Pizza = Love

I just spent the last 10 minutes trying to come up with some witty opening to this post to no avail. It is 1:30 a.m. on Wednesday night/ Thursday morning and my creative juices are not flowing freely. With that in mind, I'll jump straight into my thought process for the past couple of weeks.

........one..........

...........two...........

.............three............

Two weeks ago the Soul Force Equality Ride made an appearance on our campus. For those of you who are not familiar with this group of people, this is my understanding of who they are (if I am in any way wrong in my understanding and description please let me know). The Equality Ride consists of approximately 50 individuals who believe in the Biblical acceptance of homosexuality and have taken it upon themselves to go to 32 Christian colleges and universities to promote discussion about the connection between faith and religion and gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, and trans-gender lifestyles. One of their stops on their tour across the U.S. was here at Liberty University. I remember the last time they tried to come on campus a couple of years ago. After being banned from campus for violating the terms of the allowance on campus from the previous time, a few of the them were arrested for trespassing and the rest were forced to stay just in front of the entrance of University Boulevard.

That was then.

I'm not second-guessing or questioning the decision to ban Soul Force from campus at that time. This time around 5 of them were allowed on campus to donate books to the library and talk to students while the rest waited on the sidewalk (town property) just off-campus. There were no major hiccups. No arrests to speak of. No serious arguments with students for the most part. That is not what has frustrated me for the last couple of weeks. Instead, what has bothered me is the general reaction to hearing about Soul Force's presence on campus. With fall break starting and 3/4 of the campus leaving for the long weekend, many Liberty students didn't realize that Soul Force even existed, never mind the fact that they were in our library. However, almost every time I mentioned it or explained it to someone on campus I got a startled look from them as if to say "wait... gay people? here? at Liberty? ...and they allowed this??" First of all, let me say that I have absolutely no idea if the people on the Equality Ride are themselves gay, lesbian, bi, or trans-gender. It would not surprise me if at least some were, but I did not have the opportunity to talk to them while they were here because I was at work the whole day. However, this look was an almost universal response to hearing who Soul Force was and that they were on campus. I know of one individual who was particularly irate that Liberty University would allow homosexual supporters on campus.

How close minded have we gotten?!

I'm not saying that I agree with homosexuality. I don't. I absolutely don't. What I'm saying is that Christians in the United States have closed their minds to everything not Christian to the extent that not only are they separate from the secular world, but they are scared of it! They think that to brush shoulders with a person of a different denomination is possible heresy, never mind brushing shoulders with someone from a different religion. I'm obviously exaggerating a little bit, but the principle is still true. We often view homosexuality as some strange and contagious disease that we must avoid contact with at all costs. We're scared of what we don't understand or are not a part of.

How dare we allow homosexuals on our campus? How dare you call yourself a Christian while you refuse to reach out to people desperate for the love and acceptance of God. The Christian church in the U.S. has been so remiss in properly addressing the issues of homosexuality or atheism. We so often treat these people as an enemy to be destroyed. We forget that Jesus died to save each one of them. We talk about the homosexual agenda. What about the agenda of the American church? To get sweet sound systems? To get state-of-the-art sanctuaries and youth rooms? To beat our record number of salvations in a year? What about God's agenda? What about God's glory? I think that one of the things that glorifies God the most is His love exemplified in our lives. This doesn't come about by quoting John 13:35 and giving each other a hug after church. It comes about by Christians waking up and talking to these people as individuals and human beings.

Homosexuality does not define their entire being. Not everything they do is related to the homosexual lifestyle. Yes he is gay. Get over it! Please don't accuse me of supporting homosexuality. All I am saying is that we often get hung up on labels. In reality I am just as sinful as someone practicing homosexuality. The difference is that everytime a Christian talks to me it's not always about the most obvious area of weakness or sin in my life according to them. So why is it that we constantly want to talk homosexuals about homosexuality? I refuse to believe that this label is what defines these individuals. God doesn't see a label. God sees past the open wounds of their sin and my sin and sees the son or daughter he created.

This rant has gone on longer than I intended. It's now 2:40 in the morning and I have to get up in 5 or so hours to go to class but I want to leave you with a few thoughts in summation.

After Soul Force left Lynchburg I had an idea that I wish I had thought of earlier. What if while these 50 or so individuals were sitting around just off campus, 20 or 30 LU students walked over with some drinks or some pizza and just sat down with them. What if we just hung out together a little while and talked about anything except homosexuality. There is a time and a place for that discussion. For now we are called to be the expression of God's love. Sometimes that expression is through splitting a pizza with someone. God loves me so much and I am so, so thankful for that. But, God forbid, that I ever forget that God loves gays, lesbians, bi-sexuals, trans-genders just as much as he loves me.

Jesus thought so much of those struggling with homosexuality that he died for them. The least I can do is buy them a pizza and ask about their day.

-Jeremy