Still Time to Care: What We Can Learn from the Church's Failed Attempt to Cure Homosexuality, (Hardcover)

Still Time to Care, by Greg Johnson shows us how Jesus is both the Lion and the Lamb. Greg presents the withering critiques of the Lion of Judah against those who have burdened and abused His people. He also presents the gentle care of the Lamb of God who offers grace and compassion to the bruised reeds among His people. Still Time to Care addresses the intersection of non-straight people, Jesus, the Bible, and the church. Greg explains what the Bible teaches about sex, marriage, attraction, and orientation. He also provides leadership for people and churches to shepherd straight and non-straight people with the gospel. In Still Time to Care, the Bible's teachings on sexuality are “settings of silver,” and the applications of those teachings in a community of care are the “apples of gold” (Proverbs 25:11). Still Time to Care is written in four parts. Part one is “The Paradigm of Care.” Here Greg demonstrates that the “ex-gay movement” has not been the church's main posture toward the gay community. The ex-gay movement began 40 years ago and died in 2013. But, prior to the ex-gay movement, there were leading lights from across the broad range of the church who had a very different posture toward non-straight followers of Jesus. Greg quotes extensively from C.S. Lewis, Billy Graham, John Stott, and Francis Schaeffer, showing that each of them practiced and taught a Paradigm of Care. Nearly every Christian considers at least one of these four as a father in the faith. This Paradigm of Care manifested itself in compassion and patience and understanding toward Christians who experienced romantic attractions toward people of the same sex. These four were radically different from the ex-gay movement. They did not believe that a person's sexual orientation should be expected to change when someone committed to following Jesus. Greg shows that their posture and their practice was to be a deeply encouraging, “non-anxious presence” with non-straight people who were Christian, and with non-straight people who weren't Christian. Their posture shows that the Paradigm of Care that Greg proposes in this book is not new. Greg's conclusions and pastoral approach are well-represented throughout the church. Still Time to Care is a call to return to the posture of a much healthier period of the church. This part of the book is powerful because many people don't know that a significant portion of the church responded to non-straight people in this way. Part two of the book describes the birth, history, and failure of the ex-gay movement. Greg describes the ex-gay movement as a Fall: it's a fall from the prior Paradigm of Care (Part 1) into what Greg calls the “Paradigm of Cure.” Prior to this Fall, the best of the church prioritized caring for people who follow Jesus and experience non-straight attractions. But the ex-gay movement changed its focus and prioritized curing people from their non-straight attractions. Here, Greg brings convicting exposure and