Read Mark 10:28-30
“Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life.” ~ Mark 10:28-30 ESV
So, I was gettin’ up with a friend of mine who just so happens to not be a Christian but who is instead in a long-term gay relationship. He’d gone to a Christmas carol service and had said that he wanted to meet up and inquire more about Jesus and whatnot. He asked if that was alright. I was, like, “Uhhhhhh, YEAH! Yup, yes….that’s great. That’s good. I can do that.” :-) (Lol! My geekishness is more prominent at times than at other times.) So anyway, we were having lunch and he straight up asked me, “so, what does Jesus think about my relationship with my husband?” I tried as carefully and as graciously as possible to kinda walk him through what I understood Jesus to say about sex and marriage and all those sorts of things. And this friend of mine, just kinda looked at me with those piercing eyes and said,
“Warner….my partner is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. We’ve been together for over 20 years. What could possibly be worth giving up that relationship for?”
And I remember sitting there thinking….”that’s a good question, actually.” And then I remember thinking, “okay Lord...gimme some help, here. I really need an assist, right now…” And I remember thinking that the answer has surely got to be more than “Well, you get heaven, one day”. My friend was asking a real time, here and now, down-to-earth, ground-level question. And I considered it absolutely necessary to give a ground-level answer to his question that wasn’t just some airy-fairy, abstract response, like, “Welp, there’s eternity”. I mean, it is true that there is eternity with our Heavenly Father that awaits us. But I imagine giving that response would have me reminiscent of Celie in “The Color Purple” in that scene when she says to Ms. Sophia after being beat by her husband Harpo…
Celie: Dis life be ova soon. Heaven last always.
And I could totally imagine my friend not missin’ a beat and emphatically sayin’...
Sofia: Girl, you betta bash Mister's head open and think about Heaven later!
Okay, well, maybe not quite like that, but basically the same sentiment. :-)
Fortunately, what DID come to mind was this exchange between Peter and Jesus in Mark 10:28-30
“Peter began to say to Him, “See, we have left everything and followed You.”
Now, we don’t know what Peter’s tone of voice was. Maybe he was braggin’ to Jesus, like, “JESUS, LOOK AT US. WE’VE LEFT EVERYTHING FOR YOU CUZ WE’RE SOOOOO DEVOTED AND STUFF! AREN’T WE GREAT?? LET’S POST HOW GREAT WE ARE ON FACEBOOK!” Or maybe not. We don’t know. Maybe Peter was instead in deep, profound despair and saying it, like “Jesus we’ve kind of given up a whole lot, here. This is gonna be worth it, right?” Again, we don't know.
Regardless of the way Peter delivered it or what was behind it, Jesus answers in the next verse (29, 30) with thoughtfulness and compassion.....
"Jesus said, ‘Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life.’” (Emphasis mine)
What a great passage and a wonderful response! Jesus assumes that there will be things that we’ll have to leave in order to follow Him….whether gay, straight, homo or hetero. And He assumes that the costliest of those things will be relational; familial, ie “...no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands…”
Look, it may well be that there are some relationships that we will have to leave behind to follow Jesus….that we’ve already had to leave. There are some cases where we don’t get a choice in that matter. We are essentially left behind by some family and/or friends or surroundings. And then there other times where the relationship will need to be so radically reconfigured that in one sense we’re practically leaving it behind. But thankfully, Jesus doesn’t say, “well, grit your teeth and hang in there and wait for glory.” Jesus says, “now in this time...we will receive a hundredfold”. Whatever it is we’ve had to leave behind, we’ll receive far more by His divine, perfect hand and in greater measure. And again, Jesus puts it in relational language:
“...receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, (and yes) with persecutions…”
Jesus is primarily promising, FAMILY. Jesus is saying that whatever change you or I have to go through relationally, as you come to follow Him, you should always feel a net increase in family by coming to Christ. And that is what we (Jesus followers) are meant to be providing as Church (ie the body of Christ).
The reality is that it is easy for those who’ve come from a gay background to feel homeless. It’s like they’re not part of the community they’ve left behind and many don’t feel like they really fit in their church, either. I once heard that we can live without sex but we cannot live without intimacy. I absolutely cosign that! So, therefore our responsibility as church...as the earthly body of Jesus Christ...is to fulfill this promise here in Mark 10. To make sure that those who’ve left behind family, relationships, etc receive far more even in this life than what they’ve left behind. Jesus says that it is never a bad look to follow Him. Never.
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"For if we are beside ourselves [mad, as some say], it is for God and concerns Him; if we are in our right mind, it is for your benefit." ~ 2 Corinthians 5:13 (Amplified Bible)
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