Many people think Christians are prejudiced against homosexuals because some Christians have said and done very unkind things to homosexuals (often in the most public way). If we were as kind, loving, and caring of people as Jesus was, no one would accuse us of prejudice. Jesus was not persecuted for being mean to people. Jesus was persecuted and killed by the religious and political leaders because he was kind to people and because that kindness included speaking and acting out against the injustice and unkindness of the religious and political leaders. Jesus wasn’t killed for standing against sin or sinners. Jesus was killed by the religious, political, and spiritual principalities and powers because he opposed their oppressive power with the power of God, which he used to heal and care for people. Caiaphas, Pilate, and Satan were in league together and turned their destructive power onto Jesus directly. Jesus absorbed all they could do to him and then the healing, caring power of God found its fullest expression in the resurrection of Jesus, which marked the beginning of the end of all destructive powers.

What is the point of all this? We are not called to morality debates, or to defend the history or status of any human government, or to protect any legal definition of marriage. We are called by Jesus to love people and treat them with kindness. We are citizens of the kingdom of God and no other allegiance compares to that for us. Our mission is to preach the death and resurrection of Jesus and the death to our own selves and our own resurrection to new life. That is the Gospel message. We preach that message by loving and being kind to people. No other way. The Christian response to homosexuality and heterosexuality are the same: have you been crucified with Christ? Have you been raised to new life? Is it you that lives or is it Christ who lives in you? These are not questions we can answer in the abstract or on behalf of people we don’t know personally. And we can’t think for a minute that death to self and resurrection in Christ looks like anything other than the same healing, caring power of God that Jesus both submitted to and wielded. So let’s commit to being as kind, loving, and caring of people as Jesus was, and leave the rest to the Holy Spirit.