Do certain lifestyles keep one from being a Christian

What does the word from the Word say?? Forget everybody's "opinion" and lets see what the Lord Jesus says!!

The word from the Word says for us to "flee fornication"

The word from the Word says that "Adulterers and all fornicators will not inherit the Kingdom of God"

You can't be saved and entertain homosexuality at the same time!

 

Isn't that like saying you can't be saved and embrace ANY type of sin at the same time? Sin is sin.

I, in no way, condone homosexuality; but I have a few questions:

If a person was 'saved', baptized, and lived the Christian life for umpteen years and then embraced homosexuality...

1) Did they lose their salvation?
2) Are they backslidden?
3) Were they never saved to begin with?
4) Did God turn them over to a reprobate mind?
5) Is there no hope for this person?
6) Are they doomed for Hell?
7) How should we deal with someone like this?

§ue

 

Every single christian makes daily choices to disobey God in one way or another. Are they still christians? Are you still a christian? God is the one who convicts and changes a person. Did every change God made in you come on the first day you were saved? No. It is a life long process. Give God a chance to make the same changs in others too. We have no idea whats going on in the hearts of people we choose to pick out their sins and run them into the ground. Is that christian behaior? No. People try to make others sins known to all becasue it makes them feel better about themselves and their own sin.

 

Good post DonnA!

 

The subject of homosexuality has been since the OT. God let us know His position on the subject then. God NEVER changes.

I believe that once a person is saved that they can never be plucked from the Father's hand. If they are sinning they will be convicted by the Holy Spirit.

I don't know if it is nature or nurture. It seems that the scientist will say that there is a genetic predisposition to certain thing--alcohol for one. I used to drink A LOT!! But I don't now. It was a decision. If a person is homosexual, it will be a choice they make to engage in sex or not.

There is one thing that I know for certain: God loves the person--not the sin.

 

Then, you are so much better than the rest of us. Including the apostle Paul, who wrote many years after his conversion:

15For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do. 16If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good. 17But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. 18For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. 19For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. (Romans 7:15-19) NKJV

 

Blackbird won't be able to answer you for 2 weeks unless he sneaks online from across the sea. Pastor David is 'away' on a revival tour.

 

Paul was clearly saying that he did not do all he knew to do. The Bible calls that sin. So, Paul admitted to sinning.

 

We all have the predisposition to sin( according to God we got it from Adam). It's why Jesus died on the cross. Which means it's not an excuse to sin.

 

Well I'm sorry, but according to scripture, christians still sin. Are you perfect that you never sin? The bible says thats a lie.

Again, I'm sorry, but that isn't true. Unless you are saying God is not longer working in you, becasue He is done, you have made it to perfection. Of course thats not true either. Scripture tells us we are a work in progress, which means God's not done with us. I'd don't know about you but God is continuelly working in me.

 

UNBELIEVABLE....

Every time this issue comes up it always, without measure boils down to sin being sin. However, the people that say "No," to the question of whether or not a person is saved/was saved are always the same ones that seem to think comparatively about sin in comparison to other sins. The standard for comparison with regard to sin is GOD, not between sins and which of our sins are worse than the others.

Here's the deal people, for those of you that say this person was not saved to begin with, I've got news for you...I USED TO BE THIS HYPOTHETICAL PERSON...and I can tell you from personal experience you are quite wrong.

I was saved, I was a "practicing homosexual" and even a meth addict, and, guess what, none of you knew what was going on in my mind every day. None of you can begin to understand the level of chastisement and discipline in my life. None of you can know how miserable I was, and none of you can know what it is to sit in a room full of gay men that all hate Jesus, and to sit there all the time knowing you know Christ, but you don't dare say anything for the simple reason that you sit there defaming the Lord's name.

We need a lesson, a HUGE lesson here in theology. There is a big difference between backsliding and apostacy.

Backsliding is defined as the falling into grievous sin, yea, even for long periods of time of the believer.

Apostacy is backsliding and an accompanying repudiatiion of the gospel of Christ. Apostates are, by definition, not saved.

I am constantly amazed at those that miss that point. I am also constantly amazed by those that would sit and point fingers and who can't control their tempers, smoke cigarettes (that's called nicotine addiction, folks...it's just plain, old fashioned drug addiciton that gets washed over, because, hey, it's not pot or meth or prescription drugs,), and basically spend more time looking down their noses at others because they have forgotten the heinousness of the little sin patterns in their lives which are just as offensive to God's holiness as my homosexuality once was along with my meth addiction.

Get over it people. Yes, I angry right now. VERY. I'm indignant that the same people that sit and condemn people for spreading STD's and HIV are often the same ones shoveling Krispy Kreme's into their mouths by the dozen every day and slowly killing themselves. I'm tired of people that say that drug addicts can't possibly be saved, but when Mrs. Godly Grandma Smith goes to be with the Lord after smoking a pack or two a day for decades after she came to know the Lord and whose hubby was even a deacon in church they think how terrible that was, but nobody would dare say she couldn't possibly be saved.

Again, practicing sin is practicing sin...and it doesn't matter if it's homosexual acts, smoking cigarettes, telling little white lies to get out tight situations, or having a problem with your temper. "It's the little foxes that destroy the vines." It's high time we remember it.

 

http://www.harvestusa.org/articles/clarify.htm

http://www.harvestusa.org/articles/balancetruth.htm

http://www.harvestusa.org/articles/legends.htm


The above link goes to HarvestUSA a Presbyterian ministry to homosexuals, one of the most successful "exgay" ministries in the US.

Read it.

I would point out that we Reformed theology folks are the ones that are so often accused of teaching "Lordship salvation..." and not even they agree with the sentiments in the first post of this thread. The even bigger irony is that it's usually the Arminian types that suddenly become "Lordship salvationists" when this issue arises. All of the sudden, the ideas of backsliding go out the window." Oh well, I suppose that's to be expected when one's entire theology is man-centered, believing not in total depravity, but a mortal wound, that a dead man can make himself repent and have faith (when in fact it's the other way around, but that's a whole other discussion). Amazing, absolutely amazing how quickly the antiCalvinist becomes a very strict Calvinist, to the point of believing in something very close to sinless perfectionism.

Luther said we are simultaneously saints and sinners as far as the cooperative work of grace in sanctification goes. This is supported by Paul who calls himself the chief of sinners, not referring to his past life before Christ, but to his present view of himself in the here (well, the then) and now.


Here's some highlights:

The current problem in many conservative circles is that homosexuality has often been elevated to be the worst sin. The homosexual is classified as the most heinous of persons to be avoided and intolerated at all costs. Don't get me wrong, homosexuality is a most serious sin. But this pious pharisaical attitude that puts homosexuality in a category all its own can't stand.

There may be a need for Christians and the church as a whole to repent if they have practice this wholesale type of condemnation and rejection of people. Unfortunately most of the gay community lives with this kind of image of the average Christian. I remember visiting a neighborhood gay bar and seeing a bumper sticker someone had found. Hanging over the mirror behind the bar area, it read, "kill a queer for Christ." Is it so surprising to us that those in bondage to homosexuality have gone to great lengths to reinterpret and revise the scriptures and who, out of practical experience, see this historic kind of Christianity as uncompassionate?

. I think Gordon Dalby in his book, Healing Of The Masculine Soul put it best. He likened the discussion concerning homosexuality to a surgeon and a patient on an operating table. He said that, as a conservative, the surgeon curses the patient, slashing him ruthlessly while as a liberal, the surgeon glibly pronounces the patient "healthy" simply to spare him the pain of surgery, however necessary.


Too often the idea that we Christians have is to offer simplistic solutions. I for one can not get over the comment that if somebody is still "practicing" a particular sin five years after accepting Christ that person is not saved. Hmmm, well, does that mean the person that smokes for five years after accepting Christ isn't saved? The person that spends five years with anger problems?

Folks, some sins are bondages. Homosexuality is a bondage with deep deep DEEP roots.

Now, do I believe that a person can accept Christ and not feel conviction for sin? No. Do I think that they can go for a time, even a very long time, and not feel such conviction at all but later return to the Lord? YES. This is Biblical. The bottom line is no man among is in the position to make the judgments about individuals required in the first post of this thread.

I direct you all to the sin of two men in the Ephesian Church named Hymenaeus and Alexander in I Tim. 1:20. These men are named by Paul. He says he handed them over to Satan so that they would be taught not to blaspheme. We know that doing this means that they were put out of the congregation so that Satan could have their way with them. The idea is that what we bind on earth is bound in heaven and vice versa. The Lord, through Paul, chose to put these two out of the congregation and basically let them learn their lesson the hard way. Scripture teaches us to do this as a last resort. Why? Because what we do as a matter of church discipline is an example of what God is doing spiritually. Now, notice the conclusion of 2 Timothy. Alexander gets mentioned in a list of people Paul remembered as having hurt him. Hymeneus isn't on the list anymore is he? I understand from this past January's Bible study (those of us that are SBC should have been studying these two epistles as a denomination), that the general consensus is that Hymenaus learned his lesson. Alexander did not. Paul does not say anything about either of them not being Christians. However, since their particular sin pattern had to do with 'blasphemy,' most likely spreading Gnosticism/Judaizerism, one could argue that Alexander wasn't saved, since he's the one that Paul names as eventually getting judged by God for the harm he did to Paul, Paul being personally hurt by the situation in that church since he spent so many years in it.

 

GeneMBridges,
I've only read your first post and already I'm giving you a resounding AMEN!!! I'm sure that the second post deserves another one on top of that.

I too have experienced the same thing that you have talked about, but because I thought I was alone on these pages I was afraid to admit to much of my past life. The last time I posted a thread with definite questions about my salvation I was very quickly kicked around and told I could not be saved and have a sinful lifestyle at the same time.

I never believed that and I still don't and I am pleased to know that someone has the intestinal fortitude to come out and talk about it honestly and openly.

I was born again/saved in 1963 at the age of 15, and when I got into college discovered sex at the age of 21, in 1968. It was like a wildfire in my life and in the ensuing years I grew out of fellowship with fellow Christians and began to sow wild oats by the fields full. I was more liberal than I ever thought I would EVER be. But I still had times when guilt was all over me and I was being convicted of my sin which was rampant.

By 1970-1972, I had failed at one marriage and begun a successful one, and the guilt eventually caught up to me and I was a pitful mess. In 1986, The Lord called me back into the fold and if He hadn't done that I might be dead today from HIV/AIDS. For many years sex was my God and following my rededication ALL of that temptation to go back into that lifestyle left me completely. Just like POOF!!! It was gone. I repented and I know that I know today just like I knew that I knew back in 1968-1986 that I was saved.

Some here on BaptistBoard make you believe that you were never saved to begin with, but I know in my spirit and my heart that that just is a lie from the pits of Hell. They can believe that stuff if they want, but those who believe it either have never succumbed to temptation or they have lived lives of perfection.

So go ahead now all you holier-than-thou self-righteous Baptists and rake me over the coals, but remember as you judge me so you will be judged yourself. Ya'll did it before on that other thread so I expect it will be repeated here.

Thank you Gene, for helping me to speak out in your support and in so doing feel a weight taken off my own shoulders.

You most definitely CAN be saved and fall into sin for years before being called back by our Saviour and Lord. Don't let ANYONE tell you otherwise. Repentance is the key and and that goes in hand with seeking the Kingdom of God.

Like the prodigal son, I came home.