Jim and John have a legal marriage certificate. They live in a state where the union is recognized as legally binding. They found a pastor to perform the ceremony. He told them that they could not help their sensual inclinations. With the pastor’s blessing and the government’s backing, they feel free to act upon their choice.

Should that create a problem for anyone?

Let’s shelve that question for the moment and ask another question. What is the truth of the matter?

The truth of the matter is that when God created the first couple, He did not create two men. He created one man and one woman. God created this couple because it was not good for the man to be alone. As a husband and wife, they could find completeness. God gave them to each other for two noble purposes: that each might unselfishly fulfill the other’s needs and that children might result from the union.

Neither did God place the first home in the care of two women. He created a couple that complemented each other physically, emotionally, and spiritually. The home He created had everything necessary to fulfill a family’s requirements to exist and to thrive in a stable and secure environment. “Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh” (Genesis 2:23, 24).

Should that create a problem for anyone?

It did for Satan. He immediately set about to destroy the home by introducing the idea that personal gratification was the missing link to a higher state of satisfaction. He used forbidden fruit as his teaching device. When Satan succeeded in getting the first couple to nibble the forbidden fruit, he took a long stride toward accomplishing his goal of disrupting the first home. The forbidden fruit proved to be fleetingly sweet, but the aftertaste was bitter and enduring.

Satan is still working to destroy homes. He has never discovered a better way to do so than by getting people to sample his forbidden fruit. Often he uses forbidden sensual fruit, which also is fleetingly sweet but has a bitter and enduring aftertaste. Fornication, adultery, and homosexuality are specifically forbidden in the Bible.

The Bible explains the process (Romans 1). People become corrupted in their worship. As they lose their focus on God, they begin to burn in their lusts for others of the same sex. “Leaving the natural use of the woman, [men] burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error” (Romans 1:27).

So, what is the truth of the matter?

You and I are free to live any way we please, but we are not free to choose the consequences that come with our choices. These are rooted in God’s divine law. They follow our actions in a completely logical and predictable way. God gave us more than enough information in His Word so that we can read it and determine right from wrong. “Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind . . . shall inherit the kingdom of God” (1 Corinthians 6:9, 10).

Perhaps you’re wondering how much credibility to give to what many perceive to be a dry, dusty, ancient book that takes a hard line against behavior you may defend. The Bible is God’s Word. The Bible itself has something to say by way of authenticating its own validity. The apostle John wrote, “Thy word is truth.” The truth of this Bible will judge us in the last day. God is supreme, and His Word is final. Pastors and state governments may say what they will, but God is unbending. He will enforce the decrees of His Word.

That is the truth of the matter, and it will matter for eternity.

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Rod and Staff Publishers Inc.

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