grant such exceptions (Lev. 18:22, 20:13). Paul echoed Moses in 1 Cor. 6. And seemed to confirm this in Rom. 1 by speaking of female-female and male-male unions as “unnatural.”
6. Yet Scripture clearly does show movement by God’s people toward welcoming those who were once excluded (e.g., David’s Canaanite and Moabite grandmothers—Tamar, Rahab, and Ruth; eunuchs in Isaiah 56:3-8; uncircumcized Gentiles in Acts 15). How likely is it that the Spirit intends LGBTQ+ inclusion to be part of this pattern? We see no movement in Scripture toward loosening moral codes in the area of sexuality. Rather the opposite: we see the Spirit working to deepen obedience here. Jesus tightens down on sexual ideals (“Moses said no adultery, but I say no look of lust” and “Moses allowed divorce, but that’s not how it was in the beginning, so I say no divorce”). In the church’s lists of sins, immorality (porneia) is listed most frequently. The Spirit-inspired trajectory of inclusion will never disregard the call to faithful living by that same Spirit.
7. Many of us have seen the Spirit of God use the gifts of men and women who are in same-sex partnerships. Yet when the Spirit fills someone it does not mean that everything in their life is thereby holy. God in grace meets all of us sinners where we are and comes into any area of life that we open to the Spirit.
8. We want to be people marked by grace, like Jesus. May it be so! Far too often our lack of grace as the church has led those with same-sex attraction to feel and internalize a sense of rejection.
But hand in hand with showing love and mercy, may we also, like Jesus, teach God’s design for our lives as seen in Scripture and encourage movement toward that divine intent. Jesus’ acts of grace and welcome always appear with calls to radical, costly obedience—both “I do not condemn you” and “Go and sin no more.”
Out of a high trust in Scripture we expect that one day we will see much wisdom and compassion in the Spirit of God steering people away from what Scripture lists as sin.