Back when I was working at That Ministry, it was widely acknowledged that no one was allowed to speak to the Big Guy because he was very important to God, and if we interrupted his day, we might be disrupting whatever was going on between him and God at that moment. We called it, “Breaking his anointing.” You didn’t want to break his anointing because then he might not be able to perform whatever miracle God had called him to do that day.
I can’t tell you why I fell for that, but I did. Then, one day I woke up and thought, “Is God that weak?” I mean, here I was trusting that this Being had created heaven and earth, had managed thousands of years of miracles to bring Jesus into the world, then thirty-three years of perfection in human form, culminating with a resurrection from the dead after a three-day junket to hell, but me saying hello to some gel-slicked yokel in a three-thousand dollar suit was going to keep Him from being able to move on someone’s heart?
That’s embarrassing, y’all. Ten years of my life are embarrassing. I tell you about it because for every one of me waking up and asking that question, there were five more at the ministry telling me that was the enemy coming to confuse my mind, and disrupt my purpose. I tend to think it’s the other way around, though.
Jesus was all about suffering people to come to him. Sick, small, dirty, unwanted–that was his jam. The more insignificant the better because they needed him. The ones who just wanted to say hello, or touch his robe because they believed in his ability to make their lives more livable were welcome. Find me a time when Jesus told someone to go away because they were interrupting his ability to do his Father’s work. Find me a time when Jesus had his disciples go out and make sure the gathering crowds knew not to look him in the eye. Find me a time when Jesus demanded a stylist and his own fully stocked refrigerator to travel with him.
Jesus wasn’t weak. You couldn’t break his connection to God because it wasn’t weak. Your humanity didn’t diminish his godliness because it was not weak.
Your sin did not diminish his holiness.
I’m going to preface the rest of this by saying I don’t believe in sex-out-of-wedlock as a sin. I’m also going to preface this by saying I don’t think gay sex is a sin. Whatever consenting adults want to do with their bits is fine by me, as long as the other party is also consenting and adult. Jesus said there were two laws to follow, and neither of those laws said anything about how you like your toast buttered.
However, some people honestly do believe if you are a sexually active gay person, you are in great sin and great moral peril. They feel like they have to tell you that they love you, but they hate your sin. Your sin being that you are acting on your gayness. (If you are gay and celibate, they don’t have to hate your sin, they just have to worry that one day you might snap.)
There are some people who feel like gay marriage diminishes straight marriage, kind of like how me saying hello to the Big Guy might diminish his connection to God. Those people won’t even bake you a cake because that cake might cast a pall on their spirituality.
Those people are wrong. Those people are misguided. Those people are ignorant.
Sin does not diminish the presence of Christ. The presence of Christ diminishes the presence of sin.
Jesus told us to treat our neighbors as we wanted to be treated.
Jesus told us to go the extra mile for strangers.
Jesus told us to go out into the world and be lights in darkness, not to sit in our fruity little churches and congratulate ourselves on how pristine and white we are.
If homosexuality were a sin (and again, I don’t believe it is), that still wouldn’t have kept Jesus away from your wedding. That man liked a party. Sin didn’t keep Jesus away from whores and thieves. Sin didn’t keep Jesus from knowingly adding Judas to his core group of disciples. Sin didn’t keep Jesus away from crowds full of people, which probably included some gays. Sin didn’t even keep Jesus out of the Temple–but he did whip and curse the sin right out of there.
Jesus is not so weak that you showing love to someone you think is deplorable will break your connection to him. On the contrary, that’s the way he likes to work.
If you are afraid that showing love to another human being somehow weakens your Christianity, then I pity you the little god you serve. If your god is that small, that weak, and that petty, you need all the sympathy I have in my reserves.
The Outside Lane 