Megan Udinski, FISM News
John MacArthur, American pastor and theologian, urges American pastors to stand by their Canadian brothers in preaching on biblical sexual morality to combat the oppressive laws being passed in Canada.
Pastor James Coates of GraceLife Church in Edmonton, who had recently been jailed for keeping his doors open during COVID-19 lockdowns, has kept Pastor MacArthur informed on how churches are being attacked in Canada.
On January 8, Bill C-4, banning conversion therapy in Canada, will become law criminalizing the biblical teaching of marriage and sexuality. In an email to MacArthur, Coates explains how the bill “directly comes against parents and counsellors who would seek to offer biblical counsel with respect to sexual immorality and gender” and the vague wording could be used to “criminalize evangelism.”
Fellow pastor Andrew DeBartolo clarified the concerns of the bill in a letter to Pastor John. He explains the definition of conversion therapy as used in the bill is “a practice, treatment or service designed to change a person’s sexual orientation to heterosexual; change a person’s gender identity to cisgender; change a person’s gender expression so that it conforms to the sex assigned to the person at birth; repress or reduce non-heterosexual attraction or sexual behavior; repress a person’s non-cisgender gender identity; or repress or reduce a person’s gender expression that does not conform to the sex assigned to the person at birth.”
Regardless of whether the person struggling with their identity wants to seek biblical counsel, such counsel under this new law could lead a pastor to jail for up to five years. In DeBartolo’s own words, “According to Canadian law, as of January 8, 2022, the belief in God’s design for marriage and sexuality will now be seen as a myth.”
In solidarity with Canadian pastors, MacArthur is urging American pastors to dedicate January 16, 2022, to preach on the biblical ethic of sexuality. The costs are much higher for our Canadian brothers but demonstrating solidarity in the church will have a tremendous impact.
DeBartolo closes his letter saying, “We will be doing so illegally, declaring to the State that there is one God and one Lord over His church, and that Christ alone gets to both define marriage and dictate what is required in the pulpit.”
MacArthur writes to fellow ministers of the gospel explaining how this very attack on the gospel of Jesus Christ has been taking place in our own country as well. In 2012 California, New York, New Jersey and Nevada passed bills banning “gay conversion.” On August 18, 2020, the Democratic Party declared that it, too, would ban “harmful conversion therapy practices.” The Obama and Biden administrations alone have appointed more than 250 LGBTQ+ individuals to serve in the government, demonstrating the priority of the left to force an unbiblical ideology on all Americans.
Near the end of his letter MacArthur states, “Our calling as gospel ministers is to preach the truth, confront sin, and call all men to repentance and obedience to the gospel—the good news that achieves soul conversion and saves sinners from eternal wrath.”