Honors Programs vs. DEI

A month ago, Seattle Public Schools (SPS) announced that for the 2024-25 school year, they will be replacing their honors programs with a more “inclusive” and “equitable” program that will also be more “diverse.” You’ll notice that those three words are the components of DEI, which has two foci: race and sexual identity/orientation. In the case of SPS’s plan, the primary focus is on race, as can be seen in phrases like “historical inequity,” “historically excluded,” and “racial inequalities.” The Seattle Times reported that in the district’s gifted program, 52% of students were white while only 3.4% of them were black. The district’s new program will require teachers to create individual learning plans for each student.

The Seattle Times reported that both parents and teachers have been critical of the new program, saying that gifted students will be overlooked and that teachers will have the undue burden of having to create an individualized plan for each student. Seattle Public Schools is not the first district to replace honors/gifted programs with a more “equitable” model. In the fall of 2022, Culver City (CA) USD replaced honors classes at Culver City High School with a “one-size-fits-all approach that officials said would give students of all races an equal education.” A few months later, parents spoke out against the new program. One mom who was critical of it said, “My family are immigrants. We came to this country to have a better life, a better education, to get out of poverty … we want to be able to give them a better education.” Notice that this mom is an immigrant. Another parent said, “My daughter, who is a sophomore has said that it’s not working. She’s been in honors the whole way and as a sophomore now, she says she’s not challenged.” Notice that in this case the parent is quoting his or her daughter. A couple of high-school students from my church who were taking a statistics class at our local community college recently asked something similar: “Why are we taking class time to review fractions and decimals?”

Patrice Lee Onwuka, the (black) director of the Center for Economic Opportunity at the Independent Women’s Forum, has spoken against the elimination of gifted/honors programs: “I was an immigrant, latch-key kid excelling in my inner-city elementary school, but bored with my education. A program for gifted public school students sponsored by a local private school changed that.”

Sometimes parental pressure causes schools to restore honors classes. This hasn’t happened (yet) in Culver City, but it has happened at Patrick Henry High School in San Diego and at Barrington High School in Rhode Island. I think there will also be increasing pressure on Seattle Public Schools to restore its honors program.

On a personal level, I am grateful that my son was able to enter a gifted program starting in third grade; my daughter did the same starting in sixth. They also took some AP (Advanced Placement) classes in high school. That may sound prideful, but the fact is, my wife and I wanted our kids to be challenged as much as possible in school, not bored.

What does the Bible have to say about gifted/honors programs? As with so many contemporary issues, it doesn’t speak directly to this one. As I was researching this issue, however, one thing that came to mind was the parable of the talents that Jesus told in Matthew 25:14-30. In this parable, a man gives money to three of his servants: five talents to one, two talents to the second, and one talent to the third. The first two servants doubled their master’s money, while the third did nothing with his one except to bury it. When the master returns “after a long time” (verse 19), he commends the first two but punishes the third. Different commentators have interpreted this parable differently; some have seen it as a matter of money management; others have seen it as a matter of using our abilities; and others have seen it as all-encompassing: time, talent (ability), and treasure (money). I interpret it the third way. For the purposes of this blog post, here is the key point: in verse 15, we are told that the master gave each servant a different amount, “each according to his ability.” This is so important to understand in light of the fact that contemporary American society likes to throw out nonsensical bromides like “You can do anything!” However, the Bible teaches otherwise; the Lord does not give everyone the same abilities–and thus not the same responsibilities, either. We see something somewhat similar in a different context in 1 Corinthians 12:7-11 (and a few other passages), where the Apostle Paul writes about spiritual gifts, which are given only to Christians; the repetition of the phrase “to another” tells us that the Holy Spirit does not give every believer the same gift or gifts.

I believe this Biblical principle of differing abilities applies very directly to gifted/honors programs; since not everyone has the same abilities, we should not expect every student to be able to succeed in school to the same degree. And for those students who want–even need–to be challenged, I think that gifted/honors programs most definitely have their place. Eliminating such programs does students and their families–and society at large–a disservice.

Here’s another quote from Patrice Lee Onwuka that I like: “By committing to equality of opportunities – not outcomes – for all students, we will pave the way for more Black inventors, doctors and scientists to pioneer life-changing discoveries or cultivate future leaders to change our world.” I would add that this applies not only to black people, but to all, regardless of race. Gifted/honors programs do not detract from this kind of equality, but in fact enhance it: “equality of opportunities–not outcomes.” Now that is wisdom.

A Matter of Conscience

I don’t know if any of you are Agatha Christie fans; she was a prolific British mystery writer from the 1920s through the 1970s. Her novels and short stories almost always involved a murder that was eventually solved by the likes of Hercule Poirot, Miss Jane Marple, and others. Her psychology of murder was that it was almost always carefully calculated/premeditated and would not be committed unless the murderer was confident that there was a strong-enough reason for it (and that s/he could get away with it). Thus, the murder was never random but was targeted at a specific individual that the murderer knew.

In 1994, John MacArthur wrote The Vanishing Conscience. His thesis was that the conscience was something that needed to be trained from a young age. If it wasn’t, then kids would grow up with a poorly-functioning conscience that might essentially become non-functioning. One of the Bible verses he referred to was 1 Timothy 4:2, which refers to “hypocritical liars, whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron.” Ephesians 4:18 is a related verse: “They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts.” These verses describe how over time, a conscience can become “seared,” a very descriptive word, or how a person’s heart can become hardened. This brings to mind Pharaoh in the book of Exodus, whose heart was hardened against the Hebrews.

In his book, MacArthur gave examples of teens and young adults whose actions indicated seared consciences. Jumping ahead thirty years to the present, unprovoked assaults and murders of strangers have escalated, in sharp contrast to Agatha Christie’s depictions of murder. One of the more shocking murders was by two Las Vegas joy-riding teens who deliberately ran over and killed a bicyclist in August of last year. On the video, you can hear one of them say, “Ready?” while his partner in crime says, “Yeah, hit his ass.” The two can also be heard laughing. These same two teens also hit at least two others in the same fashion. Largely because of their stupidity in recording and posting the video, they were caught and now, thankfully, face multiple charges. These two are examples of teens who grew up without trained consciences. I’m not saying they are hopelessly lost, but they are literally on the highway to hell.

All of the preceding came to mind recently when my daughter told my wife and me that one of her elderly housemates had asked her to order cigarette filters for her on Amazon. The smoking (only outside, thankfully) housemate said that she hadn’t been able to find filters in our city. My daughter didn’t want to order them for her because it would violate her conscience; she didn’t think that people should smoke. Interestingly, another housemate said that he would have been “OK” with buying the filters for her; his reasoning was that the filters would lessen the effect of the carcinogens in the smoke. Unfortunately, however, he never shops online, either; furthermore, he doesn’t drive. My wife called a smoke shop in our city, and they do indeed sell cigarette filters, so the smoker now knows where to buy them.

This matter of conscience comes up more often than one might think. One area for churches is communion; some serve grape juice rather than wine because of the concern for any present or former alcoholics who may partake. There is a Bible passage related to this: 1 Corinthians 8. The Apostle Paul refers to eating food that had been sacrificed to idols, saying that the Corinthians had the freedom to do this; however, he says that for the sake of the weaker brother or sister, they should not eat such food because then the weaker one may be emboldened to eat such food. Verses 11-13 tell us, “So this weak brother or sister, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. When you sin against them in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother or sister to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause them to fall.” Notice the reference to “conscience.” I am not saying that every church should serve grape juice, but simply that if it is known that someone in the congregation has had a problem with alcohol, then it is right for the church to use juice.

Matters of conscience sometimes come up unexpectedly. For example, a few months ago, several of the sisters at our church organized a birthday party for one of them. They had a wonderful dinner at a restaurant which was going to include belly-dancing later in the evening. Knowing that our daughter would be offended by this, my wife first talked to her about it ahead of time, explaining that if she didn’t think she could handle it, then she couldn’t go. She really wanted to go, so my wife told her just to not look at the belly-dancers. In the end, our daughter was able to tolerate it by not focusing on the dancing.

Another area where this matter of conscience comes up regularly is media, whether it’s movies, TV shows, video games, music, or books. When our kids were young, they watched a wonderful show called The Magic School Bus, which engaged kids with humor and animation as it taught them science. We knew a godly family whose mother would not let her kids watch that show because of the word “magic.” Similarly, she would not read, or let her kids read, C.S. Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe because of the witch and her magic. In contrast, over a period of a couple years, my wife read all seven of Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia to our kids as bedtime stories; both our son and our daughter were captivated in the same way that my wife and I had been. While we felt sad that our friend’s kids would not grow up with The Magic School Bus and the Chronicles of Narnia, she was a godly mother, and you could see it in her kids.

A couple weeks ago, I heard a few minutes of James Dobson interviewing a woman writer and speaker; I didn’t recognize the name and don’t remember it, but one thing she mentioned in the context of sexuality is that sometimes wives enjoy watching “chick flicks” with their husbands. However, she cautioned that if such a movie shows nudity and sexuality, it may very well affect the husband in a way that it may not affect the wife. I can attest to this. If my wife and I are planning to watch a romantic comedy, I can easily look it up online and find out what is going to be portrayed. If it seems like it’s going to show more than I can handle, then I know to avoid it. On the other hand, when it comes to violence, I have a higher tolerance for it than my wife; again, if it’s something we’re planning to watch together, we can look it up online and make our decision. And sometimes I just watch something alone.

Twenty years ago, The Passion of the Christ was released. Our pastor at that time encouraged all adults and even teens to see it. One of my friends took his teen son to see it in a movie theater and regretted it; his son looked down for much of the movie and asked, “When is it going to be over?” Then later, when we found out that our son’s youth leader had shown a few minutes of it at church, we spoke with the youth leader about it, asking him to please not show anything so graphic again. We hadn’t seen it yet, but we knew enough about it that we didn’t want our teen son to watch it. Several years later, my wife and I decided to watch it; I have never seen such a brutal, graphic portrayal of violence, either before or since. I understand that there are some who have seen it and have benefited from it in terms of understanding what Jesus went through for us; however, for me, it was too much.

The Bible doesn’t always give us clear-cut answers to questions and issues. This is certainly true when it comes to things like wine, books, music, movies/shows/video games, and other entertainment (including belly-dancing!). Different Christians have different levels of what they can handle. The principle that my family has adopted is this: Do not violate your own conscience or coerce someone else to violate theirs. When Christians allow their own consciences to be violated or coerce others to do something which would violate theirs, we are on a dangerous path. Thanks be to God, however, if we do violate conscience, then when we repent, there is always our Lord’s forgiveness!

An Eclipse Experience

You may be aware that just four days from now, on Monday, April 8, there will be a total solar eclipse over parts of the United States.  You can click here to see a map showing its path:  https://science.nasa.gov/eclipses/future-eclipses/eclipse-2024/where-when/

You may not be aware that in the 20th century, there were only 12 total solar eclipses in the contiguous (48, excluding Alaska and Hawaii) United States.  You can click here to view a map showing the paths of these 12:  https://nationaleclipse.com/maps/usa_20th_century.html  Furthermore, in this century, there are only a total of 8; one was in 2017, and then there is the one happening next week.  After that, you will have to wait another 20 years for the next one.  (On the other hand, there are total solar eclipses happening in other parts of the world; there are 68 total worldwide in this century.)  The point is, a total solar eclipse is a comparatively rare event.  I have had the privilege of witnessing the two most recent ones, in 1979 and 2017. Rather than just using overused adjectives to describe how awesome (oops, there’s one!) they are, I will relate my experience in 1979.  I wrote an essay about that experience for a college class, but sadly, I have not been able to find it; regardless, I will do my best to relive and recount the experience here:

“I am sitting with 20 or so other students at my astronomy professor’s house.  There is a great deal of animated conversation as we look at some of the best photos from our recent eclipse trip.  My mind drifts away from the conversation and back about two weeks to that transcendent experience…

“On Saturday, we had all packed into a bus for an 8-hour ride that took us from northwest Iowa to a small town in North Dakota, just south of the U.S.-Canada border.  We had spent the weekend scattered among seven houses belonging to incredibly hospitable people who housed us, fed us, took us to church, and asked us questions about the total solar eclipse. 

“We got up early on Monday morning.  One thing about a total solar eclipse is that totality lasts a mere 2-4 minutes; another thing is that the path of totality is relatively narrow, so it’s vital to be in the right place at the right time.  And finally, everyone prayed for clear skies so that we could see it!  Thankfully, our astronomy professor knew exactly where to be and when to be there.  And thankfully, the Lord provided clear skies that morning!  Our best bet was to travel a few miles to and then across the border.  When we stepped onto the snow-covered, frozen plains of Manitoba, two of the Canadian students in our group immediately knelt down and kissed the ground. 

“It was about 9:00, and totality was supposed to start at 10:36.  Our professor quickly set up his telescope and a small whiteboard on a stand to show a projection of the disk of the sun; that way, we could see how much of the sun was covered as the minutes ticked by.  At approx. 9:30, we could see that a tiny part of the disk was blacked out, so partiality had begun.  As time ticked by, those of us with cameras and tripods (not including me) prepared them; nobody stood (or sat) still for very long, as it was only about 10 degrees (this was February 26).  There was also a lot of excited conversation, including from the 7-year-old son of Professor Hodgson.

“By 10:00, it had already gotten noticeably darker, and as the minutes ticked by, that continued.  At 10:30, it was very noticeably darker, and we soon noticed shadow bands on the snow; these are moving, wavy lines of alternating light and dark.  We also noticed that there were fewer bird calls; Prof. Hodgson had told us that during a solar eclipse, they are fooled into “thinking” that it’s a false dusk.  Then suddenly, the world was plunged into almost complete darkness.  Out of the corner of my eye, I could see a little light on the horizon.  I took a quick glance; it looked like a sunset.  I quickly turned my gaze to the blacked-out sun.  Prof. Hodgson’s son yelled, “Totality!” while those with cameras began snapping photos.  There were initially a lot of oohs and aahs, but most of us simply looked up in awe and gazed at a black disk with an irregular ring of fierce, insolent white fire (the sun’s corona) surrounding it.  The ring seemed to be saying, “Try as you like, you can’t snuff me out completely!”  I wasn’t sure, but I thought I glimpsed a reddish spot on the outer edge.  Later, when I saw a couple of great photographs taken by a couple of my classmates, that spot and others were revealed to be red tongues of fire (solar prominences) that were coming out of the ring as well.  (Here’s a link to a stock photo that includes prominences:  https://www.sciencephoto.com/media/328798/view/prominences-seen-during-a-total-solar-eclipse)  It was as if the white light and the red tongues were fighting against the darkness.  Hmm…more than one spiritual parallel here… I was reminded at that moment of how primitive societies would become frightened during totality; they would beat drums, dance around, and yell to frighten away the evil spirits that had blotted out their light-giver; their strategy always worked!  In our case, there were a few more exclamations, but there was mostly silence (except for the snapping of photos), as we all reverently drank it in.  Prof. Hodgson had warned us, however, that as soon as we saw the bright light of the sun emerge, to immediately look away.  (Eclipse glasses were not yet a thing.)  All too soon, and very suddenly, the light of the sun reappeared, and we immediately averted our gaze…

“My attention returns to my classmates and Professor Hodgson at his house.  In contrast to the two and a half minutes of totality, our conversation continues, loud and animated, as we examine some of the best eclipse photos.  I think that those 2+ minutes will be forever burned into my memory as a transcendent, once-in-a-lifetime experience.”

That’s the end of the 1979 story.  However, as I mentioned at the outset of this post, I got to see a second total solar eclipse in 2017, 38 years after my first one.  My second one was especially special because my wife was with me; we traveled all the way from central California to the mountains of Idaho to see that one, and again, thank the Lord, on the morning of the eclipse, it was clear.  We have friends, a couple, who had moved to North Carolina but had come back for a visit just a couple months after the 2017 eclipse.  When we asked the man if he had seen it, he said that they would have had to travel about an hour to be in the path of totality; he and his wife didn’t consider it worthwhile.  When he found out that we had traveled ~12 hours (one way) to see it in Idaho, he looked at us incredulously.  He then made some disparaging comments about the “types” of people (such as environmentalists, who care more about nature than making money) who typically go to such events, as well as expressing how he thought it was a waste of time and money.  This friend has always been uninhibited about expressing his opinions and doesn’t enjoy being out in nature, so I kept that in mind.  However, I told him that what my wife and I had recently witnessed was an incredible blessing and a unique expression of the glory of God; he had no response.

My wife and I are not going to be able to travel to the band of totality next week.  If you are so blessed as to live somewhere within that band, you won’t even have to travel!  If you live close by, please take the time to enter the band, unlike my friend; you won’t regret it.  Even if you have to travel a few hours to get there, I believe you will find the experience to be as transcendent as I have, regardless of whether you are a follower of Jesus Christ or not.  And if you are already a follower, I believe you will find yourself worshiping the Lord in a new way.

Faith and Feelings

With the beginning of Holy Week just a few days away, as always, I am looking forward to Easter, which is my favorite holiday in terms of its significance. In past years, I have thought about what it was like for Jesus’ followers, especially starting when Jesus was arrested in Gethsemane. I imagine the confusion and especially the fear that they must have felt. In fact, two of the Gospels make their fear very explicit. The last sentence in Matthew 26:56 says, “Then all the disciples deserted him and fled.” Mark 14:50 repeats this, almost word for word. A short time later, Peter denies Jesus three times out of that same fear, just as Jesus had prophesied he would. Moving on to Good Friday, I imagine the mixture of emotions Jesus’ followers must have felt as Jesus hung on the cross: among other things, horror, confusion, fear, and grief, which surely continued through the Sabbath. And then on Easter morning, I imagine the fear and initial confusion of the women in Luke 24 when they go into the tomb and discover that Jesus’ body is not there. Verses 4-6 tell us, “While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, ‘Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is risen!'” The women tell the disciples what happened, but verse 11 says: “But they did not believe the women, because their words seemed to them like nonsense.” Peter and John then run to the tomb, and John 20:8-9 says, “Finally the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside. He saw and believed. (They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.)” Jesus then appears to Mary Magdalene, and that evening He appears to all of the disciples except Thomas. By the end of the day, the fear and confusion that Jesus’ followers had previously felt have transformed into what must have been an increasing understanding and inexpressible joy!

I am not the most expressive person when it comes to emotions but not the least, either. And on Easter morning, when I am celebrating Jesus’ resurrection with my brothers and sisters, I experience a joy that carries me through the day and well beyond. One of the primary reasons for this joy is the evidence for the resurrection; my faith does not depend on my feelings at any given moment, but on the objective evidence for it. I wrote about this evidence three years ago; you can click here if you’re interested: https://keithpetersenblog.com/2021/03/24/evidence-for-the-resurrection/ There seems to be a growing tendency among younger believers in the U.S. to desire emotional “experiences” that will make them feel close to the Lord. Last week, I read an excellent post by seekingdivineperspective, a sister in Christ and fellow blogger, about both the importance and limitations of feelings when it comes to our faith; she rightly says that the emotional highs are wonderful, but that Satan can use even those highs, as well as the lows, to lead us astray if we’re not careful. Click here to read her post: https://wordpress.com/read/feeds/77411698/posts/5155771865

Maybe an analogy will help to illustrate this. When I fell in love with the beautiful, godly woman who was to become my wife, I experienced an amazing emotional high. I wanted to be with her as much as possible, and when we were apart, I thought about her almost constantly. And after we got married, the high continued! Over time, of course, we both found that our feelings fluctuated, but what didn’t change was our commitment to each other. Years later, we also came across a fascinating chart about marital satisfaction, showing how it fluctuates over the life of a marriage. The bottom line is that we shouldn’t expect to always experience the incredible high of “being in love.” In fact, when married couples do expect that high but don’t experience it, they sometimes question whether they’re “in love” anymore; divorce is often a result.

In a similar vein, I don’t expect to experience a spiritual high every day. Perhaps you remember what happened at Asbury University in February of last year; some called it a revival; others called it an outpouring; still others were skeptical. Regardless of what you want to call it, one thing we can say is that it was a spiritual high for many of the people who experienced it. I decided to research what has “happened” a year later. Not surprisingly, there was a special anniversary chapel service last month that celebrated what happened last year. Zach Meerkreebs, pastor-in-residence at Asbury University, spoke in the chapel on the first day of the outpouring last year, and he spoke again at the special service last month. Here are a few sentences from an article in The Asbury Collegian: “The anniversary chapel was a celebration. It was also an acknowledgment of the events and the different responses to them. In a benediction to the students after the anniversary service, Meerkreebs left Asbury with a prayer and a challenge: ‘Fall back in love with the ordinary.’ It was not an attention-grabbing message or a revved-up cry for the Spirit’s return. Each statement on Hughes’s stage echoed the idea that spirit was still present, even after crowds dispersed. It was a challenge to bring our memory of the extraordinary into the ordinary parts of our lives.”

Now there is wisdom! “Fall back in love with the ordinary.” If I had been there, I would have stood and applauded. Notice also again these words from the writer of the article, Kaitlyn McCracken: “It was not… a revved-up cry for the Spirit’s return.” And finally, again: “It was a challenge to bring our memory of the extraordinary into the ordinary parts of our lives.” Amen and amen! I can’t deny that I experienced a little extra thrill because in my post a year ago about what happened at Asbury, I also urged us to focus on experiencing the Lord and obeying Him in the “ordinary.” I quoted three writers, including Julie Canlis, who wrote about “a theology that values slow growth over dramatic change and the ‘ordinary’ as essential to our spiritual maturity.” You can read the rest of it here: https://keithpetersenblog.com/2023/02/23/spiritual-highs-and-the-ordinary-life/

Our feelings are important, certainly including our spiritually-related ones. However, I don’t believe we should expect to experience spiritual highs on a daily basis; if we do, we will be disappointed, and we may be tempted to wonder if our faith is real. For myself, I love experiencing spiritual highs as much as the next person. I can also say, however, that knowing objective facts and getting my questions answered over the decades have strengthened my faith immeasurably.

May you have the most blessed Easter weekend ever!

Is All Sin the Same?

I used to be part of a church where the pastor would sometimes preach against specific sins. However, as time went on, he would in essence dilute his message by saying something like, “But we’ve all got our own stuff.” Occasionally, he would have us turn to the people sitting next to us and say something like, “I’m messed up, but so are you.” (Ha, ha) Eventually, preaching against specific sins became a rarity. The one exception was pride; the pastor spent about two years focused on humility. As important as that was, however, he didn’t give examples of what it looked like. Not coincidentally, the church had been shrinking for some time, and it wasn’t showing any signs of stopping. A good friend of mine talked to the pastor about the importance of preaching against specific sins, but his response was if he did that, people would become “offended” and the church would become even smaller! Well, the pastor didn’t do that, but the church continued shrinking anyway.

There were other factors that contributed to the dramatic shrinkage of this church, including a series of bad decisions that I won’t go into. However, I believe that at the heart of it was an initial reluctance, and eventually a refusal, to preach against sins of various kinds and to urge people to repent of them.

Perhaps people know about sin without their pastor preaching about it. What does research show? Despite the ready availability of all kinds of Bibles, Christian books, and wonderful spoken messages that are easily accessible, most American churchgoers are Biblically illiterate. A graph that I found through Bob Smietana of Lifeway Research shows that only 20% of Americans have read the Bible all the way through at least once. You can access that graph and others here: https://research.lifeway.com/2017/04/25/lifeway-research-americans-are-fond-of-the-bible-dont-actually-read-it/ Frankly, since only about 8% of Americans are Christians, I’m surprised that 20% have actually read the Bible cover to cover. Regardless, one thing this may indicate is that my former pastor either assumed that congregants already knew what the Bible says about specific sins, or worse, that he shouldn’t confront them. One of the implied messages was that all sin is the same anyway; furthermore, as the pastor told my friend, we don’t want to offend people by pointing out specific sins that they or their loved ones may be struggling with. Maybe he was unsure about how to couple preaching about sin with the wonderful message of God’s forgiveness.

Let’s focus directly now on the question in the title of this post: Is all sin the same? I mentioned earlier that my former pastor preached about humility, which is the antithesis of pride. Since this is my primary sin problem, I (usually!) appreciate being reminded of this. It has helped me to explore humility much more. I’m a work in progress, but I can say, for example, that over time I have become a man who apologizes more readily; the same is true of my forgiving others when they apologize. When I find myself refusing to live in forgiveness, I don’t have peace; that is one of the consequences of that sin. How about other sins? One example of a sin with obvious consequences is murder, which can result in a person living a significant portion of his life in prison. Most people don’t commit murder, but do you know what the Bible says about hate? I John 3:15 tells us, “Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him.” Wow. This clearly brings us back to the priority of forgiveness.

One kind of sin that my former pastor very specifically refused to preach against was various kinds of sexual sin. Some people like to focus on STDs and unwanted pregnancies, but here’s what 1 Corinthians 6:18 says: “Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body.” This verse very directly states that sexual immorality (a man sleeping with anyone who is not his wife, or a woman sleeping with anyone who is not her husband) is a different kind of sin, but what does it mean? Verse 16 tells us: “Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, ‘The two will become one flesh.'” Beyond STDs, unwanted pregnancies as a result of sleeping around, and broken marriages–as bad as those are–at the heart of it is that the Christian’s body “is a temple of the Holy Spirit.” (verse 19) The consequences of sexual immorality are more obvious than those of pride. However, the Lord knows that sin begins in the heart and mind, which is why Jesus tells us in Matthew 5:28: “But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”

I would be remiss if I didn’t also mention another kind of sexual sin: those who have “transitioned” to the opposite gender. Genesis 1:27 tells us this: “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” For trans women and trans men, whether they realize it or not, they are saying to God, “I don’t like the way You made me.” The consequences of this sin can be very severe indeed. I have addressed transgenderism more here: https://keithpetersenblog.com/2022/02/23/clarity-and-compassion-for-the-transgendered/ When I knew that my previous pastor was going to be focusing on this verse, I suggested that he address the trans issue, but he again refused.

We could go on to address other sins, some of which have more obvious consequences than others; think of stealing and lying, for example. However, I think we can now answer the question in the title of this post: Is all sin the same? No, in the sense that the consequences are different; this is particularly obvious when it comes to various kinds of sexual sin. We also know that sexual sin is qualitatively different because it is a sin against one’s own body. However, the answer is also Yes, in the sense that Scripture reveals that sin begins in the heart and mind. Furthermore, sin that is not confessed and repented of is what separates people from God, including the ultimate separation in hell.

Maybe you think I focus too much on sin and should instead focus on the love and grace of God. First of all, if you talk to anyone under 40, you may be surprised at their notions of right and wrong. Second, in my most recent post about the Bible as a whole, I wrote that since so much of the Bible is focused on warning against sin and judgment of it, we would be wise to focus more on that than we do; in other words, let’s have more balance. Finally, with Good Friday a mere three weeks away, this is a good time to be reminded why Jesus died on the cross: it was because of our sin. Psalm 32:5 says this: “Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, ‘I will confess my transgressions to the Lord’–and you forgave the guilt of my sin.” That’s what Good Friday is all about! When we confess our sin and repent of it, then we can receive the Lord’s forgiveness and have the peace that we long for. If you are reading this and do not yet know the Lord, I pray that this will be the time that you confess your sin and turn to Him in saving faith.