One of the Church of England's most influential evangelicals has come
out as gay.
Jayne Ozanne, 46,(pictured right) was a founder member of the Archbishops' Council, the
Cabinet-style body at the heart of the established church's governance. She has
through a distinguished career and record of service worked closely and prayed
alongside senior evangelicals including the former Archbishop of Canterbury
Lord Carey of Clifton and the present Archbishop, Justin Welby.
Today, Monday, she is to be announced as the new director of Accepting
Evangelicals, whose patrons include Baptist minister Steve Chalke and worship
leader and commentator Vicky Beeching, who herself stunned the evangelical
community worldwide when she came out last year.
Formerly from the Orthodox wing of the Church, holding strictly
conservative views on sexuality, Ms Ozanne disclosed her sexuality in
confidence a few years ago in a moving letter to a select group of church
leaders. Not one of the few who knew has leaked details of her journey.
She has now decided to go public through Christian Today as part of what
she believes will help the Church, currently deeply divided on the issue, to a
better understanding of sexuality. She, along with many others, wants to see
the Church end its infighting and move on to more pressing issues such as
mission and social justice.
Comment:
If Miss
Ozanne, claims to be an evangelical Christian and believes whole heartily what
the Bible teaches, she and her supporters would know that the Bible clearly
teaches that both homosexual practice and behaviour is clearly forbidden by
Scripture. If the Bible teaches that Homosexuality in all it’s forms is wrong,
surely for us believers homosexual behavior and practice is also wrong.
1
Corinthians 6:9-20 New Living Translation (NLT)
9
Don’t you realize that those who do wrong will not inherit the Kingdom of God?
Don’t fool yourselves. Those who indulge in sexual sin, or who worship idols,
or commit adultery, or are male prostitutes, or practice homosexuality, 10 or
are thieves, or greedy people, or drunkards, or are abusive, or cheat
people—none of these will inherit the Kingdom of God. 11 Some of you were once
like that. But you were cleansed; you were made holy; you were made right with
God by calling on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our
God.
Avoiding
Sexual Sin
12
You say, “I am allowed to do anything”—but not everything is good for you. And
even though “I am allowed to do anything,” I must not become a slave to
anything. 13 You say, “Food was made for the stomach, and the stomach for
food.” (This is true, though someday God will do away with both of them.) But
you can’t say that our bodies were made for sexual immorality. They were made
for the Lord, and the Lord cares about our bodies. 14 And God will raise us
from the dead by his power, just as he raised our Lord from the dead.
15
Don’t you realize that your bodies are actually parts of Christ? Should a man
take his body, which is part of Christ, and join it to a prostitute? Never! 16
And don’t you realize that if a man joins himself to a prostitute, he becomes
one body with her? For the Scriptures say, “The two are united into one.”[a] 17
But the person who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with him.
18
Run from sexual sin! No other sin so clearly affects the body as this one does.
For sexual immorality is a sin against your own body. 19 Don’t you realize that
your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to
you by God? You do not belong to yourself, 20 for God bought you with a high
price. So you must honor God with your body.
1
Timothy 1:8-11 New International Version - UK (NIVUK)
8
We know that the law is good if one uses it properly. 9 We also know that the
law is made not for the righteous but for lawbreakers and rebels, the ungodly
and sinful, the unholy and irreligious, for those who kill their fathers or
mothers, for murderers, 10 for the sexually immoral, for those practising
homosexuality, for slave traders and liars and perjurers – and for whatever
else is contrary to the sound doctrine 11 that conforms to the gospel
concerning the glory of the blessed God, which he entrusted to me.
Romans
1:24-32 New Living Translation (NLT)
24
So God abandoned them to do whatever shameful things their hearts desired. As a
result, they did vile and degrading things with each other’s bodies. 25 They
traded the truth about God for a lie. So they worshiped and served the things
God created instead of the Creator himself, who is worthy of eternal praise!
Amen. 26 That is why God abandoned them to their shameful desires. Even the
women turned against the natural way to have sex and instead indulged in sex
with each other. 27 And the men, instead of having normal sexual relations with
women, burned with lust for each other. Men did shameful things with other men,
and as a result of this sin, they suffered within themselves the penalty they
deserved.
28
Since they thought it foolish to acknowledge God, he abandoned them to their
foolish thinking and let them do things that should never be done. 29 Their
lives became full of every kind of wickedness, sin, greed, hate, envy, murder,
quarreling, deception, malicious behavior, and gossip. 30 They are
backstabbers, haters of God, insolent, proud, and boastful. They invent new
ways of sinning, and they disobey their parents. 31 They refuse to understand,
break their promises, are heartless, and have no mercy. 32 They know God’s
justice requires that those who do these things deserve to die, yet they do
them anyway. Worse yet, they encourage others to do them, too.
Hebrews
6:1-12 New Living Translation (NLT)
6
So let us stop going over the basic teachings about Christ again and again. Let
us go on instead and become mature in our understanding. Surely we don’t need
to start again with the fundamental importance of repenting from evil deeds[a]
and placing our faith in God. 2 You don’t need further instruction about
baptisms, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal
judgment. 3 And so, God willing, we will move forward to further understanding.
4
For it is impossible to bring back to repentance those who were once
enlightened—those who have experienced the good things of heaven and shared in
the Holy Spirit, 5 who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the
power of the age to come— 6 and who then turn away from God. It is impossible
to bring such people back to repentance; by rejecting the Son of God, they
themselves are nailing him to the cross once again and holding him up to public
shame.
7
When the ground soaks up the falling rain and bears a good crop for the farmer,
it has God’s blessing. 8 But if a field bears thorns and thistles, it is
useless. The farmer will soon condemn that field and burn it.
9
Dear friends, even though we are talking this way, we really don’t believe it
applies to you. We are confident that you are meant for better things, things
that come with salvation. 10 For God is not unjust. He will not forget how hard
you have worked for him and how you have shown your love to him by caring for
other believers,[b] as you still do. 11 Our great desire is that you will keep
on loving others as long as life lasts, in order to make certain that what you
hope for will come true. 12 Then you will not become spiritually dull and
indifferent. Instead, you will follow the example of those who are going to
inherit God’s promises because of their faith and endurance.
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