RE: A Gay Man in Biden’s Cabinet
A Response to Senator Adeyeye’s Essay
By: Deji Yesufu
When I read Sola Adeyeye’s “A Gay Man in Biden’s Cabinet”, I knew immediately I must offer a rejoinder to the article. Senator Adeyeye is not someone whose opinion anyone should dispute, as he has not only carved out a niche for himself in the hallowed chambers of the higher legislative house in the National Assembly but he is also an intellectual whose submission on sundry national and international issues cannot be easily faulted. In this essay, however, I found the erudite Osun State politician greatly wanting and I trust I can point some points in his essay that where not only erroneously but pandering to heresy – especially when one considers that the piece was written by a professing Christian.
For those who may not have read the essay, Senator Adeyeye was saying that Christians should not fault President Joe Biden for electing a gay man into cabinet. Among other reasons he raised, the Senator said that America was a democracy and not a theocracy. He also pointed out that Biden would not be the first US President to appoint a gay person to office; former President Trump, who many evangelicals love to extol, also appointed a gay person to his cabinet. Senator Adeyeye wrote that homosexuality is a sin but it may not be a crime. That in Nigeria, where there is a subsisting law against homosexuality, it is both a sin and a crime. But in the USA, where many states have passed laws endorsing homosexuality, while the act remains a sin it is not a crime. Senator Adeyeye ends his essay with these strong words for his target audience: “The Church’s sure foundation was, and remains, an ever-prevailing person, the Solid Rock. His name is Jesus Christ.” If the evangelicals had disputed anything the celebrated Senator had written up till that paragraph, we should at least agree with this one which is a clear word from the Holy Writ (1 Peter 2:7).
The great advantage of essay writing is that a person can state his argument uninterrupted and most times if it is well written, one essay can end all arguments. The story is told of how the 16th century Greek Scholar and Roman Catholic theologian, Erasmus, was coerced to respond to Martin Luther’s writing that had begun to shake the foundation of the Roman Catholic Church. When Erasmus would eventually write, he wrote a treatise disputing Luther’s doctrine of God’s Sovereignty. He said in essence that Luther appeared to be right in many of his arguments but that element in his theology where he appears to paint man as helpless in the matter of salvation was faulty. Erasmus taught that whatever else may be found in the doctrine of salvation there remains an active free will in every man. When Luther responded to the book, he wrote his mighty treatise: “The Bondage of the Will”. Luther said in essence that the will of every man is held captive to sin and except a sovereign God wakes the dead sinner to spiritual life, such a man remain helpless. Salvation was a hundred percent the work of God and nothing of man. Erasmus responded to Luther’s essay with a longer book but Luther never returned to the argument. He explained that everything he had written in his book was sufficient to counter any argument on the subject. I am of the opinion that Senator Adeyeye’s essay has not answered all the questions on this subject and that he has actually left himself vulnerable for a response as I hope to give in a moment.
Since the Senator has referred copiously to the Bible in his essay, perhaps I should remind him that the Bible refers to Satan as the Prince of the power of the air (Ephesian 2:2) and that there is a sense in it that the kingdoms of this world are under his power and influence (Matthew 4:8-9). I want to suggest here that every nation, state or people are ruled by a god. That God may be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, or that god may be Satan and all of his various influences. It is true that America is not a theocracy like Old Testament Israel was but America, like any other country on earth, is ruled by a god. It is left to the people of that nation to allow for the Christian God to rule their nation or to allow the Prince of the power of the air to reign supreme. When evangelicals rail against a President appointing a gay man to public office, they are refusing the god of this age to reign over their nation. When Christians make excuses for gay people in government, they are allowing the devil reign in their government.
I could easily be asked: what did the evangelicals do when Trump appointed a gay man to office? We should remember that most thorough going evangelicals never consider Donald Trump a Christian in the first place. They tolerated him because he did their bidding. If Trump, at some point in his administration, went on to appoint a gay person into office, they would consider it as his pandering to the 9 million gay population of the United States. Trump played politics with his appointments – just like any other politician will do. But Biden appointing a gay person to office has greater implications than Trump because the Democratic Party is a party that flaunts its supports for gays and the LGBTQ communities; and if Biden considers appointing gays to office at the very beginning of his administration, you already have an inkling of what his government will look like.
If we believe the Bible, we had better allow it to rule all our lives and not just some portions of it. Homosexuality is a sin not because it is any worse than lying, adultery, fornication or stealing, but because it is a sin against nature itself. A cursory look at Romans 1:21-25 will reveal that homosexuality is a product of a particularly base and dark mind; a result of God abandoning a man or a nation to the basest of sins. While the sin of adultery and stealing are the product of men’s natural evil inclinations, homosexuality is a learned act. It is rebellion against God and we should be reminded that God indeed overthrew nations in the Bible for this very sin. If these times of grace will not allow God to rain down sulfur and brimstone on countries that allow homosexuality to flourish in their midst, we should remind ourselves that the God we serve is unchanging and will someday judge these very grievous sin. I will not want to be part of those who were making excuses for sins that God considers particularly despicable.
Something else we must keep in mind in these modern times is that while the Church is in the world, the Church is not of this world. We do not pander to the system of this world, our kingdom is not of this world; our goals and priorities are very different from this world. We must realize that ultimately every political system in the world today is going to become increasingly antichrist. While the Democrats may have sold all their platforms to the devil, the Republicans are still trying to keep some of their Christian conservative values. Ultimately, they will also give in to the demands and wants of the time. The Church would however be preserved by only one element: a commitment to the tenets of the Holy Scriptures. The real meaning of the reign of the Antichrist is that by the time our Lord is returning, the devil would have taken over every system of the world and only the Christian that is truly committed to God’s law will remain standing at those times. This is why Jesus asks that when he returns will he find faith on earth? If in the mere matter of international politics, we are already kowtowing to the thinking and preferences of a liberal and antichrist people, what will happen when the Antichrist is ruling the earth and demanding the devotion of all men?
Just as Senator Adeyeye concluded his essay, the church’s foundation is indeed Jesus Christ. Our Lord rules the nations of the earth even today, but it is left to the Church to allow for his influence to pervade their communities. The evangelical churches in America are standing against a steep mountain of satanic, antichrist and demonic influences in the political system that governs their country today. I sure hope that none of us will be found siding with such a system. Like our Lord said, we cannot serve God and serve mammon at the same time. Even today, our Lord demands we take a position: we cannot be hot and cold at same time. When we do take a side, may it be that we are siding with a righteous course and there is no righteousness in a government that celebrates homosexuals.
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