What Atheists Believe: What would you add?

Mark P. of Proud Atheist provided a list of what atheist believe. ”The list can be read here. Mark asks his readers, “What would you add?”

How about these:

Atheists believe it is okay to seize snippets of our sacred book and use them to smear God and His people without any regard for context. Why not at least examine the context first?

Atheists believe in love so long as it doesn’t involve people of faith. At least that has been my experience.

Atheists believe in kindness so long as it is not directed towards people of faith. A quick visit to Proud Atheist will attest to that.

Atheists believe in family unless you are of the family of God.

Atheists believe (or at least some do) that people of faith are fair game for ridicule and scorn.

Atheists believe in a woman’s right to choose the fate of her unborn child.

Atheists believe unborn children have no rights.

Atheists believe that creationism is a fairytale.

Atheists believe in the fairytale of evolution.

Atheists believe that faith in God is silly.

Atheists believe our ancestors were monkeys.

Atheists believe there is no evidence for God.

Atheists believe the non-evidence of a missing link. Atheists do have faith after all!

Atheists believe a person is hateful if they do not support the homosexual lifestyle. I would like to think this is not true of all atheists.

Atheists believe that it is natural for a person to be bisexual.

Atheists believe they will never bow their knee to the God of the universe. I believe they are wrong.

And more importantly, atheists still have time to reconsider the damage they are doing to others who might actually be interested in honestly examining the Christian faith and exploring the depth of God’s love!

Atheists should either learn what Christianity is or leave it alone.

Disclaimer: This list is compiled from my own experience with atheists and does not necessarily represent the beliefs of all atheists on every point.

Leviticus 20:13

As the clamor continues to increase among the gay and lesbian community and their supporters, the Scripture passages condemning the behavior are becoming more and more confusing to a lot of folks.

Case in point: someone wrote to the editorial section of my local newspaper opposing homosexual marriage. In the commentary, the writer sited Leviticus 20:13 but said only that God considers homosexuality to be an abomination. A few days later, a counter commentary appeared stating that the previous opinion failed to identify the remainder of Lev. 20:13 affirming the punishment for the sin, which is death! The implication being that if one uses this verse to condemn homosexuality, then one must also adhere to the notion that homosexuals should be put to death. The rebuttal is a classical “gotcha” response. Its purpose is to confuse Christians by forcing us to choose whether we accept or reject the law of God as divinely instituted.

The Law of God is indeed divine and righteous. Under the Law, homosexuality is condemned and punishable by death, so too is adultery and several other immoral acts. But does this mean that Christians believe death as a punishment for such sins should be carried out? Consider this:

In His sermon on the mount, Jesus taught mercy with regards to the strict judgment of the Law. Many of the religious leaders in Israel, who believed His message was blasphemous, purposed to entrap Him by contrasting His teachings with the Law whenever the opportunity arose. One such opportunity happened when certain Pharisees saw His disciples plucking grain and eating it on the Sabbath as they passed through a field.

The Pharisees accused Jesus of breaking the Law by letting His disciples do this. The tradition of the Jews had strictly prohibited any work on the Sabbath, even if that work was a work of necessity. The disciples were hungry and in need of nourishment, but the tradition of the Pharisees showed no mercy. Jesus reminded them that when King David and his men were hungry, David entered the temple and ate the showbread, which was not lawful for him to do.

Jesus then asked them, “Have ye not read in the law, how that on the Sabbath days the priests in the temple profane the Sabbath, and are blameless?” (Mat. 12:5) The priests worked on the Sabbath day to present the offerings before God for the sins of His people, yet the Law prohibited work on the Sabbath. But the work of the priests was the work God; therefore, it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath. Mercy and kindness are the works of God; so Jesus told them, “If ye had known what this means, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guiltless.” (v7)

The mercy of God was also exemplified when the Pharisees once again found an opportunity to trap Jesus by the Law. They had found a woman who was caught in the act of adultery and brought her before Jesus. They took up stones in their hands and challenged Jesus by reciting the Law that stated she should be stoned. Believing the Law to be explicit in its judgment, they asked Jesus what He had to say concerning this. When Jesus looked up, He simply said, “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.” (John 8:7) Unexpectedly faced with the reality that they themselves were guilty of the same Law that condemned the woman, one by one they dropped their stones and walked away. Jesus approached the woman and asked her, “Woman, where are your accusers? Has no man condemned you?” The woman replied, “No man, Lord.” So Jesus told her, “Neither do I condemn you: go, and sin no more.”

Understanding the Law of Moses from the perspective of God’s love and mercy enables us to understand that God did provide mercy in the Law. The punishment for immoral acts listed in Leviticus did not have to be carried out had the religious leaders showed mercy. The Law did not exclude opportunity for repentance, and it provided provision for the shortcomings of His people, for His people were weak and none were righteous according to the Law.

All the judgments of the Law have been executed upon Christ who is the fulfillment of the Law. God’s mercy was exhibited through the sacrifice of His righteous Son upon whom the sins of the world may be imputed for all who repent and believe. God did not condemn us before we believed, but waited on us patiently. How, therefore, can we do anything but show to others that same mercy, compassion and patients we received? If the Spirit of Christ is not shown through us, how can we expect others be drawn to His grace and goodness? If they hate us for our opposition, though we show mercy, praise God; if they repent and come to Christ, praise Him even more!

Nature of the “B” in LGBT

It occurred to me after writing my previous post that Justin R. Cannon has a bigger problem with his argument than I previously thought. As stated in my last post, Cannon presents the argument that the people Paul was referring to in Romans 1 were acting unnatural in their same-sex activities because they were heterosexual. If they had been homosexual this action, according to Cannon, would have been natural and acceptable.

The foundation of Cannon’s entire argument is based on people being created either homosexual or heterosexual. Each of these creations possess their own unique nature. So what is unnatural for one is natural for the other. If God created homosexuals with their nature and likewise heterosexuals with their nature, what nature do bisexuals possess? Did God create bisexuals with a dual nature?

Cannon includes bisexuals in his defense of the LGBT way of life, so what exactly does it mean for bisexuals to be part of God’s natural creation? Are they a special group of humankind created to have “natural” relations with either sex? If so, why did God create heterosexuals? Why are there homosexuals? Why didn’t God create us all to be bisexual thus allowing us to choose whichever lifestyle suits us? That way, people could not have been lead to “unnatural” relations because of their sin and Paul would not have condemned the behavior.

But the fact of the matter is God created women for men so that the two could be one flesh. Paul was rightly condemning same-sex actions as unnatural because they are. God created a heterosexual race only; and Justin R. Cannon’s self-defeating Bible study only serves to prove how true that is.

Response to an LGBT Bible Study

I was asked to give my opinion on the conclusions of Justin R. Cannon regarding Romans 1:24-27. Cannon’s commentary appears in a Bible study on a pro-homosexual website called truthsetsfree.net. Cannon is the founding director of the website which touts itself as an affirming Christian outreach ministry to the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community.

I have been involved with apologetics for many years, but never delved into this arena until now. I never realized the impact the gay agenda had on the Christian church until it hit home, when my grown stepdaughter was seduced by the doctrines of the “Christian” gay agenda.

Romans, chapter 1, is one area of Scripture I always felt was so non-ambiguous regarding the condemnation of homosexuality that the homosexual community couldn’t possibly formulate a coherent argument to the contrary. Reading Cannon’s commentary affirmed my assumption.

Cannon is praised by the LGBT community because of his efforts to justify homosexuality in God’s holy word. Cannon’s work is comforting to many in the gay and lesbian community, but do his arguments make sense? How, for example, does he justify homosexual behavior from Romans, chapter 1, when it appears to so strongly condemn that behavior?

Cannon first wants his readers to believe that anti-homosexual sentiment in the church is a result of bad teaching and a lack of contextual understanding. But what Cannon offers his readers is something far worse than “bad teaching;” he offers them a twisted view of Scripture designed to fit his gay agenda.

In his Bible study, Cannon draws the attention of his readers to a single Greek word, aphente (to give up, divorce), appearing in verse 27. He asks his readers to ponder these questions: “How can you give up something you do not have? How can you divorce something you are not bound to?” He answers the questions by misrepresenting Paul’s teaching on God’s natural creation. Instead of recognizing the true context: “they gave up the natural use of women,” Cannon changed the meaning to: “they gave up THEIR natural use of women because they were heterosexual.” This, of course, implies that God also created homosexuals who have a different nature than those to whom Paul is referring.

This raises some obvious questions: If God created man in His own image, why do men possess two different natures? Does God have two natures? If God calls a man’s leaving the natural use of women dishonorable, then the same must be true for a homosexual man leaving his “natural” use of a man for a woman?

Nobody needs to explain to a child, for instance, that homosexuality is unnatural; it is evident from creation. Men and women are different and compatible. When God made Eve from Adam, Adam declared, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” The following verse, therefore, affirms, “For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh.” It is evident that God designed nature such that a young man would expect to have a mother and father, leave home, and marry a woman. This nature is clearly evident from the creation. To the church in Corinth Paul asserted this: “For man was not made from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man.” (1Cor. 11:8-10)

Man was not created for man or woman for woman, but woman was created for man. That is the way God made us. It is the result of our fallen state that has perverted the truth of God’s creation. The creation itself is evidence of what natural relations are. Those who practice unnatural relations are without excuse because of that evidence.

Even marriage is a model of God’s relationship to us who believe. Paul elucidates to the Ephesians in chapter five that the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church. Christ is the Bridegroom and the church is His bride. If homosexuality was intentionally created by God, who is the head in those relationships? And what do such relationships represent spiritually, that God is the Bridegroom of Himself, or that the church is her own bride without God? And if a homosexual man were to abandon his same-sex relationship and join himself to a woman, thus becoming a model of Christ and His church, are we to believe that God will find this dishonorable? If the gay and lesbian community wants to ponder spiritual questions, let them chew on these.

Cannon further attempts to distort the context by introducing an unfounded connection to orgies. Cannon concludes that since Paul refers to lust and dishonorable passions being practiced, he must be talking about orgies. Yeah, that’s the ticket. It is a matter of historical fact that the pagan world indulged in orgies so this must be what Paul is referring to. Cannon’s conclusion is nothing short of a blatant denial of the true context of Paul’s words.

The only thing Cannon accomplishes in his Bible study is to introduce to his readers a different gospel than the one preached by Christ’s holy apostles. Take head to what the Apostle Paul sternly warned, “If anyone preaches any other gospel to you than what you have received, let him be accursed.” (Gal. 1:9)

Our prayers cry to God through our Savior Jesus Christ that those homosexuals compelled to follow Christ will receive strength to overcome their carnal desires and cleave onto His amazing grace and healing. Many have left the gay community by turning to Christ for help. Contrary to the lies propagated by gay activists, former homosexuals live happy normal fulfilling lives. We all have our cross to bear, so we ask that you bear your cross and turn to Him. He will not disappoint you; He will not leave you in confusion.

For resources and information to help understand this issue from a Christian perspective, please visit www.focusonthefamily.org

God bless!