The Sound of a Mighty Rushing Whisper

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I do not envy Ed Litton.

As recently elected president of the deeply fractured SBC, he has the distinct privilege of being observed by the double-barreled microscope know as social media. And as we all know, the people who wield this weaponized tool tend to have an itchy trigger finger and a distaste for context.

Nevertheless, anyone who accepts the presidency of the largest protestant denomination willingly accepts a higher level of scrutiny. Likewise, in his role as a pastor he has agreed to “incur a stricter judgment” (Jas 3:1).

Furthermore, the sinful howling of social media does not mean that all criticism is invalid. It just means that, as Christians, our criticism must be honest (Ex 20:16), gentle (2 Tim 2:24-25), after slowly hearing (Jas. 1:19), always with grace (Col. 4:6), avoiding careless words (Matt 12:36), glorifying to God (1 Cor. 10:31), and “only such a word as is good for edification according to the need of the moment, so that it will give grace to those who hear” (Eph. 4:29).

With that in mind, let’s proceed with severe charity.

What Exactly Did Litton Say?

Over a year ago, Litton claimed that God “whispers” about sexual sin compared to other sins. Interestingly, Litton apparently plagiarized this quote from former SBC president J.D. Greear.[1]

I want to note that Litton and Greear did not deny the sinfulness of homosexuality. Both explicitly state that homosexuality is a sin with a quotation from 1 Corinthians 6:9–10.

Sadly, both men swerve off the road later on in the sermon. Both say that Christians go wrong by “thinking that homosexuality is the worst of all sins.”[2] On face value, this is a fine point to make. It is certainly the case that some Christians think this, and those Christians are wrong. As John MacArthur said, “I couldn’t think of anything greater than have a whole church full of ex-[homosexuals], to join the rest of us ex-whatever we are—sinners.”[3] We are all sinners in need of a savior.

Unfortunately, rather than stopping here, Litton and Greear overstate this point and end up in a twisted, applicational ditch. Litton says, “In the Bible, sexual sin is whispered compared to the shout God makes about greed and judgmentalism.”

This claim will be our focus.

Evaluating the Claim

What metric is used to measure the volume of Scripture? Are “greed and judgmentalism” mentioned more times than sexual sin? Is the language for “greed and judgmentalism” more severe than the language used for sexual sin? Let’s put both of these measurements to the test.

1. Frequency of Mention

a. Sexual sin in the Old Testament

Gen 19:1–11; 38; Ex 20:14; 22:19; Lev 18:22; 10:29; 20:10–21; 21:9; Deut 5:18; 22:13–30; 27:21; Judges 19; 1 Sam 2:22; 2 Sam 11–12; 13:11–14; Prov 5:3–23; 6:24–35; 7; Jer 7:9; 13:26–27; Ezk 22:11; Mal 3:5.

I came up with this list after about 30 minutes of searching a study Bible and Google. It’s not even remotely exhaustive. A quick read of 1–2 Kings, 1–2 Chronicles, or the Prophets could provide many additional negative examples.

b. Sexual sin in the New Testament

Kevin DeYoung summarizes: “There are at least eight vice lists in the New Testament (Mark 7:21–22; Rom. 1:24–31; 13:13; 1 Cor. 6:9–10; Gal. 5:19–21; Col. 3:5–9; 1 Tim. 1:9–10; Rev. 21:8), and sexual immorality is included in every one of these…You would be hard-pressed to find a sin more frequently, more uniformly, and more seriously condemned in the New Testament than sexual sin.”[4]

c. In a twist of painful irony, the very passage Litton was preaching from, Romans 1:24-32, dedicates 85 words to sexual immorality (24, 26–27) and only 1 word to “greed.”[5] When Litton says “sexual sin is whispered compared to the shout God makes about greed,” he seems to have turned a blind eye to the very passage he was supposed to be preaching.

2. Severity of Language

a. Concerning the language of Litton’s preaching text, Robert Gagnon adds,

“Both the highly pejorative description and the extended attention that the apostle Paul gives to homosexual practice in Rom 1:24–27 indicates that Paul regarded homosexual practice as an especially serious infraction of God’s will….It makes little sense to argue that Paul took extra space in Rom 1:24–27 to talk about how homosexual practice is “dishonorable” or “degrading,” “contrary to nature,” an “indecency” or “shameful/ obscene behavior,” and a fit “payback” for their straying from God in order to show that homosexual practice was no worse than any other sin. Paul obviously gave idolatry and homosexual practice more airtime because they were two classic, not-uncommon examples of great human depravity that could only occur after humans had first blinded themselves to the truth around them. In the case of homosexual practice, humans would have to suppress the self-evident sexual complementarity of male and female (anatomically, physiologically, psychologically) before engaging in intercourse with members of the same sex.”[6]

b. Leviticus 20:13 says of homosexuals, “they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.” Gagnon again notes, “Although in the concluding summary (Lev 18.26–27, 29–30) all the sexual offenses in Lev 18 are collectively labeled “abominations,” “abhorrent” or “detestable acts” (to’evoth), only man-male intercourse in 18:22 (and 20:13) is specifically tagged with the singular to’evah.”[7]

c. Proverbs 5:3–5 says of the adulteress,
“In the end she is bitter as wormwood,
Sharp as a two-edged sword.
Her feet go down to death,
Her steps take hold of Sheol.”

d. Proverbs 6:32–33
“The one who commits adultery with a woman is lacking sense;
He who would destroy himself does it.
Wounds and disgrace he will find,
And his reproach will not be blotted out.”

e. To quote Justin Peters: “Ask David.”[8] See his story with Bathsheba in 2 Samuel 11–12.

f. In Jeremiah 13:26–27, Yahweh uses the great shamefulness of sexual sin to illustrate Israel’s wicked condition. This is common in the Prophets.
“So I Myself have also stripped your skirts off over your face,
That your shame may be seen.
As for your adulteries and your lustful neighings,
The lewdness of your prostitution
On the hills in the field,
I have seen your abominations.
Woe to you, O Jerusalem!
How long will you remain unclean?”

g. 1 Corinthians 6:18
“Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually, sins against their own body.” In some sense, sexual sin is uniquely detrimental to the sinner.

h. 1 Thessalonians 4:3
“For this is the will of God, your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality.”

i. Hebrews 13:4
“Marriage is to be held in honor among all, and the marriage bed is to be undefiled; for fornicators and adulterers God will judge.”

j. Jude 7
“Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, since they in the same way as these indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh, are exhibited as an example in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire.” 

Greear explained later on, “I applied that [whisper] quote to the difference in the emphasis Jesus places on the dangers of pride and greed versus sexual sin and said that given the sheer number of times Jesus talks about pride and greed, it is as if he saved most of his volume to warn about pride and greed.”[9]

So let’s look at a third criteria.

3. Emphasis of Jesus

a. First of all, Jesus is Yahweh![8]
When Genesis 19:24 says, “Then Yahweh rained on Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from Yahweh out of heaven,” this was an action of God the Son as well as an action of God the Father and God the Spirit. (Remember the doctrine of inseparable operations from a few blog posts ago!) 

When “Yahweh spoke to Moses” in Leviticus 20:1 and later said “If there is a man who lies with a male as those who lie with a woman, both of them have committed a detestable act. Their bloodguiltiness is upon them” (v. 13), these words cannot be separated from God the Son.

To separate the words of the Son from the rest of Scripture is to separate the will of the Son from the Father and the Spirit. Crazier still is to pit the words of Jesus against the rest of Scripture, as if He has a different disposition towards sin than His own words in the Old Testament.

So, Jesus’ attitude towards sexual sin is perfectly aligned with everything written in the Old Testament because He and the Father are one (Jn 10:30).

b. Jesus illustrates the severity of sexual sin with a violent picture in Matthew 5:27–30, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery’; but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. If your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to go into hell.”

c. In his personal letters at the beginning of Revelation, Jesus warns two churches for sexual impurity mixed with idol worship (Rev 2:14, 20).

d. In Revelation 21:8 Jesus says, “But as for…the sexually immoral…their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”

Jesus lists 8 sins in his final statement on the judgement of sinners. Sexual immorality is specifically listed while “pride and greed” are absent. Pride and greed are obviously not excused, but their absence seems to weaken the claim of Greear and Litton.

Conclusion 

Whether the criteria is frequency of mention, severity of language, or emphasis of Jesus, the idea that God “whispers” about sexual sin is reckless and simply untrue. Even when compared to other sins, how could the language above possibly be considered a “whisper?”

The thoughtlessness of Litton’s claim becomes clear when it’s applied to various situations. For instance, I recently preached in Las Vegas. Would Litton say God shouts about the sins on the casino floor while He, comparatively, whispers about the sins in hotel rooms? Would Greear say that, comparatively, Scripture whispers about the man who cheats on his wife while it shouts about the wife who runs up her credit card debt? I pray that neither men would accept these logical implications of their statement.

An Appeal 

If you’re reading this and are currently enslaved to sexual sin, whether it’s homosexuality, pornography, adultery, or anything else, you need to know two things.

First, God certainly does not whisper about your sin. He doesn’t whisper about any sin. The reality is that God is holy and therefore incompatible with sin of any kind. In the end, all unrepentant sinners will be “in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death” (Rev 21:8). God will act as the perfect judge and punish all wrongdoing for eternity.

Second, even though our sin is incompatible with him, he has still chosen to save sinners like us. If you know that you are living in sin and destined for Hell, please consider reading or listening to this sermon called “Fifteen Words of Hope.”

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6PJNfbIuS4&t=3s All Litton quotes are taken from this video.

[2] For an argument that homosexual practice is worse than many sins, see: http://www.robgagnon.net/articles/is_homosexual_practice_no_worse.htm

[3] https://www.gty.org/library/sermons-library/1376/the-bible-and-homosexuality

[4] Kevin DeYoung, What Does the Bible Really Say About Homosexuality? (Wheaton: Crossway, 2015), 74. Underline added. Posted on his Twitter account 6/25/21. Curiously, this book is endorsed by J.D. Greear. 

[5] Word counts taken from the NASB1995.

[6] http://www.robgagnon.net/articles/is_homosexual_practice_no_worse.htm Underline added.

[7] http://www.robgagnon.net/articles/is_homosexual_practice_no_worse.htm Underline added.

[8] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNdrUxysNjU

[9] https://jdgreear.com/a-statement-about-my-sermon-on-romans-1

[10] Here’s a sermon through some of the passages that prove Jesus is Yahweh: https://www.gracechurch.org/sermons/16454

NewsJacob TrotterComment