{"id":139,"date":"2015-06-26T11:24:40","date_gmt":"2015-06-26T11:24:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/elifesucks.local\/?p=139"},"modified":"2020-03-29T17:57:45","modified_gmt":"2020-03-29T17:57:45","slug":"gay-marriage-ruling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/elifesucks.local\/experience-life\/gay-marriage-ruling\/","title":{"rendered":"Gay Marriage Ruling"},"content":{"rendered":"

Staff,<\/p>\n

I’m sure you’ve seen the news on social media. The Supreme Court ruled today 5-4 that gay marriage is legal in all states now.<\/p>\n

I’m sure you have lots of feelings about this. Maybe sadness. Maybe anger. Maybe confusion. You probably want to vent. I totally get it.<\/p>\n

Here’s what I’d ask you to do, though. Let’s not express these views on social media.<\/p>\n

Here are some reasons why:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Most evangelical Christians are likely to respond negatively, some even hatefully. This will cause watching unbelievers to further justify their rejection of Christianity. Let’s not give them reason to reject Jesus just because we disagree about a political issue. We want the watching world to start following Jesus much more than we want them to agree with us about a gay marriage law. We don’t ask people to give up gay marriage before coming to Christ. You come to Christ first, he changes your heart, then you give up gay marriage.<\/li>\n
  2. We have gay people that go to our church. They will be watching to see if we still love them & welcome them into our church. I don’t want you or I to give them any reason to believe that we are “against” them & that they are unwelcome now.<\/li>\n
  3. You represent our church. People will see your comments as possibly being endorsed by the church, which wouldn’t be true. In fact, as the news stations call, we plan to make no comment. Why, you ask? Because this issue is serious enough & emotional enough for a conversation, not just a brief sound bite. Sound bites, especially with the media, usually get Christians in trouble. They hurt our cause, they usually don’t help it, from my experience. A 20 second response doesn’t do justice to the issue, and there’s almost no way you can be viewed as loving in 20 seconds. They want you to just say, “I can’t believe this. I’m upset. I disagree, etc.” Every homosexual & every friend\/family of a homosexual will hear that as hateful, which wouldn’t be true, but you didn’t have time to express your love for them. And if we can’t express the truth in love, like we are told to do, then maybe we need to find another context where we can.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Anyways, I’ll be chatting with you more in the days to come about the implications this ruling has for our church. In the mean time, be encouraged. God is on his throne. This doesn’t surprise him. Today’s ruling makes the work we do more important than ever. Laws, leaders & governments can’t change people’s hearts. Only Jesus can. Your job & mine is to introduce as many people to Jesus as we can. What a privilege!<\/p>\n

    You guys rock!<\/p>\n

    Chris<\/p>\n

    —
    \nChris Galanos
    \nLead Pastor
    \nExperienceLifeNow.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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