Sex Education in the PCA

By Faith Magazine has published an edition that includes a number of articles on Human Sexuality.  It’s worth a read, if only to read representatives of the PCA in their own words. 

The article on teaching teenagers about sex presents 10 Principles that ought to be taught to teenagers & young adults. After noting…

“ Satan continues to undo God’s order and design, urging us to choose our plan for sex and gender rather than God’s, thereby fueling our doubt of God’s Word, continually asking: “Did God really say . . . ?” In a First Things article, “Reflections on the Revolution,” Deborah Savage, a child of the 60’s and the sexual revolution, offers this truth: “Human sexuality is at the core of man’s essence, which is why the serpent never tires of meddling in it, the author lists and briefly elucidates upon ten principles. 

The first two are, in order,

1. God is our loving authority on sex and gender

The Bible is the Christian’s authority. The cultural mantras “you do you” and “follow your heart” teach us to live under the authority of our own desires, feelings, and intuition. But God calls us to deny ourselves and our untrustworthy intuitions, and instead live under His loving and life-giving authority. The Bible is God’s gift to us; it teaches God’s plan, purpose, will, and way for how things are supposed to be. We are to believe and behave in ways that are firmly rooted in biblical truth (2 Timothy 3:10-17). We’re to judge our feelings by Scripture, rather than judging Scripture by our feelings.

So far, so good

2. All people are made in God’s image

The Bible teaches us that every human being is a divine image-bearer, full of God-given value, dignity, and worth (Genesis 1:26-31). Every human, then, must be shown compassion, love, kindness, and respect. When we choose to follow God’s will on matters of sex and gender, we may look down on others. 

One wonders if this is a frank admission that the those among elders & others in the PCA who affirm a tradition bound perspective have in recent history & in the present day, behaved in a spiritually & emotionally abusive fashion. After all, Charleston Presbytery called for a bona fide board of inquisitors to sit in judgment of every elder, especially any of them who, like Chris Yuan & others who minister in & / or out of the “Side B,” Revoice, Harvest USA, &tc ministries in the United States & talk about their Same Sex Attraction (SSA) issues as a besetting product ot the noetic effects of sin.

But those who choose to live sinfully — under their own “you do you” authority — should be treated with the same compassion that Jesus Christ has shown us. Hateful, harassing, and shaming attitudes must be rejected as sin against God. While using our judgement to discern between right and wrong is appropriate (Philippians 1:9-10), judgement that leads to condemnation belongs to God alone. The most loving thing we can do for another is to show grace while also telling the truth — even when that truth is hard.

On the face of it, this much is true.

God has given us His order and design for sex and gender at Creation.

God’s order and design for human sexuality, marriage, and gender is clearly stated in the Creation narrative (Genesis 1 & 2), reflected in the teachings of Jesus Christ, and maintained consistently throughout the Bible. This order and design serves as our pattern for living today.

That sounds good until people fail to think God’s thoughts after Him by referring to Genesis 1 & 2 as if God’s decretal will in Eden is the template for His moral will in the present day. When Yeshua answered a question about divorce (Matthew 19), He didn’t refer to God’s decretal will as the one stop shop for Sexual Ethics & Marriage & Family. He went on to couple His reference to Genesis from which He called upon the decretal will of God with respect to the covenantal nature of marriage (not whether or not marriage is a heteronormative affair) with an allusion to God’s moral will relative to divorce & the regulation thereof in the face of the hardness of the heart.

The author runs off the rails here. How so? He begins well, extorting us to remember that God Himself is the final authority in these matters. However, as soon as He deploys Genesis 1 & 2 in order argue that the Created Order itself provides a moral template for Sexual Ethics, he has gone down the road of committing the Is-Ought Fallacy &, ultimately, Vicious Circularity.

Romans 1 doesn’t deploy Genesis 1 & 2 to teach & defend Sexual Ethics. Romans 1:20 establishes God & His moral will as the only truly non-arbitrary epistemic warrant for ethics touching on worship & human behavior in general, sexual ethics in particular.

This is the sort of thinking in which people like Jared Moore, Justin Peters, & Publisher at Reformation Charlotte regularly engage.

For example, on page 181 of his doctoral dissertation, Jared Moore writes that “according to nature” refers to God’s design for male & female bodies - which means that he believes that human anatomy provides a sufficient (or a necessary & sufficient) epistemic warrant for human sexual ethics. In addition, a few pages prior, he refers to Genesis 1 & 2 & God’s design.

He’s wrong.  Following the rules of sound reasoning & Biblical Hermeneutics, the descriptive statement that God created Adam & Eve male & female respectively is not a morals clause that defines sexual attraction to someone of the same sex as masculine or feminine based on the identity of the person to whom someone is attracted.  It’s simply a description of God’s creative fiat in Genesis.  (Incidentally, he also asserts that the statement is person specific, yet to hear him talk about it, it’s general & applies to sexual attraction in general not just to one specific individual). 

The moral will of God is expressed in the command to be fruitful & multiply.   How are gays unable to fulfill that command?  If adoption is valid for heterosexuals but not homosexuals, then on what basis?   His answer seems to be “based on the identity of the prospective parents.”

To love God over & above all else & your neighbor before yourself constitutes the sum & substance of the Law (Mt.22: 36 - 40). (Perfect) love fulfills the Law (Rom. 13:8).   

His entire POV conduces to God condemning homosexuals regardless of their love for Him & each other.   That’s not how God condemns & commends, & it’s the road to spiritual abuse, Situational Ethics, & exercises in bigotry that seek to obviate Matthew 5:41 & Luke 14:33, resulting in LGBTQ people being told they must give up precious things to follow Christ, while Christian bakers, photographers, & magistrates are protected from giving up precious things in order for them to do the same. 

How does God condemn & commend us? According to 1 Sam. 16:7, God looks at the heart, not the appearance.  Jer. 17:10 says substantially the same thing. Mt. 5:28 locates the sin of adultery & all sexual immorality in lustful intent, & James 1:14–15 teaches we form & follow our desires into condemnation & death.  The Bible flat out denies we have libertarian free will. 

It’s also clear from Mt. 22:36 - 40 that the First Table of the Law is summarized as, “Love the LORD with all your heart, might, soul, & strength above everyone & everything else, & the Second Table is summarized as, “Love your neighbor before yourself.”  Everything else hangs on these two sets of principles.   Romans outright states in Chapter 13 that love is the fulfilling of the Law. 

As noted in an earlier article, if God commends & condemns regardless of motive, then that leads directly to Situational Ethics & Works Righteousness. 

In Situational Ethics, people are morally condemned & commended based on their life circumstances, external qualities, &/or other factors that are *not* their internal motives.   David & Sam are told their marriage is a sin because it’s a sin to romantically love a person of the same sex.  That means that God condemns their love not because of their motives, rather because of their sex/gender.  In addition they are also told their relationship is a sin based on whether or not they have a marriage certificate.   As long as the religious bigots among us can withhold a marriage certificate from them, that’s another weapon they have to enforce their unbiblical theology & ethics on the targets of their displeasure. 

David & Sam’s love couldn’t possibly be real love. On what basis?  “Isn’t it obvious?!  They are of the same sex!” is the inevitable reply.  Ergo, their accusers conclude - on the basis of their sex/gender - that David & Sam are failing to love God & neighbor & are in sin.  

How do we know this? According to someone like Publisher at Reformation Charlotte or Jared Moore in the Southern Baptist Convention or some of the men in the PCA General Assembly, the answer is simply “On the basis of their sex/gender.”  They are arguing themselves in vicious circles. 

Aren’t these people Calvinists?  How quickly their allegiance to Volitional Determinism takes a back seat to God condemning people based on the target of their love instead of their love for God & neighbor.  In other words; the motives that underwrite the relationship are overlooked in favor of the objects in the relationship, & David & Sam are judged to be in sin based on the objects of their love, not their love for God & neighbor.  In other words, their motives really don’t matter.  They are in sin regardless of their motives. 

Heterosexual couples receive the same treatment by people who insist that, in order to avoid God’s condemnation, the only morally upright sexual relationship is in the bounds of holy matrimony.   If that’s true, then they too are condemned by God & other accusers on the basis of whether or not they have a marriage certificate.  The accusers’ thought process is the same. 

In Situational Ethics a baker who wishes to bake the cake for David & Sam is told not to do so because doing so would be a sin, based on the identity of the baker’s clients & the meaning of the cake.   There’s a flow chart - if gay, then no cake; if not gay, then serve.   

Matthew 5:41 is ignored in favor of Situational Ethics.  Mt. 5:41 enjoins us to bake the cake & do our best to do so with nonduplicitous motives.  Incidentally, this applies to all Civil Rights issues.  

The end result is Works Righteousness. If God condemns based on externals, then our motives really don’t matter.   God condemns us for baking the cake regardless of our motives & He commends us the same way. This logically applies to every thought, word, & deed.  Ergo, if we just do the requisite amount of spiritual rigamorole, we can earn God’s favor based on our actions regardless of our motives.  Yet the Bible is filled with language about empty feasts & wrongly motivated activity & language describing Israel as a faithless spouse, &, as we earlier observed, lustful intent is what defines sexual immorality both figuratively (Jeremiah & Ezekiel)  & literally (Matthew 5). 

If the Lord wills, we will examine the rest of By Faith’s article. Suffice it to say, they aren’t exactly off to a very good start.

Thank you, God bless us all, each & every one, & “Go & sin no more.”