Homosexuality by Birth or by Choice A summary version from a biblical perspective – Pt 1

by Rev. Amos Dennie

So once more the question is: Does the Bible forbid homosexuality? Yes it does; the Bible is realistic. You might not expect it to mention a topic like homosexual behavior. But in fact there are six places in the Bible; three in the Old Testament and three in the New Testament, where the issue is directly addressed. In all six of these passages, homosexual acts are unequivocally condemned.

In Leviticus 18:22 it says that it is an abomination for a man to lie with another man as with a woman. In Leviticus 20:13 the death penalty is prescribed in Israel for such an act, along with adultery, incest and bestiality.

Now sometimes homosexual advocates make light of these prohibitions by comparing them to prohibitions in the Old Testament against having contact with unclean animals like pigs. Just as Christians today don’t obey all of the Old Testament ceremonial laws, so they say we don’t have to obey the prohibitions of homosexual action. But the problem with this argument is that the New Testament reaffirms the validity of the Old Testament prohibitions of homosexual behaviour.

The third place where homosexual acts are mentioned in the Old Testament is the horrifying story in Genesis 19 of the attempted gang rape of Lot’s visitors by the men of Sodom, from which our word sodomy derives. God destroyed the city of Sodom because of their wickedness.

Now if this weren’t enough, the New Testament also forbids homosexual behaviour in 1 Corinthians 6: 9 – 10 Paul writes,

“Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, or thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.”

It is also mentioned in 1 Timothy 1:10 and in Romans 1:24-28. Here Paul talks about how people turned away from the creator God and began to worship instead false gods of their own making. He says:
“Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

“For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done.”

The forgoing therefore established the fact that homosexuality is therefore a matter of choice and God our creator did not make a mistake when He created male and female, and if the argument advanced by homosexuals makes any sense it means that all criminals can claim that they were born that way; rapists, murderers, etc. Therefore we should open the prison and set all prisoneres free as they too can claim that they were born so, then we will live in a lawless society; every man a law unto himself, and the law of the jungle will prevail.