We don't jump up and down about homosexuality at our church.
One, because we refuse to let our culture dictate how important or unimportant an issue is. Whether its liberal or conservative media, or liberal or conservative Christianity (both of whom make too big a deal too often of this issue for opposite reasons), we strive to keep our focus on the essentials of the Christian faith.
Two, we rarely focus on this issue because we do not want to give the impression, or buy into the lie, that any one sin is greater than another. For example, we've recently re-edited a section of our membership class manual that seemed to be giving that impression too often.
But we did focus on "Homosexuality, The Bible & Christians" this past Monday night. I felt that we owed our congregation more biblical clarity about the subject. I also wanted to offer pastoral and prophetic encouragement as to what it means to apply the grace and truth of Jesus to loving our LGBT friends, co-workers, neighbors and family members. In addition, I wanted to speak directly to those who have same sex attraction, as Pastor Mike to any who will have me.
So here is the recording, and the handout I gave to everyone. I broke the lecture up into two parts (this totals an hour and fifteen minutes), then we held about thirty minutes of Q& A and comment. There are many things I wish I had also said, or said better (like "if you have a friend who is homosexual, your friendship doesn't have to be about that - just be a good friend," and "you don't have to agree with our biblical position on this to be a member of Lake Forest"), but I'll let this stand (ummm's and all - for some reason i was chewing 'ummm gum' that evening, sorry).
