The recent controversy within the evangelical world over World Vision has taken many different paths and I have intentional chosen not to jump on the bandwagon of let me see how many blog hits I can get because I am blogging on the hot topic issue. The conservative evangelical voice has been represented by people like Al Mohler and Russell Moore, whereas the more liberal voice has been represented by the likes of Rachel Held Evans.
My purpose in this post is not to address the controversy within itself because that battle has been fought and there are many wounds on both sides as a result. My purpose is to look at another component though, a component that involves Millennials, which includes me. The question has been posed recently, "Are church teachings on homosexuality driving Millennials away from faith?"
Evans has concluded in her recent CNN
article that the teachings of the church are in fact driving away a generation, the Millennials. But I really think that the wrong question is being asked here because we all know that we can go out and find a group of people, including a church, that fits all of our preferences and opinions. The better question, the purer question would be, "are the teachings of Jesus found in Scripture on homosexuality driving millennials away from faith?"
You see the two questions seem similar but are very different in nature and notice that I do not attack any of the points brought up by Evans because once again she is asking the wrong question. If it is the teaching on homosexuality driving them away from faith and their church then I believe most millennials will just go find a different church, one led by a guy like Rob Bell, who matches their personal preference over biblical precedent.
But if it is the teachings from the Bible, God's Word that is driving millennials away then there is a very different issue. And please hear it loud and clear from this millennial, GO! If it the teachings of the one that represents love then please leave the church with my blessing as you leave.
So my question for the evangelical millennials is this: Is it worth it?
Is your personal preference on gay marriage worth ignoring the biblical precedent?
Is it worth leaving the church because the God of love who sent his son to die in your place also teaches that any sexual relationship outside of marriage is wrong and sinful?
Is it worth the "victory" of our fellow brothers and sisters within the LGBT to lie to them about what the Bible says in a loving and gracious way?
Is it worth the "victory" of being for gay marriage only to realize that you are ignoring the sense inside of you saying, "this is wrong!"
I, for one, love the people inside the LGBT community, I sincerely do. And I believe that people like Evans sincerely do as well and I am glad to hear that she is done arguing (I doubt it) and wants to move on to loving and serving people. But I do want all of those in the LGBT community and all my fellow evangelical millennials to know what the historical document of the Bible actually teaches.
It seems that evangelicalism has pushed Evans back to following Jesus, which I am all for, so if the result of this whole thing has been to push evangelicals back to following Jesus then I for one, think that it may have been worth it.