Do we really need to define marriage?
October 7, 2003
 |
Define Marriage? Who would have thought that marriage would ever have to be defined?
Civilizations, world-wide, have defined marriage for more than 6,000 years as being between one male and one female. Common sense and nature seem to shout it at us. But, define marriage? Apparently we must. Southern Baptists took a giant first step in June 2000 when the family article of The Baptist Faith and Message was overwhelmingly adopted in its annual meeting.
The family article clearly states, that according to Scripture, marriage is defined as one man and one woman. Some Baptist people have gotten hung up on the “S” word (submit) in this article, not seeing the article’s culturally strategic purpose. I believe the primary purpose of the family article was to counteract the homosexual movement’s aggressive posturing of homosexual “marriage.” Southern Baptists were years ahead of the pack in taking a stand against legitimizing homosexual “marriage.”
Today, The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of our Southern Baptist Convention in concert with other concerned ministries such as Focus on the Family, The American Family Association and Prison Fellowship, are asking churches to mark October 12-18 as Marriage Protection Week. You can find more details in a host of Internet sites, including www.marriageprotectionweek.com. On this website, you will find many downloadable resources including bulletin inserts with action steps to get a Federal Marriage Amendment moving through Congress. What is this proposed amendment?
According to the Alliance for Marriage (www.allianceformarriage.org), the proposed Federal Marriage Amendment reads: “Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this constitution or the constitution of any state, no state or federal law, shall be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups.”
Personally, I can support an amendment like this. But it is a sad commentary on our current court system when sitting judges cannot see this basic building block of culture and society. They have become blinded by their own social activism and are applying their social activism into law against the overwhelming majority of American people. So, we must, as a free people define it for them. I would encourage you to support this cause.
What’s at stake?
Let me quote Maggie Gallagher in her July 17, 2001 New York Post article wherein she says: “Ideas have consequences. When a court orders gay marriage … then the law will announce that procreation is not any part of the public purpose of marriage, that children do not need mothers and fathers, and that men and women do not need each other. Various institutions, including your child’s school will be turned into mandatory carriers of this new ideology.”
I don’t want my children or grandchildren taught that homosexuality is legitimate or proper and I am sure you do not either — especially when God’s Word is so absolutely clear on the issue (Romans 1:24-27).
Sadly, there are even some Baptist groups that do not heed the call to doctrinal purity in this area, but rather bend their knees to social pressure rather than bend their knees to our Lord Jesus Christ. A recent example of this was reported in The Knoxville Tenn. News on June 29 (www.knoxnews.com/kns/state/article/0,1406,kns_348_2075592,00.html). The Glendale Baptist Church of Knoxville had been a Southern Baptist-affiliated church for 52 years. When they hired an open lesbian associate pastor, the Tennessee Baptist Convention and the local Baptist association disfellowshipped them for theological impurity. They have now “forged bonds” with the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (CBF) with all rights and privileges. This breaks my heart, knowing of the judgment to come before Jesus in eternity.
“… as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.” Joshua 24:15b