Respect for Marriage

[Darris McNeely] The United States midterm elections are now more than a week behind us, and finally it seems, at least in the United States House of Representatives, it appears that the Republican Party is going to have the majority. The Senate has already been decided with a Democratic majority. We're entering into an interesting period between now and the time when the next Congress will be seated in early January 2023, it's called a lame-duck session of Congress. And that doesn't mean things won't be done, but there's actually one particular piece of legislation that is working its way now through the Senate that has big implications for those who have a biblical understanding of marriage, and a biblical worldview of issues and events in the world.

It is what is called the Respect for Marriage Act. It is an effort now that is going to be brought before the Senate for a vote that will essentially codify same-sex marriage as law. If the Senate passes it, most think that the Senate will, there will be enough votes to do so, then it will go to the House of Representatives, still controlled by the Democrats, and they have indicated that that will be passed, and President Biden will sign it. The Respect for Marriage Act, if signed, could codify the ability of same-sex marriage, as well as interracial couples to get married, and require states to recognize this fact as a right established in Supreme Court rulings in recent years, and so it will now be codified in law. There probably will be challenges down the road to it, but it appears that it's going to be passed as a law, and impacting all 50 states.

When you look at the issue from the viewpoint of the Bible, the idea of same-sex marriage is not something that is described, sanctioned, or talked about in the Bible. When the Bible talks about marriage, and marriage is a divine institution of God ordained in scripture, it is between one man and one woman, and it is to be for life, intended to be for life. God said that for this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother, and woman as well, and the two shall come together and form one flesh. And so, marriage in the Bible is not same-sex. In fact, it just isn't there, and marriage cannot be defined as that. But that, of course, is where we are in today's world, and now we're seeing that work its way to that point of codified legislation in the United States Congress.

And so when we think about that, when we understand what the Bible says, and the implications for that, a lot more to be talked about, a lot more to understand. And especially when it comes, in this particular law, to the rights of religious bodies to exclude people from their midst or from using their facilities, who are engaged in same-sex marriage. The implications of this, that some feel have now been alleviated, but there's still some ambiguity there, could impact the tax-exempt status of churches and religious bodies whose teachings and whose practice do not go along with the idea of same-sex marriage according to this law. In other words, they hold to a biblical point of view, their tax-exempt status could be infringed.

That is a real problem. That would be a departure for United States law and practice, and would impact a lot of religious organizations. That's how serious these issues have become in our world today, and helps us to understand something in terms of what we need to be aware of, and also how we need to be praying, certainly like kingdom come, but even that we are fully aware of where we are going when legislation of this type is supported by a majority of lawmakers, as well as the citizens who send them to Congress to make those laws. We're in a dangerous world right now. We're in a very serious situation, and we need to be watching and understanding.

That's "BT Daily." Join us next time.