All right, you see 2 Peter chapter
2 and verses 4 through verse 8, it has to do with God's dealings
of apostates in both of the texts that we will read. Verse 4, if
God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to
hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved
under judgment, and spared not the old world, but saved Noah
the eighth, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the
world of the ungodly, and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah
into ashes, condemned them with an overthrow, making them an
example unto those that should after live ungodly, and delivered
just Lot, vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked, for
that righteous man dwelling among them, in seeing and hearing,
vexed his righteous soul from day to day with their unlawful
deeds." Now, what was the sin of Sodom exactly? Book of Jude,
verses 5-7. I will therefore put you in remembrance,
though you once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved the
people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that
believed not. And the angels, which kept not
their first estate, but left their own habitation he hath
reserved in everlasting chains unto darkness, unto the judgment
of the great day. Even as Sodom and Gomorrah and
the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over
to fornication and going after strange flesh, are set forth
an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. Now look at
verse 7 again if you would. Giving themselves over to fornication
and going after strange flesh. I thought instead of speaking
on the health bill that I would speak on this subject of the
evening. Now perhaps the question ought
to be modified a bit that stood at the head, that instead of
will God judge America for their friendliness under homosexuality,
we might put it is God judging America for their view. Has God begun already some degree
of punishment? To our many sins there has been
added another. That is a toleration and acceptance
and protection of homosexuality by laws that have been passed
favoring this which is condemned in the Word of God. Now, would
you raise the question, why would we suspect that God would or
that God might or that God would send a judgment where this sin
is practiced and where it is prevalent and where it is protected? Why would a thought like that
be entertained in the mind of many? Well, it is because of
what we find in the scripture concerning the great destruction
of Sodom and of Gomorrah and the cities round about them because
of this sin. There are several other passages
as well, some which we will read, which condemn the sin that is
called sodomy in the Old Testament. In no uncertain term, the Bible
condemns this sin in every place, and both of our texts that we
have read mention that the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah serves
as an example to those that would afterward live ungodly. Very clearly the writer said,
these are set forth for an example. Then there's a very important
question to be raised here in the very beginning, which is,
by what standard or by what measure are we to judge the merit or
the demerit of homosexuality? How shall we decide the issue,
whether it is right or what is wrong? What kind of evidence
may we bring forth that is credible in one way or the other? Shall
we hear the experts, experts in quotation marks? the militant
homosexual activists? Shall we listen to them tell
us about it? Shall we get our information
from the psychologist? Or shall we let the politicians
decide and tell us? the filthy swines, what I call
them, the liberal media. How about Hollywood? We let Hollywood
define the issue. How about the apostate clergy? How about the latest poll that
we might read about in our country? How about the evening news and
the way that this thing is displayed in all of these places? And I
would answer all of that by saying that for the Christian, there
is only one factor in deciding the question. All controversies
about it are settled by one factor, and that is What saith the Scripture,
the Word of God? What does the Bible have to say? Let God be true and every man
a liar. What is written in the Scripture?
Because, after all, we accept the Scripture as the inspired,
the infallible Word of our God. They are Our guide of rule and
of faith and of practice. For what is wrong and what is
right is laid out for us very clearly in the Scripture. What
is an abomination in the sight of God is told us in the Scripture. What he hates and what he will
punish and what he will judge is very clearly set back out
in the Scripture. So, let's begin like this. Let's
go back to the creation of the human species when God created
mankind. When He did, God created one
man and God created one woman, Adam and Eve were their name,
and He gave them the command that they were to multiply and
replenish the earth. These became the first couple. They became man and wife. They were one flesh, Genesis
chapter 2 and verse 24. When Moses had finished telling
of the creation of the woman in Genesis chapter 2 verse 18
through 23, he then draws a conclusion and he makes an application and
it's found in Genesis chapter 2 and verse 24. He said, therefore,
that is on this account, for this reason, seeing that this
is so, a man shall leave his parents, his father and his mother,
and he shall cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh."
Now this is quoted also for us in the New Testament, therefore
concerning the conjugal union as seen as a model in the first
creation of man and of woman. Here are some things that are
true. Number one, man need not be bound to celibacy. This is not the way that God
would bind the man. For God said, Genesis 2.18, it
is not good that man should be alone. I therefore will make
for him and help me." That is, one that is suitable to him,
one that's suitable to his condition, one like he needs, and one like
or of his species. Secondly, the union was not to
be polygamous. As Adam was not bound to celibacy,
neither was it to be polygamous. For God created one and and only
one of each. He did not make multiple wives
for Adam, but one woman or one wife for the one man. And then thirdly, the union was
not to be homosexual, but heterosexual, for God made two genders, male
and female, created He them, Genesis 1 and verse 27. Now the
word Homosexual refers to two of the same sex or gender. Homo, the same kind, equal, or
the same. And the word hetero, heterosexual,
refers to an attraction unto the opposite gender. For hetero
means a different kind, another, other, a different sex or gender
from the original. Thus the natural order, the natural
inclination was heterosexual from the beginning. The opposite
genders, male and female, forming one flesh union called marriage
for the propagation of the race and to be a type of Christ and
His Blessed Bride. How in the world could a homosexual
union ever do either one of these things? A homosexual union can
in no way produce a child. And for that reason, homosexuality
is a monstrous perversion according to the Word of God. It is a corruption
of the original or of the natural order. It is an affront to the
holy and righteous God who designed it, and it is an attack upon
the infallible Word of God. None can take apart or maintain
homosexuality without setting aside the authority of the Word
of God. But now let us move to what I
call the second phase of our study, where in this part we
ask ourselves the question, what is the general teaching of the
scripture concerning homosexuality? Here we should notice again that
the Old Testament name for it was that of sodomy, or they were
called sodomites. It's the Old Testament name from
the prevalence of the sin in the city of Sodom. And they became
to be known as Sodomites and their sin as Sodomy. The most famous account of this
sin that we have in the Old Testament is likely that one in Genesis.
Chapter 19. In a city called Sodom, some
would say it today, there was a large homosexual population
there. Or, as we hear on the evening
news, there was a large, quote, gay community, unquote, there. Gay pride ran high. And they
were out of the closet and publicly in the open. And Jude verse 7
that we read describes them this way, get it again, giving themselves
over to fornication and going after strange flesh. We'll come back to that in a
bit. When Abraham and Lot parted company, Lot, you remember, pitched
his tent towards Sodom. Genesis 13 and verse 12. And in verse 13 we read, the
men of Sodom were wicked and sinners before the Lord exceedingly. Again in Genesis 18 and verse
20, the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great because their sin is
grievous. God would destroy Sodom and Gomorrah,
but first he delivered Lot and his family. And the ugliness
and the degradation of the Sodomites is seen when the two angels of
God in the form and appearance of men appear to Lot in the city
of Sodom in the evening. They have come near to deliver
Lot before the city is destroyed. And in Genesis 19, verses 4 and
5, let's see how tolerant and how nice they are. The Sodomites
converged on the residence of Lot, about to tear his door down,
and requested that the guest that Lot had brought into his
house, these two men, be brought out, and listen, quote, that
we might know them, unquote. You've got to get that. Not that
they might meet them, not that they want to shake and howdy
and say we're glad to have you visiting our fair city. It was
not that they wanted to make their acquaintance because The
expression here, and so many other places to know, is a euphemism
that is used in the Bible for sexual copulation. As when Adam
knew his wife and she conceived, Genesis 4 and verse 1. But they are open about it in
Sodom, about their intention. And Gil wrote on Genesis 19 and
verse 5, They were open, they were impudent,
they declared their sin without shame and blushing." They burned
with unnatural desire toward the men that had come into the
house of Lot. The prophet Isaiah, when he would
rebuke the sin of Israel and show the impudence of their sin,
he said in Isaiah 3, And verse 9, they declare their sin as
Sodom and hide it not. Not that their sin was sodomy
in Isaiah, but they were in open defiance of God, just as Sodom
was, as seen in their countenance and seen in the way that they
carried themselves. in that particular day. Now back
to Genesis 19, and the men of the city, the pederasts of that
city, marched on Lot's house and they declared their intention
openly and loudly and that in the street. As we see in our
day, so-called gay pride marches in the streets of American cities
declaring their sin, as did Sodom, and with corrupt politicians
marching arm in arm through the streets of American cities. Now
you understand that under the Mosaic Law, Under the ceremonial
law of God, homosexuality was among that list of sexual sins
that were called confusion and abomination. You have it in Leviticus
18. In Leviticus chapter 18, such
things are condemned as incest. adultery, bestiality, homosexuality,
which God said defiled the land. Not that these things were not
practiced, for God said these are the things that are practiced
by the people in the land that I'm going to drive out to give
you the land. They were actual sins practiced
by the heathen. We read in Leviticus 18, And
verse 22, Thou shalt not lie with mankind as with womankind,
it is an abomination. Again, in Leviticus chapter 20
and verse 3, much the same thing. If a man also lie with mankind
as he lies with a woman, both of them have committed abomination,
they shall surely be put to death, their blood shall be upon them."
Now the strongest passage in the New Testament against homosexuality
is that one from Paul in Romans chapter 1. where he says in verse
26 and verse 27, where both women and men perverted the natural
into that which is against nature. They have perverted the natural
to the unnatural, the natural into that which is against nature. And notice how he describes it,
burned with unnatural lust one toward another. Paul called it
unseemly in Romans 1 and verse 27. Unseemly means what is shameful,
what is indecent. It is something that is indecent. It is the shameful thing as opposed
to that which is decent and graceful. Unseemly, therefore, in our King
James, Romans 1, 27, is a little bit too weak of a translation
of the Greek word. Working out shame or indecency. John Murray wrote on the passage
in Romans 1 and verse 27, quote, the offense of homosexuality
is the result of the abandonment of the divinely constituted order
in reference unto this." Go back to the Old Testament again. For
more scriptures such as Deuteronomy chapter 23 and verse 17. There shall be no whore of the
daughters of Israel, nor a sodomite of the sons of Israel. 1 Kings. Chapter 14, verse 24, there were
sodomites in the land. And they did according to all
the abomination of the nations which the Lord had cast out before
the children of Israel. 1 Kings 15 and verse 12, when
Asa became and was king over Judah, the Bible said that he
took away the Sodomites out of the land and removed all of the
idols which their fathers had made. In 1 Kings 22 and verse
46, Jehoshaphat, the son of Asa, came to be king in Judah. He
instituted some reforms in the land, including evicting the
Sodomites out of the land again. 2 Kings 23. Now, Josiah is king
of Judah, and he sets more reforms in place, beginning in the second
verse. He began by reading the book
of the covenant of the law, which had been lost and stored somewhere
away, containing the ordinances of God. And in the third verse,
he led the people to make a covenant with God that they would obey
the things that were written in that book. And then in verse
4 and 5, he destroyed all the implements of Baal that had been
brought into the temple and tore down all the groves where heathen
worship was carried on. But we note in verse 7, and he
broke down the house of the sodomites that were nearby the house of
the Lord. These sodomites had taken up
residence in dwelling places even next to or in the shadow
of the house of the Lord. where they, as Gill put it, quote,
prostituted their bodies to each other, committing that unnatural
sin one with another, unquote. Matthew Henry weighed in on this
particular text, quote, where all manner of lewdness, and filthiness
was practiced under the pretense of religion in honor of their
impure deities." And do we wonder why? Was sodomy treated as it
was in Israel under the ceremonial law? We've already saw that it
defiled the land, Genesis 18, 25. Not just the dirt that would
form, it defiled the land. It defiled those who practiced
it. It was pervert and it was corrupt of what God had ordained. It was totally inconsistent with
the worship of God. Being a thing practiced in love
by heathens and by pagans, not by the people of God. A perversion
of the natural order. A thing that God could neither
condone nor bless. And in the practice of it, it
made a people and a nation subject to the judgment of the Holy God. As when we see in Romans chapter
1, of the judgments of God against it, in verse 27 and the last
part, receiving in themselves that recompense of their error
which was meat, which was new, which was suitable to their conduct
and their way of life. And here's the rendering of that
particular passage in Romans 1 and verse 27, given in Marshall's
interlinear Greek-English New Testament, verse 27. Quote, Receiving
back. in themselves the requital of
the error of them which behooved." And then I got out Barry's interlinear
and it's like this, quote, and the recompense which was fit
for their error in themselves receiving," unquote. Now what effect might such sins
have upon society where they are protected, prevalent, and
where they are practiced? And our opening question, will,
is, has God judged homosexuality and America for their tolerance
of it? over these years. I want to tell
you a little incident. Years ago, on my way to a Bible
conference in southern Louisiana by the side of Interstate 10,
was the biggest sign you ever saw standing out there in the
marshes among the alligator. And in huge letters it said on
that sign, AIDS, A-I-D-S, judgment has come. And it was out there
where nobody could get to it to deface it or tear it down. So what has America done in light
of this sin? Well, there are now several so-called
hate crime laws that have been passed in our country to apply
to minorities, particularly to blacks and to homosexuals. But
these are laws applied almost exclusively to whites, and seldom
do you ever hear of a minority charged with a hate crime. What
is a hate crime? Well, if you commit a hate crime,
you get a stiffer penalty for a crime committed against a protected
minority. And as you might expect, hate
crime laws are now in the process of being expanded into hate speech
laws. We knew that would come, first
hate crime and then hate speech. hate speech so that it will be
a forbidding of being critical of the homosexual lifestyle. It is not enough just to keep
quiet and just to stay out of it, just to be silent about it. They want all to affirm, quote,
that gay is good, unquote. Here's the aim. Here's the intention. Many would lose their jobs where
they work. I guarantee this to be true if
you or they took a strong stand at work against homosexuality. Because political correctness
rules today. The political correctness line
of propaganda. So that several states have passed
laws making it legal for homosexuals to marry. Two homosexuals or
two lesbians can marry in some state. Now that's a real oxymoron
if you ever heard of one. And homosexuals have been allowed
to adopt children in our society. It is impossible, I repeat, for
a homosexual union to produce a child. Then we are aware that
several openly homosexuals have been elected to political offices
in America. Congress, mayors of certain cities
have elected lesbians and homosexuals as mayors of that city. Homosexuality. Who likes it? Who's pushing it? Well, homosexuality
is being pushed by such as the liberal politicians, the liberal
lapdog media, Hollywood, God-haters, apostate church and Judas-goat
preachers, and in large part, the liberals, have taken control
of the educational system and use it more for social engineering
than they do for education. They push more diversity than
they do education. The kids can't read, they can't
do math, and they don't know English, but they know that gay
is good, that Christianity is intolerant, that condoms are
free, and that Heather has two mommies. They know all of that
from learning it in the elementary school. In Genesis chapter 19,
from the actions and behavior of the men in Sodom, we see the
militancy of their in-your-face attitude of the Sodomites. What did they do? They compassed
the house of Lot and they demanded that his guests be brought out.
Verse 4 and verse 5. And when Lot called their actions
wicked, when Lot said it was a wicked thing, in verse 7, they
became enraged, and in verse 9, they said, why this man judges
our lifestyle. They became enraged that Lot
would judge them. Who are you to come and sojourn
and be a judge among us? Now, brother and sister, oh,
how they hate to be told that homosexuality is a sin and a
perversion against the Word of God. How they hate to be told
that the Bible strictly forbids it, and they will gnash their
teeth, and they threaten a lot. And they were about to break
his door down in verse 9. Do you find it ironic, I do,
that those who plead for tolerance are the most intolerant of all
people? They have a tactic that they
use to silence their critics. If you speak out against homosexuality,
if you criticize it, if you oppose homosexuality, they've got a
new disease for you. If you criticize it, they call
you homophobic. And this, my, this is a fatal
disease. If you get homophobia, you are
in bad shape. And I have to say, I think that
I have tested positive for homophobia. But this is a true story, I'm
going to tell you, in Indianapolis. a family owned a bakery. And the name of that bakery was
simply Just Cookies. Just Cookies was the name of
their business, and a college girl came in one day to place
an order, a rather large order for some cookies, and it was
found, it had come to pass that the cookies were to be used in
the college for the National Coming Out Day. These cookies
were to be used by homosexuals in the National Coming Out Day. If you don't know what that is,
that's when homosexuals declare openly that they are homosexual. They tell it to others, celebrate
it, they come out, and they come out even politically. Well, the
owners of Just Cookies said, look, That's a we have a conviction
against that. We don't want to do that. We
don't want to set this kind of example in front of our little
daughters. We just don't want to receive
your order. And you know what happened. The
girl didn't go to someplace and buy them. She made a big stink
out of it. And before it was over, the mayor was involved
in it and condemned them. And the landlord that owned the
property is probably going to cancel their lease and shut down
just cookies because they did not want to make cookies for
a homosexual. Now, I want you to imagine a
scenario for that. A pastor goes into a bakery to
place an order for a cake. During the conversation, he says,
this cake is for our church's anniversary. We're having an
anniversary this next Sunday. The owner says, oh, that's interesting.
That's nice. What church do you belong to?
What's your religious belief? And the pastor said, well, we're
Calvinistic. We preach the sovereignty of
God. We believe in the five points of Calvinism. The bakery owner
says, oh, wait a minute. I think that's heresy. I think
that's right out of the pits of hell. I think that's sent
more people to hell than any other doctrine around. Do you
think that the mayor would get involved in that? Do you think
the news media would cover that story on the news at 6 tonight? The homosexual community has
a couple of slick marketing tactics that we want to look at. Number
one, way long ago, they managed to politicalize homosexuality
and the AIDS issue. They were successful in making
a politicalization out of the issue so that it is now seen
through the prism of political correctness. It is not viewed
medically, as it ought to be, or scientifically. It is viewed
through political correctness. Way back, they politicized it.
Secondly, by the way, did you know that AIDS was named something
else way back? It was GRIDS. gay-related immunoficiency
disease. And political correctness changed
it to AIDS. But secondly, they succeeded
in giving it the nickname gay. They succeeded in that. We all
picked it up. Just about everybody uses that
term now. Now, does this mean that they're
married, that they're happy, lively, given the social pleasure? Will God judge homosexuality? That's my question. He did in
Sodom. What is not to say that God will rain down fire and brimstone
on America? I don't say that at all. That
He's likely to rain fire and brimstone down, or that the earth
is likely to open up and swallow up a million people. But He hath
other eras in His quiver, my brother, my sister. He has many
ways to reveal His wrath, Romans 1.18. Homosexuality destroys
the moral fiber of a society, it breaks down the natural order
of a family, it contradicts the Word of God, it is an abomination
unto God and invites His judgment and ripens for judgment being
an open defiance of Almighty God. Now remember, in closing,
this, that the support and the promotion of homosexuality is
a way to stab Christianity in the side. This homosexual movement
and the great support that it has garnered is a way to stab
Christianity in the side, just like Joab smote Abner in the
side and killed him. It is a battering ram to use
against biblical Christianity. It is an opportunity to rub it
in the face of Bible believers, to take away the influence of
God's Word, to neutralize biblical morality and say, well, there
are no absolute. It is a means for God-haters
of all types to attack Christianity. Even the wicked who are not homosexuals
rally with them so that the moral standards that were erected by
our forefathers can be thrown down and everyone can do then
that which is right in their own eyes. Friend, never forget
one way that God judges homosexuality. According to Romans 1 is to give
them up to their uncleanness, to lay the reins upon the neck,
to let them go, to give them over to a mind not capable any
longer of discerning right and wrong and wickedness. And be
warned, homosexuals do not want to peacefully exist. They will not quit or be satisfied
with equal rights. They want to impose their standards
upon society and for society to accept their standards without
question. That's the end. And I think you'll
see that in the days that are to come. God calls it an abomination. He has judged it severely in
the past. And so we have reason to think
that he will judge it according to his good, sovereign will. Thank you for listening. Hey,
you, think about it in the days to come. Stand upon the Bible
when it comes to this matter. I don't advise you go to work
and get on a stump and start spouting off because you won't
be working there much longer. But your belief, let it be in
the Word of God.