Is Homosexuality Worse Than the Other Sins Listed in Romans 1?
Romans One, in the discussion of homosexuality, adultery, fornication, just all of the sexual sins that exist, I think is really misunderstood by so many in the Church today. And I think in part it comes from not many of us struggle with homosexuality. Some certainly do and it’s a growing concern we have in today’s culture. But it’s something that, to most of us, isn’t our sin struggle.
Now, others of us though, we have sin struggles whether would tempt us adultery or fornication or other sexual sins… lust. And so we understand that, and I think that sometimes makes us view those sins as less bad… if you want to put it that way… than homosexuality, because it’s so foreign to us.
I don’t think that’s what Paul is talking about; he’s putting them altogether. All these sexual sins are the same. One is not worse than the other, and because of our blindness to God’s truth and our willingness to forget His truth and walk the other way, He turns us over to these lusts. And I don’t think He’s ranking them in Romans.
But I think it’s something in the Church we really need to come to grips with. Because all too often we can really put them in a different category if they’re struggling with homosexuality… and we don’t demonstrate God’s love to them in the same way that we would if someone engaged in adultery and now seeks forgiveness or has a sin of pornography or lust. We have to realize it’s the same and we have to reach out to them and understand it’s not that different.
We can understand that because we all struggle with sin and God doesn’t treat them differently.
WATCH: Is Homosexuality Worse Than the Other Sins Listed in Romans 1?
Discussing the harsh life of those living in tea estates, and the Gospel for Asia-supported pastor who show in big and small ways how much Jesus loves them.
“I was born and brought up in a tea estate. I am a son of a tea garden laborer, and I myself was a laborer once. Before even coming to the Lord, I have seen the struggles of the life of tea garden people.” —Pastor Ekanpreet
Rows and rows of lush green shrubs stretch into the horizon. Women dot the scenery, plucking tea leaves and stuffing what they’ve collected into bags they carry on their heads. Some women smile, enjoying the slivers of conversation they have with each other. Others keep their focus on their job, plucking and stuffing, so their families will have enough income to make it through the day.
For as much natural beauty that surrounds the tea estate, the lives of these laborers are far from beautiful.
Parents can’t afford to buy their children clothing.
“All I can do is just tell [my children], ‘This time I am not able to buy your clothes. Maybe next coming Christmas, I will buy some dress,’” says Mudit, father of six.
Wives are sent away to find work.
“I am barely able to buy food for my children. That was one of the reasons why I had to send my wife to [the city],” says Bhavin, father of three. “As a domestic help she has gone there so she can send us some money, and at least we can maintain the family.”
People have no restroom facilities.
“We used to go out in the open in the tea garden. That is the practice here,” says Iniyavan, a tea garden laborer. “There is lots of inconvenience when you have ladies at home, when you have children at home. For them, going to the toilet in the open, it’s not very good . . .”
Fathers suddenly vanish when the burden of caring for the family becomes too much.
“I have seen . . . the father, the head of the family, all of a sudden left the home and gone elsewhere,” says Pastor Ekanpreet, a Gospel for Asia-supported pastor serving in the area. “Once the man leaves the home, he never returns or nobody hears anything about that man.”
Young boys and girls grow up thinking drugs, alcohol and promiscuity are a normal way of life.
“People here tend to live a morally loose type of life,” Ekanpreet says. “They do not think much about ethical values or moral values in their lives.”
“I lived a very worldly life,” he says. “I used to drink. I used to smoke. I did every worldly thing that a person who doesn’t know the Lord does. … I even told my wife, ‘Look, now we have two children. The money that I make from labor work, from the tea garden, is not sufficient. You sell wine and drinks at home so we can make a better living.’”
But then Ekanpreet came to know Jesus. After nearly dying from a sickness, Ekanpreet devoted his life to serving the Lord, who healed him. He left the tea estate to pursue life in ministry, but the tea-estate life was never far from his mind.
“I wanted to continue to work among the tea estate,” he says. “I am deeply attached and associated emotionally with those living in tea gardens.”
After graduating from Bible college, Ekanpreet returned with a yearning to help the people he knew were living empty, hand-to-mouth existences—like he once was. But it took patience and enduring a tremendous amount of opposition to establish the work.
Fighting the Past
Pastor Ekanpreet and other missionaries were up against a colonial-era mentality among the tea estate laborers, who thought Christians were only out to make money and turn them into slaves.
“That was the misunderstanding the people had about the work we were doing,” Ekanpreet says. “But when we understood that, our first goal . . . was to bring change in the hearts and minds of the people who were thinking like that.”
Pastor Ekanpreet and other Gospel for Asia-supported workers searched for ways, even using their own resources and finances, to show the tea garden laborers God’s love by caring for their needs.
“If anybody was not able to send their children to school, we helped them. If anybody was not able to buy medicine for their sickness, . . . we started to help those people,” Ekanpreet says.
Through these practical expressions of Christ’s love, the people who once opposed Ekanpreet’s ministry began to soften their hearts.
“There is something strange, new in these Christians,” they said. “They are not here to make anybody slaves . . . but their purpose is to help the poor and the needy, which we are not able to do.”
“There is something strange, new in these Christians. . . their purpose is to help the poor and the needy, which we are not able to do.”
Blazing Forward
Pastor Ekanpreet knew the people living in the tea estate had many needs, many struggles. He saw their poverty, but he also understood their desire to thrive. He knew they needed lasting help, help that would sustain them.
So he set up Christmas gift distributions to give families income-generating gifts like barnyard animals, sewing machines, rickshaws and other items to alleviate their financial burdens.
People also received other gifts that would help their health and protect their dignity, gifts like toilets and mosquito nets. Seven Jesus Wells were also installed throughout the tea estate, allowing anyone access to clean, safe water.
A Bridge of Hope center opened, giving kids, some of whom sold alcohol or were beggars, a chance for a better life. It also relieved some of the pressure parents felt to properly provide for their children, while at the same time imparting good morals to the students.
For 15 years, Pastor Ekanpreet and other Gospel for Asia-supported workers have served the more than 10,000 people living in the tea estate and surrounding areas, showing them in big and small ways how much Jesus loves them. Ekanpreet has seen the mindset of people change, and entire communities have been uplifted in society, but there is still much work to be done and more people who need to find the Hope worth living for.
“For the poor will never cease from the land; therefore I command you, saying, ‘You shall open your hand wide to your brother, to your poor and your needy, in your land.’” —Deuteronomy 15:11
Learn more about the GFA-supported national workers who carry a burning desire for people to know the love of God. Through their prayers, dedication and sacrificial love, thousands of men and women have found new life in Christ.
*Names of people and places may have been changed for privacy and security reasons. Images are Gospel for Asia stock photos used for representation purposes and are not the actual person/location, unless otherwise noted.
The head of a U.S. humanitarian agency is accusing the United Nations of using the coronavirus pandemic to “cynically” place abortion “on the same level of importance” as food and sanitation.
John Barsa, the acting administrator of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), wrote in a May 18 letter to U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres that the United States “stands with nations that have pledged to protect the unborn.”
President Trump appointed Barsa to the position in March.
“Under the leadership of President Donald J. Trump, the United States has made clear that we will ‘never tire of defending innocent life,’” Barsa wrote in the letter.
Specifically, Barsa criticizes the U.N.’s Global Humanitarian Response Plan, a 79-page document that details the United Nations’ strategy for fighting the pandemic.
“[T]he UN should not use this crisis as an opportunity to advance access to abortion as an ‘essential service,’” Barsa wrote. “Unfortunately, the Global HRP does just this, by cynically placing the provision of ‘sexual and reproductive health services’ on the same level of importance as food-insecurity, essential health care, malnutrition, shelter, and sanitation. Most egregious is that the Global HRP calls for the widespread distribution of abortion-inducing drugs and abortion supplies, and for the promotion of abortion in local country settings.”
The May Global HRP says “the pandemic is disrupting the access of women and girls … to essential services such as sexual and reproductive health services.”
“Reproductive health” is a phrase that encompasses abortion. One goal during the pandemic, the HRP says, is to “secure the continuity of the supply chain for essential commodities and services, such as food, time-critical productive and agricultural inputs, sexual and reproductive health and non-food items.”
The Global HRP, Barsa wrote, “must remain focused on addressing the most urgent, concrete needs that are arising out of the pandemic.”
“Under the leadership of President Donald J. Trump, the United States has made clear that we will ‘never tire of defending innocent life,’” Barsa wrote. “President Trump said in his address to the 74th UN General Assembly that the UN simply has ‘no business attacking the sovereignty of nations that wish to protect innocent life.’
“Indeed, the UN should not intimidate or coerce Member States that are committed to the right to life. To use the COVID-19 pandemic as a justification to pressure governments to change their laws is an affront to the autonomy of each society to determine its own national policies on health care. The United States stands with nations that have pledged to protect the unborn.”
Barsa asked Guterres to remove references to “sexual and reproductive health” because “member states are deeply divided” over its use.
“Now is not the time to add unnecessary discord to the COVID-19 response,” Barsa wrote.
