the following resource is from desiringgod.org this morning's text is from romans chapter 1 verses 24 through 27. therefore god gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity that their bodies might be dishonored among them for they exchanged the truth of god for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever amen for this cause god gave them over to degrading passions for the women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural and in the same way also men abandoned their natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the dew penalty of their heir in our exposition of the book of romans now we have come to this astonishingly relevant section in chapter 1 verses 24 and i'll probably go on through 28 even though i didn't announce that i would go that far where paul touches on the reality of homosexuality now this is relevant i say for a lot of reasons we mentioned some of them yesterday there was a conference called here i stand to address the issue of homosexual and homosexually active clergy in the elca that was reported in the star tribune as you all saw whether in saint paul or in minneapolis the story of the hate crime committed against the university of wyoming student who was lashed to a fence and beaten and not expected to live perhaps you also read about the lambeth conference in england back in august with 641 anglican bishops from around the world who came together and voted remarkably overwhelmingly that homosexual practice is incompatible with scripture perhaps you saw in usa today or new york times or washington post in late summer full page ads picturing 850 former homosexuals who had gathered that summer last summer at exodus international for a conference to celebrate the power of christ to triumph over homosexuality here in minnesota with the help of some of you i am kept apprised of various legal cases involving the custody of children in the homes of homosexual couples and the disputes that can arise over foster care and adoption in these matters or to bring it right home to our church i'm aware in our own fellowship of people who are homosexually oriented and i'm aware of a wider group of families that are touched by this sons and daughters parents uncles and aunts and close friends in other words this is not a subject that you have to work hard to find relevance for and paul would not have been surprised by these things the apostle paul writing 2000 years ago was not and would not be taken off guard by any of this if i understand him correctly now what is unusual about our day one of the things that's unusual there are many is the defense of the legitimacy of homosexual relations and activity biblically in other words groups that attempt to show from the scriptures that it is legitimate to have a long-term faithful one-on-one homosexual relationship the most common example of this kind of of uh thinking claims that the denunciation's apparent denunciation of homosexuality in the new testament are not references to committed long-term faithful homosexual relations but our condemnations of promiscuity and pedorasty let me use the words here of one scholar who's not living anymore and i won't mention his name just not to besmirch his memory any more than it already is what the new testament is against is something significantly different from a homosexual orientation which some people seem to have from their earliest days in other words the new testament is not talking about what we have come to speak of as sexual inversion rather it is concerned with sexual perversion inversion referring to being homosexual by birth or by nature and so the argument is yes the the new testament says things about homosexual behavior but when it indicts it it is indicting the promise the promiscuity or the abuse of young people rather than committed long-term homosexual relationships now with regard to our own text right here in chapter one especially verses 26 and 27 the argument gets more precise and the argument here is that the unnaturalness that's being condemned here is when people who are naturally heterosexual do homosexual acts because that's unnatural it's not unnatural for a homosexual to do homosexual acts it's unnatural for a heterosexual to do homosexual acts and that's what the text is condemning let's read it so you can see if you agree just read verses the last part of verse 26 their women exchange the natural function for that which is unnatural and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of woman and burned in their desire toward one another men with men committing indecent acts so the argument goes that what's being indicted here is the unnaturalness of those who are by nature heterosexual leaving that to do homosexual activity and by implication i assume the reverse would also be true those who are homosexual by nature would be unnatural to leave that and engage in heterosexual activity now there are major problems with that interpretation and i'll mention three and as i move toward the third one i move there because that one opens the whole text to us and i will try this morning to to give a faithful exposition of this whole text not just a piece of it here's the first problem in verse 27 it says the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another now if these were men who were by nature heterosexual what's this burning for another man heterosexuals don't burn for the same sex this is a very strong term burning it's used only here in the new testament it's not just the word burn it's got a intensifying particle on the front of it and so here is a major stumbling block for saying that what we have here is heterosexuals who for some strange reason would engage unnaturally in homosexual activity paul's mind these people are burning for the other sex which i think almost by definition is what it means to be a homosexual by nature not heterosexual of course there is such a thing as a bisexual however if if you contemplate the possibility that that's what paul has in mind that the argument won't work either because by implication though i haven't read this argument i've only read the other one a bisexual would by nature naturally engage in sex with either a man or a woman and therefore shouldn't be indicted for either because you're only indicted according to this argument for going against your nature and if your nature is homosexual do homosexual acts if it's heterosexual do heterosexual acts and i presume then by implication if you're a bisexual do either and do them well i can't even finish the sentence making sense out of it that's why we haven't read it i suppose because it's hard to be faithful and long-term doing both so the first problem i have with this argument and this interpretation is that the language of burning for your own sex doesn't seem to fit being a heterosexual and crossing over promiscuously to do homosexual acts here's the second problem in verse 27 at the end of the verse it says their women exchanged the natural affection for that which is unnatural or is that verse 26 the women exchanged their natural affection for that which is unnatural now the little phrase that which is unnatural in the greek is a stock phrase in greek ethical literature for homosexual behavior per se not homosexual promiscuity by heterosexuals now i read that long time ago but yesterday i tracked down josephus i tracked down philo i tracked down plutarch and i looked up texts to see the use of para fusine and whether this claim was so and it is so this is a standard usage in the greek world that when something is done paraphrasis against nature it was what they used to describe homosexuality per se therefore all the evidence linguistically is that when paul uses the phrase to describe what women or men are doing he's not talking about the extraordinary promiscuous activity of a heterosexual going against that nature to do a homosexual thing but homosexuals per se are paraphuses namely against nature so paul simply picks up the common phrase that's used for homosexuality per se in the whole greek ethical literature and uses it and that stands in the way of this interpretation now the third argument against such an interpretation is the big one and it involves us in the larger picture of what's going on in this text and that's what i want to talk about this morning but first let me tell you where we're going this week and next week in some of my prayers about it my aim today in the time that we have is to give a sound and faithful exposition of verses 24 to 28 as i can which will leave me no time for application today which is one of the reasons i planned a long time ago that we would take at least two weeks on this and so my plan is that you will come back my hope is that you will come back because once we're done with the exposition and the big pictures before us many questions are yet to be addressed practical questions personal questions and the wider social questions as well as the wider biblical context which i'm not going to touch on at all which needs to be brought in so we will take at at least one more week on this at least now my prayer as we do this is that in both these weeks we will be a church and i will be a preacher in particular that will find a biblical balance between clear conviction about the sinfulness of homosexual behavior and patient compassion to come alongside those of you who have homosexual desires and alongside your family and your friends and seek your good we really have a beautiful statement on uh conviction and compassion our view of homosexual activity that the elders passed about six years ago and i think that i'm going to make sure it gets into every one of your hands next sunday as part of this service i think you will find great help it's being used all over the baptist general conference in our districts because it is such a good and balanced statement i want us to be and any of you who are um excessively filled with animosity towards homosexual people need to hear this very carefully i want us to be a church like corinth at least a church like paul wanted corinth to be when he wrote listing fornicators this is the list from first corinthians 6 10 fornicators idolaters adulterers effeminate homosexuals thieves covetous drunkards revilers swindlers and then he said such were some of you but you were washed and you were sanctified and you were justified in the name of the lord jesus christ and in the spirit of our god so i want us to be a church of justified sinners who are coming alongside each other with all of our differing genetic hormonal environmental inclinations to our various sins that's a very important sentence which i'll address again next week i'll say it again i want us to be the kind of church that is filled with justified sinners who come alongside each other with our genetic hormonal environmental inclinations that cause everybody in this room to one sin or the other it is folly to think there's no genetic basis for anger impatience rudeness lying theft do you think that sins emerge de novo out of nowhere on the spur of the moment none of them does they're all rooted in how we got to be the way we are either by virtue of our parents or our hormones or our genes everybody got to be the way you are crummy as you are in this room by virtue of the interplay of those three things genes hormones and experiences of a zillion kinds so that what pops out of your mouth sinfully or out of your life sinfully is owing to stuff in you and your background so there's no sense here of getting all worked up about whether sins of any kind have roots in nature they do and the question is so what you do you do genetic research on all the violent criminals criminals in prison today and you will find physical differences between them and the run of the mill culture you will so what do you do empty the prisons and turn everybody loose no we are responsible i am wired to sin certain ways and i could tell them but there's no point in wasting your time on things you already know probably my personality is spring-loaded to sin certain ways no excuse piper well that's all next week so i'm i'm not supposed to be talking about that all of that to say i'm glad you let me be your pastor and i don't want to run out anybody from this church who's wired to sin i don't want to chase anybody away who struggles with the way you're wired or the way your parents did you in i want us to get around each other and say if it takes 10 or 20 years i must stand with you in this battle but make it a battle okay now the third reason for why this interpretation is not valid namely the interpretation that says really what romans 1 is all about is heterosexuals who become promiscuous in homosexual acts or homosexuals who become promiscuous in heterosexual acts and it's not talking about homosexuality per se as an unnatural thing that paul disapproves of i think that's a wrong interpretation and and the third argument has to do with the entirety of the meaning of the text and so i think the entire text has another viewpoint and i want you to to follow me as i show you that viewpoint what i see in this text and i hope you have your bibles open now because i'm going to get very specific and walk you from verse 23 to 28 pointing out a pattern that develops you've all seen it probably but it'll help if i point it out again to make it crystal clear three times in this text there is a sequence of thought with three steps in each sequence each of the three steps corresponds to each of the other three steps and sheds light on the other three steps in the sequence let me summarize first what the three steps are and then i'll show you the three sets of sequences of those steps in this text here are the three steps first we have exchanged the glory of god for the creature that's step one it's mentioned three times step number two god hands us over to that which we prefer that's mentioned three times third we therefore having been handed over to that which we prefer act out externally and bodily in our sexual relations a dramatization of what has happened internally and spiritually in the horrendous exchange of the glory of god for the creature those three steps in that order are mentioned three times you cannot miss the point and structure of this text once you have been drawn have your attention drawn to it so let's let's walk it and see it let's start in verse 23 first set of three verse 23 they exchanged the glory of the incorruptible god for an image in the form of corruptable man that's step one step two verse 24 therefore god gave them over in the lusts of their heart to impurity that's step two the giving over now step three at the end of verse 24. so that that's an awesome two words god gave them over to impurity so that their bodies would be dishonored among them so in response to the rejection of god's glory as our treasure god wills that there be a disordering of bodily life in dishonorable deeds that's awesome you see that god hands them over that is he decrees that they be given up to impurity so that their bodies would be dishonored let me paraphrase it this way the sexual disordering of the human race is a judgment of god for exchanging him for a creature and it's a disordering that affects every one of us in this room every one of us i'll tell you why homosexuality is highlighted over against a fornication or adultery or lust or pornography those get there due later in romans but we'll come to that directly that's the first sequence of the three here's the second sequence of the three in verses 25 to 27. step 1 verse 25 they exchanged the truth of god for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever amen now what is that parallel that parallels verse 23 they exchange the glory of god for images here they exchange the truth about god for a lie what's the truth of god that they exchange the truth of god that they exchange is god is more to be preferred than creatures god is more valuable than creatures any creatures human creatures or any other creatures god is more valuable and that truth was exchanged for a lie what's the lie the lie is my way is better than god's way that's the lie my preferences are superior to god's preferences for me idols are better than the maker so that corresponds to verse 23 and that's step one here's step two in this second sequence verse 26 for this reason god gave them over to degrading passions what does that correspond to verse 24 god gave them over to the lusts of their heart in impurity to impurity now step 3 verses 26 and 27 is the unpacking of homosexuality their women exchanged the natural function for the unnatural and in the same way also men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another men with men committing indecent acts now what does that correspond to in the sequence it corresponds to verse 24 at the end so that their bodies might be dishonored among them the dishonoring of the body that paul has in mind in verse 24 is homosexual behavior per se so we can say more specifically now what he had in mind in the first sequence of thought he had in mind this the sexual disordering of the human race in particular homosexuality in this text but not only homosexuality is a judgment for the exchanging of the truth of god for a lie this is why he handed them over so that their bodies would be dishonored among them now defined as homosexuality homosexuality is the judgment of god for the exchanging of god for a lie now here's the third sequence of the same three thoughts starting and finishing in verse 28 verse 28 they did not see fit to acknowledge god any longer that's step one what does that correspond to it corresponds to 23 they exchange the glory of god for images it corresponds to 25 they exchange the truth of god for a lie and here it simply says they don't want god in their knowledge anymore they have the same thing three times 23 25 28. now here's step two second part of verse 28 god gave them over to a depraved mind that corresponds to verse 24 god gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity it corresponds to verse 26 god gave them over to degrading passions so god's response to the universal exchange of god for images and truth for lies and the not wanting to have god in our knowledge and his way in our minds the response to that is god decrees homosexuality step 3 says it at the end of verse 28 he gave them over to do things which are not proper which corresponds to verse 24 at the end so that their bodies would be dishonored among them and corresponds to and 26-27 women and men pursuing homosexual relations so homosexual behavior is parallel with dishonoring the body and doing what is not proper now there's the text that's the structure of the text three sequences of three exchanging god being handed over to impurity and dramatizing in your sexual disordering what you did spiritually that's the text now let me close with four concluding observations number one the deepest problem in our lives heterosexual and homosexual is the terrible exchange of the glory of god for images like ourselves or anything the deepest problem in this text and in the universe of mankind is not homosexuality it's not adultery it's not pornography it is that awesome deeply rooted universal no exceptions exchange that every human being comes into the world making namely god for something else that's the problem in the world it's beneath all the maladies of the world and repairing that problem is my main business in life and i think your main business in life not first the fixing of disordered sexuality that's the first observation and the most important one here's the second one the sexual disordering of our lives and most vividly homosexuality though not only homosexuality is a judgment of god upon the human race because we have exchanged the glory of god for other things sometimes people ask is aids a judgment of god upon homosexuality now you have an answer and it will be an unexpected answer from this text the answer is homosexuality is a judgment of god upon the human race so is aids so is cancer so is arthritis so is every futility in your life and so is death do you remember what four weeks ago verse 18 the wrath of god is being poured out and i unpacked it from chapter five on death chapter eight on futility and disease even we who have the fruits of the holy spirit first fruits of the holy spirit groan inwardly waiting our adoption the redemption of these bodies so let me make this real clear because tom varno if you're in this service tom helped me with this when i alluded to it as i'm alluding to it now that i need to state very clearly for you if homosexuality is a judgment if aids is a judgment if cancer is a judgment if arthritis and alzheimer's are judgments if death is a judgment if you're stubbing your toe on the way out of here and experiencing futility is a judgment of god on a fallen world where the whole creation has exchanged god for other things what shall we say then about the children of god against whom there is no wrath or condemnation anymore and the answer is we are not lifted out of this world of woe when we get saved but rather in this world of woe with all of the same diseases and all of the same futilities well maybe not all but most of the same futilities we are now encapsulated in a work of grace that enables us to experience handle this the very judgments of god upon the human race as pathways to holiness and heaven rather than sin and hell even leukemia even leukemia michael is a pathway to holiness in heaven because of the grace of god but it wouldn't exist if this weren't a fallen creation neither would homosexuality neither would my bent towards impatience or whatever neither would any other malady or futility or misery or frustration none of it would exist if there weren't sin in the world all of the rottenness and evil came into the world because god subjected the world to futility not of its own will but of the will of him who subjected it in hope and it's the hope that i'm going to hold out over and over again in these messages but there is no point in ignoring the meaning of god handed us over to degrading passions so that our bodies might be dishonored that's the decree of almighty god as plain as he could write it now once you felt that and you've grasped it then all the gospel words all the hope-giving words don't land on some kind of sentimental poor genetic situation that we're not responsible for they land on reality and we can be honest with ourselves that all of us are under the judgment of god i'm gonna die i'm a saint god loves me and he's going to take my life 52 or 82 makes no difference he's going to take my life the lord gave the lord's going to take it away because i have sinned and adam's sin and in out of my sin and i'm not going to escape it but you know what's happened it has become a pathway to heaven and therefore is no longer a condemnation for those who are in christ jesus and so can every malady in your life including a homosexual orientation which we'll talk more about next week but let me draw quickly to a close here those were my first two concluding observations the third is this the reason paul focuses on homosexuality i think in these verses is because it is the most vivid dramatization in life of the profoundest connection between the disordering of heart worship and the disordering of sexual relations now this is heavy and give me a minute on this and i'll try to say it as simply as i can but it is the most profound and awesome thing in this text manhood and womanhood exist from the beginning of creation for a grand and glorious purpose namely to represent or to dramatize the relation between god and his people or later we learn christ and his church ephesians chapter 5 verses 31 and 32. this is a great mystery paul said and i take it to mean christ and the church when he referred to genesis 2 24 about a man leaving father and mother and cleaving to his wife the meaning of sexuality no we trifle in this country oh there's going to be a debt to be paid in hollywood and other places for the trifling of this awesome glorious huge reality of sexuality that is so great and so wonderful and so full of meaning at the highest levels of the universe and we trifle with it in our pornography in our movies and our television their magazines in our advertising oh there's gonna be a debt to be paid the way we take this awesome reality which is given by god at the very outset of creation as a dramatization of how he loves his people and christ loves his church now in view of that what happens when the relationship between god and man is disordered with an exchange of god for images of ourselves what happens to the drama if the reality is disordered and man no longer relates to god is his is his treasure but looks for satisfaction to the creature that he can manage and that is more like himself what happens to the drama of that and the answer is it becomes similarly disordered and the most vivid dramatization of the disorder of man's exchanging god for something like himself is a man exchanging a woman for one like himself or a woman exchanging a man for one like herself homosexuality is decreed as a judgment by god in order that there might be dramatized in the world what happened when you and i whatever our sexual orientation exchange the glory of god for something like us that's the meaning of homosexuality and it is awesomely profound and to be dealt with not with trifling and not with hate crimes but with evangelism which leads me to my very brief last point the healing of the homosexual soul just as with every other soul is the restoration of the glory of god to its proper place that's where the healing is the healing of the heterosexual soul and the homosexual soul and each has their peculiar sinnings the healing of those souls comes through the restoration of the glory of god to its rightful place as the all-satisfying treasure of the human heart and when that happens either we'll pick it up here next week either there will be victory awesome victory over a homosexual orientation that's happening in the world today or a triumphant capacity to lead a fulfilled joyful obedient celibate life with the orientation till jesus finally makes john piper and you right at the last day let's pray oh god we've just begun we've just got the lay of the land out there in front of us there's so much more to say would you sustain us would you give everybody now the capacity to process these things these are big these are weighty matters to be a male or a female is an awesome thing oh that we might not trifle with our sexuality oh god serial fornications serial homosexual partners serial adulteries going to r-rated movies that have sex scenes that no 12-year-old should ever lay their eyes on not to mention 32 year olds oh god we trifle with this massive reality forgive us forgive us i am so thankful lord that there is a righteousness that is not my own with which i am clothed this morning by faith in jesus as is everyone in this room right now homosexual or heterosexual clothed with the righteousness of christ through faith lord grant that faith i pray would you stand for a benediction well may the lord restore his value and his glory and his beauty to its rightful place in your heart and in your life by the power of the holy spirit through the word of god and all the people said amen thank you you're dismissed thank you for listening to this resource from desiringgod.org if you found it helpful we 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