Matthew 19

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Read Matthew 19.

People in our culture sometimes say, “Jesus never talked about homosexuality.” Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said that in 2012*.

Technically, that statement is true. Jesus did not directly condemn homosexuality the way he did unlawful divorce (v. 9) and a number of other things.

But, notice here in Matthew 19 what Jesus said when he was asked about divorce (v. 3). He could have said, “Haven’t you read… that at the beginning the Creator… said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’?”

In other words, Jesus could have started his quotation of Genesis with Genesis 2:24, the verse that directly speaks to marriage. BUT, instead, he first quoted Genesis 1:27 in verse 4: “…at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female’”. Jesus framed his answer on divorce with a biblical understanding of marriage and he quoted from two different chapters in Genesis to frame that biblical understanding of marriage.

Why did he do that?

One reason was to preserve the biblical definition of marriage as between a man and a woman. Humanity was created in male and female counterparts so that by coming together as one flesh (v. 5, Gen 2:24) they could glorify their creator by enjoying godly sexuality and by creating children together.

Divorce destroys God’s intention for marriage (v. 6). That was Jesus’s point and why he quoted from Genesis in his answer. He acknowledged that divorce was “permitted” (v. 8) in some situations but that, in most instances, it is just a legalized form of adultery (v. 9).

Same-sex relationships–whether legal or not–also violate the Creator’s intentions for marriage and, unlike divorce, there are no exceptions allowed anywhere in scripture.

All kinds of sexual relationships are considered acceptable in our culture but that cultural acceptance do not change God’s infallible Word. Most people on earth are or could be tempted by some form of sexual sin whether premarital sex, adulterous sex, homosexual attraction or sex, lust, and so on. As Christians, we should obey God’s instructions and plead for his grace and mercy, not label as good what God calls sin.


* Click here to read the story on President Carter.