Leviticus 18:22 "You must not have sexual relations with a man as you would a woman. That is a hateful sin."

Ok, that's clear enough.

Leviticus 19:19 "Obey my laws. You must not mate two different kinds of cattle or sow you field with two different kinds of seed. You must not wear clothing made from two different kinds of material mixed together."

I guess I'm confused as to why we choose to follow some of the OT laws, and not others.

Why is homosexuality something Christians fight really hard against, but we don't have any people protesting the use of mixed fabrics?

I only have a minute before dinner, so this will be quick: homosexuality being a sin is there in the NT too, where as the mixed fibre thing isn't...

Again, I'm not going to give a long reply atm, partly because of time and partly because I think it's a question that could be argued around for days. I think the answer comes down to cultural specifics. Some of the laws are more "helpful" proscriptions to keep the Israelites safe and healthy in the desert and distinctive from the nations around as God's people. Others are more universal directives about things that people generally consider to be wrong - and to borrow Sparkling's point again, if it's repeated in the NT, then there's a greater chance that a particular law is of the universal rather than culturally helpful type. While that seems straightforward enough, how you interpret one from the other is sometimes not easy - and I guess that's how we get into differences between denominations and sects.

I don't want it to be an argument. I just really am struggling with what I think about a few issues.
Romans 1 mentions it, any others?

The differences between cultural and more universal ones is a tough one. I don't think everything in the NT is universal though.

I just feel as though we pick and choose which ones suit us best. Maybe that's not the case, but I dunno.

I think that the Old Testament Law doesn't apply as law anymore...Christ did away with it...if you want a long discussion of that, let me know - I've studied it for years and could rant a long time. All of the topics that one could phrase the "moral" laws from the Old Testament are revisited in the New...like homosexuality. You're right that it seems like picking and choosing if we quote the Old Testament law to say its wrong; however, like Larissa pointed out, it's talked about in the New Testament, too. Murder is denounced in the Ten Commandments, but that's not really why we are against it; the reason is because Jesus taught against it...and said that hate is equally wrong.

I believe that the New Testament contains all the Law that we are required to follow. The Old Testament and its laws should still be studied, though, because much wisdom can be found therein...for example, the foods that God didn't allow His people to eat are repeatedly found to be unhealthy. The Sabbath that He commanded us to keep is repeatedly found to have great health benefits as well.

Elisabeth, I was hoping you'd post about this, with you studying it and all

This is kinda random, but I had this thought.....

Could homosexuality (sometimes) stem from a prejudice against the opposite sex?

I'm a bit confused as to what you mean. Are you meaning that: I don't like boys, because of something in my past, therefore I become gay?

Because I think that is a legitimate reason why some people become homosexuals.

I guess my general rule has been 'ignore all rules from the OT, except the 10 commandments'. Lol I don't mean ignore, but ...yeah lol.


I think for some people, it might be that - someone might have had a bad experience with men and decided she trusted women more and stuff, but I don't think that would be a majority. Some people say that a "majority" (I say it like that because it always depends on where you read it) of homosexuals were sexually abused as children. That might be correct, but I think there are a large amount of straight people who were also abused.

The main problem I have with homosexuality and the Bible is that it almost doesn't seem fair. It's easy enough to read the Bible and say, "The Bible says it's a sin, so it's a sin," but it's a lot harder when you actually talk to a homosexual and realise that they never wanted to be gay. I have a friend who came out (and boy was that a shock - I'd met him at church and had a mini crush on him hehehe) and I talked to him and, back then straight after he came out, he was still a Christian and stuff, but now I'm not so sure he is because I think he didn't get a lot of support from his Christian friends when he came out.
Anyway, he'd always felt that way, but he tried to hide it and change it, but he just couldn't.

I agree, I think it may the case for some people, but the majority just realise they are gay without necessarily having had any bad experiences with the opposite sex or abuse.

I'm with you there, Bubblies... I don't think what gay people do is right, but I find it very hard to think of them as evil in the way that I know a lot of very conservative people do. My sister mixes in a world where she has a lot of gay friends, and so I have got to know some on a personal level - one in particular is a very close friend of the family now. I don't have any problem with gay people themselves, as most of them are lovely individuals...

And now I wait for this:

just coz you were waiting for it