On Friday, an Andrews University Student Movement newsletter sent out by the Andrews University Provost contained a hit piece on Coming out Ministries (COM). Why?
Coming Out Ministries was founded by a couple individuals who were previously living the LGBTQ lifestyle. After the Lord delivered them from the sins of homosexuality and moral failure, they (quite naturally) experienced a desire to minister to other people who were stuck in that lifestyle (Mark 5:19). Coming Out Ministries was formed to encourage and educate people on the evils of unbiblical sexuality. This ministry has helped people around the world resolve moral issues and find freedom and peace in Jesus Christ. The Bible calls that ‘conversion’ (Matthew 18:3). Put your finger on that word.
You would think that such a ministry would be most welcome on Adventist college campuses. After all, young people today are being culturally bombarded with gender confusion, deviant sexuality and the rainbow roundabout of alphabet soup activism. But, since 2015, progressive SDA campuses—which currently look for ways to affirm LGBTQ+ deviancy—have been un-affirming towards this ministry which helps people resolve moral sin and find freedom in Jesus Christ. They wax eloquent about diversity and inclusion, but when it comes to a biblical ministry that helps people resolve gender dysphoria and moral failure, it’s exclusion, man.
Even though Coming Out Ministries has traditionally not been welcome on these culturally-conditioned SDA campuses, these schools can’t control what happens across the street, and that brings us to an amazing story.
In September of this year, the Village Church in Berrien Springs hosted a Jesus & Wholistic Sexuality conference. This conference had encouraging presentations on biblical sexuality coupled with testimonies of freedom and victory from people who have biblically resolved moral failure (LGBTQ+ and otherwise). One of the presenters stayed in the home of Bonnie Perry, and she was deeply impressed with the presentations and stories of freedom that she heard at the Jesus and Wholistic Sexuality conference at the Village Church.
In the course of conversation, she mentioned a professional building that she was considering selling on St. Joseph Ave. in Berrien Springs, MI. The building (former law office) sits right across from the entrance to Andrews University. Even though she had higher offers on this property, the Lord inspired her to offer the property to Coming Out Ministries at a reduced price, and it is going to happen! This is really great news, praise God. The Lord will bless this sister greatly for her faith. You can help too, if you wish:
Did I mention that this is great news? We can see the hand of God all over it. We need offices like this at every SDA College, to help young people.
But, not everyone is happy about it. Last Friday, the Andrews University Student Movement newsletter was sent to students by the AU Provost (Christon Arthur). This newsletter is put out by students and customarily emailed by the Provost, and does not necessarily carry the approval of the Andrews University President etc. But, if I was Provost, I would read the blessed thing before sending it out.
In this newsletter was an article (by Erin Beers) on Coming out Ministries, saying that having the ministry nearby the University was a bad thing. The author called for the sale to be cancelled, and for COM to be rejected because they are involved in ‘conversion therapy’. Not very inclusive of her, is it?
So why would a student at a Christian University have a problem with a ministry that is helping people biblically resolve moral and spiritual issues (James 5:16)? I believe the reason is that a person can choose to follow the Bible’s teaching on sexuality or they can choose to follow the world’s teachings. But you can’t choose both. You can have biblical sexuality (which is pure, good and wholesome) or you can have LGBTQ+. Not both.
Errors in the Student Movement Article
This is a tough one because there are so many, but let’s look as some of the problematic statements in the article.
She spends most of her time building a strawman, accusing Coming Out Ministries of using conversion therapy. She invokes the name of Gretchen Whitmer who has outlawed ‘conversion therapy’ in Michigan. Make no mistake, friend. The real target of progressive governors and antichrist tyrants is not conversion therapy per se, but conversion itself. They don’t want people resolving LGBTQ+ sin because they believe the lie that it is a viable alternative to heterosexuality and actually healthy for society. They don’t want you to be converted, period (John 3:3).
Beers accuses COM of reparative therapy, suggesting that they are unethical for doing so. She appeals to the Human Right Campaign as an authority. Friends, the Human Rights Campaign is a hard left pro-LGBTQ+ organization, at war with the principles of God found in the Bible. She cites no Scripture in her article, relying instead on so-called-science and human reasoning. This captures the distinction between biblical Christianity and woke moralizing that is actually the opposite of what the Bible teaches.
She says that Coming Out Ministries is biased and uneducated. Apparently she isn’t biased. I would suggest that Coming Out Ministries is convicted of biblical truth, and walking in joy as a result of true freedom in Christ. Like all believers, they/we are ‘biased’ towards the Word of God and unalterably committed to Jesus Christ (Romans 13:14; 2 John 1:4-6; Matthew 24:13).
Coming Out Ministries is bad because they are not affirming, and the author defines ‘affirming’ as not believing that homosexuality is sinful. You can add me to the list, too. By your definition, I am not affirming. I am however captive to the Word of God on matters of biblical sexuality. Biblically biased.
She closes with:
For this last section I would like to speak as a concerned student of Andrews University to Coming Out Ministries directly. I urge you to reconsider your decision to buy this office and instead think of the people that you will harm regularly with just your presence. Right outside of campus is not the place to start a new branch of ministry. If you must obtain an office in Berrien Springs, then let it be somewhere else where students can still access the office if they choose to. Don’t force this ministry on people, especially those who are vulnerable. Ultimately, this does not come down to agreeing or disagreeing with the ministry itself. It comes down to the harm that this purchase will cause, the lives of students who will, on a daily basis, be impacted, and the lengths that your group will go to spread your own ideologies.
Questions for Miss Beers:
How do you feel about conversion?
Does being in Christ mean that old things pass away and all things become new in Him? (2 Cor. 5:17).
Are the old things that pass away good things or bad sinful things?
Are the new things, good things or sinful things, according to the Bible?
Is it possible to resolve moral failure, both heterosexual and homosexual? Will a failure to do that keep someone out of Heaven?
Does God want us to repent of our sins or celebrate them?
Victimhood
The author says that COM wishes to “target students” who are unsafe on Adventists campuses. And having an office across the road from Andrews, would force turmoil on students and faculty members. Oh, please. This is victimhood nonsense, so dear to the woke crowd.
The victim class has never been as defined, elevated and exalted as it is today. And this victim class comes in the form of race, the poor, women, and homosexuality. The victim class is growing because moral authority has been bestowed upon the victims. Everybody wants to be a victim. It’s popular, it’s trendy. This dominates at the University level. If you are not a victim, you have nothing to say. You have no moral authority, you have no place at the table.
But what does the Bible say? The most comprehensive explanation of humanity is that all have sinned. This reality dominates humans. And they don’t want to be guilty. That’s why victimhood is so popular. It offers a "get out of jail free card" against any guilt. So, the victimhood phenomenon that we are seeing in western culture is simply an attempt to jettison any and all guilt and accountability. This is a dagger to the heart of the gospel, which says all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. If all have sinned, then all need a Savior. If I can push off my guilt onto someone else on the basis of perceived victimhood, then I don’t need a Savior. We first saw this in Genesis 3.
The default position for a sinner is to blame someone else. The default position for conversion is brokenness over sin, and the publican in the story of Jesus is an example of this (Luke 18:9-14).
When the church decides to embrace the sinner's victimhood status, this is a disaster. This prevents people from coming to the cross. It prevents repentance. That’s why you don’t hear the word repentance much anymore—it has been eliminated by the false gospel of social justice and victimhood. And this is the world in which we are called to share the Everlasting Gospel.
Listen friend, you are not a victim. You are a perpetrator, like me. You are a culprit, and for your sins, you will eternally die—apart from Jesus Christ.
A person or organization that worships diversity and inclusion is destined to accept homosexuality because the church itself is grounded in something different—biblical truth. The true church always celebrates the truth, not diversity, and truth requires repenting of homosexual sin, not celebrating it.
LGBTQ+ is a Religious Impulse
By now it has to be clear to all that there's no masking the divide between biblical Christianity and this new neopagan religion that welcomes all things LGBTQ+. This new religion requires the rejection of Scripture and the elevation of modern gender and sexuality ideologies to the driver's seat. Liberal churches (or universities) did not start this liberal free fall in 2023. A lot of barriers had to fall, and a lot of biblical doctrines had to be bent to get here. A lot of texts of Scripture had to be set aside before professing Christians can openly support homosexuality and LBTGQ+ gender confusion as a viable way of living.
And here's where we need to understand something. Those who are trying to push the revolution in sexuality, gender, marriage, and all the rest, they are trying to create as many religious allies as they can, including SDA universities.
At the beginning of the LGBTQ Movement, the claim was that there is nothing wrong with homosexuality, but there is something wrong with believing that there's something wrong with homosexuality. Historically, normal, sensible people understood that the harm was homosexuality and that homosexuality brings harm.
Since then, there has been a flip in the argument by deliberate public relations strategy, and it was overwhelmingly successful. It was successful in rebranding the ‘harm from sexual deviancy’, which is condemned in Scripture (Romans 1:27), to those who hold moral sanctions against alternative sexual lifestyles, behaviors and relationships. In other words, they tried to say that the only harm was opposing LGBTQ+, not the biblical consequences that follow it.
But right now, we are looking at a crisis when it comes to the mental health of many young people who are experiencing emergencies and self-harming behaviors based upon their involvement in the LGBTQ array—in particular, the identities summarized by transgender and non-binary.
We need a careful understanding from a Christian perspective of what the harm would be and who would be responsible for that harm. The clear implication of the Student Movement article is that there's nothing wrong with transgender or non-binary ideologies. They have no negative effect upon young people who may be troubled because after all—those ideologies are presented as normal, and religion may be the culprit. The argument here is that those who would dare oppose those ideologies represent the threat or the harm. Let's put it a different way.
SDA liberals are actually arguing that those who question transgender ideology, those who can't enthusiastically celebrate it, that we're the ones doing the harm.
Here's what we need to understand. We're not denying that there is harm. We're very concerned about the young people suffering that kind of harm, but we have a very different source to blame. We blame those ideologies and those who are pushing those ideologies themselves, not those who are pushing back on the ideologies.
Many of these people live in a fantasy world in which the consequences that follow moral failure can coexist with a healthy happy life. Or that LGBTQ+ ideology can co-exist with Sola Scriptura, but the fantasy is rapidly coming apart.
So again, we're not denying the harm. I personally heard Chloe Cole’s testimony of the tremendous damage that was done to her by the lie of fluid gender identity and autodeveloped moral deviancy. Because of these cultural lies, harm is coming with great regret into the lives of so many young people.
As Christians, we believe the harm is those who are subverting God’s Creation order, and those who are placing a deep fragility in the hearts and minds of so many young people, those who are lying to them by means of ideology and seducing them into what can only create a very deep brokenness. As a result, many of these young people are experiencing the consequences of moral failure, such as depression, loss of spiritual interest, and anger. We care about that, and so does Coming Out Ministries. Hundreds have been encouraged by them, check out their testimonies sometime!
We don't deny the brokenness, but we know where it comes from, and it's not coming from God’s creation order or Scripture. There is a line of connection between immoral choices and consequences that we experience. God allows these consequences (there about 12-13 of them) into our lives to wake us up to the need for repentance. To bring us back to Him and His perfect plan for our life.
The gospel begins when we take full responsibility for our sins. Fear God and give glory to Him, for the hour of His judgment has come. That’s our responsibility.
And that is our task in the Three Angels Messages, one that Coming Out Ministries and many others are faithfully performing.
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“That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; But speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ” (Romans 13:14-15).