Gay demographics: what are the REAL numbers?

If the homosexual lobby is to be believed, every other person you bump into is gay. At work, at home, in town, in the city, in church, the more vocal activists in the lobby make it seem like people who self-identify as homosexual or lesbian are a major portion of the population.

They scream about rights, and their civic due, and not being marginalized any more like any other large minority group, such as African Americans. Black people as a major minority rose up in the 1960s to claim their civil rights, the gay lobby says, and homosexual lobby now makes the same claims. Homosexually-oriented people are elected to office, serve as community leaders, even preach from pulpits. There is a homosexual character on most sitcoms now, either as a regular character or as a recurring character. Homosexual references are made on scripted shows and on reality television shows, movies, and books. Christian colleges have gay support clubs now. We are literally saturated with the notion that homosexuality is the norm. Heck, even the animals do it, so it must be normal, right?

Not so fast.

I opened with "If the homosexual lobby is to be believed..." but what are really the statistics on numbers of self-identified gay and lesbian people in America? Can we believe those numbers? I am not talking about a girl who experimented once when she was 12, or the guy who woke up sorry and embarrassed after the drunken orgy of a frat party. I am talking the militant, life-long, "out" homosexuals who choose to live that lifestyle as mirror to heterosexuality.

No. We can't believe the numbers. They're a crock.

"Americans Have No Idea How Few Gay People There Are"
"One in ten. It's the name of the group that puts on the Reel Affirmations gay and lesbian film festival in Washington, D.C., each year. It's the percent popularized by the Kinsey Report as the size of the gay male population. And it's among the most common figures pointed to in popular culture as an estimate of how many people are gay or lesbian. But what percentage of the population is actually gay or lesbian? With the debate over same-sex marriage again an emerging fault line in American political life, the answer comes as a surprise: A lower number than you might think -- and a much, much, much lower one than most Americans believe."

So, what are the numbers? Well, Americans believe a quarter of the population is gay. The true number is about 4% and is probably probably closer to 2%. A 2011 report by the Williams Institute on Sexual Orientation estimated that 4 million adults identify as gay or lesbian, representing 1.7% of the population over 18. (source)

That is some very successful perception-altering on their part. So how is it that the homosexual lobby has made it seem like you can't swing a cat in the Bible Belt without hitting a queen or a dyke? Because of this.

Bunheads.

Bunheads is a new ABC Family show by the producers of Gilmore Girls. I never saw the tv show Gilmore Girls but every news story I read about Bunheads identifies the show that way so I will too. Bunheads is the nickname for ballerinas, and the show that made its debut last Monday is touted as a new family oriented entertainment.

I saw the pilot and I liked it. I thought the writing was sophisticated and witty, the show was emotional without being sentimental, and I put it on the list for future watching.

So what is my concern with the show and how does it relate to the vastly overestimated homosexual numbers? Here:

At one point toward the end of the pilot episode, which is on ABC Family I remind us all, the mom-in-law character was having a heart to heart talk with her new daughter-in-law. The girl had just married the mom's son and had moved into their home in a town called Paradise.

The scene took place in a roadhouse toward the end of the show, a show in which constant references had been made for the last 90 minutes to the smallness of this rural seaside town. It is small. There is no movie theatre. It has just about one store. (Giving directions to a newcomer- "Go to Main Street, turn left, and look for the store called Sparkles.") The teens, when feeling frisky and up to no good, break into the library and, gulp, read. It's so small that teenagers literally have nothing else to do but read? THAT is how small, out of the way, and retiring this little town is. Even the show synopsis calls it a "sleepy coastal town."

So back to the scene. The new daughter-in-law asks about the dancers attending the mom-in-law's ballet class. The teenage girls all had a story, and of one, the mom-in-law said,

"Her dad's gay. Oh, he thinks it's a big secret but we all know. Thing is, if he would just come out of the closet he would smile once in a while. And plus, there are a lot of very nice, single gay men in town."

A town so small has "a lot" of gay men? The perception the homosexual lobby would have us believe, and uses family entertainment to do it, is that literally just about everyone is gay. Bombard a population with that message for thirty years and you get a new generation coming up who thinks everyone is gay. And if there are so many gays, then it must be normal. That is the strategy. Normalization through numbers.

Of course I'm not blaming the entire skewed perception on one television show, but it is representative of the insidious but casual nature that scripted tv and movies: that every closet has a gay person lurking inside it, summoning up the courage to leap "out." We have been saturated with casual one-off lines like the one in Bunheads casually declaring that there are "a lot" even in this small town. 'We don't have a theater but we've got our gays!'

You can see the success the homosexual lobby has had in altering the perception of a nation of over 300 million souls. The homosexual lifestyle is an aberration. Some succumb and choose it. Make no mistake, though, it is a choice, not an identity. I understand the fight that homosexual people have in resisting that aberrant behavior. All people attempt to resist sin in some form or fashion. I understand also that some sins are more besetting than others. God will still judge them.

BUT, God in His loving kindness, accepts the repentance of one who seeks to shed that lifestyle and turn to Him. His mercy is greater than any sin, and He listens to prayers beseeching deliverance. Here is a moving three minute clip from a testimony John MacArthur shared of a homosexual's repentance. (The clip says 7 minutes but the audio goes out after three minutes.) It is quite moving:

If you are involved in a homosexual lifestyle, or any lifestyle that is unacceptable to God, please repent. Ask Him to forgive your sins, and make Him Lord. His wisdom is so vast that he will lead you into a life that is purer and more peaceful than you can ever imagine.

And Christians? If the US population of born again believers was 3% of the total population, and we had been as vocal (but not law-breaking) and persistent as the homosexual lobby has been, where would this nation be now? Joel C. Rosenberg is working hard right now with his "Implosion" simulcast in Houston today, praying for revival. You can join him in prayer and on Facebook at the Epicenter Team page.

It all begins with prayer. For the penitent homosexual, reviler, blasphemer, slanderer, it begins with a prayer of repentance. With the Christian, it continues with prayer. Seek Him while He may be found.

"Seek the LORD while he may be found; call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts;let him return to the LORD, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon." (Isaiah 55:6-7 ESV)

A budding stick

My kitchen window won't stay up. So I use a stick to prop it open. I got the stick from the yard a couple of years ago. LOL, I had to be fast because my landlord is diligent and he goes around and picks up all the dead sticks blown down from windstorms.

It's been cool lately and I've enjoyed being able to open my windows and have the breeze go through, rather than having to live in AC air. Yesterday as I raised up the window and grabbed the stick from the well of the sill, I noticed for the first time that the stick was budding.

I thought it was strange, because I've had the stick for a couple of years and it has always been dead. It was dead on the ground when I got it, it languished dead in the windowsill through winters, rains, and heat, and it was dead when I used it to prop up the window all this time. Here is a photo:

Looks like a dead stick, doesn't it? Well, it is!

But then a leaf grew!

Actually, two leaves are growing!

See?

So the stick is like us before we're saved. We are dead in our sins. We bear no fruit, we have no life. Sure, we are walking around and living and working and marrying and stuff, but we are dead sticks walking.

"As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins," (Ephesians 2:1)

But when we are born again, we are first justified. This means being forgiven, we are now having a right relationship with God. It is a legal term of justice, the Judge giving a pardon. Then we are regenerated.

"And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses," (Colossians 2:13)

"...even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved" (Ephesians 2:5)

Regeneration means born again, a rebirth, having new life. The next step in His process is sanctification, which means the process of God molding us as His clay to become more Christlike in all we think, say, and do. Sanctification is a long process, a lifetime, and then an eternity. It is the process of living a holy life. We cannot do this apart from Jesus.  Justification is a one time event happening in one moment, the moment God forgives you of sins.

Regeneration is the glorious moment of new birth. Paul captures it in chapter Titus 3:5:

"he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit,"

If God makes a dead stick bud, then He can make you bud too! Seek Jesus for forgiveness of sins, He will wash them away and renew you as His new creation in a holy rebirth and subsequent sanctifying growth that will last all your life, in this age and the eternal one to come.

Wash yourself in the word, let its comforts engulf you!

Sometimes we know that God is so big, we wonder, how can He know us? Why does He care about little old me? Will He even remember me? We know He does, but sometimes it's hard to think on, that He is so mighty but that He cares about even our daily provision. So when we offer each other comfort, we often turn to the wonderful verses about God knowing all about us. Here is one-

"I tell you, my friends, do not fear those who kill the body, and after that have nothing more that they can do. But I will warn you whom to fear: fear him who, after he has killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him! Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God. Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows." (Luke 12:4-7).

I am going through Ezra and I read Ezra 2 the other day. I was struck by the verses that make up the bulk of that chapter. It is the part where the LORD puts on the exiled Israelites' hearts to leave Babylon. The 70-year exile is over and it is time to return, build the temple, and resume life as a person of God in the Land. Fifty-thousand people were to return. The Remnant.

"The number of the men of the people of Israel: the sons of Parosh, 2,172. The sons of Shephatiah, 372. The sons of Arah, 775. The sons of Pahath-moab, namely the sons of Jeshua and Joab, 2,812. The sons of Elam, 1,254. The sons of Zattu, 945. The sons of Zaccai, 760. The sons of Bani, 642. The sons of Bebai, 623. The sons of Azgad, 1,222. The sons of Adonikam, 666. The sons of Bigvai, 2,056. The sons of Adin, 454. The sons of Ater, namely of Hezekiah, 98. The sons of Bezai, 323. The sons of Jorah, 112. The sons of Hashum, 223. The sons of Gibbar, 95. The sons of Bethlehem, 123. The men of Netophah, 56. The men of Anathoth, 128. The sons of Azmaveth, 42." (Ezra 2:2b-24)

Look how exacting! Look how perfectly God's records are kept! Look how much He knows! And it doesn't end there. After the genealogies which comprise the bulk of the chapter are exhausted (so that the generations of priests and Levites will be able to maintain their claim to the office of Priest), we read how many singers and gatekeepers there were:

"The singers: the sons of Asaph, 128. The sons of the gatekeepers: the sons of Shallum, the sons of Ater, the sons of Talmon, the sons of Akkub, the sons of Hatita, and the sons of Shobai, in all 139." (Ezra 2:41-42).

And He is not done, after all the listings of the different types of servants, there is a list of how many horses and donkeys! "Their horses were 736, their mules were 245, their camels were 435, and their donkeys were 6,720." (Ezra 2:66-67).

Rather than wanting to hurry and read through these extensive lists, I slowed down and lingered over these verses. First, because if it is in the bible it is put there for a reason, likely, many reasons that prayer and meditating upon will bring out. Secondly, I like to picture in my mind the men whose names are listed actually gathering their sheep and packing up the donkey and the women un-pitching the tents. I like to imagine the scene so as to bring to life that this is a real event and these were real people. Third, I was simply struck at the exactitude of the Lord. His record-keeping is as exact and controlled as He is. Of course He knows us! He knows our struggles, our sins, our attempts, our repentance, our thoughts, our failings, our past and our future. He knows. And not only that, this great God of ours, He empathizes. How can such a High and Exalted God sympathize with our puny problems?

Here is how:

"Surely our griefs He himself bore, and our sorrows He carried; yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted." (Isaiah 53:4).

Because of this, He personally can sympathize with us. He is our great High Priest:

"Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need." (Hebrews 4:14-16).

Friend, if you are struggling, if you feel lost or alone, go to the throne of mercy. It is not far, only as far as closed eyes and clasped hands. We serve a great and holy God who loves us and knows us through and through. Let Him comfort you--

"Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal." (2 Corinthians 4:16-18)