We are celebrating the wrong thing:
While June might be a celebration of all things homosexual in some quarters, we need to reconsider. We can start by recalling that the very first Pride Month – or Pride Day – occurred a long time ago. We read all about it in the 19th chapter of the book of Genesis. The sin of sodomy was not looked upon very favourably by God, so the five cities of the plain were all destroyed. As verses 23-29 put it:
The sun had risen on the earth when Lot came to Zoar. Then the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah sulfur and fire from the Lord out of heaven. And he overthrew those cities, and all the valley, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground. But Lot's wife, behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt. And Abraham went early in the morning to the place where he had stood before the Lord. And he looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah and toward all the land of the valley, and he looked and, behold, the smoke of the land went up like the smoke of a furnace. So it was that, when God destroyed the cities of the valley, God remembered Abraham and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow when he overthrew the cities in which Lot had lived.
So the very first Pride Day did not go down very well. And lest critics think this is just some Old Testament thing which God no longer is concerned about, they better think again – and actually read their whole Bible (if they even have one). The New Testament also makes it quite clear what God thinks of this particular sin.
Indeed, what the Apostle Paul says in Romans 1 could not be clearer. He speaks of how God gives up sinners to their sin, and how those who reject God and truth end up embracing degeneracy and lies. He could have run with any number of sins here to use as an example of this, but he highlights just one. As verses 26-28 state:
For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done.
Of interest, this passage demonstrates that homosexuality is both a great sin and also the punishment for the sin. When you want sin bad enough, God will allow you to wallow in it, and it becomes a chain around your neck. The punishment fits the crime.
But I want to return to the Old Testament and look at just one more very interesting passage. Isaiah 3:9 in the NIV says this:
The look on their faces testifies against them;
they parade their sin like Sodom;
they do not hide it.
Woe to them!
They have brought disaster upon themselves.
Here is how the ESV puts it:
For the look on their faces bears witness against them;
they proclaim their sin like Sodom;
they do not hide it.
Woe to them!
For they have brought evil on themselves.
Notice two things about the phrase "they parade their sin like Sodom." As to the verb being used, other versions can also be appealed to here. The HCSB says "they flaunt their sin". The NET Bible says "they openly boast of their sin."
Moreover, this sin is "like Sodom". Just where does the word "sodomy" come from? Comparing this flaunting and parading of evil with Sodom is very telling indeed.
But let me mention two further things about all this. One, if you look at the context of the passage, it is of course referring to Judah and Jerusalem, and God's judgment that is coming upon them. All sorts of sins were being punished here, not just one.
Also, while other sinners of course promote their sins and evil actions, the reference to Sodom here makes this even more fitting when we consider the rainbow mob of today. The homosexual activists, the trans militants and the drag queens that we see everywhere can perfectly be described as those who flaunt their sin, parade their sin, and promote their sin. Indeed, having loud and proud parades down our main streets all year long – and not just in some Pride Month – is just how they are so very well remembered. That is what they do. They flaunt their sin like Sodom.
Little wonder that another familiar text from a few chapters later in Isaiah also seems to fit so very well here. I refer to Isaiah 5:20: "Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter."
The activists have manged to convince most our our elites, politicians, and media folks that this sexual revolution is a good thing, and those who resist these parades of debauchery and decadence are somehow the bad guys. Vice has become virtue, and virtue vice.
So the Bible speaks perfectly to the times we are now living in. But the way the militants happily shake their fists at God and think they can get away with this public promotion of evil will not long be the case. They will one day meet their maker and have to give an account.
We of of course can pray for them and share biblical truth with them. Some WILL respond. I have a number of personal friends who were rescued out of the radical homosexual lifestyle and have been wonderfully transformed. Many have gone on to get married and have children.
So change is most certainly possible. But pride is never the way to proceed. As we also are told in Scripture:
Psalm 18:27 For you save a humble people, but the haughty eyes you bring down.
Proverbs 11:2 When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble is wisdom.
Proverbs 16:18 Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.
Proverbs 21:4 Haughty eyes and a proud heart, the lamp of the wicked, are sin.
James 4:6 God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.
So forget about Pride Month. What we need is an international Repentance Month. That is our only hope.
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