Welcome back to Liberty Insider.
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We were so eager
to get going that
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we're almost jumping the
gun because this is a hot topic.
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It is.
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And with my guest Alan Reinach,
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we started by just
legally talking about
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a Supreme Court action
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which most people
probably didn't hear about
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or if they did,
it didn't mean much.
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But there's a lot riding on
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how the courts
and our legal system
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adjudicates between what
has become the competing rights,
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religious
rights, and gay rights.
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And there is saying, Lincoln,
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that the court did not reach
the core issue in the case.
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The court paid
lip service, both to,
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you know, gay rights and
their rights to be served
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and not discriminated against
when they go to restaurants
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and go to
businesses as they should.
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They also paid lip service
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to the rights of
religious conscience,
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but they never resolved
the conflict between them.
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And, you know, it remains
for future cases to figure out.
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And it will be
future cases because...
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Of course there will.
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I think both parties are
pushing stuff up through the...
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creating cases, designed to
be said to the Supreme Court.
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You know, the culture war
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has become a bit
of a zero sum game.
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Zero sum game means,
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you know, both sides
are playing for keeps,
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know, you know,
only, you know...
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Take no
prisoners. Take no prisoners.
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Winners and losers.
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But you know who the
real loser in the culture war,
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in my perception,
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the real loser
is the gospel itself
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because when Christians fight
so hard against gay rights,
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what happens?
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Secular people, well meaning
people, not just activists,
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but, you know, they think badly,
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they see the church,
and the Jesus of the church
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as bigoted, as
racist, as homophobic,
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as anti-gay, as full of hate.
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Now the Jesus that
you and I know and love
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is not a Jesus
of hate, He said...
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you know, He died to
save the entire world,
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not just a few.
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He didn't just die
for the straight people,
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He died for everybody.
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Now, we've, on this program,
spoken about this issue,
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not this decision per
se that I can remember.
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Sure. A lot, and
that's been my view.
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I think Christians are at
great risk of being portrayed
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as hard-edged bigots,
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you know, don't even want
to even deal with such people,
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unclean, you know?
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It seems to me from what I know,
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and, of course,
everyone has to act
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according to their conscience,
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I can't tell anyone at
least of all another Christian
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how they should
react in this situation,
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but what if they'd come
into this guy's cake shop.
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And as he came in, he welcome,
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you know, glad
you chose my business,
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and then they ask him to do it.
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And he says, "Well, you know,
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thank you for choosing my store,
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but I have to tell you
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I'm a Bible believing Christian.
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And my book, you
know, warns against you
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or something
against your lifestyle,
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and I certainly can't
endorse that lifestyle,
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but I want to tell you
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if you still want
to go with me, great.
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But I may not be the best person
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to do this for you.
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I don't know if
you're going to see this
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as a sufficient parallel...
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I mean, how is that denying
his faith or refusing service?
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So, but let me tell you about
an experience I had years ago
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when I was first
practicing law in New York.
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And I went to an
education day event
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at one of the
churches there in the Bronx.
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And these folks were, you
know, so an education day,
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you know, you're
telling the high school kids
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and the younger
kids about, you know,
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what it means to be a lawyer
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and what you do as a
lawyer, that sort of a thing.
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And there was a
doctor, and a dentist,
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and, you know, a teacher,
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you know, some
other people there.
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The grown-ups were
giving me such a hard time.
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How can you be a
lawyer and a Christian?
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How can you
represent the guilty?
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And I'm like, well, you know,
people who have gone wrong,
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you know, they need
some grace, they need some...
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They need to have a
Christian witness, you know.
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If you're not...
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If there's no Christians
in the system anywhere,
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how are they ever
going to find Jesus?
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And, you know, it strikes
me if Christians now maybe,
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you know, should I...
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If I'm not a
criminal defense attorney,
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but should Christians say,
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"Well, we're not
going to do criminal defense
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because these are sinners,
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so we're not going
to help these sinners
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who have
committed these crimes."
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Well, to me, that's a
little bit like saying,
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"Well, I'm a baker, but
I'm not going to bake for..."
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But you don't necessarily,
when you get a client,
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you don't claim to know
more than the judge will know
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after a whole trial
and all the evidence
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that he's guilty.
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Well.
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He might have a
personal inference.
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We've had to
struggle with this, Lincoln,
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because it turns out that,
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you know, not all the
cases we take and the clients
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we take are as upstanding
as we thought to begin with.
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And sometimes we
come away thinking that
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the employer was
right to fire them.
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But I remember Antonin Scalia
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telling a story
about the horse thief
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that was brought to
trial before a friendly court.
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And they said he's
not guilty. But he...
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And he doesn't have
to give back the horses.
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So I guess it's
possible to be complicit,
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but I don't think lawyers,
as a philosophical matter,
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buy into the guilt of someone
that's accused of a crime.
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You are wanting them
to get a fair hearing,
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and it may turn out that
you help someone this guilty.
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But that's not really your job,
you ought to be an advocate.
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And Christ is our advocate.
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We're guilty to
start with. So...
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And He's redeeming
us, He's redeeming us.
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But coming back to Jack
Phillips, I mean, you...
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Look, you raise a good
question as a theological matter
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is that the best
of the only position
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for Christians to take
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to refuse to
serve the gay couple.
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And that's a valid
discussion to have,
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and I have my questions as well.
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I mean, I'm not a
theologian, I'm a lawyer.
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But, you know, from a
legal standpoint, of course,
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he has every legal right to
have his religious convictions
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and to have them respected.
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And I do think that the Supreme
Court's decision showed respect
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for his beliefs,
it remains to be seen.
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You know, going back to
the decision in Obergefell
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where Kennedy wrote
the majority opinion
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approving of same sex marriage.
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And of course Kennedy's gone.
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But the, you know, the
decision paid lip service
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to the right to believe
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what you want
about human sexuality,
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but it did
nothing to express support
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for the right to act
according to your belief.
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So do you think
this is a continuation of
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what under the
Obama administration
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we took them to task a
bit, and the president himself,
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he early on was inclined to
talk about freedom of worship,
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not freedom of religion.
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And even the communist system
allowed freedom of worship
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to hold a view and
within narrow confines
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to sing hymns and so on,
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but not to go out
and put it into action,
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that's really
what's at stake, isn't it?
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Well...
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Or free exercise as
the Constitution says.
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You know, I think
the culture warriors are
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misreading the
trend of history, frankly
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because I think the trend
of history is to secularize,
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and instead of
being so combative,
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we need to be more
gospel-focused, and ultimately,
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that's going to be
where the power is.
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Christ says, "If I be
lifted up from the world,
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from the earth, I
will draw all men."
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And if the church is failing,
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it's because we're
not lifting up Christ
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and showing Jesus properly.
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And when we're fighting these
culture war, you know, battles,
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we're alienating people
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rather than
drawing them to Christ.
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Right, you're right.
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And so the thing is
to represent Christ,
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not protect ourselves,
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and the story that even as
you're talking comes to mind,
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people wouldn't
normally use it this way,
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but the man on the Jericho road,
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lying there in the
blood and this gore,
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and the priest pulls
his skirts up, walk by.
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You know, I think there's
certain charity involved too.
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Not endorsing
someone else's life style,
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but a Christian
needs to reach out
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and help in
whatever way they can.
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I don't think that means
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that you put all of
flourishes on the cake
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because you can't be
enthusiastic about it,
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but you definitely will
help them in the last condition,
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and by charity, and then
I would, spoken in season,
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you know, people
think witnessing is,
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you know, push it
there on this road.
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But when you're
on side with someone
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and helping
them in this wedding,
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you know, they can
call it what they want,
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not the biblical wedding,
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but you're helping them in this.
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Maybe then you could
insert biblical view of
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why you had this
reticence to start
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with that you spoke about.
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Well, you know, the
real question to me is,
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you know, the,
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you know, Jack
Phillips missed an opportunity
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to show the grace of
Christ to this couple
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that somehow in showing
them a Christian witness...
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a lot of secular people,
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a lot of gay people expect
hostility from Christians.
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And so they're reinforced
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in their
opposition to Christianity
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when they get rejection.
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And like it or not, I just...
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From the material
in their own community
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there's a lot of self-hatred,
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they're not
self-confident as they make out,
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they don't need
further condemnation.
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If anything, that will
give them a false sense that,
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you know, they
justified in opposing you.
00:10:05.77\00:10:08.10
But to be charitable
and humane toward someone
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and then maybe
drop the word that
00:10:11.81\00:10:13.17
this is out of harmony
with God's Word, who knows.
00:10:13.21\00:10:15.71
Right, you know...
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That might gain
their conscience.
00:10:17.11\00:10:18.81
On a basic gospel orientation,
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I think the mistake
that the church has just made
00:10:21.72\00:10:24.45
is that we make
people's sexuality
00:10:24.49\00:10:28.26
a barrier between
themselves and Christ.
00:10:28.29\00:10:31.59
And that's not
the way it should be.
00:10:31.63\00:10:34.06
We really should
send the message that
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there is no barrier.
00:10:36.70\00:10:38.37
Jesus died for you,
you can encounter Christ,
00:10:38.40\00:10:41.27
you can have a
relationship with Christ,
00:10:41.30\00:10:43.30
and Christ alone is the one
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who is going to
deal with sinners,
00:10:45.71\00:10:47.51
and clean us up,
reform us, change us.
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We worship Christ.
00:10:53.28\00:10:54.62
King Solomon was
asked once to adjudicate
00:10:57.75\00:11:00.29
between two women
claiming the same child.
00:11:00.32\00:11:04.39
And one never knows how
he was going to be execute,
00:11:04.43\00:11:06.66
but his proposal was
slice the child in two,
00:11:06.70\00:11:09.53
give half each,
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obviously, they'd each
have half a dead child.
00:11:10.93\00:11:13.60
I pity the Supreme Court of late
00:11:13.64\00:11:15.74
because in a recent case,
00:11:15.77\00:11:18.51
the cake maker case,
for one of a formal title.
00:11:18.54\00:11:22.28
In essence, they
were asked to divide,
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liberties, rights in half
00:11:25.31\00:11:28.45
between the rights
of Christians to witness
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and to stand on their faith,
00:11:31.42\00:11:33.22
and the new found civil
right of gays, and transgenders,
00:11:33.25\00:11:37.39
and their pressure group.
00:11:37.43\00:11:40.83
I'm not sure that this
right can be equally divided.
00:11:40.86\00:11:44.03
And it's unfortunate that
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it becomes a
conflict between rights.
00:11:45.43\00:11:48.07
But what is certain is
that Christians in their witness
00:11:48.10\00:11:51.57
cannot afford to offend people.
00:11:51.61\00:11:55.18
We need to be as
inclusive in the right way
00:11:55.21\00:11:57.91
as Christ was
condemning the sin,
00:11:57.95\00:12:00.62
but even patting with
the public and if you like,
00:12:00.65\00:12:04.49
we need to avoid
the crying leper,
00:12:04.52\00:12:07.19
and say as Christ did,
00:12:07.22\00:12:09.22
a soul to be saved
in every situation.
00:12:09.26\00:12:11.99
The legal battle will continue,
00:12:12.03\00:12:14.06
but more
important is the moral one
00:12:14.10\00:12:16.46
in the witness of Christians.
00:12:16.50\00:12:18.93
For Liberty Insider,
This is Lincoln Steed.
00:12:18.97\00:12:22.00