I was listening to the pastor on the radio on the way home, he was dicussing 1st Corinthians Chapter 5 verses 1-13 5:1-13.  Now he was speaking about it in the church, and how sexual immorality must be dealt with in the church.  I whole heartedly agree with him on that.  I think most Christians do, if they are actually Christians and understand that we are to live as we are called to in Christ.

That said, that passage is about the church, not a country, not a government.  It is about we in the church, and how our lives are supposed to be lived.  So here I go again, to try and shed some light so people will understand that the government and the church are separate right now and need to remain so until the second coming of Christ when He rules. 

So first off we are a nation of laws and rights based upon the Constitution of The United States of America, and the Bill of Rights granted us through the Constitutional process.  That is important to understand, because all people who are citizens have those rights.  Not just the Christians in this nation, all people who are citizens !!!

So as such, this government is not just for Christians, it is for all Americans.  Now we have laws in this country that ste ages as to when a person is of a legal age to make decisions about their lives.  Such as at 18 years of age one can vote.  One can join the military without a parents signature, one can enter into a legal contract and have it be binding and a legal obligation, ...  That means one can choose to get married to a person they want too, unless of course they happen to be of the same sex.  Because in America homosexuals are not considered to be citizens I guess.   I mean mass murderers can get married in prison- for crying out loud- but homosexuals well that is just to much to allow. 

Now before a bunch of you -do gooder- christians jump on me and say you can't be a Christian if you believe in homosexual marriage.  Put a sock in it, and listen for a few minutes.  You might actually learn something about being in Christ.  First off.  I don't believe in homosexual marriage, but it is not my right to impose my beliefs on people who don't believe as I do.  This country is not a church, it is a nation of individuals who have the same rights as I do, whether they are religious people or not they have a right to marry who they will as long as both people are of the age of consent and they harm no minors or people who are not of their right mind and cannot decide for themselves.  Do I have to agree with their decisions ??  Not at all.  Do I have to allow them to make them ??  Yes I do if I consider myself a Christian and an American.  There will be those who disagree, I understand that.  That is their right, but it is not their right to impose their beliefs upon people who do not believe as they do, and still think they believe in allowing freedom of choice and freedom of religion. 

I'm going to post 1 Corinthians 5:1-13 and make some comments as to how I understand the verses.  Then I'm going to post some other verses from 1 Corinthians to allow people to see how I can come to these conclusions Biblically.

5 It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and such sexual immorality as is not even named among the Gentiles-that a man has his father's wife! ² And you are puffed up, and have not rather mourned, that he who has done this deed might be taken away from among you. ³ For I indeed, as absent in body but present in spirit, have already judged (as though I were present) him who has so done this deed. ⁴ In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when you are gathered together, along with my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, ⁵ deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. ⁶ Your glorying is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump? ⁷ Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us. ⁸ Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

 Paul is speaking to the members of the church, not those outside of the church.  He is saying that the sexual immorality should not be allowed in the church.  Because the church is to be separate from the ways of the world.  If you notice the woman in the act is not mentioned.  Why because she was not a member of the church, and therefore was not under the judgement of the church, she was not in Jesus Christ and so her sins were not the responsibility of the church members to bring up to her.    Why do members of a church glory in allowing the sin of their brothers and sisters to be passed off as being acceptable ??  Whether it be sexual, or coveteousness, greed, hard heartedness, political lies, or being a false witness against a brother or sister to gain financially or to gain a position  of authority for control instead of giving Him the glory.  It is still against Christ in the Church, and that is what is wrong to do.

Christ is our Way, if we are of Him, our lives reflect that in how we live and treat others as well as how we want them to be allowed to see Him in freedom not forced beliefs.  We don't want to glorify sin in the church as being His grace allowing it, we want sin gone, as a way of life from we who profess to be His.

⁹ I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. ¹⁰ Yet I certainly did not mean with the sexually immoral people of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. ¹¹ But now I have written to you not to keep company with anyone named a brother, who is sexually immoral, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or an extortioner- not even to eat with such a person. ¹² For what have I to do with judging those also who are outside? Do you not judge those who are inside? ¹³ But those who are outside God judges. Therefore "put away from yourselves the evil person."

 Paul says we as a church are to not keep company with the ones who are a brother in Christ with those people.  He says for what do I have to do with judging those who are also outside ??  That would be judging the people outside of Christ.  We judge those who are inside.  Those who are outside of Christ God judges.  We as Christians are to put away those who claim Christ, but won't repent from their evil way.  This is what I've been writing about when I speak of political church's and churchs' trying to make America in their image whether it be conservative or liberal.

He does not say to stay away from the people of the world that we are to be a messenger of Christ to while we are still in this world.

Am I different from a lot of Christians ??  I don't know all Christians, but I try to live as Christ calls me to, and live as He instructed Paul through the Holy Spirit to teach we who came to Him-Jesus Christ- to be saved.  I'm not threatened by those of the world because I'm a sojourner whose time here is to work for Christ and share His Way.  I'm not detoured by those with their own plans of using His Name for their gain and power either.  They do not scare me or overwhelm me with their lies and ways, because I have Him.

1 Corinthians 2:9-16

⁹ But as it is written: "Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, Nor have entered into the heart of man The things which God has prepared for those who love Him."

¹⁰ But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God.

¹¹ For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God.

¹² Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.

¹³ These things we also speak, not in words which man's wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.

¹⁴ But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

¹⁵ But he who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is rightly judged by no one.

¹⁶ For "who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct Him?" But we have the mind of Christ.

When we receive His Spirit in us we are given the discernment from Him.  Therefore the things of the natural man are not of a great concern to us as far as looking for the gain here on earth as they do, because to us it is temporary and not worth the effort and time it takes from doing the work of Christ.  The things of this earth perish and have no eternity, the flesh gets old, and sick, then dies, or dies young and is still gone in the flesh.  

The Love we have goes on and the things we do in Christ remain.

So for all of you who want condemn and stop the homosexuals who are not professing Christ from living in the flesh, and for all of you who want to make this country just as you think it should be to fit your image of Christ.    Beware, you bring the judgements you make on them upon yourselves and you are not Christ.  For He did not not say force all the people to follow Me in My Way.  He came and gave freely and said freely to come to Him and to give yourself to Him of your own free will, but to count the cost before doing so.  Following Him is not easy, His burden is light, but the ways of the world are always there and the enemy of Him will try to destroy your walk with Him.  That is why He said-paraphrased- narrow is the Path to Salvation and few are those who find it, but wide is the road of destruction and many are those who travel it.

This country needs to remain free for all to choose as they will.  I've spoken my piece and stated what I believe, as well as why I believe that Way.

Comments are welcome and disagreements happen.  Respect should go both ways, or there really can't be a discussion, there can be arguments and nobody wins an argument.

Vote it up and comment if you like it.  Comment and make salient points if you'd like to dispute it please.  Oh and for you Christians who want to dispute it.  Please show me scriptures that back your discernment.  So we can read them together and I vcan see where you are getting your understanding.  Thank you.

Thanks for reading it either way.