The Crux of the Matter - From the Executive Chair

The Bi-Monthly Newsletter of Augsburg Lutheran Churches

Vol. 3, No. 3 (January-February 2004)

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Joint Council Report

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Sexual Boundaries and Biblical Confession

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From the Executive Chair

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from the executive chair ...

Lenae Rasmussen

A SEARCH FOR CLARITY

In his Feb. 3-4, 2004, presentation for the Claus Harms House Clergy Symposium, Dr. Dennis Bielfeldt pointed out that the hearts and minds of individuals are corrupted by the very process of discussing "gay marriage" as if it were a matter of opinion or an option we can choose if doing so makes us happy. The fallacy of such thinking is blatantly being disregarded by those who promote a change in the definition of "marriage" and other standards for Christian churches in North America.

It is also alarming that those who are claiming to be "open-minded" on this matter have not expressed empathy with the children and adults who are being crippled by pederasty and other abuses symptomatic of the gay lifestyle. Such victims are typically treated as the invention of homophobic "imaginations;" at best they become theoretical abstractions without name or reality. This allows advocates to speak in benign and general terms, to avoid all the "unpleasant details" about what really happens to people caught in these behaviors. Avoidance of the truth, in this manner, enables rationalization and approval. Those who abhor these developments are accused of being intolerant and rejecting the "mystery of God's creation" which, of course, includes all lifestyles no matter how deviant.

The Bible teaches that The Fall is the mystery we cannot explain, not creation. Why I am vulnerable to sin in one way and my neighbor is in another is not answered; why sin entered the world at all is an enigma. On the other hand, God's intent for creation, especially his intent for marriage between one man and one woman is clearly revealed (see Genesis 2:18-25; Matthew 19:4-6). To twist matters around to say that creation is the mystery, that no one knows how God meant things to be, and therefore, "If it feels good, God meant it to be that way," is to turn Scripture on its head. Yet it is this kind of thinking that seems to have taken over the minds and voices of those who also seem ready and willing to ostracize and sanction those who are unwilling to abandon the biblical witness that has stood for 2000 years.

We may face bleak days ahead in which we must stand and confess the truth of the gospel even when, as Gerhard Ebeling put it, we can do nothing more than refuse to go along with the insanity and heresy imposed upon us by hierarchical leaders.