“The Confession, and those who are opposed to Revoice and Side B Gay Christianity, view not only actual homosexual acts but desires to be properly sinful. We also regard part of the work of sanctification to consist of bringing these desires into subjection and mortifying them so they really diminish and die as the regenerate person is sanctified.”
(Andrew Webb – The Aquila Report) At the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) General Assembly June 25-28, 2019, several speakers (the most prominent being self-proclaimed Gay PCA pastor Greg Johnson) took issue with the Nashville Statement on the grounds that it condemns a homosexual self-identity….
The speakers clearly indicated that they believe that to identify as homosexual and to admit that their lives are dominated by homosexual desires and affections is not sinful unless those desires are actually acted upon. In other words, they may constantly struggle as “Gay Christians” with sinful desires and temptations to have homosexual sex and homosexual relationships, because that is part of their nature as homosexuals, but that unless they actually act upon them, thus joining will with desire simply having those desires is not sinful. They also make it clear that they do not believe that people born with homosexual desires can ever be free of them in this life. Therefore, the life of these Gay Christians will be marked by a constant daily struggle – often described as “heroic” at the General Assembly – not to give into the desires and succumb to temptation.
The real problem is that while there may be PCA presbyters who agree with and sincerely believe in this view of the non-sinfulness of sinful desires and the inability to be free of them before glory, this is not the Reformed position expressed in the Westminster Standards regarding the sinfulness of desires or “orientation”. It is in fact much closer to the pre-Reformation, semi-Pelagian view of sinful desires, appetites and motivations summed up by what the Roman Catholic Church (RCC) calls “Concupiscence.”
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