Ben Johnson reports at LifeSiteNews.com:
The nearly billion-dollar Christian charity World Vision has reversed its longstanding policy, announcing that it will begin hiring homosexuals in same-sex 'marriages' to work for their ministry. . . .
"World Vision maintains that their decision is based on unifying the church -- which I find offensive -- as if supporting sin and sinful behavior can unite the church," said Franklin Graham, the president and CEO of Samaritan's Purse and leader of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. . . .
Tim Wildmon, president of the American Family Association, said, "World Vision has abandoned the warning of Paul and compromised the integrity of a ministry financially supported by Christians who regard Scripture as the final authority on the issue."
"Christians who support World Vision should stop, as should all of the artists and authors who raise money for them," he emphasized. "There are many other organizations that sponsor children around the world who remain true to the Gospel."
"Stearns likened the divide between Christians to controversies over the proper baptismal method, saying eliminating this theological issue would help focus the organization's efforts to promote Christianity," LifeSiteNews reports.
"I know the Evil One would like nothing better than for World Vision to be hobbled and divided on this issue, so that we lose our focus on the Great Commandment and the Great Commission," Stearns is quoted as saying.
Southern Baptist Theological Seminary president Albert Mohler disagrees, calling Stearns' reasoning "pathetically inadequate," according to LifeSiteNews.
"It is ridiculous to argue that World Vision is not taking sides on the issue,” LifeSiteNews quotes Mohler as saying.
"Willingly recognizing same-sex marriage and validating openly homosexual employees in their homosexuality is a grave and tragic act that confirms sinners in their sin" and "will mislead the world about the reality of sin and the urgent need of salvation," LifeSiteNews also quotes Mohler as writing.
"Donor bases come and go. But the Gospel of Jesus Christ stands forever," said Russell Moore of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, according to LifeSiteNews.
One should point out that Jesus of Nazareth himself has spoken quite clearly on the subject of marriage, saying, for example, "Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female . . . For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh" (Matthew 19:4-5).
I, for one, join with Jesus of Nazareth and with all others who revolt on behalf of intelligence against "marriage equality" or any other such phrase that fronts for counterfeits and masks societal barbarism.
On its website, World Vision has the tagline, "Building a better world for children."
How sweet, but ironic. How hopeful, but savage. And how loving, but false.
And how vain to do so in the name of Jesus. Not only is claiming Jesus for that which Jesus explicitly rejects a spiritual and strategic loser, it is a way of taking the Lord's name in vain.
In fact, because of its rejection of the Creator's verifiable information and wisdom concerning marriage, World Vision is now committed to making a worse world for children.
Water yes, marriage no.
That's not sweet. That's not hopeful. That's not loving.
If World Vision cannot be trusted to speak and practice truth regarding a phenomenon as foundational as marriage, which is so clearly emphasized in the data of Scripture, how in the world can the organization be trusted to speak and practice truth in other important but less foundational matters?
That's not relief, that's pain.
And if World Vision breaks faith with Jesus here, at such a foundational point, who is to say it will not break faith with Jesus elsewhere, when the board again is "overwhelmingly in favor" of such a regressive step?
This is not simply a matter of the blind leading the blind. It's the depleted disserving the starving.
It is vanity, incoherence, and worldliness, all in the name of ministry.
By its own choice, World Vision has exposed itself has having lost its vision. It has broken faith with Jesus, the verifiable Lord of history, the water of life.
A loss of funding may be the least of the organization's problems.
Here is contact information for World Vision:
World Vision, Inc.
34834 Weyerhaeuser Way South
Federal Way, WA 98001
1-888-511-6443
1-253-815-1000
info@worldvision.org
Related
The Revolt of Intelligence Against "Marriage Equality"
Francis Schaeffer -- "The Central Problem of Our Age"