what is sexual immorality under the new covenant?

[feetxxxl]

what is sexual imorality under the new covenant............ie homosexuality? is it according to our understanding of the regulations of scripture under the new covenant, homosexuality is a sin? (each must own his own understanding)

are we saying our understanding is that under the new covenant we still have a relationship to god thru regulation as in deut 28. that if a gay marriage is filled with the same spirit as that of a heterosexual marriage, it is still a sin out of regulation.
how is that possible, we dont live under the law but instead grace...which is also spirit. why would we be under something that even if we obey it we receive no salvation, no righteousness.

1cor13 anything that is without love is nothing and gains nothing.

there are a million reasons to obey a regulation, pride, guilt, homophobia, etc the only right one is love. that being the case then our leading is christ's love who essence is in the 2nd commandment(love neighbor)(love one another as i have loved you) and the fruit of the spirit of galatians these are what leads us.

john in 1john says we must love, and we cannot love god unless we are loving our brother also. the first commandment can only happen if the 2nd commandment is done at the same time. we are led by the love of the spirit of the one who lives in us. scripture says that christ's love transcends all knowledge, why would we then choose to be led anything but love.

explain how you are loving your brother by placing your heavy burden of understanding of regulation on him even when his life is full of the same spirit as the life of any heterosexual......... or being a believer his life is full of the holy spirit in the same way as that of a believing heterosexual.


to do that regulation trumps love, it trumps honoring anothers life experiences, his sincerity of heart, walking in his shoes, carrying his burdens, etc.
"if you have done it to least of these you have done it to me."


being led by our understanding of regulation means we are leaning on our understanding, which proverbs tells us not to do. it also means we are leaning on our seeing in part, thru a poor reflection, which we know is with error.

under the new, christ's love becomes our regulation, which is apart from our own understandings but it is his love thru us.

thru us he can love even when we are without understanding.

 

[Dream]

Feet, hi, nice to meet you. Actually, there are some very different approaches to this out there. There is actually a fundamentalist approach to it, believe it or not, and it is a needed approach. A very large group of Christians have fundamentalist training. I will also include some Catholics in this category. For these, it is obscure and trite to simply say that 'Love conquers regulation'. They want an explanation that works within their framework. The mind and the feelings must be activated together, and minds have so much material to activate that you can't simply ignore it. Homosexuality has got a paradoxical status, and that is why its hard to discuss. It is like the Creation/Evolution controversy. For a long time many Christians were thinking that Evolution might be an assault against Christianity. For many of these same people, the very existence of a homosexual person is like an impossibility. Its a crack in the world, so to speak.

 

[shawn]

There is no new covenant.

There is only a renewed covenant.
The passage in Jeremiah where this notion of a "new" covenant comes from has been mis-translated and the word is renew, not new.
This was referring to the Jewish people and the Mosaic covenant.

It is all a big myth-conception.

Jesus did not come for the whole world but was seeking to get the house of Israel back on track.
He failed and soon after (as indicated in the Tenach) the temple was destroyed and the people were dispersed to the four winds as a result of their wickedness.

The whole of the christian religion has been a big social engineering program from the start.

(my opinion, formed through decades of more than just casual research)

 

[Amergin]

There is no new covenant.

There is only a renewed covenant.

There is no covenant and no renewed covenant. If there was no covenant in the first place, renewing nothing is rubbish.

The passage in Jeremiah where this notion of a "new" covenant comes from has been mis-translated and the word is renew, not new.
This was referring to the Jewish people and the Mosaic covenant.

The covenant was a mythological story by Moses to enhance his authority as absolute monarch of the Israelites. Like all prophesies, covenants are conceived in the minds of delusional people for various reasons (epilepsy, brain strokes, encephalitis, smoking weed, or psychotic illness.)

Who seriously believes that an almighty cosmic god wanting to make a covenant with humans, or give them prophesy would not announce it all over the world from the stratosphere in all languages so there would be no confusion? Most god invented by humans do not give information to all people on Earth or all people of a small country. He takes some unwashed, odoriferous, rambling, irrational eccentric out behind the large boulder to give him the covenant/prophesy.

And all humans are supposed to believe the cock-eyed bollocks of the old man who is busy swatting at invisible birds, bat winged demons, and picking lice off his groin. And millions of people think he is a great holy man.

It is all a big myth-conception.

Agreed.

Jesus did not come for the whole world but was seeking to get the house of Israel back on track.
He failed and soon after (as indicated in the Tenach) the temple was destroyed and the people were dispersed to the four winds as a result of their wickedness.

Jesus was a Israelite patriot who wanted to restore the Kingdom of Jerusalem. His second reason was to reform the badly corrupted Judaiism prevailing in that time. He probably linked Israels horrible wrongs, genocide, torture, clerical corruption to its fall to alien (Seleucid and Roman conquest. The wickedness of the upper class or ruling class of Jews seemed to destroy any hope of Jesus claiming the throne of Israel.

The whole of the christian religion has been a big social engineering programme from the start.

That Christian Religion began its social engineering in the late 4th and early 5th centuries AD. It invented a Pagan Religion called Athanasian Christianity elevating the purely human Jesus into a new god. This social revolution suppressed scientific knowledge, great literature, astronomical knowledge, the spherical Earth. It also persecuted the Roman Pagans almost out of existence and rival Jesus Cults declared heretics and persecuted. We call this social engineering project THE DARK AGES This age of horror and suffering lasted more than a millennium of dreadful fear, hate, and wallowing in Bronze Age ignorance. In Muslim countries the Dark Ages persist today.


Amergin

 

[Quahom1]

There is no covenant and no renewed covenant. If there was no covenant in the first place, renewing nothing is rubbish.



The covenant was a mythological story by Moses to enhance his authority as absolute monarch of the Israelites. Like all prophesies, covenants are conceived in the minds of delusional people for various reasons (epilepsy, brain strokes, encephalitis, smoking weed, or psychotic illness.)

Who seriously believes that an almighty cosmic god wanting to make a covenant with humans, or give them prophesy would not announce it all over the world from the stratosphere in all languages so there would be no confusion? Most god invented by humans do not give information to all people on Earth or all people of a small country. He takes some unwashed, odoriferous, rambling, irrational eccentric out behind the large boulder to give him the covenant/prophesy.

And all humans are supposed to believe the cock-eyed bollocks of the old man who is busy swatting at invisible birds, bat winged demons, and picking lice off his groin. And millions of people think he is a great holy man.



Agreed.



Jesus was a Israelite patriot who wanted to restore the Kingdom of Jerusalem. His second reason was to reform the badly corrupted Judaiism prevailing in that time. He probably linked Israels horrible wrongs, genocide, torture, clerical corruption to its fall to alien (Seleucid and Roman conquest. The wickedness of the upper class or ruling class of Jews seemed to destroy any hope of Jesus claiming the throne of Israel.

That Christian Religion began its social engineering in the late 4th and early 5th centuries AD. It invented a Pagan Religion called Athanasian Christianity elevating the purely human Jesus into a new god. This social revolution suppressed scientific knowledge, great literature, astronomical knowledge, the spherical Earth. It also persecuted the Roman Pagans almost out of existence and rival Jesus Cults declared heretics and persecuted. We call this social engineering project THE DARK AGES This age of horror and suffering lasted more than a millennium of dreadful fear, hate, and wallowing in Bronze Age ignorance. In Muslim countries the Dark Ages persist today.


Amergin

Of course since you have no proof of fact, your convictions are only that...yours (your interpretation). Therefore you would be as guilty as those you condemn for believing what they believe.

 

[The Word]

what is sexual imorality under the new covenant............ie homosexuality? is it according to our understanding of the regulations of scripture under the new covenant, homosexuality is a sin? (each must own his own understanding)

are we saying our understanding is that under the new covenant we still have a relationship to god thru regulation as in deut 28. that if a gay marriage is filled with the same spirit as that of a heterosexual marriage, it is still a sin out of regulation.
how is that possible, we dont live under the law but instead grace...which is also spirit. why would we be under something that even if we obey it we receive no salvation, no righteousness.

1cor13 anything that is without love is nothing and gains nothing.

there are a million reasons to obey a regulation, pride, guilt, homophobia, etc the only right one is love. that being the case then our leading is christ's love who essence is in the 2nd commandment(love neighbor)(love one another as i have loved you) and the fruit of the spirit of galatians these are what leads us.

john in 1john says we must love, and we cannot love god unless we are loving our brother also. the first commandment can only happen if the 2nd commandment is done at the same time. we are led by the love of the spirit of the one who lives in us. scripture says that christ's love transcends all knowledge, why would we then choose to be led anything but love.

explain how you are loving your brother by placing your heavy burden of understanding of regulation on him even when his life is full of the same spirit as the life of any heterosexual......... or being a believer his life is full of the holy spirit in the same way as that of a believing heterosexual.


to do that regulation trumps love, it trumps honoring anothers life experiences, his sincerity of heart, walking in his shoes, carrying his burdens, etc.
"if you have done it to least of these you have done it to me."


being led by our understanding of regulation means we are leaning on our understanding, which proverbs tells us not to do. it also means we are leaning on our seeing in part, thru a poor reflection, which we know is with error.

under the new, christ's love becomes our regulation, which is apart from our own understandings but it is his love thru us.

thru us he can love even when we are without understanding.

You need to read Matthew 5. Jesus didn't come to abolish the law. He came to fulfill the law so everything is the same until this age is over, which is going to happen very soon. Those who keep sinning will die sinners but the law states that the penalty of sin is death so when you die, your penalty is paid because the death of Jesus made it possible for everyone to be forgiven of their sins. All sinners will be freed from their sinful flesh and live forever.

 

[feetxxxl]

granted.........there were cultural understandings handed down generationally, beginning with king henry the 8th(1500's), head of church/state, who enacted a law that made homosexual sex punishable by hanging(the law stayed on the books for 300 years). british colonists came importing that same understanding of illegality with different punishments. and so it has remained illegal until the 1990's.

the church is the culture, the culture is the church. until it was made legal the church's understanding of homosexuality being a sin could not openly be challenged, from within.

 

[feetxxxl]

for those assessing the issue about new covenant consider reading heb8

heb8:

7For if there had been nothing wrong with that first covenant, no place would have been sought for another. 8But God found fault with the people and said:
"The time is coming, declares the Lord,
when I will make a new covenant
with the house of Israel
and with the house of Judah.
9It will not be like the covenant
I made with their forefathers
when I took them by the hand
to lead them out of Egypt,
because they did not remain faithful to my covenant,
and I turned away from them, declares the Lord.
10This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel
after that time, declares the Lord.
I will put my laws in their minds
and write them on their hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.
11No longer will a man teach his neighbor,
or a man his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,'
because they will all know me,
from the least of them to the greatest.
12For I will forgive their wickedness
and will remember their sins no more." 13By calling this covenant "new," he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear.

the old covenant has long since disappeared. yet even after 2000 years christendom is still struggling to take its foot out of the old covenant and put it beside its other one in the new.

under the new covenant we no longer have a relationship to god thru regulation, but instead directly to the spirit of the one who lives in each believer.

under the new everything is done thru christ.


john 14:7 Jesus answered: "Don't you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, 'Show us the Father'?

"apart from me you can do nothing"





john 5:39You diligently study the Scriptures because you think that by them you possess eternal life. These are the Scriptures that testify about me, 40yet you refuse to come to me to have life.

it is thru living the love of christ, his spirit within us, we see what the law is saying.

 

[Quahom1]

...the old covenant has long since disappeared. yet even after 2000 years christendom is still struggling to take its foot out of the old covenant and put it beside its other one in the new.

under the new covenant we no longer have a relationship to god thru regulation, but instead directly to the spirit of the one who lives in each believer.

under the new everything is done thru christ.

The Old convenant is not gone at all. It is history to be studied, analyzed, contemplated, and never forgotten. Those who forget history are most apt to repeat it.

 

[Thomas]

Hi feetxxl, welcome to the forum —

what is sexual immorality under the new covenant ....

Before looking at the moral argument, I think it's worth looking at the premise on which the moral argument is founded.

The essential message of the New Covenant is Love, "God is love" (1 John 4:8), and the nature of this love is the free gift of the self to other. This 'gift' has come down to us as sacrifice, but even the sacrifice is founded in the same messge "God so loved the world as to give his only son".

Love in contemporary western understanding has more to do with 'possession' and 'requirement' — its the inversion of the concept — people 'love' those things which benefits themselves, rather than the ideal of love which is the gift of self for the good of another.

Sexual morality then is to do with idea of the gift of self, but that notion is almost alien today. 'Sexual freedom' means the ability to engage in anything that satiates the carnal appetites, anything I like doing, and as many philosophers have argued, rather than an actual freedom, sex is commodified and reduced to a trading value ... it's a kind of currency.

............ie homosexuality?

Here I might depart from the tradition as commonly received.

I think the terms disort the idea of what sexual identity comprises. To me human sexual identity is not a series of positions, but a continuum between, for the want of a better term, 'absolute masculine' and 'absolute feminine'. By 'absolute masculine' I do not mean alpha-male activity, indeed many would argue that severe autism is an 'absolute masculine' tendency, and I have known homosexual men who have ticked every 'alpha male' checkbox on the list.

So people are located in their gender determination like beads on a necklace, but a necklace that is not one single strand, but multiple strands.

But to the point — I think the condemnation of homosexuality in Scripture is more to do with licentiousness and concupiscence than it is to do with condemning someone who is located at a certain points along that necklace of gender determination. (Bananabrain offered some insight on this a while ago).

Certainly, it seems to me that to condemn a 'chaste' homosexual, whilst saying nothing to a rampant and predatory heterosexual, is a nonsense, and here we must look at how much cultural interpretation informs our reading of Scripture.

In the contemporary debate, for example, the assumed link between homosexuality and paedophilia is unproven, in that there is none ... its just the 'ruling class' — heterosexuals — find it easier to shift the burden on to another — the homosexual — rather than face the problem within their 'own culture', as it were. Similarly rape, in all its forms, is not to do with sex, it's to do with power.

is it according to our understanding of the regulations of scripture under the new covenant, homosexuality is a sin? (each must own his own understanding)

Well above is some thoughts on my own understanding.

Sexual immorality then is not so much to do with who does what to whom, but rather it's to do with the corruption of the idea of the gift of self.

that if a gay marriage is filled with the same spirit as that of a heterosexual marriage, it is still a sin out of regulation.

I think the focus here is in what is meant by marriage in the Scriptural context.

In marriage the two become one flesh ... but marriage is the meeting of two universes, if you like, it is the resolution of all duality.

Homosexual union can never equal that symbolism.

So whilst I would defend the right for homosexuals to live in a loving union, and even a union of love, I cannot call this 'marriage', because it isn't, according to the symbolic and metacosmic reading of the term. (And neither are the vast majority of heterosexual marriages, either.)

A gay marriage can never equal the reality of a full marriage because there is no creation. I am not saying the sole point of marriage is progeny, but I am saying there is more to the idea of 'marriage' than simply two people who want to spend their lives togather because they share a mutual bond. In the same way there's more to the contemporary notion of marriage, which is an excuse for a big dress and a party ... why is it that so many people want to get married in church, and yet never set foot inside one again ...

The fact of nature is, a gay relationship cannot 'go forth and multiply', so a gay relationship falls short of the full sacramental notion of marriage in which the cosmos is renewed physically and well as spiritually.

why would we be under something that even if we obey it we receive no salvation, no righteousness.

Careful here, for this is close to saying 'why should we do anything if there's nothing in it for us?' That is not love. Love is the gift of self, freely given, with no expectation of return.

1cor13 anything that is without love is nothing and gains nothing.

But love for gain's sake is not love either.

Scripture says that Christ's love transcends all knowledge, why would we then choose to be led anything but love.

Why indeed? But then why do people want to be 'mystics', or why do people engage in 'the way'? Normally because they want something out if it, which precludes them every really engaging at any profound level ... it's still self-seeking, and self-serving.

Love is blind, as the saying goes, and this is more profound than many realise.

Many condemn the religious-inspired for their 'blind faith', yet what those who condemn do in their ignorance is fail to comprehend that the darkness of faith is not empty, it's full, it's just full of something that transcends knowledge.

But do not assume 'love above regulation' means that in love, anything goes ... far from it ... the 'regulations' concerning love are far more severse than the regulations concerning obedience, and love is far more difficult, and demanding, than the law, because it demands all.

In closing, as I am sure I've offended a fair few, I stand by the principle that just because I exist, I have a right to this or that. Couples, for example, do not have the right to children that they assume today, and medical science seeks to fulfill. A want, a hope, a burning desire, i accept, but it's not a right.

People far too easily assume their 'rights' to something simply because they exist. This again is nothing more than the exercise of power and possession of the gifts of creation.

Thomas

 

[feetxxxl]

consider that the godlove(love one another as i have loved you) of the 2nd commandment(love neighbor) is the summation of all new covenant law. that any law under the new covenant contains the essence of that love, otherwise it is not a law of the new covenant. apart from all that is about the 2nd commandment.

"everything is permissible but not everything is constructive"1cor 10:23

living this godlove, is living this love in everything we believers do. again it is christ's love thru us. it is what he is doing in us. not what we are doing of ourselves.

"without me you can do nothing"

it is not about physicalities, but about spirit.

god is love . god is spirit. godlove is spirit.

"the sons of god are led by the spirit of god."

believers get hung on lev but not all prohibitions of lev of themselves were not sins, nor are they sins of the new covenant.

if one says that homosexuality is a sin they have only to give witness as to how being gay comes against the love of the 2nd commandment. i know of no such witness. my witness is that the lives and marriages of gay believers are filled with the fruit of the spirit in the same way as those of heterosexual believers. where the spirit rests shows what is of god.

 

[Dream]

Of course since you have no proof of fact, your convictions are only that...yours (your interpretation). Therefore you would be as guilty as those you condemn for believing what they believe.

That is a good point. This whole 'God was originally a minor volcanic deity' spiel has been done to death. Somebody who keeps talking like they have proof should have some proof, or they're just talking.

 

[Thomas]

it is not about physicalities, but about spirit.

But homosexuality, as it is currently expressed, invariably focusses on physicality.

Adelphopoiesis, or adelphopoiia, from the Greek compound of 'brother' and the verb 'to make' was a ceremony practiced at one time by various Christian churches to unite together two people of the same sex (normally men).

Some argue that this is evidence of the joining of two persons in a marriage-like union. This is contradicted by the Greek Orthodox Church, and this contra-argument is supported by the texts of the rites, which speak of a union 'in spirit' and 'in faith' but not 'in nature' ... the implication being obvious.

+++

In Catholicism, moral theology unfolds from its teleological principles.

From the Christian viewpoint, not all things to which a person might be inclined are "natural" in the morally relevant sense; rather, only the inclination towards the full and proper expression of human nature, towards its end, and not necessarily towards its contingent good, are considered 'natural'.

These are enshrined in the theological and cardinal virtues. The cardinal virtues, by the way, were identified in pre-Christian culture, and readily adopted by Christianity as in accord with what they saw as 'natural moral law'.

Contrary inclinations are thus seen as perversions in the sense of a disorder of the will, leading to acts directed not towards the end/good of human nature, but rather aim towards a more contingent, and often transitory, lesser good, which reveals itself to be not a good at all, and which might well be actually detrimental to the journey towards the end good as such.

This is not unique to Christianity, as any authentic spiritual tradition will have a sound moral model, and indeed often the moral tales are interchangeable.

Christianity follows the 'narrow path' from the natural to the Divine, because for us, the Divine is the source, cause and end of happiness; a happiness that comes to rest in the Beatific Vision.

Therefore, and somewhat strictly in application of the rule, all willed activity that aims at an end other than the Beatific Vision is, to some degree, a moral weakness, or moral laxity.

This would be utmost severe were the remedy not easy to hand, but such is not the case, as the Sacrament of Confession performs precisely this function (as does the 'sin-eater' in some non-Christian cultures).

It is self evident that the natural law of life is knowable apart from any special revelation, by examining the forms and purposes of life. It is in this sense that many cultures evolved a moral law that regards homosexuality as unnatural, since it involves a sexual partnership other than that to which the purpose of sexuality points.

Thomas

 

[Thomas]

The Old Covenant still stands — God does not go back on His word.

Jesus is the Word, spoken to Israel, become flesh.

Thomas

 

[feetxxxl]

"God does not go back on His word."

which word are you referring to. in lev god said slavery was good. "take slaves from the surrounding countries for life, and pass them on to your children as inheritance"

under the new covenant, slavery is an intolerable evil because of its violation of the godlove of the 2nd commandment(love neighbor), the summation of all new covenant law.

heb8:

7For if there had been nothing wrong with that first covenant, no place would have been sought for another. 8But God found fault with the people and said
"The time is coming, declares the Lord,
when I will make a new covenant
with the house of Israel
and with the house of Judah.
9It will not be like the covenant
I made with their forefathers
when I took them by the hand
to lead them out of Egypt,
because they did not remain faithful to my covenant,
and I turned away from them, declares the Lord.
10This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel
after that time, declares the Lord.
I will put my laws in their minds
and write them on their hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.
11No longer will a man teach his neighbor,
or a man his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,'
because they will all know me,
from the least of them to the greatest.
12For I will forgive their wickedness
and will remember their sins no more. 13By calling this covenant "new," he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear.

 

[feetxxxl]

as i said before it is about spirit. christ said we have to come to him for life. we have to come to christ to see thru his love what the law is saying.

his love is about the fruit of the spirit, the fruit of christ's spirit being different from those of powers and principalities, because they are of a spirit that comes against christ.

as believers are we to to look at the law, or instead the fullfilment of the law which is christ's love. "fulfillment of the law is love"

mattew 23: 23"Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cummin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. 24You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.

as believers, it is thru living the love of christ that reveals the spirit of christ, full of mercy, justice,and faithfulness, that the law, thru christ points to his spirit.

col1: 15christ is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. 16For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. 17He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. 19For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, 20and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.

 

[Thomas]

[/B]By calling this covenant "new," he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear.

Whilst the Apostles, and even Christ, refer to a 'new' Covenant, it is only 'new' with regard to the Revelation of the Word made flesh, but the Word, who is Christ Jesus, is the word spoken from the beginning.

Sonship was spoken of to Israel: "Because Israel was a child, and I loved him: and I called my son out of Egypt." Hosea 11:1.

Again, if you read St Paul in the Letter to the Romans, he wrangles with just this point, and comes to a different conclusion than you.

The New Covenant is not substantially different to the Old, indeed the Old foretells the New, and prefigures it, so really the Covenant in Christ is only other to the Covenant with Israel because of the intransigence of man, not because of difference in God.

Christ sums up the whole of His Covenant by repeating the words of Deuteronomy, and the Shema Israel.

The Covenant is 'new' because it reveals more of itself than was previously seen or understood. Christ is the Incarnate Word of God, and so the Incarnate Word of the Covenant.

There is a tradition that God uttered the first syllable, and because man did not comprehend its full import, He uttered the word, and because man did not understand the word, He uttered the phrase, and so on, until all Scripture was written.

Thomas