July
19, 2018
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It’s a common claim accepted as
truth: God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah because gays had overrun the place.
This past week, Franklin Graham
repeated this biblically illiterate and twisted claim as if the LGBTQ community
should be on notice that wearing shirts that say, “So gay, so what?” might
result in God sending fire from the sky like the good ole days.
Like blindly spouting, “God helps
those who help themselves” is in the Bible without double checking, the claim
that God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah over homosexuality remains one of those
commonly repeated claims that is biblically false.
Tisk. Tisk.
No, God didn’t destroy Sodom and Gomorrah because of homosexuality– and that’s what Franklin Graham is Wrong About Today.
No need to take my word for it– if
the Bible is our authority, let’s just look there.
The Bible does tell us that
Sodom and Gomorrah was overrun by wicked people, there’s no doubt about that.
When Abraham tried to bargain with God to save the city, we remember he had to
keep moving the goal post to strike a deal with the Almighty. And yet, in the
end, the only ones to be saved were Abraham’s family who lived down there– and
even that was clearly a matter of God just doing Abraham a solid, because later
in the story we discover that Lot was a horrible human being who should have
been at ground zero of God’s wrath.
I’m sure you also remember that God
sent a couple of angels to do the extraction mission just in case the gang of
misfit oil drillers failed to drill deep enough into the asteroid or detonate
the nuke that would divert it into space and save the city.
Okay, I might be confusing that last
part with a movie I saw once, but I think my point still stands.
Anyhoo, the angels went into the
city to grab Lot and his family, but there was just one problem: their worst
fears turned out to be true and the city was full of basically the worst people
on the planet. They even formed a mob outside Lot’s house and wanted to haul
these strangers out into the street and gang-rape them. Lot tried to talk them
out of it, but they reminded him that he was just an immigrant and that they’d
do even worse to him if he stood in their way.
Now, I *shouldn’t* have to explain
that there’s a difference between being gay, and wanting to beat and gang-rape
immigrants in your local town. If I have to, there’s a problem- but it’s not
really my problem.
The irony here is that in fact, this
wicked action tells us the people of Sodom and Gomorrah were likely harshly
disapproving of being gay– which is precisely why they weaponized it. You
see, in these ancient cultures homosexuality was largely despised because the
one on the receiving end of the transaction was seen to take on the role of a
woman– and if there’s one thing they hated more than gays, it was women.
Thus, for one man to rape another man wasn’t an act rooted in sexual desire,
but an action rooted in humiliating and demoralizing that person. It would have
been an action to strip them of their manhood.
Had Lot seen them as being gay, he
would never have offered to let them have sex with his virgin daughters instead
(horrible human being, remember?). They weren’t interested in that option- not
because of sexual orientation, not because they were seeking sexual pleasure,
but because they wanted to send a strong message to these new immigrants who
wandered into town.
This was rape. It was an
anti-immigrant hate crime. None of it has anything to do with sexual
orientation.
These weren’t people inviting the
angels to come out and participate in a gay pride parade, but were instead
trying to humiliate and demoralize them by forcing them to be on the receiving
end of male/male sex, something that would have been extra detestable for these
bronze age tribes.
So, say it with me: Trying to
gang-rape immigrants as a way of humiliating and demoralizing them isn’t the
same thing as just “being gay.”
What the people of Sodom wanted to
do to the strangers who came to visit Lot revealed the deeper wickedness that
made the city detestable to God: a lack of hospitality for strangers. In fact,
for those who claim a belief in the inspiration of Scripture, we turn to the
Bible itself to tell us why God destroyed the city:
“Behold,
this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom: pride, fullness of bread, and
prosperous ease was in her and in her daughters; neither did she strengthen the
hand of the poor and needy. And they were haughty, and committed
abomination before me: therefore I took them away when I saw it.” – Ezekiel
16:49-50
When God describes why he took these
folks out, he lays out the case quite clearly: The people of Sodom were rich
and full of themselves– thinking they were entitled to whatever they wanted,
giving no thought to helping the poor or to showing hospitality to strangers
(immigrants), and they showed scorn for anyone they felt was inferior to them
(aka, “haughty”). To top it all off, they attempted to do something that should
be seen as detestable in the eyes of anyone with a sliver of humanity.
Basically, when the mission to
divert the asteroid failed, God was rather okay to put on that Bloodhound Gang
song and tap his foot with the beat while humming “we don’t need no water…” and
you know the rest.
But none of that has anything to do
with being gay.
When the Bible describes a bunch of
rich a%&@! who didn’t give a rip about the poor and needy, and who hated
immigrants so much that they were content to rape and dehumanize them, it’s not
describing the same thing as when that kid in your church youth group works up
the courage to admit they’re gay.
It’s not the same thing. It’s not
even close to the same thing.
And to sucker millions of people
into blindly believing otherwise is What Franklin
Graham is Wrong About Today.
*****************************************************************************
Dr. Benjamin L. Corey is a public theologian and cultural anthropologist who is a two-time graduate of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary with graduate degrees in the fields of Theology and International Culture, and holds a doctorate in Intercultural Studies from Fuller Theological Seminary.
He is also the author of the new book, Unafraid: Moving Beyond Fear-Based Faith, which is available wherever good books are sold. www.Unafraid-book.com.
Corey often writes with a certain degree of snark, but is actually quite likable in real life.
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