Not as Expected
2 months, 4 weeks By Allyson
In: Christianity | Christians | Gay Community | LGBTQ | love
Well, this week isn't quite turning out as I had expected. This blog didn't get posted on the 21st as first anticipated, mostly because I'm just not feeling too great.
But nonetheless, this week has been a week of reflection for me. Reflection about myself, about what I believe, what I don't, what I want to accomplish, and those things that I didn't accomplish.
One of the issues I've been thinking about is how many Christians are in an uproar over the gay community. History is repeating itself, only instead of women or blacks being oppressed, it's the gay community. They are people. People who like everyone else in this country deserve certain rights, whether you agree with their lifestyle or not. The other thing that bothers me is that Christians can be so ignorant and hateful- not all Christians. But there's a lot going on in the media, making fools of themselves and the world is laughing at us. And notice, I said us because I am a Christian. I know what the Bible says about gays, but I think how people are interpreting it today is wrong. The problem with the bible is that the context in which things were written is often lost. It was written how many years ago? It's been translated and retranslated how many times by people? People who make mistakes, who filter it through their own perspective.
I'm going to talk about Pentacostals and Assembly of God because they are what I'm familiar with most, what my beliefs align with most. We don't have any restrictions on food. We simply pray over our food before eating and thank God for providing it. But in Leviticus chapter 11 it talks about Clean and Unclean Food. It says that we're only supposed to eat animals that chew cud and also have a split hoof, which means you aren't supposed to eat pork.
But the interesting thing is that there is another passage in the New Testament that is kind of like an addendum. In Acts chapter 10, Peter is sitting on a roof praying. He gets hungry and asks for a meal to be prepared. But while he's waiting he falls into a kind of trance and has a vision. A sheet filled with 4 legged animals and lizards and birds comes down. God tells him, "Get up, Peter. Kill and eat." But in verse 14 he says no, because he's never eaten anything unclean. God's response is "Do not call anything impure that God has made clean." Basically what this is supposed to mean, I think, is that Jesus dying on the cross took care of this. He was the ultimate sacrifice and cleanser, purifier. This is why we don't have restrictions on what you can eat.
So why am I going into all of this? The last time anything was acceptably added to the bible was how many years ago? The bible might say that the gay lifestyle is wrong, but I think the lifestyle from back then in comparison to now has changed. I don't think it was really aimed at gays, I think it was aimed at Corinthians and their lifestyle, their treatment of women, slaves, and boys. In Romans, it's actually mostly written in Paul's opinion. And he makes it clear which parts he's saying is his opinion. But I think it's also interesting that his opinion was to worry about the people in the church and judge their actions. Let God deal with the ones outside of the church.
I don't really want to go into too much detail because then I'll be guilty of what I'm trying to say is the problem. Making assumptions on ignorance. I'm still searching for an answer. I've looked around on the internet a lot. I saw mention that the word was mistranslated. Something about the greek work pederast, and that people aren't really sure what it was referring to. And it's a big gambit from male prostitutes, to homosexual offender, to pedophile, to a female prostitute.
But the one thing that I think all believers can agree on is the statement in the Bible that says, "... God is love" 1 John 4:8. If God is love, and we're to be like Christ, where is your love when you make signs that scream God hates fags? The God you're talking about is not mine. And you make me ashamed to be called a Christian because I have to be put in the same category of people as you.
How is this any different when women fought to be considered equal in society?And people thought simply because she is a woman she doesn't deserve to own property or have the right to vote or to get divorced or to serve in the military? How is it different when blacks were thought to not be equal just because they didn't have pale skin? They used to not be allowed to get married either, anybody remember the jumping over the broom? In the end I'm really disappointed. I thought we had come so much farther than this. I suppose that's my idealist naive child like view.
LGBTQ community, please know not all Christians hate you. Not all Christians think you should be denied the right to marry. Not all Christians think you're going to hell simply because you're gay. I don't claim to understand everything about you, but I'm willing to have an open mind. And I'm so sorry that you are having to fight for what should already be yours.
At the risk of sounding very 60s, try love, not hate. Put aside your differences.
God Bless ~ Allyson
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