A standalone study on loving people the world says you cannot love, without surrendering the truth.
The big question
Few questions divide the church like how to engage the LGBTQIA community. Many land in one ditch, all truth and no grace, or the other, all grace and no truth. Bryan Loritts, preaching from Hosea 3, refuses both. He holds a clear biblical standard and pursues radical, costly relationship at the same time. This study works through how he does it, and what it would cost you to try.
Key takeaways
- Tolerance is a low bar. Christians are called to love, which is harder.
- Grace and truth belong in tension, and grace usually comes first.
- People will not hear truth until they feel grace, and grace requires relationship.
- Loritts holds an orthodox standard, marriage between a man and a woman, while keeping the friendship.
- We are all Gomer, redeemed by costly love. That is the only ground to love from.
Scripture to sit with
John 1:14. The Word became flesh, full of grace and truth. The model for engaging anyone.
Hosea 3:1-5. God tells Hosea to love an unfaithful wife. Covenant love, costly and strange.
John 13:35. By your love all will know you are my disciples. Not by your position papers.
Galatians 5:22-23. The fruit of the Spirit, with love leading the list.
Quotes worth discussing
Loritts says, “Tolerance is such a low ethic… we’re not called to tolerate, we’re called to love.”
On relationship, Loritts asks, “People won’t hear truth until they first feel grace. But in order to feel grace, there needs to be relationship. So how strange are your relationships?”
On the line he holds, Loritts says, “The goal ain’t to make them heterosexual. It is to make them holy like Jesus.”
On posture, Loritts says, “The standard of God’s word does not give us license to be bigots.”
Discussion questions
- Are you weighted toward grace or toward truth? What does the other side cost you?
- How strange are your relationships? Who is in your life who sees the world very differently?
- How do you hold a clear standard and genuine love at the same time?
- Where have you confused tolerance with love, or truth with cruelty?
- What does it change to see yourself as Gomer, loved at great cost?
Go deeper
This study comes from the Jude 3 Project’s Preaching in the Culture conference with Bryan Loritts. For related Jude 3 work, see the conversations on what the Bible says about sexuality.
A closing reflection
Before you think about anyone else this week, sit in Hosea 3 and see yourself as Gomer, redeemed at the cost of everything. Then ask God for one strange relationship, with someone the world says you should not love, and the grace to hold truth and love together the way he does with you.