Gays, lesbians or sinners?

I have just finished watching a sort of documentary on gays and lesbians and I was utterly shocked that in this day and age, the one place that is supposed to bring us peace and joy in times of trouble and despair is the same one place that is trying to instill feelings of hatred in our hearts against our fellow human beings.

The church once so powerful is trying again with a different approach to play God and condemn people as it did in the past. Numerous subjects are on its list and among them homosexuality.
Quotes from the Bible follow and sure enough everyone is claiming that homosexuality is unnatural and the greatest of sins, that homosexuals must be not only hated but eliminated.

What a sad concept, I thought as I recalled Jesus' words to his disciples. Love one another he kept on saying. In fact Jesus never condemned any sinner that crossed his path, quite the contrary he helped that sinner instead.
Jesus never judged anyone for even his own disciples were sinners and he knew it as did they. But Jesus accepted them and loved them even more so.
Are we above Jesus, I wondered that we must become judges and executioners?
For what is the church preaching to us these days besides hatred to homosexuals and other beliefs and such? How can we walk in the steps of Christ when we do the contrary to what he did? How can we be so pure and Christian or reborn even as some say, when our hearts are filled with anger, hatred and even criminal intent to fellow humans?

Perhaps homosexuality is a sin, though it seems psychologically and scientifically it was never proven to be something of a disorder that one can heal. Most of these failed attempts pushes the victim towards suicide or depression, repression even and denial. But let us suppose it is a sin and a major one for that. I wonder where in the Bible it says to convert one another? All disciples preached and yet all of them ended by saying that they will pray for sinners, not reform them, readjust them, reset them. And yet it seems our church considers the possibility to reform others not only in prayers but also in action. If it is not the church then it must be its followers, and for that the church must be held responsible, for thoughts of its followers take root in its preaching.

But if there was no more church and if we were to pray every day as the Lord had taught us, and as the church must teach us, then we would find ourselves saying: "give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us."

Nowhere in that statement did God intend for anyone to punish anyone else because he or she is a sinner, in fact the statement is very clear as to whom we should pray for forgiveness and what we should do in case we are wronged by another. I suppose a sinner could trespass against us just by being a sinner. And if such is the case, as is the case with homosexuals, then we too must forgive, for how else can we ask God to forgive us when we cannot forgive each another.

Are you not aware of that other story in the Bible, no not the Sodom and Gomorrah story, but the one about the unforgiving servant. Now the king forgave his servant for his debt because the servant asked for mercy. And yet the servant himself demanded money from another who owed him, instead of repaying him with the same mercy he just got. (Matthew 18:28-34)
'You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. 33(AT) And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?' 34(AU) And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers,[l](AV) until he should pay all his debt. 35(AW) So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother(AX) from your heart."

In other words, God is saying why must I forgive you if you cannot forgive another? Or if you like, He is also saying I have forgiven your sins not so that you can punish another for his. In short, I believe He is saying as you shall ask, also do. If you want God to forgive you for your sins no matter how small you think they are, then you must forgive others also. You have no choice. And if in your eyes, in your beliefs, in your absorption of Christian morals you believe homosexuals are sinners, then your task as specified by God is to pray for them and allow God to forgive them and perhaps heal them. It is not your job.

I do not know whose idea it was in the beginning to play God on earth. Are we above God now, have we transcended to his position in Heaven and taken into our hands the punishment of sinners and the execution of right and wrong on earth?

I mean, we are in 2010 for Heaven's sakes. Technologically we have advanced more than we have ever dreamed of accomplishing and yet despite all our advancements we are still restricted by beliefs and popular voting. I dare say it is like popular voting because the strongest army takes the stand. And apparently churches have been equipping themselves with an army, one they call for God.
An army who will vote against what is wrong, wrong as expressed in the Bible, one that will promote killing if necessary also for the sake of the Bible.
News about teenagers being bashed for the mere reason that they are gay is not acceptable. And if there was such a God in your eyes, I pray thee, ask him before you go to bed if such a thing is according to his will.

I am so saddened to learn about the churches' actions and preaching that I find myself out of words.
However one thing comes to mind. Are we any better than our fellow Muslims I ask you then? We can't condemn them because we fear them, we fear they will drop some bomb on us or even some suicidal maniac in our streets. In truth we are no better. They believe that by defending their land and turning everyone into Muslim they are serving God. They believe that by threatening the entire Christian population in the world and the Jews for that matter, they are serving God by eliminating sinners from the world.
I have had many Muslim friends who of course do not share that view though one thing remains true. In the Quran, Christians are the sinners, the lost, the mislead.
What is to make us Christians today, bashing homosexuals in the streets, leading demonstrations with banners in the air stating hate homosexuals and burn in hell and die statements, and so forth any better than our fellow Muslims?

Ironically we speak ill of them and yet we follow their path. They drop physical bombs, we drop moral ones.
We claim to be sons of God but we choose who is and who is not of God, because some sins to us are more important than others, that we choose to close our eyes on our own sins and point fingers at the outside world where people like homosexuals exist.

Will God punish you because you lied? You should ask Him. But I know this much, He will not raise a congregation to hunt you down and cut off your tongue because you lied and lying is a sin. He will not set forth an army of his followers to pluck your eye out because you envied your friend's wife and lust over her though that too is a sin. He will most surely not bring down his army to kill you and tear your body into pieces because you killed someone and that too is a sin.
Are all other sins forgiven I ask?
Or is it hard to look at oneself and recognize that even these little sins are still sins. But it does not matter to God, because that is the reason He sent His only begotten son to save us, to die for us, to bear our sins, to be humiliated and spat on and beaten and pierced for us, all in the name of love.
So if such a God exists, and He is love, then how come we kill each other every day verbally, emotionally, mentally, physically in the name of God?

So for those of us who CHOOSE to be evil, please leave GOD out of it. His message was clear and it was nothing but LOVE.

PS: No intent is meant to exclude transgender, Bisexuals and others but to make it to the point the common word of gay or homosexual was mostly used.

Passage of the Bible taken from URL:
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+18&version=ESV