Heya Gray
Please do
Okay, then. Of course, I won't be able to respond to anyone but you since this is not a debate thread. Someone else can give their opinions on the video, but I won't answer them.
I applaud the amount of effort Vines put into his argument. I agree with pretty much everything he says, but I don't come to the same conclusions. What he has managed to do is to prove that the issue of sexual orientation is not covered in the Bible. Such a debate was not on the minds of the authors of the Bible, who didn't seem to understand the concept of sexual orientation.
However, an argument from absence can only get you so far. It doesn't prove that homosexuality is a good thing.
He quotes God's words in Genesis 2:18: "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him." First he says that it's not good for a man to be alone, and he applies this to homosexual men as well as heterosexual men. But he contradicts himself later when he says that Paul encouraged some to live a life of celibacy, and that some have such a gift. So by his own admission, there are exceptions to the rule.
Then he puts emphasis on the words "suitable for him," stating that Eve was the helper suitable for Adam personally, but that for other men another man might be a more suitable partner. This is taking the verse out of context, however, and his assertion is unsupported.
He says that gay people do not choose to be homosexual, and he argues that God made made him the way that he is. And if God loves him, then that proves that homosexuality is a good thing. But he forgets that a ton of other conditions can be God given from conception as well. Some are born with mental and/or physical abnormalities. These are not good things, but at the same time they do not reflect a moral deficiency on the part of the person born with the disease or their parents.
People can also be genetically predisposed towards negative behaviors, such as drinking to excess and smoking. There also may be a gene that makes men more likely to cheat. Their conditions do not justify their actions, but we expect them to overcome their conditions and display some self-control.
Also, while every instance of same-sex intercourse in the Bible that is shown in a negative light is gang rape or something of the sort, there is no exception clause in the Bible for two same-sex people who genuinely love one another and want to have a family. As Vines said, it may not have even occurred to people like Paul that such a thing was possible, but the writers of the Bible condemned the forms of same-sex relations that they
were aware of.
Vines says that Paul proposes marriage as a remedy for passion, so that two can have relations in an honorable setting. However, the marriage seen in the Bible is defined as between a man and a woman. There is no exception in to this. In fact, the explanation for marriage goes back to Adam and Eve, when Eve was made from Adams flesh. The man and the woman come together to make one flesh again. This is what marriage is. Same-sex marriage doesn't fit.
It also doesn't fit with the relationship between the church and Christ, which is what marriage represents. The bride represents the church, and the husband represents Christ. The ways the two relate to one another, the eternal bond between two people, represents God's everlasting relationship with His people. But if you have two men or two women, how does that work? Applying the same principle to same-sex couples, we'd either have two gods together or two churches.
Vines succeeded in showing that the context of a loving relationship between two of the same sex is not specifically condemned in the Bible. However, what the Bible
does give on the subject is a clear and consistent definition for marriage as being between a man and a woman, and there is no exception given for same-sex couples.
