It's LGBTQ+ pride month and the "celebration" has already resulted in major controversies in classrooms, on athletic playing fields and in major corporations. Sadly, many of these institutions are big businesses and they don't want to alienate the powerful "woke" left. It is heartening to see consumers pushing back at the increasingly aggressive LGBTQ+ agenda.
Harder to explain is the apparent surrender of some churches to the pro-homosexual agenda. Quite a few churches in the Washington, D.C., area are flying gay pride flags. Some of them are the same churches that would never hang an American flag outside or inside the sanctuary.
The Episcopal Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City appears to have gone all in on LGBTQ+ demands. The historic cathedral, with a rich history, has bathed its entire sanctuary with the rainbow lights of gay pride. Virtually every day during the month of June, the cathedral will be hosting activities, celebrations, seminars and music, all promoting LGBTQ+ pride.
I would love to see a campaign to reclaim the rainbow as the symbol God meant it to be. In Genesis, we are told that God dealt with man's evil conduct with a flood that destroyed humanity, except for Noah and his family.
When the flood waters receded, God placed a rainbow in the sky as evidence of His promise to never use a flood again to destroy evil-doers.
The Book of Revelation, written by the Apostle John, describes in great detail how God will deal with sinful men in the future — by fire — preparing the way for Christ's return. This is the same John that the Episcopal Cathedral of St. John the Divine is named after. Am I the only one to notice the irony?
The church is for sinners. Its doors are always open to the broken for whom Christ died. But the church should never embrace or celebrate the sin of men, no matter what that sin is. And expressing pride in those living in sin is as far from humble forgiveness and repentance as one can imagine.
Churches can and must look different in how they handle this. Our "bottom line" is God's Living Word — nothing more and nothing less.