The Strand Study Bible

GENESIS GENESIS the dismantling of Judeo-Christian ethics (Psa 33:12). Alternative lifestyles ( the men of Sodom ), according to God’s Word, just happen to be one of them. Proverbs 14:34 says: Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people Whenever God authors something, no civilization can alter it without experiencing the “judgment of God.” Renowned British anthropologist J.D. Unwin conducted an exhaustive study of the eighty-six known civilized and uncivilized cultures spanning 5,000 years, and found that the most prosperous cultures were those that maintained a strong marriage ethic. Dr. Unwin reported that, without exception, every society that abandoned this ethic and allowed sexual misbehavior and permissiveness to prevail amongst its people experienced demise soon after liberalizing their sexual practices. There were no exceptions. 1 God, the Great Designer, is a God of order. Whenever you look at the human anatomy, which God said He designed (Psalm 139:14); it doesn’t take much to realize that the human body was not designed for homosexual or lesbian relationships. If God is a God of order (and He is), then common sense says that a man and a woman match up, not a man and a man or a woman and a woman. It is an insult to the Designer not to live according to our design. The Moral Laws (crimes against God) were written to show man his relationship to a Holy God. These laws revealed God’s standard of righteousness. To violate one of these laws is to offend a Holy God and bring down His wrath upon that people. Although God loves sinners (Jn 3:16), He hates sin. And, according to both the Old Testament (Gen 18:20 & 19:24-25, Lev 18:22 & 20:13, Deut 23:17-18, Jud 19:22-23, I Ki 14:24 & 15:11-12 and II Ki 23:7) and the New Testament (Mt 11:23-24, Rom 1:24-32, 93 God wrote the Book of Leviticus to tell people how to avoid damaging diseases. The homosexual lifestyle causes a horde of complications. Dr. Jeff Satinover, in his book Homosexuality and the Politics of Truth , states that homosexual behavior results in numerous health problems, including infectious fissures, colon and rectal cancer, hemorrhoids, prostate damage, condylomata, herpes, hepatitis A and B, nonviral infections, and AIDS. 2 Alternative lifestyle behavior also shortens the median life span of homosexuals by 20-30 years. Mark Cahill in One Thing You can’t Do In Heaven notes: There is a lot of death in the gay community. Homosexuals often think about eternity because so many friends die. One man I talked with at the festival in 1999 told me that twenty years earlier he and eighty friends had a group photo taken at a gay bar in Atlanta. He said that a week ago he had looked at the photo again. He held up five fingers as he explained that out of eighty guys, only five were still living! 3 However, Cahill goes on to note (and rightfully so): Homosexuals tend to be the only group of people that Christians look down on and treat like the scum of the earth. We don’t do that with liars, thieves, blasphemers, prisoners, etc., but we often do with homosexuals. Once we witness to homosexuals eye to eye and realize how much they truly need Jesus, we can show them the appropriate love, and they will be receptive to our message. 3 Joe Dallas in The Gay Gospel agrees. He notes: I Cor 6:9 b , I Tim 1: 9- 10 a and Jude 7-8 ), alternative lifestyles will hurt a nation. There are five reasons why alternative lifestyles are so devastating to human culture: 1. Its a crime against the human body

Homosexuals’ claim of not having asked for their orientation is, in most cases, true; we ought to feel genuine compassion for people struggling with, or mistreated for, something they never chose. Stanton Jones of Wheaton College puts it well: If you cannot empathize with a homosexual person because of fear of, or revulsion toward, them, then you are failing our Lord. But where we must part company with promoters of the pro-gay theology is in the conclusions they have drawn. We cannot rewrite Scripture, as they have, to accommodate a sin simply because some believe it to be inborn, unchangeable, or common. On this point, we might well borrow a quote from the liberal playwright Lillian Hellman: “I cannot and will not cut my conscience to suit this year’s fashions.” 4

According to Lester Brown, Gary Gardner and Brian Halweil of the Worldwatch Institute, three specific threats are already pushing death rates up or have the potential to do so–the HIV epidemic (which leads to AIDS), aquifer depletion, and shrinking cropland area per person. “Of these three threats, the HIV virus is the first to spiral out of control in developing countries,” says Brown. “The HIV epidemic should be seen for what it is: an international emergency of epic proportions, one that could claimmore lives in the early part of the next century thanWorld War II did in this century.” In sub-Saharan Africa, HIV already infects one fifth to one fourth of the adult population in Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Swaziland. Barring a medical miracle, many African countries will lose one fifth or more of their adult population to AIDS within the next decade. The virus has also established a foothold in the Indian subcontinent. With 4 million of its adults now HIV positive, India is home to more infected individuals than any other nation. With the infection rate among India’s adults at roughly 1 percent–a critical threshold for potentially rapid spread–the HIV epidemic threatens to engulf the country if the government does not move quickly to check it. In some countries, the HIV virus is reversing gains in life expectancy made in the last several decades. For example, in Botswana, life expectancy has fallen from 62 years in 1990 to 44 years in 1998. In Zimbabwe, it has fallen from 61 years in 1993 to 49 years in 2000 and could drop to 40 years in 2010. 5 NOTE – The Apostle Paul reminds us in Romans 1:27 ( men with men ) that alternative lifestyles are unnatural . 2. Its a crime against society The current healthcare destruction, due to AIDS, is proof enough that alternative lifestyles will bankrupt any society. Frank