“An aged man, whom Abraham hospitality invited to his tent, refused to join him in prayer to the one spiritual God. Learning that he was a fire-worshipper. Abraham drove him from his door. That night God appeared to Abraham in a vision and said: ‘I have borne with that ignorant man for seventy years: could you not have patiently suffered him one night?”
The Talmud
Do Christians drive people away from their door because of what they believe? I think so.
Case in point the same sex marriage debate. The gay and lesbian community have been lobbying governments for years to be able to be ‘married’.
Christians and other religious groups have a very clear definition of marriage. It is the union of a man and a woman. And to Christians in particular marriage is a very sacred thing. To violate what they feel is it’s true meaning is to put a red flag in front of a bull. It’s the equivalent of a Christian asking a gay man to stop being gay.
Now before I go any further. Let me make it clear I am not asking Christians or for that matter members of the gay community to give up their beliefs.
What I am asking is that Christians, of which I am one, recognize that we live in a free and democratic secular society. A society where governments try to work in what they consider is the best interest of all people.
As Christians I don’t think we should be standing with placards in front of parliament trying to restrict the rights of others.
To do so is to like Abraham throw the person out of our tent and potentially sentence them to an eternity separated from God.
I feel we need to reach out to the gay community agreeing to disagree at least on the same sex marriage debate.
I also believe that until we put the placards down and stop protesting against everything except our right to worship freely, our ability to reach others will be at least limited.
We cannot stand on street corners, scream in the media, and yell from the pulpit, in a secular world such as we live in “because I disagree with you, I want your rights restricted!” Which is exactly what people see when they see us protesting against anything.
Christianity is not a “do not” belief system.
Christianity is a lifestyle. It is a belief that God himself reached down to man saying, Jesus himself saying, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. John 3:16, 17.
How can we as Christians possibly hope to get that message to anyone when they see us protesting against anything and everything we dislike.
Question: Do you really think the apostle Paul spoke against anything he disliked when he was in Athens or any other part of the Roman empire. Read Acts 17: 16-34. And think about it.
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