Christians are Told to Bow or Face a Fierce Collision

Matt Recker

In a recent New York Times opinion column entitled, “Bigotry, the Bible and the Lessons of Indiana,” opinion columnist Frank Bruni tells conservative churches to “take homosexuality off the sin list” and bow to the new enlightened understanding of our modern world (New York Times, April 3, 2015). Bruni sees that homosexuality and devout Christianity are two forces in fierce collision. Sounding eerily similar to Nebuchadnezzar of old, he writes that “our debate about religious liberty should include a conversation about freeing religions and religious people from prejudices that they needn’t cling to and can indeed jettison, much as they’ve jettisoned other aspects of their faith’s history, rightly bowing to the enlightenments of modernity.”

The religious liberty Bruni advocates is for the church to bow to the new cultural norm. Accept homosexuality and avoid the fierce collision. He preaches to Christians that marriage between a man and woman is something Christians should not “cling to.” The church, Bruni reasons, does not have to be in conflict with homosexuality, it ought to jettison its view of marriage and just bow to pressure and accept it. Let go of your “ossified” traditions, he says, and change. Bruni goes on to chide the church for holding on to a few “scattered passages of ancient texts” written by men with “biases and blind spots.” He then congratulates various denominations and so called Christian teachers as examples of those who have bowed to the LGBT agenda. He invites the last stubborn refuge of “homophobia and discrimination,” those Christians holding to their “archaic” standards to join those who changed, to follow his advice, and to fully accept L.G.B.T. lifestyle.

Bruni reasons that bowing is reasonable because the writers of Scripture were not inspired by God but rather were moved by their biases. Bruni’s arguments have been tried and found wanting for centuries. God’s Word still lives and abides forever. Bowing is obviously only the Devil’s solution and not God’s. The Lord’s solution is for God’s people to trust in Him, to refuse to bow and like the three courageous Hebrew children of old, to be cast into the fiery furnace if necessary. The solution for those telling us to bow is for them to bow their knee to the mighty name of Jesus. Those who refuse to bow to Christ will face the ultimate fierce collision: with Christ Himself. Jesus said that He will grind to powder those who reject Him (Matthew 21:44) The real solution to this ultimate encounter is to stand for God and only bow to Him, confessing that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God.

Matt Recker is the pastor of Heritage Baptist Church in New York City.