Democrats have frequently turned to Jesus and the Bible to support their causes. They campaign in Black churches. They love religious voters who vote for abortion, homosexuality, same-sex marriage, and governmental tyranny masquerading as “social justice.” How many times have we heard how the Christmas story is about immigration or how socialism is supported by the Bible? When Hillary Clinton was asked “which book made her who she is, she replied ‘At the risk of appearing predictable, the Bible was and remains the biggest influence on my thinking. I was raised reading it, memorizing passages from it and being guided by it. I still find it a source of wisdom, comfort and encouragement.’” (Source) This is the same Hillary Clinton who supports same-sex marriage and abortion on demand.
There is even an entire book devoted to Clinton’s faith, “God and Hillary Clinton: A Spiritual Life” [2007]. The author, Paul Kengor, executive director of the Center for Vision & Values at the conservative Grove City College, writes in the preface that “some things regarding Hillary Clinton and her faith are clear: Although no one can profess to know any individual’s heart and soul, there seems no question that Hillary is a sincere, committed Christian and has been since childhood.”
In biblical terms, a person’s faith commitment is based on the fruit that grows on the faith tree, both good and bad (Luke 6:43-45). How in the world can supporting killing unborn babies and advocating for homosexual marriages be the fruit of a “committed Christian”? There must be more to Kengor’s assessment of Hillary’s Christian faith given the following. Maybe it was because it was published in 2007:
[Kengor] [a]lso published Takedown: From Communists to Progressives, How the Left Has Sabotaged Family and Marriage [2015], a shocking expose of how the far left, from Karl Marx to Herbert Marcuse, have sought to take down natural-traditional-Biblical marriage and family, culminating in “gay marriage,” which provides the long-sought vehicle for leftists to finally succeed in redefining marriage and family — and to attack religion.
While Hillary Clinton has been praised for her commitment to the Bible and Methodist faith, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson has been condemned. He said the following:
“I am a Bible-believing Christian. Someone asked me today in the media, they said, ‘… People are curious. What does Mike Johnson think about any issue under the sun?’ I said, well, go pick up a Bible off your shelf and read it — that’s my worldview. That’s what I believe and so I make no apologies for it…. That’s my personal worldview.”
It’s OK to mention the Bible if you don’t believe much that’s in it or apply any of it legislatively that goes against the Leftist playbook which is the true bible of the Democrat Party.
The Impossibility of the Contrary
Those who deny God have no way to account for the uniformity of nature and its laws. “[N]atural man does have knowledge, but it is borrowed knowledge, stolen from the Christian-theistic pasture or range, yet natural man has no knowledge, because in terms of his principle the ultimacy of his thinking, he can have none, and the knowledge he possesses is not truly his own. . . . The natural man has valid knowledge only as a thief possesses goods.”
Buy NowThe secular religion of our day is a false religion that is being forced on Christians in every government school in the United States and in many large corporations. If Christians give into what is thought to be a just a little “pinch of incense” to a false god or religion, the demand will be for bigger pinches.
Polycarp, who lived between AD 70 and 155, was arrested on the charge of being a Christian—a member of a politically dangerous cult whose rapid growth needed to be stopped. Amidst an angry mob, the Roman proconsul took pity on such a gentle old man and urged Polycarp to proclaim, “Caesar is Lord.” If only Polycarp would make this declaration and offer a small pinch of incense to Caesar’s statue, he would escape torture and death. To this Polycarp responded, “Eighty-six years I have served Christ, and He never did me any wrong. How can I blaspheme my King who saved me?” Steadfast in his stand for Christ, Polycarp refused to compromise his beliefs, and thus, was burned alive at the stake.
Is standing up for righteousness “unloving”? People should be praised for being willing to lose everything for the simple act of refusing to bake a cake or cater an event for something they cannot support. How easy it would have been to compromise; it’s only flour, sugar, butter, and water. Those demanding a cake decorated with behavior Jesus would condemn doesn’t seem to be loving. But that’s OK since homosexuality and now transgenderism are leftist sacraments along with killing unborn babies.
If Christians are labeled as “unloving” for standing up for righteousness, then what does this say about Jesus? Jesus said, “Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A slave is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they kept My word, they will keep yours also” (John 15:20). We saw this happen during the Apostolic generation (2 Cor. 11:20-27).
To criticize Christians on the homosexual marriage issue and transgenderism is to criticize Jesus and the Bible:
“And [Jesus] answered and said, ‘Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning MADE THEM MALE AND FEMALE [Gen. 1:27; 5:2], and said, “FOR THIS REASON A MAN SHALL LEAVE HIS FATHER AND MOTHER AND BE JOINED TO HIS WIFE, AND THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH” [Gen. 2:24; Eph. 5:31]? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate’” (Matt. 19:4-6).
God has “joined together” “male and female,” not “male and male” or “female and female.” If anyone is going to chastise Christians for being “unloving” in this regard, then he or she must chastise Jesus who is the source for setting the parameters of these “unloving” actions.
Jesus dealt with several sexual cases. There was the Samaritan woman who had “five husbands,” and the man she was living with when she met Jesus was not her husband (John 4:16-18).
Instead of trying to defend her lifestyle, she embraces Jesus’ message and admits her sin. The same is true of the woman caught in the act of adultery. Jesus admonished her to “sin no more” (John 8:11). Paul also dealt with sexual sins (Rom. 1:26-27; 1 Cor. 5:1-4; 6:11; 1 Tim. 1:10).
Same-sex advocates who call for the condemnation of Christians who describe homosexuality as a “sin” must condemn Jesus as well.
Jesus never would have attended a same-sex wedding or turned water into wine (John 2:1-12) for a same-sex wedding.
To attack Christians on the issue of same-sex marriage is to condemn Jesus. Given today’s definition of “loving,” Jesus would have been condemned as “unloving” for cleansing the temple and describing some of those who opposed Him as sons of the devil (John 8:44). George Grant writes, “On almost every page of the New Testament, we find Jesus offending someone. When He wasn’t confronting the scribes and the Pharisees, He was rebuking the promiscuous and the perverse.”[1] Consider these comments from philosopher Michael Bauman, Professor of Theology and Culture and Director of Christian Studies at Hillsdale College:
“At various times, and when the situation demanded, Jesus publicly denounced sinners as snakes, dogs, foxes, hypocrites, fouled tombs, and dirty dishes. He actually referred to one of His chief disciples as Satan. So that His hearers would not miss the point, He sometimes referred to the objects of His most intense ridicule both by name and by position, and often face to face…. Christ did not affirm sinners; He affirmed the repentant. Others He often addressed with the most withering invective. God incarnate did not avoid using words and tactics that His listeners found deeply offensive. He well understood that sometimes it is wrong to be nice.”[2]
Additionally, the argument that Jesus never said anything about same-sex relationships fails to consider how marriage and sexual relationships are defined in the Bible and how the New Testament is written against the definitional backdrop of the Old Testament, which He endorsed and referenced numerous times. In addition to saying that Jesus did not say anything specifically about same-sex relationships, He didn’t say anything about rape, tripping blind people and cursing the deaf (Lev. 19:14), incest, bestiality, and a whole lot more. Part of that law included (1) the definition of marriage of being between a male and a female (see above), (2) the explicit condemnation of same-sex relationships (Lev. 18:22; 20:13), without negating (3) loving one’s neighbor as yourself (19:18). This means that the whole “love your neighbor” response does not work.
The Case for America's Christian Heritage
The principles that were true and necessary centuries ago for building nations are equally true and necessary today. There’s much work before us to reset the foundation stones of a firm reliance on Divine Providence. We need to heed the words of Benjamin Franklin who quoted Psalm 127:1 during the drafting process of the Constitution: “except the Lord build the house they labor in vain that build it,” and “that without His concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better, than the Builders of Babel.”
Buy NowIn the final analysis, opposing same-sex relationships is the loving thing to do since the way we show our love toward God and our neighbors is to keep God’s commandments: “He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me; and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and will disclose Myself to him” (John 14:21; also v. 23; Rom. 13:8-10; 1 Tim. 1:8-11; 1 John 2:3; 5:2; 2 John 6; Rev. 12:17; 14:12).
[1]George Grant, The Micah Mandate: Balancing the Christian Life (Nashville: Cumberland House, 1999), 85.
[2]Quoted in Grant, The Micah Mandate, 85.