Guest Post by Joel McDurmon: Gary North, Would You Please Zip it Up?

Just as soon as the world was greeted with the Islamic terroristic murder of 50 patrons of a homosexual bar, it was also greeted with the echoes of “Economist” Gary North casually advocating the “good news” of the death of homosexuals.
In a rant that is as ignorant of what the Bible actually says as it is shockingly void of compassion, North states, “God is indeed a homophobe (Boundaries and Dominion, pg 26). He hates the practice and those who practice it, which is why He destroyed Sodom. God warned Israel; practice such an abomination, and the land will vomit you out, just as it vomited out its former inhabitants (Lev. 18:24-29)” (Boundaries and Dominion, pg 221). “Homosexuals do not reproduce. North also said, “”Homosexual behavior was a capital crime in the Old Testament (Lev. 20:13). Is it still a capital crime today? Virtually all non-theonomic interpreters draw back from this politically embarrassing (in 1989) conclusion [that it shouldn’t be]” (Tools for Dominion, pg 121). North also advocated homosexuals be put to death by stoning, saying “Public stoning forces citizens to face the reality of the ultimate civil sanction, execution, which in turn points to God’s ultimate sanction at judgment day.”
Let’s be clear: even if North’s view of the Bible were true (it’s not), it would still hardly be the time and place to advocate for the stoning of homosexuals. The lust to jump immediately in front of a camera to share such cold indifference and vacant empathy should give us as much to think about as the presence of Islamic extremists among us.
But let’s be even clearer: North’s view of the Bible is flat ignorant. Here is the view on which he bases his heartless rhetoric. He says,
On what biblical basis can a Christian speak of legitimate civil sanctions against homosexuality if the Book of Leviticus is automatically dismissed?…The average evangelical suspects – though he is really not quite sure – that the Bible authorizes civil sanctions against homosexuality. The sanction required by Leviticus is public execution…The verse says, “If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.” 
Further, this act would have had to have been proven in a court of law on the testimony of two witnesses to the act—a highly unlikely event. These witnesses, if proven false, would themselves be liable to the very death penalty they had wished to inflict.
Most importantly, this death penalty was tied to the Old Covenant seed laws. It no longer has any purpose after the coming of Christ, and is no longer in effect under the New Covenant.
Many Christians like North often refer to Romans 1 as a go-to homosexual passage, and one where it is said at least that they “deserve to die” (Rom. 1:32). This passage is, in fact, often used as a focus upon the sins of homosexuality in general and their role in the degeneracy of civilization. Indeed, the verses do address these things. What is almost always left out, however, is that it says those who “deserve to die” also include the following sins:
all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless.
There you have it. If we should be heartlessly dismissive of the deaths of these homosexuals, by the same standard we should equally celebrate it as “good news” and decline to be sad when anyone with envy, strife, deceit, gossip, pride, disobedience to parents, of foolishness is randomly slain. And unfortunately for our otherwise so holy and self-righteous “economist” here, the list also includes “heartless” (without affection) and “ruthless” (without mercy).
As many people know, this man has a long track record of ridiculous teachings and positions. This heartless disdain for tragedy and mourning only cap off what by now deserves universal condemnation. Currently North has written dozens of books on the abiding necessity of the Old Testament penal sanctions and growing, and the disapproval rate is about 9-to-1. The disapprobation seems to be coming as much, if not more, from unbelievers, who appear to be more compassionate in such a time than this guy’s branch of Christianity. Shockingly, there are a lot of people who give this video a thumbs up.
This is the worst possible face anyone professing Christ could put forward. North should be more worried that the books he’s written will be used as propaganda against Christians, because it is not just wrong, it is stupidly wrong. It is wrong in just the perfect way liberal critics could want it to be wrong: it is psychopathic and skewed, and that in an overgeneralized way that could inspire hatefulness in a broad way. It is just the type of thing done in the name of Christ that can be used to persecute the name of Christ.
I am a strong believer in biblical law. I have written books on it, as our readers well know. North is not speaking in the name of biblical law. He is not even referencing the Bible accurately. His views are not Bible but bigotry. He has a long track record of such heartless expression. I think even I can speak on behalf of most of the Christians when I say, Gary North and all other theonomists, would you please shut up.
There is a time and place for condemnation of social degeneracy. If Christians are called to such a prophetic office, they should start by denouncing the sins of Christians (i.e., themselves) who demand and use socialist programs like public education, social security, medicare, and tax-funded public services, who support wars of intervention and the militarization of police, perpetuate racism, and refuse to apply biblical law to local government, law enforcement, and criminal justice.
There’s plenty to be concerned with in our own house. If we’re worried about the collapse of civilization, we can start with our own pulpits and pews.
[Editor’s Note: Joel McDurmon indeed wrote this post at American Vision, which you can find here. However, McDurmon wrote the post about Steven Anderson, and not Gary North. The words changed in this article, to make a point, are in italics. I change these few words to demonstrate that Joel McDurmon – who until this year also believed homosexuals should be executed – continues to call himself a theonomist. Actual theonomists, like his father-in-law Gary North and the father of theonomy, RJ Rushdoony, indeed believed that the Old Testament penal sanctions for homosexuality should be punished by death (again, as Joel believed until very recently). The kinder, gentler theonomy espoused by Joel McDurmon as of late, is not theonomy at all. Theonomists, similar to Steven Anderson, believe that sodomy should still carry the death penalty. As McDurmon rightly asserts, that we should be concerned with our own house, perhaps he should listen to his own advice and repudiate the house of theonomy that Rushdoony built, and condemn theonomists for holding the precise same views as Steven Anderson.]