Dear Mama Bears, As my children get older, I’m having trouble trying to explain all the sexual preferences and genders that they are being exposed to. It’s so prevalent and I can’t shield them from it completely anymore. How can I explain to my children why biblical sexuality is more important than the whims of culture? Why didn’t the Bible or Jesus address these kinds of sexual identity issues? I want to teach my children to love everyone they encounter but stand boldly on truth. Can you help me walk this tightrope? – LOSING BALANCE IN MINNESOTA
Dear Losing Balance: While it is true that Jesus never specifically mentions homosexuality, it doesn’t mean that He had nothing to say about sexuality or marriage. Jesus employs the K.I.S.S. method (Keep it simple, stupid!) and consistently points His listeners back to how things were in the beginning, with male and female, united for life, not to be separated (Mark 10:2-9).
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But some people argue that since He didn’t specifically mention homosexuality then He was at least ambivalent about it. Such a conclusion does not give enough weight to what Jesus did say or why He only addressed certain topics. (For example, He didn’t say anything about bestiality or incest, either. To be consistent with this argument, you’d have to argue that He was on the fence about those things, too.)
The one thing we know He didn’t say was that certain types of sexual immorality were more damnable than any other. After all, sexual sins always involve us sinning against our own bodies (1 Corinthians 6:18) We are all equal at the foot of the cross.
While yes, Jesus came to die for the whole world (John 3:16), an often overlooked part of the Gospels is that He came for the Jewish people (Israel), first and foremost. (Matthew 15:24). The majority of his 3 ½ year ministry was focused on this one demographic (though He never turned a gentile away because of it). In Romans 1, Paul clarifies multiple times: “First for the Jew, then for the Gentile.” So keep in mind that Jesus’s primary message was to Jews — the people who were then tasked with taking the good news to the ends of the earth (Genesis 12:2-3, Matthew 28:18-20).
Understanding Jesus’ primary demographic helps us understand why He wasn’t more explicit about certain kinds of sexual sins. Jesus didn’t need to reiterate what his audience already knew. This would be like coming to America and feeling the “need” to remind everyone to drive on the right side of the road instead of the left. People just moving here from other countries might need that reminder, but born and bred Americans are so familiar with driving on the right side of the road that it would be redundant.
Similarly, the Jews already knew what the Law said about homosexuality. The law of Moses was very specific about sexual morality (Leviticus 18 and 20). It lists every single possible person (or thing) a Jew was prohibited from having sex with. Why was it that specific? Because every single one of those sexual behaviors was commonplace in the land of Canaan! God warns them not to do any of these things, or they would be destroyed just like the Caananites were (Leviticus 18:28).
When Jesus came to the first-century Jews, they had generations of knowledge of what sexuality was intended to be. He didn’t need to reiterate this or go into specifics. When do we see homosexuality mentioned in the New Testament? You guessed it: when the author was speaking to a gentile audience who did not have familiarity with God’s laws regarding sexuality.
Jesus did not have to address every different type of sexual immorality to advocate for biblical sexuality. He stuck to original design and even doubles down in Mark 10:5-9. We can do the same with our kids every time they come to us with “But what about [fill in the blank with new sex, gender, or marriage question]?” Just keep pointing them back to God’s original design, and things get a lot simpler. Remind them we are all prone to wander from God’s design. Every single one of us. We are all equal at the foot of the cross as image-bearers struggling to accurately reflect God’s image.
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Hillary Morgan Ferrer is Founder and President of Mama Bear Apologetics and coauthor if the bestselling books “Mama Bear Apologetics: Empowering Your Kids to Challenge Cultural Lies” and “Mama Bear Apologetics’ Guide to Sexuality.” She has degrees in both film and biology and spends her time as an author, speaker, teacher, and apologist encouraging others to discern culture from a biblical worldview.
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