A young man—in front of several thousand people—told her he had just become a Christian and wanted to share the gospel with his parents, two married women. But he wanted to know if his parents would have to get divorced if they decided to trust in Jesus.
The Bible is clear, Gilson told McLaughlin. “You have to end that relationship. You have to exit that marriage.”
“We consistently see in Scripture that marriage is a male/female, lifelong covenant of faithfulness,” Gilson said. Moreover, Ephesians 5 reveals that marriage is a picture of God’s relationship with his people, with husbands representing Christ and wives representing the Church.
If a husband models Christ and a wife models the Church, a gay marriage cannot faithfully depict that relationship, Gilson pointed out. “If we’ve got two husbands, we’ve got two Christs in the picture…it scrambles the metaphor entirely,” she said. “If we’ve got two women in the picture, we’ve got the Church saving the Church…that’s not a gospel picture either.”
McLaughlin, Gilson and Greear discussed several other questions relating to gay marriage, including why it is important to address sexuality in our cultural moment. All three agreed that the scenario they were discussing required great sensitivity, which Greear weighed in on from his experience as a pastor.
Speaking the truth in love is essential, said Gilson, describing a time in her life when she was in a gay relationship and a friend challenged her to end it. “What I needed was the truth in a context of someone who loved Jesus and who loved me,” said Gilson, “and it changed the trajectory of my ability to walk with faithfulness.”
