Brief thoughts on same sex attraction

Some comments I have read by Christians on same sex attraction (SSA). We Christians find ourselves all over the place on this subject in this modern era.

• “I’ve known too many gay people who say they have begged God to take away their SSA, to believe feeling SSA is a choice.”
• “Same sex attraction is a sin and it is a spiritual stronghold from which Jesus can deliver a person. There is no such thing as a sexual orientation. Bible knows nothing of ‘sexual orientations’.”
• “Sin begins in the heart long before it is carried out in the flesh. It would be sinful for a person to desire to murder someone, as it would be for him or her to commit the act of murder. There is nothing in the Bible to support a notion that it is okay to desire and entertain sin in the heart and mind, even if you do not commit the act.”
• “Simply being attracted to a member of the opposite sex is not sinful. Temptation is not the same as sin. There are people who struggle with SSA, but who hate it and want to get help for it. I wouldn’t say they are in sin.”
• “It is one thing to struggle with something we know is a sin. It is quite another to entertain the desire and refuse to acknowledge it as a sin.”
• “One can be same sex attracted and not entertain it, but I am saying a lot of the time we continue to struggle with sins because it’s in our nature. God doesn’t always take them away.”
• “Equating homosexuality with heterosexuality is the first step LGBT uses to get Christians to say homosexuality is okay.”
• “There is no reason to identify as homosexual if one has not and will not engage in homosexual behavior.”

Same sex attraction = romantic, physical, and/or sexual attraction to a person of the same sex.
Sexual orientation = a pattern of romantic, physical, and/or sexual attraction
 
Sexual orientation and SSA are often discussed as if it is some kind of fixed characteristic in an individual – like biological sex or age.[i] The modern concept of sexual orientation originates from the discipline of psychology rather than the Bible. The most popularly-held belief currently seems to be that people are born homosexual. Question that and people look at you as if you have abandoned your senses. To them it is an unquestionably proven scientific fact. However, numerous studies conducted have not been conclusive.[ii] The American Psychiatric Association in 2015 stated: “Some people believe that sexual orientation is innate and fixed; however, sexual orientation develops across a person’s lifetime.”

Even if one could prove there are inborn tendencies toward specific behaviors – such as alcoholism, gluttony, homosexuality, pedophilia, violence – such a fact would not determine whether or not those behaviors are moral. Do you think someone might have a natural tendency or temptation toward excessive anger or physical rage? If so, should they indulge in it, or seek to control it? God the creator, not man the created, determines what behavior is moral or immoral. The Bible is his revelation of that knowledge (e.g. John 8:32; John 17:17).

There are Bible truths we know are true – regardless of what we think is or is not true when a person is born. The Bible teaches that all are sinners (Romans 3:23). We are “predisposed” to sin. We are all born sinners. However, that does not excuse our sin (Romans 1:19-21).
 
Jesus says that you must be born again (John 3:5-7. Cf. John 1:12-13). None will arrive in heaven based on their first birth in the flesh. Only those born of God will enter the kingdom of God.

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[i] And then again, some of the same people will deny that biological sex is a fixed characteristic. 

[ii] There is no consensus among scientists exactly why an individual develops heterosexual, bisexual, or homosexual attractions.