A pastor who listens to this podcast writes in to ask a tricky leadership question. Pastor John, what should a church council or board do if one of their pastors asks to officiate a same-sex wedding? Pastor John, what counsel would you have for this church? Tony, I don't feel like I can answer that question without dropping one level down, because this is so sensitive and explosive and politically agitating that I want to go down to the bottom again and then come back up to the practical questions.

I think the practical question is relatively easy once you get the other things sorted out, which are not easy. The emotional and physical sensations that we call same-sex attraction are disordered emotions and disordered sensations. And that disordering of the soul's emotions and the body's sensations are rooted in the fall of humanity into sin.

And more specifically, Paul says, they're rooted in the sin that's understood as exchanging God's glory for images, Romans 1:23. So the exchange of woman as the glory of man for another man is a parable of the exchange of God for images like ourselves. So a person who experiences this disordering of the emotions of the soul and the sensations of the body may or may not himself exchange God for images.

He may be a Christian, but the disordering he's experiencing is rooted in that original sin and in that ongoing human bent of soul that we all have, all of us. So the issue becomes, what do we do with the disordering effects of sin in our lives? I say our lives, and you'll see why in a minute, John Piper's life.

The Bible says that if we embrace the disordering as good and normal and live our lives in accord with the disordered inclinations, then we will be living and affirming a parable of rebellion against God. And the Bible says those who live out that kind of rebellion do not enter the kingdom of heaven.

That's 1 Corinthians 6.9. Now that has nothing, get this, that has nothing to do with the peculiar nature of sexual disordering or same-sex desires. Nothing. This is true for all our disordering of all our lives rooted in sin. That's why 1 Corinthians 6.9 and 10 lists homosexual practices along with others.

So here's the list. Do not be deceived, neither sexually immoral, that's fornication because it's distinguished from the next two, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. In other words, if you embrace and live out as normal and good any of these, you perish because you're living a parable of rebellion.

So we all experience temptation to sin on a spectrum of intensity. There are occasional thieves and there are kleptomaniacs. There are people who occasionally drink too much and there are alcoholics. There are those who commit adultery once and never again, and there are predators. There are those who experimented with same-sex for a season.

Maybe they were in prison, maybe they were a teenager, and they don't anymore. And there are those who celebrate it and pursue it as normal. And Paul's point is that if you embrace adultery as good and normal, or if you embrace stealing as good and normal, or if you embrace greed as good and normal, or if you embrace drunkenness as good and normal, or if you embrace homosexual intercourse as good and normal, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.

This is not rooted in the nature of the sexual sin. This is rooted in sin and rebellion, regardless of what the issue is. Now we're getting to the question. Officiating at a so-called same-sex wedding is the same as putting your blessing on the choice of two people to commit eternal suicide.

The pastor is solemnizing and making official and blessing their choice not to enter the kingdom of heaven. Now I would say that if a pastor asks his board if he can do that, he has given a signal he's disqualified from his role of leading the sheep into the kingdom of heaven, which is his job.

And so he has put himself in a position of needing church discipline. And his board should follow the principles of Matthew 18 to seek his repentance as gently and patiently as they can. And then if he does not repent of his willingness to bless people's eternal suicide and thus lead them out of the kingdom of heaven and into destruction, he should be dismissed as a false shepherd from both the pastorate and the church.

With regard to two men or two women who ask to be married, a pastor should ask to meet with them, I think, if they're willing, in order to explain to them as patiently and carefully, lovingly as he can, why he recommends to them that they not go forward with their plans for the sake of their own soul.

And in that process, hopefully he will share the gospel and invite them to life in Christ and to his church. These days, Tony, are, as you know, things are in the news even as we record down in Indiana and so on, these are days when all Christians, especially pastors and church leaders need to stand rock solid on biblical teachings about God's good and beautiful plan for sexuality without any swagger and without any fear.

American culture is in the midst of a passionate pursuit of self-destruction. So our demeanor should be a mixture of sorrow and compassion and anger and total confidence that our God is in control and will attain his Christ-exalting, church-purifying, mission-completing purposes. Boy, that is sobering. Thank you for the warning, Pastor John.

There are many related episodes in the archives that are brought to my mind when we talk about this. Pastor John, you addressed the question, "Will you marry a heterosexual couple that is already living together?" back in episode number 365. We talked about, "Would you attend a gay wedding?" back in episode number 191.

And of course, we have talked about the fight against same-sex desires, like back in episode number 454. All of these episodes can be found in the Ask Pastor John app for the Apple and Android devices or online. Go to DesiringGod.org, click on "More" and click on "Ask Pastor John." There you can search our collection of almost 600 episodes now to date.

Well, should a couple who is expecting their fourth child pray for a certain gender for a boy or for a girl? And is such a preference wrong? A couple in India wants to know, and Pastor John will answer tomorrow. I'm your host, Tony Reinke. We'll see you then.