The Death of Christianity

All that's preventing the Episcopal Church from allowing transgender men and women the right to become ministers in its churches is approval by the church's House of Deputies. According to Reuters: "The Episcopalian Church's House of Bishops voted Saturday (July 7, 2012) to include gender identity and expression in its non-discrimination canons, meaning sexual orientation, including that of people who have undergone sex-change operations, cannot be used to exclude candidates to ministry."

The Episcopal Church, which long ago abandoned the Bible as its spiritual inspiration for a universal gospel, has fulfilled end-time biblical prophecy concerning a great apostasy (falling away from biblical truth) within Christendom through its growing acceptance of multiple paths to God offered by world religions and its latest push to embrace "alternative lifestyles," i.e. homosexuality, lesbianism and transgenderism under the banner of inclusiveness. Episcopal bishops defend their embrace of alternative lifestyles by invoking the biblical command to love others unconditionally.

But according to the Bible, unconditional love doesn't mean tolerating and embracing sin, no matter what the circumstances. Certainly, human sexuality is a powerful emotion that often dictates the attitudes and lifestyles of human beings, sometimes even into the bondage of addiction. But then again, hunger, greed, hatred, jealousy, foolishness, depression and rage are also powerful emotions that left unfettered, can lead to destructive behavior and disastrous consequences. That's why three of the main themes stressed in the Bible are repentance of bad behavior, self-control and separating from bad influences. Even more important than these is the need for each and every person to be born again into eternal life by faith in Jesus Christ's death on the cross for their sins and his resurrection from the dead. The power of Christ to deliver repentant sinners from the death grip of sin simply cannot be diminished. And that power comes by faith in Christ, not through psychology or any of its myriad of 12-step programs that often fail, leaving its adherents feeling confused, guilty and hopeless.

If the apostle Paul was alive today, he would be banned from many churches because of writings such as this: "Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God." (1Corinthians 6:9-10) Paul wasn't some philosopher who delighted in airing his opinions--he wrote his epistles through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit who lived in him. Therefore, those who choose to dismiss Paul's writings as religious commentary are blaspheming God as a liar because God inspired Paul to write that.

The Episcopal Church used to believe what Paul wrote. But that was a long time ago. Now, the Episcopal Church, like many lapsed churches and denominations, believes that it can do God's work without obeying His word. It can't and the logical result of the Episcopal Church's abandonment of God's word has been the loss of His presence and power that can be seen in the millions who have left that church since the 1970s. Thus, the more the Episcopal Church tries to attract new members by selling out Christ for sin, the more ground it loses. If this keeps up, eventually there will be no more Episcopal Church, which is just as well.