AIDS

AIDS:
A Biblical Perspective

by Dennis Pollock

"He who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body." (1 Corinthians 6:18)

Every year its victims multiply. For years it did its deadly work in secrecy before anyone knew it existed. Futurist Edward Cornish declared that, barring a medical cure, it might eventually claim as many victims as the Black Death that decimated the population of Europe during the Middle Ages.

This killer, acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS), has emerged out of nowhere to become America's most talked about and fatal disease. Back in the early nineties, when basketball great Magic Johnson announced that he had the virus, the nation was stunned with the realization that AIDS had worked its way out of the gay bars into mainstream America. Today the disease is decimating Africa, and continuing to strike hard at the sexually immoral, drug users, and even innocent babies.

Nearly everyone knows that AIDS is a deadly virus that there is no cure for, but few realize that it is far more potent and dangerous than our government is letting on. Government health officials often differentiate between those who test positive to the HIV virus and those who actually have the disease. Dr. Laraine Day has asked them, "Why do you talk as though just having the virus is not the same as having the disease of AIDS, when we know that all those who are infected with the virus will sooner or later die of AIDS?" Their reply was that although this was true, they didn't want to take away all hope from those who were newly infected.

THE WORLD'S ANSWER

The secular world has, as usual, come up with a woefully inadequate answer to the whole problem of AIDS. Their answer is summed up in the slogan "safe sex" and more specifically in the use of the almighty condom. Magic Johnson has become a national symbol for AIDS prevention, but his message to our young people has been most disappointing. Although he gives lip service to abstinence, his main message is a big push for the use of condoms and making sure that sex is "safe." (One has to wonder what is so safe about breaking the laws of God). Mr. Johnson may know a lot about basketball, but he apparently knows little about the prevention of AIDS.

The truth is, study after study has shown that condom usage is highly ineffective in preventing the spread of the HIV virus. Recent figures indicate that condoms fail around 15 percent of the time in preventing pregnancy among married couples. Among young, unmarried women the failure rate soars to as high as 44 percent! Considering that a woman can conceive only one or two days per month, we can only imagine the failure rate in preventing sexually transmitted diseases which can be transmitted 365 days per year! The condoms may work nine times out of ten, or nineteen times out of twenty, or perhaps even ninety-nine times out of one hundred. But what about the hundredth time? Hoping to defend yourself from AIDS by condom usage is like playing Russian Roulette -- you can win for a while, but if you continue to play, sooner or later the odds will catch up with you.

GOD'S VERSION OF SAFE SEX

God has His own version of "safe sex" but for some reason most of the media have ignored it. It is known as the covenant of marriage, and if it were practiced as God intended it, the AIDS epidemic would come to a screeching halt. The Scriptures tell us, "For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh" (Mark 10:7,8). The human body was never intended for multiple bed partners. For men and women to sample various sex partners as one would try on shoes is to abuse their own bodies.

God is not anti-sex; He's the one who came up with the idea! But it was always intended to be confined to the marriage covenant. Within marriage, it is a beautiful and yes, even a holy event that produces an intimacy and affection between husband and wife that transcends every other human relationship. Outside of marriage however, it is reduced to a cheap thrill which is coming to have fatal consequences.

IS AIDS GOD'S JUDGMENT?

Many have asked and speculated whether AIDS is a punishment from God on sinners. If by that they mean, "Is God sitting in heaven with an AIDS gun zapping various ones that He is especially displeased with," the answer would have to be no. If such were the case, His aim would not be very accurate, for we all know of many instances of people who have received AIDS through blood transfusions, or babies born with the virus, or nurses stuck accidentally by needles. Certainly not every person with AIDS is immoral, while on the other hand there are still many immoral persons who do not (yet) have the disease.

But while AIDS may not be a matter of God placing a deadly disease on people He is angry with, there is still no doubt that 1) It is primarily a sexually transmitted disease, 2) the vast majority of those infected have received it by engaging in what the Bible calls "fornication," and 3) it is, whether we like it or not, establishing a relationship in our minds between promiscuity and death. When AIDS was first becoming prominent, psychologist Stephen Morin reported a notable decrease in homosexual activity, stating, "There seems to be an association between sexual activities and death."

When God created our bodies, He built into them warning signals that would go off if we abuse them. Thus, when a baby puts his hand on the hot stove, he quickly learns to relate pain with the stove, thereby avoiding a potential devastating burn that could render his hand useless. When we overeat, indigestion and discomfort are our body's protest which tells us to be more moderate.

Perhaps when God placed man on the earth, He allowed the possibility of sexually transmitted diseases to serve as a warning to those who ignore His "Thou shalt nots." For many years syphilis has been the major such warning. Now as we approach the time of the end that Jesus spoke about, and as society has increasingly cast off God's protective restraints and mocked His laws as prudish and old-fashioned, He has allowed the deadly killer AIDS to surface which even the most blatant sinners cannot ignore.

Listen to what God's Word says: "Flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body" (1 Corinthians 6:18). Did you get that? Every sin that a man does is outside the body, that is, it doesn't necessarily affect his health. Lying does not destroy your health; the world is filled with healthy liars. You can rob banks twice a day for years and be as fit as a fiddle. But the Scripture tells us that those who sin sexually are not only sinning against God; they are sinning against their own bodies.

Can it be put any plainer than this? In his letter to the Galatians, the apostle Paul wrote, "Do not be deceived. God is not mocked, for whatever a man sows, that shall he also reap. He that sows to his flesh shall, of the flesh, reap corruption" (Galatians 6:7,8).

A LOVING GOD

Some may ask the question, "If AIDS is indeed a warning from God, how can He be a God of love? What many don't realize is, there is something worse than AIDS, something far more terrible than death. It is called the lake of fire, or hell, and Jesus Himself spoke more about it than any other person in the Bible. He said that hell is so awful that if you have to pluck out your eye or cut off your hand to stay out of it, then by all means do it (Mark 9:43-48). He described it as a place of outer darkness, a place where the worm (continual destruction) does not die and the fire is not ever put out, a place of continual torment and grinding of teeth in agony (Matthew 22:13). The apostle Paul wrote out a list of all those who would go there (1 Corinthians 6:9). Can you guess which category tops the list -- fornicators!

The Lord Jesus Christ died on the cross for all men and our Heavenly Father loves the gays and the fornicators too much to let them stroll casually toward hell undisturbed. He must secure their attention to the evil of their lifestyle and the necessity of repentance, and if such a severe signal as AIDS is the only thing that will shock them out of their spiritual blindness, then so be it.

Sadly, most of the world has missed the point. Rather than repenting of their sin and coming to Jesus for forgiveness, they blindly extol the condom as the new savior of the world and go right on gleefully trampling on God's holy ordinances. To them Jesus' words must surely apply, "You know how to discern the face of the sky, but you cannot discern the signs of the times" (Matthew 16:3).

THE CHURCH'S RESPONSE

How shall God's people respond to this disease? Certainly not in arrogance. Though many may have contracted AIDS as a result of breaking God's laws, none of us is in a position to throw stones at anyone else. If we got what we deserved we'd all be on our way to hell, for it is not just fornicators that Paul lists, but also covetous and revilers who will not inherit the kingdom of God. Let us always remember that Jesus' blood is just as powerful to cleanse us from sexual sins as any other transgressions.

At the same time, though, we must speak out against immorality. It is not a light thing when one transgresses the sexual laws of God. Young people who are sexually active are not merely sowing wild oats, they are sinning, and "the wages of sin is death" (Romans 6:23).

Finally, the church must lead the way in showing compassion and loving service to those who are dying of AIDS. When Jesus was here the leper was an outcast. Lepers were not allowed to associate with normal people, but were forced to live in isolation and separation the rest of their lives. No Jew of those days would ever get near them, and if someone accidentally got close to them, the lepers were required to call out the warning: "unclean, unclean."

Everyone must have been shocked when one day a leper had the audacity to come right up to Jesus. They must have been even more amazed when Jesus reached out His hand, touched the leprous skin, and healed the man. If our Lord Jesus could reach out and touch a leper in those days with the love and power of God, why should we be surprised that He wants us to reach out with love to those with AIDS in this generation?