Is it any wonder that people think that Christians are hypocrites when high profile believers like Jimmy Swaggart say the things they do?
He reportedly told his TV audience that he would commit murder and then lie to God if a homosexual simply looked at him the wrong way.
I’m trying to find the correct name for it . . . this utter absolute, asinine, idiotic stupidity of men marrying men. . . . I’ve never seen a man in my life I wanted to marry. And I’m gonna be blunt and plain; if one ever looks at me like that, I’m gonna kill him and tell God he died.
I read about Jimmy’s appalling comments at the Evangelical Outpost where Joe has written an excellent post on the incident.
Even if Swaggart is trying to use hyperbole to illustrate his predjudiced point he should know that many of his followers will blindly take his rants at face value. When a Christian leader makes such statements there will always be many people who see it as a license to hate.
Yes, this is the same Jimmy Swaggart who stepped down from his ministry for some time because he was caught in sexual sin. In 1987 he begged forgiveness after soliciting the services of a prostitute. Apparently his sexual sin wasn’t bad as that of homosexuals.
I’m reminded of the passage in Matthew 18: 23 “For this reason, the Kingdom of Heaven can be compared to a king who decided to bring his accounts up to date with servants who had borrowed money from him. 24 In the process, one of his debtors was brought in who owed him millions of dollars. 25 He couldn’t pay, so the king ordered that he, his wife, his children, and everything he had be sold to pay the debt. 26 But the man fell down before the king and begged him, ‘Oh, sir, be patient with me, and I will pay it all.’ 27 Then the king was filled with pity for him, and he released him and forgave his debt.
28 “But when the man left the king, he went to a fellow servant who owed him a few thousand dollars. He grabbed him by the throat and demanded instant payment. 29 His fellow servant fell down before him and begged for a little more time. ‘Be patient and I will pay it,’ he pleaded. 30 But his creditor wouldn’t wait. He had the man arrested and jailed until the debt could be paid in full.
31 “When some of the other servants saw this, they were very upset. They went to the king and told him what had happened. 32 Then the king called in the man he had forgiven and said, ‘You evil servant! I forgave you that tremendous debt because you pleaded with me. 33 Shouldn’t you have mercy on your fellow servant, just as I had mercy on you?’ 34 Then the angry king sent the man to prison until he had paid every penny.
35 “That’s what my heavenly Father will do to you if you refuse to forgive your brothers and sisters in your heart.”
C’mon Jimmy. You know we’ve all crossed the line and none of us deserve God’s forgiveness, yet he chooses to lavish it upon us. We need to show forgiveness to others just as freely as it has been given to us.
Update: This article tells us that Jimmy Swaggart has apologised for what he considered to be a ‘humourous comment’.
Part of the article says: On Wednesday, Swaggart said he has jokingly used the expression “killing someone and telling God he died” thousands of times, about all sorts of people. He said the expression is figurative and not meant to harm.
“It’s a humorous statement that doesn’t mean anything. You can’t lie to God – it’s ridiculous,” Swaggart told The Associated Press. “If it’s an insult, I certainly didn’t think it was, but if they are offended, then I certainly offer an apology.”
It’s a qualified apology but an apology never-the-less.
Posted by Rodney Olsen
Do you think some of your friends would enjoy reading Swaggart Incites Violence Against Gays? Please use the buttons below to share the post. Thanks.
Rodney, Thanks for stepping in with this post. I hope you and Lance have some good conversations.
You are right, we all battle sexual sin and need God’s forgiveness in this area.
To be honest….I’m having a great deal of trouble with this post.
I have no other way to say this, than to just say it.
Rodney, I am grateful for you coming out to me at the East Perth rail terminal…and picking me up..and showing me Perth…and inviting me to share your home when I first arrived.
And for a time there, I would have considered you to be a bit like an older brother.
That changed though when time after time after time after time …you kept make gay jokes and making fun of gay people.
No…you didn’t know I was gay, as I was still ‘playing the game’,and what we were doing at Sonshine was more important than anything at the time.
But it did help to drive me further ‘underground’…to the point where it finally all ‘erupted’ back in 2000. All the crap that I’ve been on the receiving end from Christians….while I was playing the ‘straight’ face.
Since then, I’ve been quietly doing some research among Christians. The views you expressed then are not held by all Christians, just most of them.
Who you were then..is how the majority of the church is now.
I struggle to come to terms with what you’re saying now….compared with what you’re saying back then.
Is this a genuine change of view now…or are you just voicing some new party line….or …what gives…I don’t know. I don’t know what or who to believe.
You can ignore this or you can answer it. It’s up to you. To be honest…I don’t really care all that much what Christians think about things.
Thanks for your comments Lance.
We all have a tendency to make fun of things we don’t understand. That doesn’t make it right but it’s something we all do. That is so much the case that I don’t even recall making those jokes but I don’t doubt your recollections. I also don’t recall all the jokes we shared together on other issues which may well have been offensive to others.
While I know a few homosexuals I have little or no understanding of homosexuality so obviously my reaction to it will not be the same as someone who has had to deal with those issues. Again, that doesn’t excuse my insensetivity but may help explain it.
I am sorry that you didn’t think that you could speak to me about what you were facing at the time. That probably had as much to do with the attitudes I displayed as it did with your desire to keep it quiet. I am sorry that I didn’t make it easy to discuss those things with me.
If my actions had anything to do with you going further ‘underground’ then I unreservedly apologise.
Have my ideas changed since then? Certainly. I believe that we are all on a journey and if we are not changing and growing, we’re dead. I am realising more and more that whatever the issue, we have no idea what those around us are facing. God is showing me more and more that whatever sin we are dealing with will cause no more or less distance between us and him than any other sin. All sin is offensive to God and just because my sin may be more ‘socially acceptable’ doesn’t make it any more acceptable to God. Yes, my attitudes are changing and hopefully will continue to change.
However I would have to say that even anytime in the past I would never have condoned the attitudes and words displayed by Swaggart. That kind of hate is inexcusable and I hope you know me well enough to realise that I would never have felt that way.
Lance, I still consider you a friend and am more than glad that I have had the opportunity to know you.
I have responded publicly so far because you raised the matter publicly, and I thank you for the gentle way in which you did.
I would appreciate the opportunity to get together sometime to apologise in person for the hurt I have caused. As you know I was trying to arrange a time to grab a coffee with you some weeks ago but things went a bit askew with my job change.
If you’d like to get together please shoot me an email.
You have good points in your post, but your humble repsonse to Lance is what I’ll be taking with me and why I’ll come back.