Fourth Year Ministries

Q: How should we be engaging and responding to the gay marriage debate, as Christians? I know what I believe as a Bible believing Christian, but how do we show that stance, in love? How do you think the civil recognition of gay marriage affects our spiritual definition and our culture. You must admit with the current divorce rate, in and out of the Church, the meaning of "marriage" is already watered down. Is this a battle the Church has already lost in our society? In my experience, I'm often quieted by words like "bigot", "narrow-minded" and "right wing kook", but I want to be bold in speaking and upholding the Truth, in a loving way, even when we are "losing the battle" on moral issues like this and abortion (to name a couple). A: Another great question. Definitely a difficult one. The difficulty is not the interpretive issue. It's because the "debate" is often so inflammatory. The name-calling that the Questio...

Q: Thank you for this discussion regarding sex and it being appropriately confined within a "marriage". But you indicated that God views a couple as married once they have sex. So what happens in the case of premarital sex with multiple partners? Is a person only considered married, in God's eyes, to the first person they had sex with? What happens if someone, that's a virgin, has sex with someone that's not? Should the former consider themselves married while the later considers it an adulterous affair? There must be a Scriptural answer to this can-of-worms. A: This question was pulled from the comments on the original post on Sexual Morality . If you haven't read that post it is beneficial to understand what ground has already been covered. The commenter's questions are good ones. They are right to point out that this is indeed a can of worms ! Bucking traditional wisdom, however, we are in fact going to "open" this issue and see what h...

Q: The Bible teaches people to abstain from “sexual immorality.” How am I supposed to know what this means? A: This is a very observant question. There are a number of passages throughout the Scriptures that explicitly condemn "sexual immorality" without a description of exactly what this means. As a result, you will find a great range of answers to a question like this. Especially amongst different denominations. Unfortunately, many of the disagreements in this particular area are not based on careful examination or exegesis of the Scriptures. They are really a product of personal preferences and cultural mores . While some of these "definitions" are probably better than others, it is always dangerous to allow our culture to interpret the Scriptures instead of the Scriptures interpreting our culture (Romans 12:1-2) -- especially when living in a "sex crazed" culture such as ours! Sex is a touchy topic. Unfortunately, one that is not discussed muc...