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Summer schedule: 9AM Sunday School, 10AM refreshments, and church fellowship meals take a break in July & August. Please join us for Worship Service, which is still held every Sunday at 10:30 AM!
Calvary Community Church

Sunday School

Lesson 12: Dealing with Homosexuality

Speaker
David Capoccia

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In this lesson, Pastor Dave Capoccia discusses how to deal with homosexuality in biblical counseling. Pastor Dave explains the need to take down false justifications for homosexuality, to minister the gospel to those struggling with homosexuality, and to exercise compassion and wisdom with unsaved homosexual family members.

Note: You may see an automatically generated notice from YouTube about “conversion therapy” beside this video. In this lesson, Pastor Dave does not advocate for conversion therapy but instead exposes conversion therapy as a harmful and deficient approach to dealing with homosexuality. Biblical counseling to homosexuals is not the same as conversion therapy.

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Note: This transcript and summary was autogenerated. It has not yet been proofread or edited by a human.

Summary

We are called to engage lovingly and biblically with those struggling with homosexuality, whether in a counseling context or within our own families. This lesson equips us to dismantle false defenses for homosexuality, present the gospel with humility and hope, and navigate family relationships where a loved one has embraced an LGBTQ lifestyle.

Key Lessons:

  1. Four common false defenses for homosexuality—that the Bible doesn’t condemn it, that same-sex attraction is not sinful, that it is biologically predetermined, and that it is a mental illness—can each be answered clearly from Scripture and sound reasoning.
  2. Same-sex attraction is same-sex desire, and desire itself can be sinful; we sin with our desires either by direction (desiring something sinful) or by degree (making something good into an idol).
  3. A gospel-informed attitude toward homosexuals recognizes that their sin, though grievous, is no different in kind from our own—we approach them with humility, compassion, and hope, not condemnation.
  4. Sanctification for a former homosexual requires total life restructuring—forsaking old companions, radically changing schedules and thought patterns, and persevering in obedience to Christ even when temptation does not disappear quickly.

Application: We are called to hold truth and love together without compromise—declaring that homosexuality is sin while treating those caught in it as image-bearers who need the same gospel we needed. For family members who reject the gospel, we are encouraged to shift from verbal witness to a life of radical, inexplicable love that reflects Christ.

Discussion Questions:

  1. How would you respond to someone who says the Bible only condemns certain kinds of homosexuality, not loving same-sex relationships?
  2. What does it look like practically to maintain a loving relationship with a family member who has embraced a homosexual lifestyle while not approving of or enabling that lifestyle?
  3. How do you guard against both harshness and compromise when someone you love is caught in a sin as culturally celebrated as homosexuality?

Scripture Focus: 1 Corinthians 6:9–11 shows that homosexuals and other sinners were transformed by the gospel in the early church—’such were some of you.’ Genesis 2:24 establishes God’s original design for marriage as the foundation from which all sexual ethics flow. 2 Corinthians 10:5 grounds the task of dismantling ideological strongholds in the counseling ministry.

Outline

Introduction

Good morning. Welcome to Sunday school.

I know some of you are just coming in, but we want to get started since it’s 9:00. Let me pray.

Heavenly Father, you are good and do good. Show us more of your good way and show us, Lord, how we can counsel your good word to your people. Pray, Lord, you’d help me to explain this topic well in Jesus’ name.

Amen.

All right. We’ve reached the penultimate lesson in our biblical counseling for marriage and parenthood series. Just the Q&A after this week. Thank you for staying with me this far in this course.

We have another important topic to discuss today as our 12th lesson. But before we get to that, let’s talk about your homework from two weeks ago. We had the break for Resurrection Sunday.

Last time I assigned you to read “How Should You Counsel a Couple in the Case of Domestic Violence” by Ed Welch, Paul Tripp, and David Powlinson. You were to write down five observations or questions.

So, what’s something that you wrote down? Something you observed, something you had a question about.

Yeah, Mark. So I guess it—yeah.

Homework Review: Domestic Violence Q&A

Yeah, it’s a good question to repeat it. What do you do when a wife confides in someone in the church that there’s domestic violence, there’s abuse going on, but she’s not willing to tell the leaders about it or proceed into counseling for it for fear of reprisal, for fear of various outcomes?

That is a common occurrence in situations like this.

When a Victim Won’t Come Forward

And my thought right now is that she needs as much as that person she’s confided in and the rest of the church and the leaders, as they get to know, want to make practical provisions for her to reassure her that as she proceeds along the biblical path of discipline but also counsel and ultimately reconciliation, she will be protected. Because she does need to ultimately trust God’s way: if I proceed God’s way, not only will he be honored, but there’s a possibility that this abuse will come to an end and this relationship can be restored.

If she’s not willing to proceed on that path because of fear, until she actually makes the sin known so that counsel can take place, nothing’s going to change. So it’s very tempting in the flesh to say, “Well, I’m just going to ignore it or I’m just going to get a divorce or we’re just going to get separated or something like that.”

But you want to trust God’s way with practical provision. If there really is a possibility of violence or threat, then we’ve prepared a safe place for you to go so that when you make this known, you don’t immediately have to go back home. You can stay here for a certain amount of time and then we proceed into counseling or something else. That’s the most immediate practical provision, but maybe there are some other things.

But she does need to make it known to someone who can actually help, and she can trust the Lord with that.

Yeah, just reemphasizing that the flesh will want to avoid confronting the issue. But that’s actually what God has called his people to do. And it’s what enables the church to actually come and protect and minister.

It’s kind of a self-defeating measure to just avoid and escape.

Understandable. And we want to show sympathy. We want to show compassion. And we want to provide any practical protection that we can.

But we ultimately want to assure her and encourage her to trust the Lord’s way. We don’t know what the outcome of that’s going to be, but God’s ways are good. They should be pursued by his people.

“We ultimately want to assure her and encourage her to trust the Lord’s way. God’s ways are good and should be pursued by his people.”

I’m sure there’s more than we could say about that, but that’s a very good question.

Other questions or observations based on the article that you read?

Let me see if somebody else does. Yeah, Jody.

Right. So Jody is just pointing out once again what we said last time: the world’s response to cases of domestic violence and abuse is in many ways opposite to what the Bible counsels. Now, again, we don’t want to be misunderstood as saying, “Oh, you’re not allowed to use any legal means. You’re not allowed to call the police. You’re not allowed to even get a temporary restraining order.”

But when a Christian does that, that is not to start removing oneself from the relationship. It’s for the purpose of pursuing counseling and discipline while under the protection that God has provided in the government and the protection that God has provided in the church.

The world is not ultimately interested in the abuser, only in protecting the abused. But as believers, according to God’s word, we want to minister to both sides and because God is able to do this, bring about reconciliation if at all possible.

Yes, Steve.

When Counseling Reaches Its Limits

Yeah, that’s a good question, Steve. In the case of domestic violence or really any kind of sin, where do you draw the line and say, “All right, you have not changed and you have not indicated willingness to change. You haven’t shown demonstrated desire to change. So there’s nothing to do at this point but bring some sort of end.”

Now I don’t know if you would necessarily counsel divorce. There may be some particulars in that situation. We do know what God’s word says about marriage and what are the proper allowances made for divorce—just very specific cases in the scriptures.

But to take your question more broadly in counseling: counseling is not supposed to last forever, especially if somebody is not going along with the counseling. Someone is unwilling to receive the counsel, proceed with the counsel, and change.

There are certain practical things in the counseling that you can point to and say, “Look, you’re not doing the homework or you’re not showing up for counseling or you keep going back to the sin the same way that you’ve always done and you give the same justifications. How do I know that you are doing what you say that you are doing—which is you want to change, you want to follow the Lord? I’m not seeing that.”

What’s going to be different going forward? There’s no hard and fast rule, not like, okay, after this many sessions, that’s it. It’s going to be dependent on the person and dependent on the situation.

You want to show grace, but you also want to keep people accountable and say, “Look, we’ve had enough time for this. It’s time to proceed to the next level of church discipline because you’re not taking this seriously. And if it ultimately gets to excommunication from the church, it may have to.”

Counselors need to be willing to go along that road to give teeth to their counseling, to show the counselee you’ve got to take this seriously. So it may end up—there’s no hard and fast rule, Steve—but you are looking for the signs. You do point it out to the person. You give them plenty of warning. You say, “All right, now we go to the next level. This may go to excommunication.”

And if it does, and that person is not showing any sign of repentance, there’s no point in proceeding into counseling at that point. Rather than give a warning, that person is to be treated as an unbeliever. Now none of us can say definitively you are an unbeliever, but we can say you’re acting like one and the Bible says now treat you like one. You are not welcome as part of the fellowship and we hope that this will turn you to repentance.

Now, it may be in a marriage situation that somebody reaches that point, they’re treated like an unbeliever, and then they decide they want to divorce from their spouse. Well, what does the Bible say at that point?

“Counselors need to be willing to give teeth to their counseling to show the counselee they’ve got to take this seriously.”

If an unbeliever wants to leave, let him leave. And so at that point, it is the believing spouse who has been left. The Bible would command, let that spouse leave because he’s acting like an unbeliever. He’s showing all the signs of being an unbeliever. So what the Bible says about that is to be followed.

Now Lord willing, it never gets to that place, but sometimes it can and we need to be willing to follow the biblical instruction when it does. These are good questions you guys have and I’m sure this is a topic that generates a number of questions. We don’t have time for more right now, but if you have more, send them to me as part of the question and answer preparation for next week.

There’s obviously a lot more to say about this topic and hopefully some of the extra information I gave you as part of your class list from last week, maybe you can also look at that if you haven’t already.

Let me tell you about your homework for this next week. I said at the beginning of this course that we would talk about homosexuality and transgenderism at the end of the course, but we’re not going to have time for transgenderism in the class. So I want to have that as part of your homework.

Well, maybe this isn’t the last reading assignment. I have one in mind for next week too.

But here’s another reading assignment for you. This is a 15-page essay written by Evan Leno. He is a seminary professor and also a college administrator, contributing writer to ACBC. He wrote this essay called “Biblical Sexuality and Transgender Sin.” I think it just gives a good basic instruction and orientation to dealing with the transgender question as a church and in counseling.

So I’d like you to read that and write down five questions or observations and we can talk about that next time. As you see as the other homework assignment there, question and answer time is next week. If you have anything that wasn’t covered in this course that you’d like to talk about or was covered in this course that you’d like to hear more about, then send me an email with your question and I will see if I can answer it.

If I get a lot, I won’t be able to answer them all, and I will do my best to answer it. I’m not sure that I can always give a perfect answer, but send it to me by Thursday of this week—that’s the 11th—so I have time to prepare an answer to questions about your homework assignments.

Today’s Topic: Homosexuality in Biblical Counseling

Okay. Well, today we are dealing with the topic of homosexuality in counseling. This is a very relevant topic for our day.

Here’s our agenda for talking about this topic. We’re first going to talk about tearing down strongholds and false defenses for homosexuality. Then we’re going to talk about ministering the gospel to those struggling with homosexuality as a biblical counselor. And then briefly at the end, I want to give you a few pieces of advice for dealing with unbelieving homosexual family members.

It’s very different dealing with somebody in counseling who actually wants help with homosexuality than somebody who doesn’t want any help at all. I’ll give you a few pieces of advice about that latter situation towards the end of the class.

We’ve already spent considerable time on the last homework, so we’re going to get right into today’s topic.

“Ministering to a homosexual in counseling is very different from dealing with a family member who wants no help at all.”

Tearing Down Strongholds

In dealing with homosexuality as a biblical counselor, you need to be prepared to do a little bit of apologetics because your counsel may have certain fortresses of false ideas defending a homosexual lifestyle that you need to be ready to expose and take down. They may have a little bit of a double-mindedness here where they say, “This is wrong. I need to get away from it, but maybe it’s not wrong and maybe I don’t need to get away from it.”

2 Corinthians 10:5 says, this is Paul writing. “We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God. And we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ.”

Now, you may have heard that verse before. It’s often quoted as a reminder that we need to deal with our own thoughts, that we need to fight the good fight in our own minds and take every thought captive and made obedient to Jesus. And that’s not a bad application of that verse, but the original context of that verse is actually not about your own internal dealing with false thoughts, but actually rescuing people, others who are caught up in sin from their false thoughts, from their fortresses.

You are to use spiritual weapons. You are to use the word of God to take down the strongholds in which others have fortified themselves so that you might rescue those people to obedience to Jesus Christ.

There are several ideological fortresses that we biblical counselors, we Christians, must be prepared to take down when it comes to counseling those who struggle with homosexuality. And I’ve got four of these for you.

“You are to use the word of God to take down the strongholds in which others have fortified themselves, to rescue them to obedience to Christ.”

If you may have seen, if you got the notes already, my PowerPoint is somewhat sparse today. So you might want to write down some notes, but I’m just going to give you the main points as we go through today’s class.

False Defense #1: The Bible Doesn’t Condemn Homosexuality

What’s one false defense for homosexuality? Number one, the Bible doesn’t actually condemn homosexuality.

Maybe that seems odd to you, but this is a defense people offer. Someone will say the Bible only condemns homosexual rape or homosexual fornication. That was the real sin of Sodom. It was their lack of hospitality because they were trying to rape the people who were coming into their town.

Or the Bible only condemns homosexuality in the Old Testament, but that was part of Israel’s law. We’re in the New Covenant. It’s not condemned in the New Testament. Or the Bible’s prohibition against homosexuality was just accommodations to ancient cultures and to the particular wrong practices that they had.

Okay, the New Testament does seem to say that homosexuality is forbidden, but it was only talking about a certain type of homosexuality that was practiced in that society. The relationship of older men with young boys—that’s what the New Testament forbids.

So there’s a variety of ways that this defense is offered. But how might we respond?

You brought up the idea that Jesus never spoke about it and Jesus never condemned it. That is another part of this defense. But Jesus did talk about the Old Testament and he did talk about marriage and he affirmed what the Old Testament taught about marriage.

Ultimately, the response to this question is you need to be honest with the scriptures, with what the scriptures actually say. You are twisting the scriptures if you say the Bible doesn’t condemn homosexuality. That’s clear in the Old Testament. That’s clear in the New Testament. You need to be honest with the scriptures.

But most basically, where does the condemnation of homosexuality come from? It comes from God’s original design for marriage, which is not cultural. This is Genesis 2:24.

Genesis 2:24: “A man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”

That’s the pattern. That’s the only legitimate sexual expression given in the Bible. So homosexuality is not going to fit in that. The Old Testament and New Testament are going to condemn that. That’s ultimately where we go back to when somebody says, “Oh, the Bible doesn’t condemn this.”

You mentioned that you need to love your child. You’re right. Loving your child and holding to the truth and even calling them out on their sin of homosexuality are not opposite. They are actually supposed to be true at the same time.

To be sure, this is not the only sexual sin forbidden. As we’ve already discussed in this course, fornication, adultery, polygamy, and masturbation are also forbidden. This isn’t God just saying, “Sorry, I know you really like those things, but you’re not allowed because I’m a killjoy.”

No, he says, “I have a very good design that I put together in creation. This is going to display my wisdom for human flourishing, and it’s going to glorify me because it’s ultimately going to picture what? Christ and his people.”

And that is not a symmetrical relationship. That is not two people who are the exact same being married. They are the same on a certain level, but they are very different on another level. They are complementary.

So God says, “Homosexual relationships do not portray that picture the way that I have designed it.” This was not arbitrary, nor is this ambiguous in the scriptures. The Bible is clear that homosexuality is not acceptable before God.

False Defense #2: Same-Sex Attraction Is Not Sinful

But a second offense, a related defense might be: the Bible condemns the practice of homosexuality, but not same-sex attraction.

Yes, it says you cannot lie with a man as a man would lie with a woman, or homosexuals will not inherit the kingdom of God. But same-sex attraction is different. The argument goes like this.

When a man feels attracted to a woman and desires to date and marry her, we would not accuse him of sin. So there’s nothing wrong about mere attraction.

Therefore, if a man feels attracted to another man or if a woman feels attracted to another woman, we should not accuse the attracted person of sin since there’s nothing sinful about mere attraction.

Now, if someone were to act on that same-sex attraction to lust sexually or to commit homosexuality or to even pursue a gay marriage, that would be sin. But as long as the same-sex attracted person is celibate in his mind and in his body, that person pleases God. He can be what some of you even said, a gay Christian.

Now, how might we respond to this defense?

For the sake of time, I’ll move forward here. This defense, this myth, finds its power behind an obscured definition. So we need to clarify what is same-sex attraction.

To borrow from Pastor Mike Ricardi in a message he once preached at the Shepherd’s Conference: Is same-sex attraction sinful?

He defines same-sex attraction this way: it is an enduring experience of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual desire for a member of the same sex.

In short, same-sex attraction is the same thing as same-sex desire.

There is a difference between noticing that someone is attractive and actually desiring or being attracted to that person.

Pastor Kevin D. Young gives a helpful illustration to show this distinction.

A mother may recognize that her teenage son is quite handsome or that her daughter has grown into an objectively beautiful woman. These noticings can take place apart from any sexual longing. But if a mother were to experience any attraction to her son or daughter, surely we would describe this kind of noticing as illicit, as a perverse response, however unbidden, that should be mortified at all costs.

That’s true. And this analogy also points us to a key difference between heterosexual attraction, homosexual attraction, or even incestuous attraction. Heterosexual attraction or desire can find legitimate fulfillment in the covenant of marriage.

But what about homosexual desire or incestuous desire?

There is no legitimate fulfillment for that desire. Nowhere in God’s universe can that be legitimately fulfilled. So just because heterosexual attraction or desire is legitimate in some cases does not mean that homosexual desire can also be legitimate.

“There is no legitimate fulfillment for homosexual desire anywhere in God’s universe.”

In fact, when we frame same-sex attraction in terms of desire, we are connected to one of the fundamental truths about sin in the Bible.

Is sin only a sin if you commit that sin on the outside in your words and behavior? No. Where else might you sin? Indeed, where is the root of even your outward sin?

Sinful Desire and the Tenth Commandment

It is in the heart. It is in the desires of your heart. Consider the tenth of Israel’s ten commandments.

What is the command?

Thou shalt not covet. What does covet mean?

To want or to desire.

It has been well said that we sin with our desires either by direction or by degree.

Not all our desires are sinful. If you have a desire, it’s not necessarily sinful, but it becomes sinful when you desire something that is sinful, like a homosexual or incestuous relationship. That is a sinful desire because you desire something sinful.

Or desire becomes sinful when you desire something that is good too much and thus you make it an idol. It becomes a lust in your heart.

“We sin with our desires either by direction or by degree—desiring something sinful, or desiring something good too much, making it an idol.”

Now, just because a sinful thought or impulse comes into your mind does not mean that you’ve already sinned.

The sin comes when you indulge or respond wrongly to that thought or impulse.

But people are not to indulge or to excuse same-sex attraction, which is same-sex desire, but rather to work to put these desires to death, to cultivate a heart that desires God and God’s way alone.

“People are to put same-sex desires to death and cultivate a heart that desires God and God’s way alone.”

The Bible condemns also same-sex attraction, not just the practice of homosexuality.

False Defense #3: Homosexuality Is Biologically Predetermined

A third defense: homosexuality is biologically predetermined.

The argument here is that science has proven same-sex attraction and homosexual living comes from a person’s biology. Whatever the Bible says, it’s probably not reliable anyway. God could not be just to deem something as sinful in me that he biologically programmed me to do.

I was simply born this way. Homosexuality is part of who I am biologically speaking. Surely God would not have me deny who I am or what I am innately.

Three famous studies concluded that homosexuality has a genetic causality. The first is the chromosome study conducted by Dean Hamer and the National Cancer Institute. This research was done on 76 gay men and their families.

The study found that the families of the 76 gay men had a much higher recurrence of homosexual male relatives than the general population. Researchers also allegedly identified a specific gene marker present on most of the gay men, concluding that this gene was responsible for their homosexual attraction and lifestyle.

Then there was the hypothalamus study conducted by Simon Lavey and reported in the August 1991 issue of Science magazine. Examining the brains of 35 individuals, Lavey asserted that there is a discernible difference in the size of the hypothalamus—the organ below the brain that controls body temperature.

There is a discernible difference in the size of the hypothalamus in homosexuals versus heterosexuals, suggesting a physiological cause for homosexuality. Lavey also noted a difference in the size of the neuron group INH3 in the 19 homosexuals of his study compared to the other 16 heterosexuals.

And then there’s the identical twins study by Richard Pillard and Michael Bailey. This was an examination of what percentage of identical twins both grew up to be homosexual. Subjects for this study were recruited via pro-homosexual publications, and the main criterion was: if you were a homosexual and you grew up with a twin, you were wanted for this study.

The study found that just over half of the homosexuals with an identical twin had an identical twin who was also homosexual, suggesting a biological cause for homosexuality. This sounds like a strong case. How should we respond to the defense that homosexuality is seemingly a biologically caused phenomenon backed up by science?

Responding to the Biology Argument

Right. Two things there.

The second one is that we all do have predispositions towards sin. But even if that is the case, and that may be biologically related, you are still responsible for your sin. What was the first thing you said again?

Yes. Correlation is not causation. Even if you see a correlation between certain things, there may be another explanation for it. If these people grew up in households that nurtured homosexuality, it’s maybe not that crazy that identical twins would both grow up to be homosexual. But that’s not all we can say. What else?

Yeah, Steve.

What about particularly for the twin study? What about the nearly 50% that didn’t grow up to be homosexual even though they are identical twins? Clearly there are more factors at work than a gene or a particular biological predisposition.

As we said when we considered science related to another topic in this course regarding corporal punishment, there’s more to the story of these scientific studies. They all exhibit major problems in both methodology and conclusions when you do a little bit more research. I did send you, if you’re part of the class list, some extra information about what the problems were in these specific studies.

Even people who are pro-homosexual will say you didn’t do that study well. There’s a major bias in your study. So there are problems with the science that supposedly makes this airtight case. We need to remember again that the Bible ultimately is the only trustworthy authority for life. And it is unambiguous when it comes to homosexuality.

“The Bible ultimately is the only trustworthy authority for life, and it is unambiguous when it comes to homosexuality.”

Unlike these scientific studies, which prove untrustworthy and ambiguous, many secular scientists actually agree that the conclusion that homosexuality is due to a gene is way too reductionistic. There are way more factors affecting a person’s chosen lifestyle than simple genetic inheritance.

But to go back to Mark’s point, biblically speaking, we Christians can admit that biology may play a factor in why you are attracted to certain sins or why you struggle with certain sins. People sometimes talk about having a temper because they’re Italian or Irish. Or maybe people are more drawn than others to hopelessness, fear, or laziness.

We humans are a complex union of body and soul. After all, these things do affect each other.

On a more fundamental level, we Christians can admit that every person did inherit something from birth which always leads him to sin, no matter how he is led. What did he inherit?

A sin nature.

Yes, you were born that way. You were born with a sin nature. You were actually conceived with a sin nature.

But the Bible does not allow you to use your inherited sin nature as an excuse for your sin. Though you are corrupt and cannot do anything apart from sin, apart from Christ, God holds you accountable for every choice that you make. Ephesians 2:3 says, “You are before Christ. You are a slave to your own desires.”

Yet you are responsible. You will be judged for fulfilling those desires apart from and against God. You are by nature a child of wrath, deserving wrath. Now, that is a hopeless situation to be in.

No wonder the world has little better to offer than to try and say your evil inclinations are actually normal and nothing to be ashamed of. There’s no hope for change except for what God reveals. We have a much better word than the world has to offer.

We have the gospel that declares, “Apart from any effort of your own, God provided a way for you to be free. Not just from the penalty of sin, God’s just wrath, but also the power of sin. It will no longer be master of your life. Christ will be your master. Righteousness will be your master.

And one day you’ll be free even from the presence of sin when you are in the kingdom of God with Christ.” That is a hope-giving word. And that is very much in contrast to the justification for homosexuality that’s biologically predetermined.

“We have a much better word than the world offers. The gospel declares that God provided a way to be free from both the penalty and the power of sin.”

False Defense #4: Homosexuality Is a Mental Illness

One more fortress to mention is that homosexuality is a mental illness.

Believe it or not, homosexuality was listed as a mental illness in earlier editions of the DSM, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Psychiatric Disorders, which is kind of like the Bible for psychologists and psychiatrists.

It used to be listed as a mental disorder in this authoritative guide, but that changed in 1973, not as a result of new scientific findings, but as a result of pressure from the growing homosexual lobby.

Still, according to Richard Eay, former MD, clinical professor of psychiatry at Cornell Medical College and chair of the APA’s committee on gay, lesbian, bisexual issues, he says there is a continuing conviction among most, although not all, dynamically oriented psychiatrists in general, and psychotherapists in particular, that homosexuality can and should be changed to heterosexuality.

He’s now deceased. That was a statement made I think about 20 years ago, so maybe things have changed a little bit since then. But he says there are plenty of psychiatrists and psychologists out there who still think this is a mental illness that should be changed.

Actually, some prominent Christian ministries and support groups to homosexuals have also operated under the assumption that homosexuality is a psychological illness. For example, Hal Shell, a former homosexual himself who had a ministry to homosexuals through College Hill Presbyterian Church in Cincinnati, saw homosexuality as a complicated compulsive behavioral disorder binding individuals to a sinful lifestyle.

So it’s a disorder that binds you to sin.

Meanwhile, Allan Minger, former president of the now defunct Exodus International, which was a coalition of several ministries to homosexuals, he says the practice is sinful, the condition is not.

The practice requires repentance and change. The condition requires healing.

By healing, he means psychological healing. It’s organizations like these that practice conversion therapy on homosexuals, which you sometimes hear about in the news these days for getting banned for being harmful.

Now, people sometimes label biblical counseling as a type of conversion therapy. That is not fair and that is not accurate. Biblical counselors do not, or at least should not, do the same thing that happens in conversion therapy.

Conversion therapy can take various forms, but basically it’s an effort to use psychological conditioning and medical intervention to change someone’s attraction from homosexual to heterosexual. Methods include psychoanalysis, arousal reconditioning, visualization, counseling, hypnosis, spiritual interventions such as prayer and exorcism, aversion therapy by electric shock or nausea-inducing drugs, hormonal or surgical castration, and even brain surgery.

That’s very different from what biblical counselors offer.

Anyways, how should we respond to those claiming that homosexuality is a condition of mental illness requiring healing by psychological treatment?

Again, for the sake of time, I’m going to give you the answer.

Here again, we see the importance of definitions and labels.

What the world calls mental illness, the Bible calls bondage to sin or spiritual struggle.

I’ve said this before, but I’ll say it again. Mind, heart, spirit, and soul are terms used interchangeably in the Bible. They are all terms that refer to the inner man.

And the Bible proclaims itself perfectly sufficient to minister to all troubles in the inner man. In fact, God by his spirit and by his word is the only one who can truly reveal and transform the heart, the inner man, the mind, the soul, the spirit.

There is no true category of some other inner man component that the Bible doesn’t address, that doesn’t minister to. There’s no psychological or emotional need that is not covered by Christ in his word.

We therefore do homosexuals a great disservice when we refer to their sin struggle as a mental illness and then try to use worldly wisdom and methods to change them. This is a sure way to rob people of hope and ability to change.

Because if the sin of homosexuality ultimately comes from a psychological condition that a person cannot help, what are the implications for his sin? He’s not truly responsible and he’s not truly able to change without intervention from experts.

Yet the Bible says that he is responsible for his sin. So he’s caught not knowing what to think: “I’m not responsible. Yet, the Bible says I am responsible.” That’s a tormented place.

And worse, the prescribed therapies, conversion therapies, usually don’t work. They just torture people.

A person struggling with homosexuality doesn’t need aversion therapy, visualization exercises, or surgery. He needs the gospel of Jesus Christ. He needs the sanctification process of confession, repentance, and change.

“A person struggling with homosexuality doesn’t need aversion therapy or surgery. He needs the gospel of Jesus Christ.”

So each of these defenses, we want to rescue people from behind them. They think that offering these things will be good for them, help protect their hearts, but actually it’s what traps their hearts and prevents them from getting what they really need. So we need to help rescue them by exposing these false defenses.

Ministering the Gospel to Those Struggling with Homosexuality

But as I was saying, we also want to point them to the true answer, which is the gospel. How do we communicate the gospel essentials to the homosexual in counseling? That’s what I want to talk about next.

In counseling the homosexual, you need to minister the gospel in three main ways.

A Gospel-Informed Attitude

Number one, in your gospel-informed attitude.

If you take your Bibles, please, and go to 1 Corinthians 6:9-11. This is a very significant text.

In the midst of talking about lawsuits and sexual immorality, the Apostle Paul writes, “Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.” Such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified. But you are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the spirit of our God.

Here’s a question for you: Is homosexuality a worse sin than other sins?

The answer, biblically speaking, is yes and no.

Some places in the Bible indicate that some sins are worse than others. For example, under Old Testament law, there were certain sins that were prescribed the death penalty, while others had lesser punishments.

As another example, in the New Testament, sexual sins are identified as uniquely heinous and dishonoring. They are sins against one’s own body. 1 Corinthians 6 says that’s different than other sins.

More specifically in the Bible, homosexuality is regarded as a terrible sin—a particularly terrible sin. It is called an abomination in Leviticus 18. It is called detestable in Leviticus 20.

It is a sin that yields the death penalty. Romans 1:26-27 refers to homosexual desires as degrading passions. It degrades those who feel them and act on them.

Therefore, especially in our pro-LGBTQ society, we should never reach the point where we are no longer profoundly disturbed by homosexuality. It is wrong with a capital W. It is such obvious rebellion against God and such grievous self-degradation.

Nevertheless, the Bible indicates that all sins have the same penalty: hellfire forever, eternal separation from the goodness and love of God. From a white lie to murder, from lust to gay marriage, all meet the same judgment.

Why? Because all sins are the same at their core. They are all willful efforts to rebel against God’s character and way and exalt the self.

Notice from the passage that we read that homosexuality is not the only sin that’s going to keep somebody out of the kingdom of God. We have all these other ones too. So in one sense, a homosexual sin is no different from your own.

Now if you are a Christian, Christ has not treated you the way that your terrible sins deserve. But he has instead saved you. He has shown compassion on you and he has saved you.

So how should this inform the way you treat a homosexual in counseling? Is it not that you should treat that person with humility, with compassion? We have no room for a high and mighty attitude towards those caught in homosexuality.

Nor should we condemn them as if they’ve committed the unpardonable sin. They have not.

Furthermore, those struggling with same-sex attraction within the church or within Christian homes—and these people do exist—they are not beasts to be banished, but they are brethren to be helped and admonished.

All this to say, we must not regard the homosexual as some enemy or dangerous alien. No, he is just like us. Though his sinful heart has manifested perhaps in a more shameful lifestyle than we have lived, he’s just like us. He’s just like you.

He’s created in the image of God just like you. And therefore, he is worthy of honor and kind treatment. He is a sinner just like you, under the same penalty of eternal wrath that you were.

And he therefore needs hope and the life-transforming power of the spirit just like you.

And what’s amazing? God is just as pleased to save and transform homosexuals as he is those who are in bondage to other kinds of sins. Because did you notice that in the passage that we just read, 1 Corinthians 6:11?

Such were some of you. Some of you were drunkards. Some of you are homosexuals. Some of you were adulterers. Such were some of you. But then what happened?

But you were washed. But you were sanctified. But you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the spirit of our God.

In the first century Roman Empire, which was more godless than our present society, if you can believe that, God was saving and sanctifying every kind of sinner, including homosexuals. And God has not changed and neither has his spirit waned in power.

God is still saving and sanctifying homosexuals today as many of our brethren have testified, being former homosexuals themselves.

“God has not changed and his Spirit has not waned in power. God is still saving and sanctifying homosexuals today.”

Jay Adams, the pioneer of the modern biblical counseling movement, writes this about 1 Corinthians 6:9-11. This is Jay Adams: “Often homosexuals, drunkards, and others will ask counselors if there is any hope of changing. Reading this passage is a powerful response. Paul makes it clear that such things as drunkenness and homosexuality are not genetic problems as some aver, but rather are sinful lifestyles.

Lifestyles due to genetics do not require forgiveness. But also, it is true that they cannot be changed either. All lifestyles mentioned here are sin and gendered. The hope lies in this: Jesus Christ died for sins, not for genetic problems. Call what the Bible labels sin sin and you will restore hope to many who have been led astray by modern propaganda often disseminated by avant-garde elements in the church itself.”

First and foremost then, as a biblical counselor you are to have a gospel-hopefilled attitude when counseling homosexuals.

“Call what the Bible labels sin ‘sin,’ and you will restore hope to many who have been led astray by modern propaganda.”

The Gospel Offering: Plea and Repentance

But number two, you must also communicate the gospel by your gospel offering plea. You must have the right attitude, but then you must actually give the gospel. Give the gospel to your counselee and make sure he understands it.

Help him see that he must repent of his sin and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ to be saved.

Show them from the scriptures that they must confess not just their behavior as sin, but their whole condition as being in a state of sin before God. Ephesians 2:1-3 talks about our former state. Show them that repentance involves a change of mind so complete that there is a change of life. They must renounce their whole sinful lifestyle. Luke 3:8-9 talks about bearing fruit in keeping with repentance.

Show them that they must transfer all their trust from themselves to Jesus Christ who died for all their sins, not just the sins of homosexuality. Romans 5:8-9 talks about God’s love demonstrated in Christ dying for sin. Show them that we must acknowledge that it is by the grace of God, grace alone, that we are saved, not because of intentions to make changes in our lives.

Ephesians 2:8-10 talks about how it is by grace you are saved through faith and not by your works.

So come with a gospel-informed attitude.

“Repentance involves a change of mind so complete that there is a change of life. They must renounce their whole sinful lifestyle.”

Gospel-Powered Sanctification

Give the gospel. Plead with them to believe the gospel. And if a homosexual is willing to repent and believe, then you can minister the gospel to him in a final way. And that is by your instruction in gospel-powered sanctification.

Now that you’re really in a discipleship relationship with your counselee, if he repents and believes the gospel, you need to teach him how to walk in increasing practical sanctification.

Salvation brings a change of heart, but sanctification brings the change in lifestyle.

For a former homosexual, sanctification means a total life restructuring.

Since homosexuality was intimately tied up with his life, you are now going to need to help your counselee untangle and remove the sin of homosexuality, but also the sins that were feeding it and were being fed by it.

Here’s another quotation from Jay Adams. This one is a little bit longer than one I read before.

When a man, a whole person, can be labeled fairly as a drunkard, homosexual, drug addict, etc., he has a life-dominating problem. He is no longer merely a man, but the Bible speaks of him as a certain kind of man: a drunkard, a liar, double-minded, etc.

A man characterized by or dominated by the particular problem that gives him his name. The Bible labels those with life-dominating problems.

Since all of life is affected by and affects the problem, the man with a life-dominating problem finds that all of his life must come under review in counseling. All of his life will need alteration.

Whenever a counselor’s problem turns out to be one large life-dominating sin like homosexuality, he may erroneously think that he has only one problem to solve. He may even become impatient with a counselee who attempts to look at other aspects of his life. “Why don’t you get to the problem? Why all this extraneous concern about family, relationships, work, health?” he may ask.

But in such cases, the problem cannot help but affect every other aspect of his life. Its effects doubtless have bled over into social life, married life, work, physical and financial matters. Whenever he has problems at work, he seeks out his homosexual companions for some immediate gratification. When he resorts to homosexual sin, the guilt adversely affects his work. The problem and problems in every area tend to feed one another.

End of the quotation.

So you can see, as Jay Adams says, “As a counselor, you must help a person with homosexual habituations to put aside systematically the old ways of life and adopt new ways that are fashioned after Jesus Christ.” And that’s what Ephesians 4:20–24 tells us: you did not learn Christ this way, but you lay aside the old self. You put on the new self, which is being made in the likeness of God because God is renewing your mind according to Christ.

Ephesians 4:20–24: “You did not learn Christ this way—lay aside the old self and put on the new self, renewed in the likeness of God.”

Some of the specific fruits of repentance you will want to teach your homosexual counselee, your former homosexual counselee, would be total forsaking of homosexual acts and companions. 1 Corinthians 15:33 says, “Do not be deceived. Bad company corrupts good morals.” They’re going to have to cut off those old relationships.

Radical changes in scheduling to forestall temptation and promote pursuit of Christ will be required.

Also, radical changes in all of life’s thoughts and activities are necessary.

Often Dr. Street, my counseling professor, says that you’ll find former homosexuals’ lives were previously saturated with thoughts of sexual things. That has to be radically changed, and they need to learn to take down the idol of sex, which was functioning as a god in their life, and to replace that idol with mind-engaging thoughts of the God of glory.

Perseverance Over Quick Victory

It really is a putting off and putting on in the inner man resulting in a putting off and putting on in the outer man. Now, something you’ll need to help your counsel guard against is the tendency to seek quick victory and total liberation from homosexual temptation rather than perseverant obedience.

This is a key concept with dealing with all types of sins. People counsel often expect that when they get serious about a sin, the old temptations will go away quickly and totally, and that standing up during times of temptation will be relatively easy and painless.

Now, sometimes that happens with certain sins, especially when a person first repents and believes. Praise God for that. They’re like, “I had no desire for this anymore.” That sometimes happens. But many times, it’s not for all the sins in a person’s life.

With other sins, the temptations keep coming and resisting is difficult. New Christians and counselors can get discouraged. They can even question their salvation.

They say, “Why is it so hard for me to stand up against this? Why does it feel like there’s no way I’m going to be able to overcome? I must not be a Christian.”

You need to help your counseling understand that what they’re experiencing is actually quite normal. If they are willing to pursue Christ even when times get hard and even when those hard times come repeatedly, assure them they can overcome.

They can experience the reward of fellowship with Christ, but they must persevere. In truth, a former homosexual may never be completely free from temptation back towards homosexuality, towards lusting, towards homosexual acts. That temptation may never go away totally.

Though, as he puts away sources of temptation and perseveres in following Christ, developing a relationship with Christ, those temptations typically get easier to deal with. But rather than seeking quick and total victory, we must teach our counselors to seek Christ doggedly, and thereby enjoy a faithful and obedient relationship to him.

It’s not about being totally free of temptation. It’s about standing for Christ, persevering whenever those temptations come. No matter how hard those temptations are, you can by the spirit of Christ and by the promises of his word, you can stand even when your flesh and your feelings are saying opposite.

“It’s not about being totally free of temptation. It’s about standing for Christ, persevering whenever those temptations come.”

You got to teach them that. You got to help them believe that so they’ll stand. This is particularly important with sexual sins like homosexuality because your body seems to be working against you.

You’ve habituated your body to seek pleasure and fulfillment in sexual things. And so the body is craving that and the flesh especially is craving that. You have to persevere and you can do that by the spirit of Christ.

Responding to Unbelieving Homosexual Family Members

That counsel I’ve given you thus far is for those who actually want help overcoming homosexuality.

What if a person doesn’t want help? What if you have a family member who’s become a homosexual and has even turned away from Christ to do so?

How should you respond? As Mark said earlier, this is not theoretical. This is what a number of families in this church have dealt with and are dealing with.

You have a child, you have a sibling, you have a relative who has embraced a gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender lifestyle. If this isn’t the case in your family, it would not hurt to be prepared for the future because the LGBTQ movement is very strong in our society.

I think we will find that more and more people will be drawn into it in the future unless God grants revival in this land. May God please protect our families from this evil movement.

But we cannot choose for them. Even if we raise them well, even if we teach them the gospel and live it out, our children will have to make their own choices. Some of them may choose to embrace a homosexual lifestyle.

So, how should you respond when a family member embraces homosexuality?

We only have three minutes, so I can’t say everything here. I’ll just give you three pieces of counsel.

Maintain a Loving Relationship

First, seek to maintain a loving relationship with that family member.

As we said, homosexuality is a grievous sin. Your first impulse might be to just cut yourself off from this family member and from his or her partner. You might think, “I don’t want you part of my life anymore,” but remember your true priority. It’s not your own comfort.

It’s the glory of Jesus Christ and his great commission.

Some parts of your relationship with this family member cannot help but change when that family member comes out. But your commitment to love that family member, especially if he’s a close family member, should not change.

Let that person, even as Mike or Mark was saying earlier, let that family member become mystified at how on the one hand you can declare God’s gospel—that he and his partner need to be reconciled to God through Jesus Christ—while on the other hand you seek to serve him and his partner with radical love.

They won’t understand how those two things fit together, but the Bible shows us that they do.

“Let that family member be mystified at how you can declare the gospel and yet serve them with radical love. The Bible shows us those two things belong together.”

Winning Without Words

You may need to enforce certain rules so that you do not inadvertently promote sin or enable an ungodly influence on the rest of your family. But don’t automatically make a homosexual family member a pariah. For the sake of Christ, maintain a love relationship if at all possible.

Number two: do not feel obligated to keep giving the gospel to a resistant family member. That may seem like odd advice, but let me explain quickly.

Some Christians are happy to maintain a relationship with a coming out family member, but resolve to speak the gospel and call on them for repentance whenever they see him. This is what you need the most, so I’m going to give it to you every time.

There are some good intentions here. But you can guess the result of this approach on the homosexual family member.

He’s going to stop being with you. He’s not going to want to visit you anymore because he knows you’re just going to give him the gospel.

But should Christians keep giving the gospel to those who have already heard it and have indicated they don’t want to hear it anymore?

Actually, the instruction given by our Lord to the apostles when they went out to preach from town to town was that they go to a town for a little while. If the people do not receive the word, they were to warn those people and then move on to preach somewhere else. That’s Matthew 10:14. The apostles were not simply to keep preaching in the face of steadfast resistance.

Furthermore, in Matthew 7:6, in a context having to do with confronting others over sin, Jesus says, “Do not give what is holy to dogs, and do not throw your pearls before swine, or they will trample them under their feet and turn and tear you to pieces.”

Finally, God’s instruction in 1 Peter 3:1 to wives suffering under husbands disobedient to the word is to practice godly submission so that the husbands may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives.

Putting passages like these together, I agree with pastor and biblical counselor Heath Lambert. When he counsels that a family member has heard and knows the gospel and steadfastly rejects it, the approach to that family member should switch from winning him with the word to winning him without the word by your loving and respectful behavior.

This is not to say that you can never preach the gospel to that family member again. Maybe a good opportunity will come up after certain changes take place in his life. But you need not lay the burden on yourself or on that family member of always talking about the gospel with him when he has made clear that he doesn’t want to hear it.

You can minister the gospel without words because you’ve already declared it, made it clear, and that person has steadfastly rejected it. So you just switch modes.

“When a family member steadfastly rejects the gospel, switch from winning him with the word to winning him without the word through loving behavior.”

Declining the Homosexual Wedding Invitation

Third, and finally, if a family member invites you to attend a homosexual wedding, graciously decline.

Truly, there is nothing to celebrate at a homosexual wedding, as the happiness of the pair that they are inviting others to share in is for a self-destructive path in direct contradiction to God’s design.

You have nothing to be happy about if you attend. Furthermore, by attending, you indicate some level of approval, and you thus send a mixed message about the gospel to that couple.

So out of love for Christ and out of love to those people, you should not go.

Now, the homosexual couple or maybe other family members may take offense at this and interpret your non-attendance as due to some kind of evil motive.

Therefore, you would do well to write the couple a kind letter explaining your non-attendance as well as your love for them and your desire to see them reconciled to Christ.

“Out of love for Christ and love for those people, write them a kind letter explaining your non-attendance and your desire to see them reconciled to Christ.”

Let them do without what they will. But you want to make clear why you’re doing what you’re doing. It’s not because you don’t love them. It’s because you do love them.

There’s much more to say on this topic, but that is all the time we have, or actually a little bit overtime.

If you have questions about what you heard today or what you should do, send me an email and maybe I can take it up in the Q&A or send you an email response. Next week is our Q&A.

Don’t forget to send me questions by Thursday of this week so I can deal with them.

Well, let’s close in prayer.

Lord God, we thank you for this truth in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, that though we like many homosexuals were dominated by various sins in our lives, you saved us. What characterized us once before is not what characterizes us now.

And yet we still need to grow, Lord, in our ability to love and speak the gospel to those caught in homosexuality. I pray that you would protect this church from the lies of the LGBTQ movement, but Lord, for us who are ministering to specific people who are caught up in it.

Give us that heart of compassion. Give us a devotion to Jesus Christ that holds out hope to that person and that wants to love that person, whether that person chooses to follow Christ or not.

May we minister the gospel both in our words and in our works. And may you be pleased to draw homosexuals and many others, Lord, to Christ.

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