Few people will deny that the topic of sexuality rises to the top of all other discussions in Canada. Even in my own church we talk about these issues frequently. The public tensions center around sexuality in relation to the notion of equality. Yet no one can doubt that the subject of diversity is just as prominent. A Christian cannot ignore these ideas of equality and diversity. And in an interesting juxtaposition, my church hosted a conference that addressed the topic of sexuality, only a week prior to the annual celebration of the local Gay Pride parade.
1. Equality of Humanity
Both the attendees at our conference and the attendees at the Gay Pride festival are all equal in worth, dignity and value. That is the Christian viewpoint. Since all the attendees are created in the image of God (Genesis 1:27a), they have an equal standing as well designed, created beings. The design of the human body abounds with evidence of this design, from the microscopic universe of complexity in a human cell to the culture-producing capacity to make create art for the senses.
2. Equality of the Sexes
If the image of God is the first equality that human beings have, the second equality which humans beings have is the equality of sexuality. Since sexuality is the expression of sex, it finds its equal source in the binary sex displayed as male and female. When we consult with Genesis 1:27, we see that this binary division of male and female establishes equality in these two sexes
We know that this second equality applies to sexuality, because in Genesis 1:28, God commends and commands the equal male and female image bearers to be “fruitful and multiply”. This requires the sexual union of male and female; two equals, producing more equals. The equality status is built into God’s design because there are things that have a lower status. In fact, God commands equal, fruitful, human beings to “fill the earth and subdue it” (v.28). Equality is established because the earth, not other people, are placed below human “dominion”.
These equalites that God has established require the high valuation on life that ought to be confessed by all people. Terms today like “pro-life” are just as much “pro-equality”. The unborn child at conception is a human life, and so ought to be treated with dignity, worth and value. The same applies to the elderly or mentally underdeveloped, who are nevertheless equal in worth, dignity and value. No matter the nomenclature we ascribe to ourselves (Baptist, Hindu, Transgender, etc) we are equal in status, worth and dignity because we are created in the image of God.
3. Equality of Corruption
There is third equality that must be looked at before we can consider the diversities. The third equality is the status of fallenness or moral corruption. The tragedy that started it all is recorded in the third chapter of Genesis. Adam disobeyed God by eating what was forbidden (v.6). The result of his action was the equally affecting contagion which touched every human being:
Therefore just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned”
Romans 5:12
Prior to the spread of this corrupting contagion, human beings were equal in status. But afterwards, they remained equal in status, yet also equally contaminated and corrupt. This equality of corruption is not talking about the quantity of criminal acts. It’s not talking about individual’s lists of sins and their relative length. What it’s talking about is that every person from the goody-two-shoes to hardened prisoner has equality of corruption.
The equality of human beings is the reason why Adam’s sin corrupts all, not just some. The point is an important one because self-identified religious people can act like self-identified gay people are unequal and more corrupt. Of course the reverse is true too. Gay people can act like Christians are moral monsters, and undeserving of treatment as equals.
Celebrating equality is a good thing. It is the gift of a special status which God has given to all people. But we must also recognize that there is an equality of corruption which requires a deliverance, but deserves none. None of us deserves to be delivered from judgment. We are all equally under the condemnation of God (Ro 1:18).
Diversity of Equality
There can’t be a discussion of equality without a matching discussion about diversity. Diversity is built into the creation of equal human beings. Even as God created humanity in the image of God, he created two binary, biological sexes, male and female (Gen 1:27). The second chapter of Genesis shows that there was a diversity to the order of the male and female creation, with man being created first in time (2:7). Without a compatible, equal complement to him, God supernaturally created the woman from the biological material of the man (v.22). This diversity in time did not change their equality, but it established diversity within equality. The man was not a woman, nor vice versa. The man had responsibilities given to him by God, such as naming the animals and naming his co-equal corresponding image-bearer. Only the woman had the diverse characteristics to bear children. Yet equality remains.
Equality was not injured or altered by this diversity. But diversities developed, as equal human couples were tasked to socially separate themselves from their parents, being bound together in a union, and establishing new families. This extension of equality beyond one couple, or one tribe is the essence of equality for all of humanity. Although there is diversity in new heterosexual, covenanted unions that are blooming with new life, every new tribe inherently possesses all the equalities, both positive and negative.
Other Diversities
The binary diversity of sex, means that men and women will differ. They will have biological and social differences. Diversity, as in all art, provides variety and intrigue. The differences between men and women are not in terms of the quantity of their worth, but the characteristics of their design.
All peoples are diverse as descendents of Adam. The biological, genetic diversity cannot dispel the fact that we are all connected to each other at the root. We all possess the equalities, even as we celebrate the diversities. Although people may talk of races in the plural, there is really only one race, that is Adam’s race, which we all share in, however diverse we may be in other ways.
Sadly, all of us would like to deny the equality of value for all people, while at the same time selectively denying the equality of corruption for others. Due to sin, we are constantly elevating ourselves and denigrating others. People can celebrate pride as a virtue, when our equality should make us all humble, even repenting in dust and ashes. As Isaiah said:
“Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!”
Isaiah 6:5
Retrieving Equality
I was confronted by the distorted views of equality recently when I had a conversation with a woman via social media.
She had been criticizing our church for promoting a conference on sexuality and gender. Her questions were about equality. Did we believe in ‘equality’? Did we support ‘marriage equality’?
I responded in as winsome a manner as possible, trying to articulate the biblical view of equality and diversity. But she responded that I was speaking in a non-secular way. In other words, my definitions of equality (in keeping with standard English usage) did not correspond to hers. When she said “marriage equality” she didn’t mean the equal status of two binary male and female people joined in a covenant with the design that their union be exclusive and fruitful. She meant homosexual unions being re-defined as marriages. We seemed to be speaking different languages.
So if I understood her correctly, she saw equality as requiring interchangeability or fluidity. Further, like Orwell’s Animal Farm, she also understood that all are equal, but some were more equal than others. I was confessing a realistic view of the world where human beings are equal in value, worth and dignity, yet diverse in binary sex, ethnicity and amazing productive capacities. But this confession was forbidden.
I came away from the exchange realizing that there is a vast language gap between what Scripture says, and what our neighbours are saying, even when they employ similar sounding ideas.
Equality and Diversity in the Message of Jesus Christ
The most important way to retrieve equality and diversity is not by playing language games, but by the gospel of Jesus Christ.
The Son of God took on the equality of human beings, by adding to himself a human nature (Phil 2:5-11). This was a condescension because the Son who is God is by definition unequally superior to all creatures. Yet by adding this second, human equality, he could welcome a great diversity of human beings to be united to him. He bore their sin, receiving their due penalty, giving them a renewed equality as children of God, objects of the Father’s love (see 2 Cor 5:21; 1 John 3:1).
There is a new message which diverse humanity must hear in all of their equal corruption. It the message of the gospel that will bring together people from every tribe, tongue and nation to worship at the feet of the one who is superior to all, the Lamb who was slain (Rev 7:9).
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