John Sherwood, a 71-year-old pastor of a north London church was arrested this past April 23 while preaching in the center of Uxbridge, London, for making “allegedly homophobic comments” in public.
Sherwood said, “I wasn’t making any homophobic comments. I was just defining marriage as a relationship between a man and a woman. I was only saying what the Bible says – I wasn’t wanting to hurt anyone or cause offense. I was doing what my job description says, which is to preach the Gospel in open air as well as in a church building.”
It has become common for those who hold to the biblical pattern of marriage being between one man and one woman to be decried, and evidently arrested in some parts of the world, as being “homophobic.” This is because those who believe homosexuality should be embraced by their culture think it is hateful for others to disagree with them.
They think their right to practice homosexuality supersedes the rights of others to free speech and freedom to exercise their religion. They take offense because they want to give offense. Homosexuals call believers homophobic to ratchet up an emotional response to the biblical view of marriage because our society is moved more by their emotions than they are by rational thought.
Christians are not homophobic; homosexuals are Christophobic.
The first point that needs to be made here is that Christians are not homophobic. Granted, there have been people who claim to be Christians that have said and done many ungodly things to homosexuals; things for which they need to repent if they are truly Christian.
Homosexuality is but one among many sexual sins. Heterosexual adultery, fornication, incest and rape are equally sinful and a perversion of the created purpose for sex, yet Christians are not called heterophobic when we teach what the Scriptures say about these sins.
The reason believers warn others about sin is because sin is what blinds the eyes of the unconverted to their need to repent of their sin and trust Christ as their Savior. We do so motivated by love remembering we were once lost in our sins and in need of a Savior.
The next point is a practical one that bears witness to the spiritual truths already discussed; only heterosexuality can contribute to the propagation of the human race. Human flourishing is wholly dependent on heterosexuality because homosexuality cannot produce the next generation.
Nature is highly discriminatory on this point; two men or two women cannot conceive and bear children. I suppose nature itself is homophobic; of course, that kind of personification is silly. Since any future generation of potential converts to homosexuality are wholly dependent on heterosexuals, the homosexual community might want to reconsider maligning heterosexuals as homophobic.
But Jesus prophesied of this sort of thing, unbelievers hating believers, when He said, “Then they will deliver you to tribulation, and will kill you, and you will be hated by all nations because of My name,” Matthew 24:9.
Christians are not homophobic; homosexuals are Christophobic.
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