Changing Views

The Evolution of My Views on
Same-sex Relationships

What was my original view of God’s view?

Back in the “ancient days” of the mid-1980s this was my sincerely held and, I believed, soundly biblical view:

Sex is a good gift that God intended us to enjoy
The only proper place for sex is within marriage where sex helps seal that unique relationship
Marriage in God’s eyes can only ever be between a man and a woman
All-male and all-female sexual activities are a shamefully wicked rebellion against God’s natural, created order.
They are part of a special category of “super sins” that go against our core identity as human beings made in God’s image
You cannot be both a practicing “homosexual” and a Christian – any more than you can be a contract killer and a Christian!
There is no exception for people who have gay sex within a committed relationship; any unrepented gay sex excludes you from the kingdom

On what was that view based?

Neither my upbringing nor my early church experience gave me any strong steer on this question. But aged 17 I'd started exploring various issues based on what I thought the Bible was saying. This led me to become a Calvinist and a believer in an eternally conscious tormenting hell - Calvin's predestination of the eternally damned - boy, that was a tough steak to chew!

(But more from Calvin later when he turns out to be a surprising revisionist ally in this debate!) I also became a young earth creationist, an opponent of women priests, or even preachers, and a marriage complementarian. These views (which I've long since abandoned) mostly horrified our youth group leaders! But then I’ve never been afraid to take and express positions that clashed with others’.

The same process also led me to my traditionalist position on same-sex relationships, based mainly on my reading of the NIV 1984 translation of three New Testament passages: Romans 1:18-27; 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 and 1 Timothy 1:9-11. This was one issue where my youth group leaders would have taken the same view as me, because in the mid-1980s it was the only evangelical view! ,In fact, it was what most of society then believed.

How has my view of his view changed?

I still believe marriage is the place where God wants us to enjoy his good gift of sex to help seal that unique partnership
But I’m now convinced in God’s eyes marriage can and does include committed monogamous relationships between same-sex partners
Sex between married same-sex partners is just as good and no more sinful than sex between opposite sex spouses
The same-sex sexual activities condemned in the New Testament were very different to sex within same-sex marriages which were then unheard of
The condemned activities were all promiscuous, abusive acts of male-only anal intercourse, mainly by slave owners with their male slaves but also more formal arrangements between older married men and youths
God no more excludes gay people from his kingdom on the basis of who they have sex with than he does heterosexual people

For summaries of the reasons for my current views – in short, medium and long versions – please just scroll down or along the menu and immediately next to this section you'll find my Case Summaries.

Why did I change my view?

Because, I believe, the Holy Spirit has shown me it wasn’t God’s view. But this revelation certainly didn’t come to me in a flash one night like those parables I was given when I was 13. For 20 years I was convinced my traditionalist view was God’s view as revealed in Scripture. Then about 21 years ago I was involved in an Alpha course where I helped bring to the Lord a gay man, Nigel, in a committed (and, I assume, sexual) relationship with his partner, Adrian. (For privacy their names have been changed). He testified God had healed him from his alcohol dependency. Yet, despite my prayers, I saw he remained just as gay and just as “wedded” to Adrian.

What on earth was God doing here? How was this possible? So, I came to believe that it was possible to be a gay person in a committed relationship with someone of the same sex but you really shouldn’t be. To be honest, I was just pretty confused about the whole thing.

It was only 10 years later that my own teenage daughter, Josie, challenged me to look at what others had said on this issue, to re-read my Bible and talk to God about it: what did he really think about gay people and same-sex relationships?

This led me to the affirming yet (I believe) thoroughly biblical view that I have today. I came to realise I’d made some fundamental errors that led me to my traditionalist position on same-sex relationships.

If you’re interested to know a bit more about my journey please read my more detailed story which I'll link here.

What key errors led to my original position?

I believe the following key errors led me to my original position:

Reading only inaccurate modern Bible translations of key verses
Taking an inconsistently literal approach to those verses - contrary to how I and other evangelicals normally interpret the Bible
Ignorance of the world into which the verses were originally written
Ignorance of what makes people gay and bisexual
Failing to follow the New Testament’s own guidance on how we apply Scripture’s instructions to situations Scripture didn’t foresee

But maybe I just got it wrong second time?

Maybe. But I really, really don’t think so. You see this wasn’t the end of my journey. Like many evangelical churches, my own church has been going through a painful process of deciding where we should stand on same-sex relationships. Two lovely, Christ-centred, young couples in our church were convinced the revisionists had got this seriously wrong: my view about same sex relationships may have changed several years ago, but God’s view hadn’t. This challenged me again. I was either wrong now or wrong previously, so I was clearly capable of getting this issue wrong. Who knows maybe I was right first time?

Scripture encourages us to “test everything” (1 Thess 5:21).

I needed to be sure as sure as I possibly could be of what the Lord’s will was on this vital life-changing, life or death issue; not life-changing or life or death for me as a happily married heterosexual, but for many LGBTQ+ people. It's life-changing for gay and bisexual Christians who are told if they truly own their sexuality Jesus will disown them. As traditionalists see it, it's a life and death issue to practice "gay" sex because it excludes you from the Kingdom. As revisionists see it, it's a life and death issue when LGBTQ+ people either lose their faith or are driven towards suicide because traditional teaching is making them hate themselves.

And so I prayed for wisdom, as James encourages us (James 1:5) - "Please show me what’s right, Lord". And so I searched and researched, I thought and I prayed. I read and listened to both sides of the argument – not just Matthew Vines and James Brownson, but Robert Gagnon, John Stott and Mike Winger. Not just Richard and Christopher Hay’s new affirming book, but Richard’s original traditionalist essay.

And the result of that search? Like Christopher and Richard Hays I’m more convinced than ever that God has widened his mercy to include within his kingdom all LGBTQ+ people, “fearfully and wonderfully made” as they are, and fully accept their relationships on just the same terms as he does with heterosexuals like me.

What about your own journey?

If you’re on that same journey I’ve been on, I’d encourage you, also, to start out by praying for God’s wisdom – for the Holy Spirit to “guide [you] into all truth.” (John 16:13). Ask him to “open [your] eyes to see the wonderful truths in [his] instructions.” (Psalm 119:18, NLT). And ask for his humility too, because “with humility comes wisdom” (Proverbs 11:2) This means laying aside not your faith in Jesus and his word, but for a time laying aside what you’d previously thought on this particular issue, and being prepared to hear him if he’s leading you some place new.

And to “test everything” commit to taking time and effort to explore this issue by using your God-given reason. “The beginning of wisdom is this: get wisdom. Though it cost all you have, get understanding.” (Proverbs 4:7)

Absolutely read the Bible, but read it in different translations and understand what the original Greek and Hebrew meant. Also, understand the world and context in which they were written to understand how it may apply to our different world. There’s plenty of advice out there to guide you (including this website and the sources I reference). As Proverbs tells us, “The way of a fool seems right in his own eyes; but the wise listen to advice.” (Proverbs 12:15). So, seek out the counsel of others who’ve written and talked about this issue.

But don’t just seek out voices that confirm you own original views, gathering about you teachers “to say what [your] itching ears want to hear.” (2 Tim 4:3). Listen to and look at both sides of the argument. And listen to the other side with open ears, as I sought to. If you only seek out voices of those who agree with your original position or don’t listen to opposing voices with truly open ears I guarantee where you’ll end up: in exactly the same place you’d started! But you won’t be any closer to truly knowing whether that’s also where God is!

Please read my piece which I'll link here for some more detailed advice about how I believe we can hear what God’s saying to us through his word.

Aren’t I just trying to substitute my worldly wisdom for God’s?

Absolutely not! As far as I’m concerned, the only position that matters is God’s position. Ultimately, I don’t care about whether the position I reach is popular or fashionable. I’ve been a Calvinist, a complementarian and young Earth creationist, an eternal torment infernalist (positions I’ve since abandoned as mistaken). And I don’t much care if I lose face by changing my position. (Hence I’ve been a member of three different political parties over the past 40+ years). God’s wisdom is higher than our wisdom and ultimately the best thing for us, however things might first look: “… my ways are higher than your ways, my thoughts higher than your thoughts" (Isaiah 55:9).

If God is on a different page to me I need to turn the pages back or forwards to get where he is. My whole journey has been about trying to find God’s wisdom and not my own or the world’s.

If we reject traditional biblical standards about sex and marriage might we end up rejecting the Bible’s standards about
everything else?

This is an important question that used to vex me plenty. But I now see that revisionists are not proposing we reject biblical standards about sex and marriage. Revisionists believe they are simply applying Scripture’s instructions in the purpose-driven, love-centric way Jesus and his apostles did to new situations unforeseen by Scripture. Jesus applied the Sabbath laws flexibly to allow him to heal on the Sabbath and similarly the apostles did so to accept into the church Gentiles who were not circumcised as the Law required. This is actually the way most evangelicals understand and apply Scripture to most issues most of the time. Revisionists are just doing the same - applying Scripture’s instruction to keep sex special for marriage in a purpose-driven, love-centric way for a group of people unknown to its human writers to exist at the time when Scripture was written - gay people. Yes, God knew they existed, of course. However, as we'll look at later under Scripture's "Silence" , there were very good reasons why Scripture could not address that issue at the time.

So, we revisionists are just saying that, like everyone else, gay and bisexual people should be allowed to marry the person they fall in love with and then enjoy a sexual relationship with them, regardless of the sex that person happens to be. On a proper examination we believe nothing in Scripture’s direct commands prevent this and Scripture’s underlying truths actually strongly support it.