Love and Amendment One

I should be writing a paper right now. That's what I've been doing this afternoon, and it's what I'll be doing all night, because it is due tomorrow. However, this was on my head and my heart, and I thought it was important to write about.

This is not about whether Amendment One is right or wrong. That discussion has been had time and time again, and I can contribute nothing to it that you have not already heard. I, like most of you, know people on both sides of the issue. Not stupid people. Not ungodly people. Not bigots. I know lots of very intelligent, undeniably Godly people who stand on both sides of the issue. This is not about who is right or who is wrong. The amendment has passed, that's over with. This post is about how we respond to it.

Here is the fact of the matter: Because Amendment One passed yesterday, there is a large portion of the population who have heard the message "Christians hate homosexuals". It does not matter what your personal reasons for voting for or against the amendment were. It does not matter what the actual reason behind the amendment was. Again, I know many Godly, loving Christians who had well thought out, biblically based reasons for voting for the amendment. Doesn't matter, nobody wants to hear those reasons. Because the tone of discourse has been so polarized on both sides, the message that has been received by the vast majority on the losing side is "Christians hate homosexuals", or at very least "Christians fear homosexuals". That's the resulting message of this amendment, whether it was intended or not. A simple perusal of Facebook or Twitter will tell you that this is the case.

Where does that leave us then? The responsibility of the church, the responsibility of us as individual Christians is to prove that this is not the case. The church cannot sit back, cross its arms and say "mission accomplished". There is fallout from this which must be dealt with, work that must be done. The only way to prove that this amendment was not motivated out of fear and hate is for us to do the opposite in our lives, to love. By no means am I advocating that homosexuality is not a sin or that it should be ignored, I am saying that you should love homosexuals anyway, as God loved you, a poor and desperate sinner.

This amendment is not going to change anyone's heart. You cannot legislate people to righteousness. This issue will never be solved by laws and regulations, but only by Jesus Christ working in the hearts of sinful people. Our job, therefore, is to bring Christ to people in love. We love in order to be Christ on this earth to people who are hurting and struggling, who are bound in a sin that they can't even see. The power of the Gospel, which is a Gospel of the overwhelming and undeserved love which God has for a broken and sinful people, is the only thing that will change hearts.

This is not the end just because the vote is over with, it's just the beginning. Over the coming months and years, the church has the opportunity to prove its critics right, that we are bigots and hypocrites, or to prove them wrong, by showing that we are fueled by the great and powerful gospel and love of our Lord, and that we show his extravagant love even to, and especially to, sinful people.