About five years ago I contributed to the book, “The pastor with the thorn in his side”. In it, seven pastors told their stories about experiencing depression. Would it have been okay if we had identified ourselves as “depressed Christians” at the time?[1] I ask because of an exchange in this month’s Evangelicals Now.
Responding to a previous debate between Andy Robinson and Matthew Roberts on same-sex desire, John Samuel, an experienced retired pastor asks Roberts a series of questions. Is Roberts willing to accept that Andy and others find their identity in being children of God, does he recognise the distinction between temptation and sin, is same sex attraction more sinful than someone’s sinful desires in relation to other sex attraction.
EN offered Roberts the opportunity to respond, a courtesy they don’t always extend to those who have been critiqued via the letters page. I would hope that he would use that opportunity well. I’ll reproduce his response in full so you can determine for yourself how well he does at responding to the questions set by John Samuel. He writes:
I am very happy to respond to John Samuel’s questions about my article. In answer to his first question, I can’t comment on Andy Robinson personally, though I am pleased that he says that his identity “in Christ” is foundational for him. What is undeniable is that Living Out materials regularly treat being gay as an identity. They speak regularly of people who “are” gay, bisexual, same-sex attracted, or trans, and does not query whether those “identities” are real but speaks of them on the assumption that they are. Granted, they say (as Andy Robinson does) that a Christian’s primary identity is in Christ, but they do not deny that a Christian can rightly also identify him/herself according to the LGBTQ+ labels. Indeed, “Christian and gay” is the first thing by which Living Out announces itself on an internet search page. Andy unfortunately misunderstands my point here in his response to my article, also in the August edition. I am not trying to persuade him or anyone else that his “experience of same-sex attraction was not real in some way”. Of course our sinful desires are real. But we don’t imagine that any other kind of sinful desire establishes an identity which we can adopt alongside being an image of God, male or female, redeemed by Christ. We don’t call ourselves “excessive-food attracted Christians” instead of repenting of our greed, “inflated-ego attracted Christians” instead of repenting of our pride, or “neighbour’s-wife attracted Christians” instead of repenting of (opposite-sex) sexual lust.
And so nor should we call ourselves “same-sex attracted Christians” (or “gay Christians”) instead of repenting of same-sex lust. God deals with all sin, and calls us to respond to all sin, in the same way. Same-sex lust does not fall into a unique category which requires no repentance. On John’s third question, I hope I can reassure him. Opposite-sex lust is a most serious sin, as I pointed out in my article, and widely condemned across Scripture. My point was that we must not minimise its seriousness, and we would not do so in a parallel way to how Living Out does with same-sex lust, by accepting it as an (in itself) morally-neutral identity. Now it is true that homosexual lust is a more grotesque distortion of God’s good design of marriage than opposite-sex lust is, which is why Paul mentions homosexuality in Romans 1 as something which sums up the depravity of sin and idolatry in a particularly clear way. But this is in no way minimises how appalling in God’s eyes sexual lust for the opposite sex is, for it too is a grotesque twisting of His created order. On the second question however I am afraid I have to differ with John, for what he says is a theological mistake; indeed, it is the position of the Roman Catholic Church since the Council of Trent, which all Protestants have historically rejected, as I argued in the February edition of en.
True, purely external temptation does not make us guilty of sin, just as it did not for Christ. But for the rest of us external temptation is joined by the internal temptation of our sinful hearts. “Each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire” (James 1v14), which emphatically was not true of Christ. And since it is a sin to tempt (which is why God tempts no-one, James 1v13; see also Luke 17v1,2) the desire to sin is sin. It pollutes our hearts, makes us an offence to God in our deepest being (Ps.51v5-6) and lies at the root of the sinfulness of all sinful actions. It was Paul’s covetous desire which condemned him before God, and the realisation of it which God used to bring him to conviction and repentance (Rom.7v7-12). That is why repentance must not be merely external like the Pharisees, but internal. It is tearing our hearts, not our garments (Joel 2v13); grieving not merely that we did evil, but that we are evil, in the depths of our hearts, from where our sins come (Mark 7v20-23).
Of course it is better when tempted by our sinful desires not to act upon them, but that does not mean we can then congratulate ourselves on our innocence. We should confess our sinful desires before the Lord and ask for His mercy, even as we thank Him for forgiving us for them and preserving us from falling prey to them, and asking for more strength to go on putting them to death. And what I should not do with any sinful desire is to treat it as an acceptable part of my character; to allow it to remain undisturbed within me as if it is no offence to God; to name myself (in part) after it by speaking of it as (part of ) my identity; to speak of it without shame as something which can peacefully coexist with being a new creation in Christ. We should not do this for any sinful desire, sexual or otherwise, and so we should not do it for same-sex lust.
I’m not going to respond to every theological argument Roberts makes. I’ve responded in detail to his theological position on desire and temptation in my e-book, Desire and Temptation. In that book, I argue that much of the current debate on concupiscence seems to reflect a misunderstanding of the arguments made by contemporaries, of the actual position of Reformers like Calvin and of what Scripture says in key places. This is particularly relevant to the way in which Robert’s incorrectly argues that Smauel has taken the position of the Council of Trent. What I want to do is pick up on a few specific concerns I have with his response.
First, Roberts says “I can’t comment on Andy Robinson personally, though I am pleased that he says that his identity “in Christ” is foundational for him.” This undermines a core principle to the conversation. Whilst we cannot read people’s souls, it is good convention that we act charitably in our assumptions of others and work on the assumption that we are having a conversation between brothers and sisters in Christ. Roberts’ language starts to create doubt in regards to that mutual understanding. Further, he can work with what Andy Robinson actually does say. He can simply acknowledge that Andy has been clear about his identity in Christ. Indeed, I note the tick “I am pleased that…” There can be a trend to treat clarification of the obviousl, pre-existing, obvious facts to be treated as a new revelation, a confession if you like.
Secondly, Roberts claims that “What is undeniable is that Living Out materials regularly treat being gay as an identity.” Actually this is not the case in any shape of form at all. It’s important to be clear that Roberts is not merely giving an honest opinion but moving to deny facts about Living Out’s position.
Andrew Blunt in response to the question “Why do you identify as a Gay Christian?” writes:
“My sexuality isn’t part of my identity; it’s not at the core of who I am.”
He adds:
“When I refer to myself as ‘a gay Christian’, I’m describing myself and part of my life experience; I’m not defining myself or making a statement about my identity.”
He concludes:
““I don’t ‘identify’ as a gay Christian, but sometimes I do find it a helpful descriptive phrase.”
Then Ed Shaw reviewing Robert’s book, “Pride” observes the following: First in reference to use of the terms “gay Christian” and “same sex attracted Christian” he says:
“…in neither case am I making my pattern of sexual attraction my core identity.”
He goes on:
“I am simply recognising, as Roberts does, that my sexual desires are a significant part of what it means to be a human created in God’s image.”
He suggests that there is a problem with Matthew’s position
“The problem is that his ban leaves us with almost no shared language with which to describe and discuss different patterns of sexual desire among human beings.”
Then he raises a missiological challenge.
“Forbidding the use of words and concepts that are in common parlance will massively hamper our evangelism and discipleship.”
This is what he actually thinks about desire.
“Behind each of our evil desires is something good that has been distorted and disordered but, if refocussed and reordered, can be redeemed.”
Now this is important theologically but I want to pause to pick up on something immediately pressing. Roberts has stated things that are obviously incorrect about Living Out and particular Christians associated with them.[2] What he says is potentially detrimental to those people and indeed as we will see shortly to others. He should quickly and publicly retract his comments. It was disappointing that Evangelicals Now published the comments. They have an editorial responsibility to verify claims they publish and cannot simply deflect responsibility solely to the author. As a minimum, they should provide a corrective note wherever this has been published.
Indeed, I would encourage EN to go further. First, they should publish a statement apologising for the incorrect content and its impact. They should clarify the case and confirm that Living Out are a recognised orthodox, Evangelical entity with no question marks about their orthodoxy. I personally believe it would be appropriate for the trustees to consider a donation to Living Out recognising the potential negative impact on them.
As I said, this matters because Roberts comments have an impact on others. As I observed above, some Christians may identify as depressed Christians. Indeed, there all kinds of ways in which we acknowledge our experience, desires and struggles in how we identify ourselves to others. That could be positive, neutral and indeed negative. And I think a look at the whole Bible permits us to. Certainly, historically protestant Christians have considered themselves to do this, Luther famously described himself as simultaneously “saint and sinner”. This is not to make something the core of our identity. It is rather to give us the language to describe all aspects of our lives. Perhaps indeed we would do well to speak honestly about our struggles and could learn from Living Out in that regard.
[1] Given the subject below, I want to be 100% clear that I do not regard Depression to be sin. However, there has been a tendency throughout history to treat it as such and create a stigma, something tohxse of us writing wanted to counter. I would be concerned that current framing of discussion about desire and temptation might lead us unhelpfully back down that route again by being too ready to identify internal experiences as sinful lusts.
[2] Indeed, we might note that he shifts the language going beyond what others say about themselves by blurring categories. Roberts collapses same-sex attraction into lust. This moves from theological assessment to accusation. At no point do any of the writers at Living Out see “lust” as something to identify as. It is the distinction between recognising that my desire is to protect myself, leading to a temptation to make reckless accusations about others. The person concerned would not identify themselves as “a slanderous Christian” or if they did, it would be a level of incredible and ironic honesty moving to repentance.
