1. Choose Celibacy or Choose Marriage - You Decide (11-09-2021).
01:40 - START OF CLASS. This is a continuation of the previous series in August 2021. We discussed the 14th amendment, which we are saying will be the central argument or central issue. Only a few years ago, the 2nd amendment was being discussed. While that is an important subject, it is not central to the end time prophetic test.
07:00 - After WWII Eleanor Roosevelt developed the idea of universal human rights, of which the 14th amendment was central. It was an American that essentially brought together the Declaration of Human Rights. What happens in America happens in the world.
08:15 - In the last camp meeting we also discussed the rights and wrongs, and the limits of Christian marriage, especially in relation to gay marriage.
11:30 - The vast majority of people do not understand the difference between sexual orientation and gender. They are completely different terms. Sexual orientation is fixed, while gender is a social construct. When we have talked about the gendered brain, it confronts the social construct of looking at men and women, as that is the way society still views human beings. In this bipolar way - male and female. Even when we use that terminology it is not always completely accurate.
16:00 - We have always taught that sin is a choice. Sinful nature is not a choice (See presentations on the Nature of Man, beginning 2017). Therefore sinful nature cannot = sin. This was the whole purpose of Paul's message to humanity. The hope of Paul's message was not the death of Christ, nor even the resurrection of Christ. Paul's message is Christ's humanity. Sin is a choice! Jesus can come in sinful human nature but not sin. Romans 8:3 says, "in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh" The word, "likeness" means "exactly like", not "similar".
25:00 - If you could demonstrate heterosexuality is a choice, which it is not, it is a force of nature, then homosexuality cannot be a choice. If you are heterosexual it's not a sin to sleep with a woman if you are a man - it's natural. We understand that there are some rules and conditions to this, but the point is, it is not a choice, and as homosexuality is not a choice, it cannot be sin. By all the biblical definitions, of compare and contrast, choice v force, sinful nature v sin, homosexuality cannot be sin.
28:00 - When you present this to the Levites, it is not enough to just answer the six verses in the Bible, the three in the Old Testament and the three in the New Testament. We should not begin presenting this subject by interpreting those six verses either. We should begin presenting this subject with the above methodology (including the material Elder Parminder presented in the previous camp meeting). Interpreting those six verses alone will not win anybody over.
34:00 - Sexual orientation, just like sinful nature, is not sin. So homosexuality cannot be sin. We should all develop studies on that. Next we mentioned two teachings of Christianity; marriage or staying single - two opposites. Staying single means being celibate. Compare and contrast, lifelong marriage or lifelong celibacy. You are forced to choose which one you will change. Will you change the definition of celibacy, or will you change the terms of marriage? Marriage is more than a Christian teaching, it is a law, or we can call it an institution, or a decree, because God decreed marriage. In our last study we looked at celibacy and Adventist Home page 121, "Jesus Did Not Enforce Celibacy". Which means celibacy is a choice. If Jesus does not force anyone into celibacy, we should not either. Force can come in many forms. For example, abusive husbands might declare, "I never hit her!". But emotional pressure, or emotional blackmail is one of the worst forms of force.
40:25 - Let us apply a simple compare and contrast to Adventist Home, 121.2. Keep in mind nearly all Inspiration is sexist. "Jesus did not enforce celibacy upon any class of men." So rich or poor, different nationalities, Jesus never forced any man. Then Ellen White explains why He did not, and what would have been the ramifications if He did. "He came not to destroy the sacred relationship of marriage" (Ibid). In other words, if He had forced celibacy, He would have destroyed marriage. If you force celibacy, you destroy marriage, which will have a destructive ripple effect in other areas. If you force celibacy on one, certain class of people, you will destroy marriage somewhere else. You cannot enforce celibacy on one race and still maintain the sanctity of marriage amongst another race. So if you force celibacy on anyone, you destroy the doctrine, or the law of marriage. And not just for that group that has celibacy forced on them. You destroy the sanctity of marriage for everybody.
45:10 - So one of Christ's objectives when He came to Earth was to exalt and restore marriage to the original, "... but to exalt it and restore it to its original sanctity." (Ibid.) His second mission was to restore the Sabbath. That's why He had so many fights about both marriage and the Sabbath. The last sentence says, Jesus loves looking at happy families. "He looks with pleasure upon the family relationship where sacred and unselfish love bears sway." 46:30 - Summary of AH 121.2 If you tell one person or a group of people, you must stay celibate, you cannot marry, and that group says, "Are you forcing me?". You reply, "No, but if you do, something bad will happen." That is force. Emotional blackmail. If you do that, and you are married, you destroy the sanctity of your own marriage. Your marriage becomes the irreligious coming together of two heterosexual people. So you cannot separate celibacy and marriage. To do so, destroys both. So you will have to change one or the other. In the 21st century, both in Christianity and the world, we have a standard operating procedure, which is anti-biblical. We force celibacy on people. Therefore we are opposed to the sanctity of marriage - and it is sin. So previously, we were all sinners! As we all believed it was wrong for homosexual people to marry. You forced them! So we were the sinners, not them!
52:00 - Marriage should have its sanctity for everyone, including LGBT. Gay marriage is not just acceptable, it is God's will. We spoke about Matthew 19 and celibacy or eunuchs. Women were not allowed to marry men, and many Christians still believe that! Women were not allowed to ask a man on a date or to get married. All of these passages are dealing with the rights of men.
57:30 - According to the Bible, only men can be eunuchs. The three types are, some who were born unable to have children, some who were made unable to have children, and some who voluntarily cannot have children. This is not just a vasectomy, which does not make men a eunuch. This third type, the voluntary eunuch, has nothing wrong with them, so actually they suffer much more than the other two types. The first two types, who have damaged testicles and therefore have problems with their testosterone level, do not have the same sex drive as an undamaged man. They will have normal amounts of testosterone running through their veins and when they see someone they like, there is nothing they can do about how they feel toward them. This third type of voluntary eunuch suffers a lot. Type one and two are lifelong, but type three can change their minds and get married.
62:45 - That's why in verse twelve, Jesus said, "He that is able to receive it....". That's how we know it is voluntary. Paul takes this subject and says you need to be really careful about volunteering to be celibate. He is typically sexist and only talks to men. He says, If you get these burning desires and cannot contain yourself, don't be silly, stop your celibacy and get married. So the only type of people who can be type three eunuchs are those who do it voluntarily, and can handle it. Obviously, today we know this voluntary celibacy applies to women, and not just men. We have taken a sexist verse, put aside two types of eunuch that cannot change, taken the third type of eunuch which is a voluntary sacrifice, and using compare and contrast parable methodology, made it a non-gendered issue.
68:00 - This study is a journey which has proofs along the way, at each stage of this study's development, which tells you homosexual marriage is correct. Therefor you can stop at any point in this study and know gay marriage is correct.
70:30 - If an abused woman refuses to leave her abusive husband, and her girl friends think she is crazy, does it mean she has "accepted" her abusive relationship? No. When she has fear and millenia of social pressure upon her, and she "chooses" not to divorce her abusive husband, that is not "acceptance", that is force. But in this study on celibacy, we are talking about voluntary acceptance. There is no abused person that voluntarily accepts being abused. They will always have been pressured to accept their situation. Usually they will have been broken by an abuser to get to that stage. Their will was crushed and destroyed, and without will there is no choice.
73:00 - If a homosexual lives in a Christain society that teaches, if you marry, or even kiss someone of the same sex, you will not go to Heaven, and then turn around and say, We are not forcing you, they are actually tricking them. They will fully understand that if they want to go to Heaven they are being told they are not allowed to kiss their partner, let alone marry them. Their free choice has been taken from them. We need to understand that, especially when we consider abusive marriages, which is a serious issue in this movement. How abusers make victims think it is all their fault! So although we are only part of the way along our journey in this study, we hope we have already shown that it has to be right and proper for homosexuals to marry using two different methods; the nature of man and the nature of celibacy. It's not some kind of great, benevolent act that Elders Tess and Parminder have authorised this movement to do. They have just opened Inspiration and discovered what Ellen White might call new light, which is actually old light that has been repackaged. For those that disagree with gay marriage, this is not some new, novel teaching. All we are doing is what every Christian does, what every prophet has done - contextualise the truth. If you are intellectually honest you will see the truthfulness in the passages we have discussed.