Exposing Preston Sprinkle's Heresy
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Preston Sprinkle is the President of the Center for Faith, Sexuality & Gender. He’s written several books and has preached across the country. He is one of the most well-known persons arguing that same-sex attraction is not sin, but if you act on it, you sin. He and Gregory Coles recently released a pastoral paper on Sprinkle’s ministry website titled “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?” Today, I’m going to interact with their claims. The entire article is full of heresy, lies, and a theology from below, a theology built on personal experience rather than built on Scripture.
Method and Empty Rhetoric
Throughout Sprinkle’s writings, he takes his personal experience and the experience of others as the unchanging foundation, and then reads Scripture based on these experiences. He tells God, based on the personal experience of others, who man is and then forces God’s word to fit their personal experience. Here are several examples:
1) Sprinkle writes, “Experiencing opposite-sex attraction, to females and not males, refers to my capacity to experience a sexual desire toward females.”[1]
Sprinkle calls his flesh “my capacity to experience a sexual desire,” rather than “sin,” like Paul does in Romans 7: “But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness” (Rom 7:8). The apostle Paul says that it was sin in him that produced covetousness, not a “neutral or good capacity” that did, which is what Sprinkle claims.
2) Sprinkle then argues, “Attraction is a general pattern that predicts the likely direction of a person’s sexual temptation. When our general pattern of attraction makes itself known in a specific moment of temptation, we choose whether to resist that temptation to the glory of God or to succumb to it through lust (a behavior of the mind) or sexual immorality (a behavior of the external body). But when we experience sexual temptation and resist it, we don’t cease being a sexually attracted person.”[2]
Sprinkle calls his sinful flesh a “general pattern of attraction,” rather than “sin” as Paul and the rest of the Scripture writers do. If it leads to sin, it’s because it is sin, according to Paul in Romans 7. Referring to the law and sin, Paul wrote, “13 Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure” (Rom 7:13). Paul says that the purpose of the law was to show him that the evil in his heart, what he found tempting, was sin. Man looks upon actions, but God looks upon the heart.
3) Next, Sprinkle argues, “Sexual attraction, therefore, is not the same as lust. A person’s sexual attraction (to the same, opposite, or both sexes) shapes the kind of sexual temptation they face and the kind of lust they might fall into if they succumb to temptation. But attraction, temptation, and lust are three different things.”[3]
Sprinkle creates a new category that is not in the Bible or Church History, a pre-sin “attraction” or “capacity to be tempted to sin” that becomes sin if you act on it but is not sin if you resist it. The Bible instead argues that an internal desire for sin is sin, even if you resist it.
In the beginning, God created Adam and Eve, male and female, in His image for the purpose of reflecting Him (Gen 1:26-28). He made Adam first and then said it was not good for him to be alone; so He made Eve from Adam’s rib (Gen 1:18-22). Adam then was missing a piece of his own body, and Eve had been separated from her body. God brought Eve to Adam, and Adam recognized her as, bone of his bones and flesh of his flesh, and he called her “woman” because she was taken out of man (Gen 2:23).
And God ordained marriage: “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh” (Gen 2:24). Males and females were designed by God for one another, their sexuality included in their design as male or female.
But the design of God was twisted when sin entered the Garden through the serpent’s deception. God forbade the tree in the midst of the Garden but the serpent told Eve that she would not surely die if she ate from it. Then Eve submitted to the serpent and started seeing the tree the way he told her to rather than how God did, and she “saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise” (Gen 3:6).
The word translated “desired,” in Eve’s thoughts, “desired to make one wise,” is translated “covet” in the Tenth Commandment (Ex 20:17; Deut 5:21). Eve coveted or desired the forbidden tree before she ate it. She created attraction for the tree in her heart by twisting the definition of “good,” for she now calls the forbidden tree “good” in Genesis 3:6, the same word God used for His creation, an attraction that wasn’t there before the serpent deceived her. She began sinning in her heart before she tasted the forbidden tree with her mouth.[4]
This means that the beginning of forbidden attraction, desire, inclination, impulse, or whatever you want to call it, is sin. It breaks the Tenth Commandment because it is not obedient to God. It is contrary to Him, and all that is in us that is contrary to God is sin. Just as Eve did not have a pre-lust desire for the forbidden tree, we too do not have a pre-lust desire for what God forbids. Rather, the moment we have an impulse, inclination, capacity, or whatever you want to call it, for what God forbids, we begin to covet, we begin to sin.
Additionally, in the Hebrew, the word “avon” refers to iniquity, a twisted character against God. David wrote, “Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. 2 Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity (avon), and in whose spirit there is no deceit” Psalm 32:1-2. When the apostle Paul quoted these verses in Romans 4:7-8, he wrote, “7 “Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered; 8 blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin (hamartia).” The apostle Paul, when quoting “iniquity” used the term “sin.” A twisted character against God is sin according to Paul. Again, if it leads to sin if you mindfully act on it, it’s because it was the beginning of sin already. The flesh can only produce according to its nature. It is sin and can only produce sin, not a pre-sin “attraction” or “capacity to be tempted,” as Sprinkle claims.
After all, if you follow Sprinkle’s logic that homosexuality in your heart is not sin until you act on it, then you would be acting on something that is not sin. If homosexuality at the root is not sin, then it cannot be sin to act on it either. You would be acting on “not sin.”
Butchering Scripture
Because Sprinkle interprets Scripture through his own personal experience and the experiences of others, he butchers it. Every text he uses to prove his point is butchered:
1) Matthew 6:12-13 – “12 and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. 13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”
Sprinkle argues that Jesus separates temptation from debts, but, Jesus says we’re to pray that God will not lead us into temptation but will deliver us from the evil. Jesus, here, clearly speaks of an evil form of temptation. We should pray that we aren’t even tempted, and that instead, the Lord will deliver us. So, not only do we confess our debts or sins, we pray that we wouldn’t even be tempted by evil! That’s what we’re to pray. The “capacity to be tempted” that Sprinkle says is not sin, Jesus says we should pray that we wouldn’t even be tempted by evil but rather would be delivered from evil temptations!
2) James 1:13-15 – “13 Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God,” for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. 14 But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. 15 Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.”
Sprinkle argues that the Greek word epithumia, translated “evil desire” in the NIV and CSB, and “lust” in the KJV, is a neutral evil desire. But James 1:13 begins by saying God can’t be tempted with evil and cannot tempt anyone with evil. Epithumia is either a good desire or a bad desire, depending on the context. Since God can’t do it according to James, it’s obviously evil desire. In Matthew 5, Jesus says it’s lust in your heart (Matt 5:27-30). It doesn’t come from God; therefore, it must be evil. And the fact that James says it leads to mindful sin and death proves it must be evil as well. Epithumia in James 1:14 is not good or neutral but lust or evil desire. Sprinkle must argue that James is saying lust is not sin. And, of course, it’s very clear James is saying evil desire in your heart, lust, is sin.
Sprinkle is arguing that it’s sin for the Devil to tempt us, sin for someone else to tempt us, and sin for us to tempt someone else, but it’s not sin for us to tempt ourselves? Why? If God can’t tempt, then tempting someone is sin. And if we tempt ourselves, it’s also sin; that’s why James says God can’t do it, and when we do it, it’s our “epithumia” that’s doing it, our lusts.
3) Hebrews 4:14-16 –
“14 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. 15 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. 16 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.”
Sprinkle claims that when the author of Hebrews wrote that Jesus “in every respect has been tempted as we are,” he meant that Jesus was internally tempted, not just externally tempted. In other words, Sprinkle argues that in order for Jesus to be truly human, He had to have an internal desire for sin. But that’s not what the Bible says. Sprinkle thinks that because he has an internal desire for sin, Jesus must have too.[5]
Interestingly, Sprinkle claims that those who believe Jesus was only externally tempted, not internally tempted, deny Jesus’ true humanity, because they limit His temptation; yet, Sprinkle limits Jesus’ temptation too. He writes,
Of course, kata panta doesn’t mean Jesus experienced every single imaginable temptation. As Denny Burk rightly points out, “[F]or Jesus to be tempted in every way as we are does not mean that he himself faced each and every individual trial that each and every human has ever faced. Such an interpretation would of course be absurd.” Rather, kata panta means that the temptations Jesus faced are categorically alike with the temptations we face. Jesus never sinned in response to temptation, but he experienced the same kind of temptation as every other human being. At no point can we accurately say, “Jesus’ temptation belongs in a different category than my temptation.”[6]
Notice that Sprinkle limits Jesus’ temptation to being “categorically alike with the temptations we face.” You won’t find that in the text. He’s limiting Jesus’ temptations because he knows that his interpretation is absurd. He says Jesus must be tempted in every way as sinners in order to be truly human, and that the Greek phrase must mean “in every way,” but he realizes that’s absurd, so he limits Jesus’ temptation to being “categorically alike” in every way to us. Well, what categories are these? The text doesn’t list them, because they’re not there.
The point the author of Hebrews is making is that Jesus was truly tempted as truly Human. Jesus was fully tempted, wholly tempted, meaning really tempted as truly Human. But that does not mean what Sprinkle wants it to mean, that Jesus desired evil in His heart but resisted it. That’s not in the Bible. The opposite is. Jesus, preaching in the Sermon on the Mount said, “Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God” (Matt 5:8). If Jesus desired sin in His heart, He was not pure. Also, Jesus said we must love God with all our hearts, souls, and minds, and our neighbors as ourselves (Matt 22:37-39). If Jesus had an internal desire to sin, then part of Him did not love God or His neighbor.
Why? Because where would a desire for sin come from in Jesus? Jesus is perfect, not conceived in sin like us, but conceived of the Holy Spirit fertilizing Mary’s egg. He is truly sinless from conception because of the Spirit’s work. So, in order for Jesus to have an internal desire for sin, He would have to will it. Consider what Augustine wrote,
Christ, then, refrained from sin in such a way that he also refrained from all desire for sin, not so that he resisted that desire which existed, but so that it never existed at all, not because he could not have had it if he had willed to, but he would not have rightly willed to have what the sinful flesh, which he did not have, would not have forced him to have even against his will.[7]
Augustine wrote that Christ could have had an internal desire for sin, because of His humanity, but He would have to will it or choose it. Jesus did not have a sinful nature like we sinners do. Therefore, in order to have an internal temptation, an internal desire for sin, He would have to mindfully will it. And even Preston Sprinkle calls this sin.
The same is true with Adam and Eve. They too were capable of being tempted because they were truly human, but the Bible explicitly says that the Serpent tempted them, not that they tempted themselves. Why? Because there was nothing within them that could tempt them; they were created “very good,” and only internally desired the forbidden tree when they mindfully submitted to the external temptation of the Serpent (Genesis 3:1-6). The same is true for Jesus. He could be tempted externally, but not internally, unless He willed the internal desire for evil, submitting to the Serpent and twisting God’s design, himself and God’s good means to God’s good object.
Returning to Hebrews 4:15, The author of Hebrews did not say that Jesus was tempted by sin or by every conceivable temptation. And he certainly did not say that Jesus ever doubted or lacked faith.[8]
To understand this phrase “in every respect,” we must understand the context of Hebrews 4:15, which is connected to Hebrews 2:14-18.[9] The author of Hebrews writes,
14 Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, 15 and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery. 16 For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham. 17 Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. 18 For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.
The author of Hebrews says that since God’s children, human beings, are flesh and blood, Jesus took on Himself the same things so that He might free them from the evil one who has the power of death. The devil has the power of death because he controls sinners through their sin, and the wages of sin is death (Rom 6:23), but God the Son took on a human nature to free God’s children from our slavery to sin, and thus, from the fear of death from the evil one (1 Cor 15:56-57).[10]
Jesus had to be made like His brothers, like God’s children, in every respect concerning suffering and temptation, so that He might mature into a merciful, full of pity, and faithful, holy in trial and temptation, High Priest, to make propitiation for the sins of God’s people. Since Jesus suffered when tempted, yet without sin, He can help God’s children when we are tempted.[11]
Now, consider Hebrews 4:14–16,
14 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. 15 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. 16 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.
The author begins by pointing to Christ passing through the heavens, referring to Christ’s ascension into heaven (Acts 1:6–11). God the Son Incarnate, the Second Person of the Trinity united to a human nature, passed through the heavens by ascending to God’s throne room in Heaven. He atoned for the sins of all believers there and sat down at His Father’s right hand (Heb 9:11–28, 10:11–14).[12] Therefore, since Christ is in Heaven, our humanity is already in Heaven because we are united to Him by His Holy Spirit (Eph 2:4-6). As a result, since our High Priest, Jesus Christ, is in Heaven, we can draw near to the throne of grace, finding mercy and grace to help in our time of need.
Jesus can sympathize with our weaknesses because He is truly human and was truly tempted. God cannot be tempted (James 1:13), but God the Son Incarnate can be and was. This is the weakness to which the author of Hebrews refers, that God cannot be tempted but the God Man can be, and was, and yet, was without sin even in His humanity.[13]
Therefore, Jesus is like all the high priests that have come before Him in that He is truly Human. And He is also not like all the high priests who have come before Him in that He is without sin, and He is God (Heb 1:1-4). Jesus faithfully endured temptation, the weakness of humanity, for us so that He could deliver us from our sin and provide us an example.
Also, Jesus is a better covenant Head of a better covenant than the old covenant heads and the old covenants (Heb 1-4:13; 8:1-13). The author of Hebrews wrote to persuade Jewish Christians to not return to the old covenant along with its high priests, priesthood, and sacrifices because Christ is the best High Priest, is of a better Priesthood, and is the ultimate sacrifice, who sympathizes with our humanity or weakness (Heb 4:14-10:18).
The purpose of Jesus being tempted as truly human or wholly tempted is so that He can be our sympathetic High Priest, so that, as the very next verse says, “with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb 4:16). But Sprinkle says Jesus was tempted so that we can go to the mirror when we desire evil but resist, and declare, “I’m like Jesus.” So, instead of going to Jesus when we’re tempting ourselves to sin, Sprinkle says we are like Jesus, in those moments. That’s not what the author of Hebrews said or taught. The whole point of Jesus being our High Priest, according to Hebrews, is to send us to Jesus not to the Old Testament patriarchs, and definitely not to the mirror.
For Sprinkle, and for those who follow his teachings, when he has an internal desire for sin, he goes to the mirror instead of to Jesus, to ask, “Did I choose this?” Which isn’t the biblical question to ask. The question we must ask is, “Does this love God and my neighbor?” If it doesn’t, it’s sin. But instead of Sprinkle examining his heart based on God’s perfect law, he examines his heart based on his own memory. Because God’s law is not the standard for righteous or obedience for Sprinkle. Man’s will is. According to Sprinkle, you can desire the most evil things in your heart, as long as you don’t act on them. You can hate God, blaspheme Christ, desire children, desire murder, etc. as long as you don’t act on them. And, he thinks he’s like Jesus when he desires evil but doesn’t act on it!
Furthermore, if Jesus had to desire evil or be internally tempted to be truly human, then so did Adam and Eve, and they weren’t truly human until Genesis 3:6, when Eve started to desire the forbidden tree. Also, if to be truly human, you must have an internal desire for evil, we will not be truly human in heaven or in the new heavens and new earth, since there will be no temptation there. And for that matter, Jesus was not truly human until He was tempted, and He’s not truly human today because He is not being tempted at the Father’s right hand. When Sprinkle’s logic is applied consistently, it’s shown to be absurd.
4) Matthew 5:27-30 –
27 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ 28 But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29 If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. 30 And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.
Sprinkle argues that Jesus only condemned intentional lust, mindful lust, not sexual attraction in this passage. He makes much of the Greek phrase “pros to” to argue that Christ only condemned intentional lust in your heart, not unintentional lust.[14] Again, Sprinkle creates a category that is not in the Bible, “unintentional lust,” and forces it on the text. I don’t know how anyone with a straight face can argue that in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus wasn’t condemning the root of sin in our hearts, only acting on the root. Again, in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5:8, Jesus said, ““Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”
First, Jesus says that lustful intent is internal adultery. From root to fruit, sin is the same from beginning to end, whether in our hearts or outward. Yet, Sprinkle says that “to feel a spike of excitement over the head-spinning beautify of another person isn’t necessarily lust”[15] (Upside-Down Kingdom Bible). He believes this is a holy desire, that he’s merely describing noticing God-designed beauty. But then he says that noticing beauty “could lead to lust,” which is a sin? That’s not what the Bible teaches about how sin begins in one’s heart. Sin does not begin as holiness or righteousness in one’s heart. Rather, James says that sin begins as lust (James 1:14), and Paul says it begins in our flesh, and the flesh is sin (Rom 7:7-9; 11, 13-14, 17, 20, 23). Sin begins as sin, not as righteousness, not as God’s design, and not as “noticing beauty.”
The same truth applies to the desires of righteousness. They always come from the Spirit and always lead to holiness. They do not come from lust. And no one sins because they were acting on holy, godly desires. No. What happens is, in the midst of holy desires, the flesh produces new desires that are contrary to God (James 1:2–15), and instead of continuing to walk in the Spirit, we choose to walk in the flesh (Gal 5:16–25). But Sprinkle thinks that the desires of the Spirit can become sin and fleshly desires can become holy. Yet, Scripture teaches that there are desires of the flesh and desires of the Spirit and these two are opposed to one another (Rom 7; Gal 5:16–25).
Second, Sprinkle teaches that Jesus used “with the purpose to lust” to condemn lustful intent and not to condemn unintentional lust. This is a logical fallacy, an argument from silence. Because if “with the purpose to lust” is removed from the verse, the Greek words that are left, blepōn gynaika, mean to “look at a woman.” There is nothing of sexual desire in the meaning of these Greek words.[16] Therefore, “unintentional sexual desire” is not mentioned in this passage. It is a category that Sprinkle created not Jesus. Yet, he claims that Christ only condemned intentional lust not unintentional. He cannot make this argument from these verses that Jesus did not condemn unintentional lust, for unintentional lust is not mentioned.
Third, although the Greek phrase pros to always means “with intent,” it does not mean the “unintentional” is not also condemned. Jesus does not always use the Greek phrase pros to, with intent, when defining sin. For example, in Mark 13:22, Jesus uses the same phrase as in Matthew 5:28, pros to, saying, “For false christs and false prophets will arise and perform signs and wonders, to lead astray, if possible, the elect.” The ESV translates pros to as “to,” before “lead astray.” Following Sprinkle’s logic, in Mark 13:22, Jesus only condemned false christs and false prophets performing signs and wonders if they intend to lead people astray, but Jesus did not condemn false christs and false prophets unintentionally leading people astray. This interpretation, of course, is absurd. Just as there is no “unintentional” category for leading people away from Christ, provided by Jesus in Mark 13, there is no “unintentional” category for lust either given by Jesus in Matthew 5.
Furthermore, in Mark 13:6, a mere sixteen verses earlier, Jesus said a similar statement without the purpose phrase, “Many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am he!’ and they will lead many astray.” The purpose phrase evidently was not necessary to say that leading people away from Christ is sin, whether intentional or not, even though Christ adds the phrase sixteen verses later in Mark 13:22. Therefore, just as Jesus adding “intentional” to “leading astray” does not indicate “unintentional leading astray” is good, neutral, or not sin, Jesus adding “intentional” to “lust” does not indicate “unintentional lust” is good, neutral, or not sin either, contrary to Sprinkle.
Fourth, Jesus included the purpose phrase of “with the purpose to” lust to properly teach the law and to show how He fulfilled the law. Jesus had no lustful inclinations, thoughts, or actions. He looked at all women as His sisters, neither as objects of lust, nor as potential spouses. He did not teach that the law required something less than His own holiness, as if unintentional lust is not sin. He preached a few verses earlier in the same sermon, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matt 5:8). In the Sermon on the Mount, He preached full obedience to the law in both heart and action. Christ distinguished looking at a sister from looking at a woman with lust in your heart in Matthew 5:27–30. He told his hearers they can look upon a woman, that is, see a woman with their eyes, but they may not look at her with lust in their hearts.
Fifth, Jesus emphasized His point, that inward lust is adultery, by arguing in Matthew 5:29-30, “If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.” To make Himself even more clear, Christ hyperbolically referred to eliminating the source of lustful intent. He did not refer to cutting off one’s head, where planning to commit adultery takes place, or one’s genitals, but one’s right eye and right hand. This is a move from the action to the cause of the action. He spoke of cutting out one’s right eye, the best eye, the source of the lustful intent, the tempter, of an evil lustful gaze. Then, he referenced the right hand, the best hand.[17]
Understanding these verses concerning rebuking the inward sinful inclination or temptation is even clearer in a similar passage in Matthew 18:7-9:
Woe to the world for temptations to sin! For it is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the one by whom the temptation comes! And if your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life crippled or lame than with two hands or two feet to be thrown into the eternal fire. And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into the hell of fire.
Jesus tied the command against temptation directly to tempting oneself by moving from condemning the tempter to telling the sinner to cut off his hand or foot, and to tear out his eye, if they tempted him. Jesus’ disciples should reject the world’s temptations. And the world should take heed, fearing God’s wrath before they seek to tempt Jesus’ disciples. However, it is not merely the world that Christians should fear but their own sinful temptations that stem from their flesh (hand, foot, and eye).
Christ’s hyperbolic response to inward temptation is drastic, but no more radical than his warning to the man that tempts His disciples: “It would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea” (Matt 18:6). Whether temptation comes from your own hand or eye or from without, Christ’s followers must reject it in a radical way for the sake of rejecting hell as well.
Christ is serious about temptations, whether they come from the world or the flesh of believers. Christ demanded an exaggerated drastic response—drown the tempter or cut off the flesh that tempts. His point is not literal since no disciple cut out his eye or cut off his hand in response to Christ’s sermon. Rather, He rebuked his hearers’ passive justification of the source of temptation to evil. By only declaring the outward act as adulterous, the Pharisees were passively declaring that lustful intent in one’s heart fulfills the requirement of God in his law.
In a similar manner, by Sprinkle claiming that only chosen lustful thoughts are adulterous, he is passively declaring that his right hand, right foot, or right eye can tempt him to sin and he can have “unchosen” lustful thoughts or be enamored by a woman’s breasts to whom he’s not married,[18] and still fulfill the law, exceed the righteousness of the Pharisees, and imitate Christ, since Christ is the goal of the law.
That’s a terrible mishandling of Scripture that sends the deceived running to the mirror to say, “I’m like Jesus,” when the truth is, “I’m like the Pharisees.”
Run to Jesus, not the mirror, and not to Sprinkle.
5) It’s easy to prove that Sprinkle creates a category he calls, “sexual attraction,” then forces it on Scripture. He writes, “the condemnation of same-sex attraction in Scripture is neither “repeated” nor “consistent.” In fact, it’s totally nonexistent. To claim otherwise is to add to the text of Scripture.”[19]
Jesus in Matthew 5:27-30 condemns lust in one’s heart. But Sprinkle says sexual attraction isn’t lust, so Jesus wasn’t talking about it. Paul condemns homosexual desires and passions in Romans 1:24-27, but Sprinkle says same-sex sexual attraction isn’t lust, so Paul wasn’t condemning homosexual attraction only homosexual lust. Can you see what Sprinkle is doing? He’s adding a category to the Bible that isn’t there and is therefore, claiming the Bible doesn’t call it sin. We could literally do this with every command in Scripture. So, God only condemned stealing, not attraction to stealing, in the 10 Commandments. Or, God only condemned murder, not attraction to murder, etc. Sprinkle is trying to get out of his sin by redefining it, by calling it “not sin.” It becomes sin if you act on it, but it is not sin until you do! It doesn’t make biblical sense or even logical sense, because if it’s not-sin in your heart, and you act on it, you’d be acting on “not sin.”
Furthermore, Christian, why would you go to the mirror if you have an evil impulse in your heart, to discern if you chose it or not, instead of going to Jesus, who actually takes your sin away? Why would you go to the mirror to say, “I’m not sinning,” as if that will take care of the evil in you? Why not run to Jesus who sits at the Father’s right hand and intercedes for you, and confess the evil or sin in your heart?
Sprinkle is preaching a false gospel. He wants to save you from your sin by telling you you’re not sinning, like a High Priest, even though you have evil in your heart. And he says you cannot be changed. He teaches that you are ontologically whatever the sin in your heart is; that’s the opposite of what the Bible teaches. The apostle Paul says to mortify your sin in Romans 8:13 and Colossians 3:5. And Sprinkle doesn’t believe you can, in the power of the Holy Spirit. Whatever particular sinful desires you have, you are those desires and they cannot be changed, according to Sprinkle. You won’t find this teaching in the Bible. You find the opposite.
6) Sprinkle claims that those who say same-sex attraction is sin are preaching another gospel. He compares it to when Paul rebuked Peter for only being around the Gentiles when the Jews weren’t around in Galatians 2.[20]
But, the difference is that Sprinkle has created a category he calls “sexual attraction” that is pre-lust, and then he claims the Bible doesn’t condemn it. Again, we could do this with every other sin by claiming that there is a pre-sin desire that the Bible doesn’t condemn. Yes, God condemns murder, but not the attraction to murder, or the “capacity to be tempted to murder.” He’s playing rhetorical games to try to save you from your sin.
The Bible, however, teaches the opposite:
In Genesis 3:6, the word translated “desired,” in Eve’s thoughts, “desired to make one wise,” is translated “covet” in the Tenth Commandment (Ex 20:17; Deut 5:21). Eve coveted or desired the forbidden tree before she ate it. She created attraction for the tree in her heart by twisting the definition of “good,” an attraction that wasn’t there before the serpent deceived her. She began sinning in her heart before she tasted the forbidden tree with her mouth.[21]
This means that the beginning of forbidden attraction, desire, inclination, impulse, or whatever you want to call it, is sin. It breaks the Tenth Commandment because it is not obedient to God. It is contrary to Him, and all that is in us that is contrary to God is sin.
Because of her forbidden desire, she ate and gave to her husband, and he ate. But Adam didn’t just walk up after Eve ate, he was standing there the entire time the serpent was deceiving her. The word “you” is plural in Genesis 3:1-5.[22] So, Adam too desired the forbidden tree in his heart and ate.
Due to their sin, their twisting of God’s good design, their creation of the lust of the flesh, all humanity was plunged into sin. Now, all are conceived in sin (Ps 51:5), and Adam’s sinful flesh is in all mankind (1 Cor 15:22). All that is contrary to God in us comes from Adam’s sinful flesh, which is now our sinful flesh.
Nevertheless, God’s good design for males, females, marriage, and sexuality remain the same. One’s sexuality, male or female, also defines one’s sexual attraction, according to Genesis 2:18-24. The two, one’s sex and one’s sexual attraction, cannot be separated according to God.
Sprinkle claims I preach another gospel because I call sin what the Bible calls sin, when in reality, he’s the one trying to take people’s sins away by telling them, like a prophet, priest, and king, “You’re not sinning!” Sprinkle is not a prophet, priest, or king. He has no authority to declare that disobedience to God in your heart is not sin. He has no authority to create categories that do not exist in Scripture, and to declare that they’re not sin. He says they become sin if you act on them, but what are they before the act? They’re evil. He’s literally saying evil in your heart is not sin, even though the Bible says we must love God with all our hearts, souls, and minds, and our neighbors as ourselves (Matt 22:37-39). Same-sex attraction hates God and your neighbor, that’s why you can’t act on it. Of course it’s sin. Otherwise, Sprinkle must argue that it’s good and holy and fulfills the law. It can’t be both evil and neutral. It can’t be both disobedience and neutral. It can’t be that it comes from the flesh and yet, is not sin.
To follow Sprinkle’s logic, he either has to argue that the flesh is not sin, which is directly contradictory to what Paul says repeatedly in Romans 7. Paul says that the flesh is sin and only produces sin. Or, Sprinkle must argue that the flesh is sin, but that it produces same-sex attraction that is not sin but then becomes sin again when you act on it. So, it’s sin, not-sin, then becomes sin again.
But if the flesh is sin, then produces “not sin,” then what is the “lust of the flesh”? Paul and John say the lust of the flesh is sin. But Sprinkle says same-sex attraction of the flesh is not sin because it’s “attraction” of the flesh not lust? Again, he’s created a category that is not in Scripture and he adds “but not sexual attraction” to every condemnation of lust in Scripture.
7) Sprinkle then argues,
“Scripture clearly and consistently teaches that temptation is not a morally culpable sin from which Christians are called to repent. Whether our general pattern of sexual temptation is toward the same sex or the opposite sex, we’re not sinning when we experience temptation and respond to that temptation in a way that honors God.”[23]
What Sprinkle claims about same-sex attraction is merely rhetorical games. After all, he’s saying that a Christian man looking at another man the way Eve looked at Adam is not sin, although it is the twisting of God’s design in one’s heart. It’s upside-down. How can using God’s creation contrary to His design, yourself and someone else in your heart, not be sin? How can a man looking at another man the way Eve looked at Adam, not be sin? It didn’t come from God. God didn’t design it. The Fall created it by twisting God’s good design. And only sinners can do it! It has to be sin!
Also, it doesn’t fulfill the law; it’s not obedience to God in your heart. It’s disobedience. It’s not neutral just because you claim “I didn’t choose it,” Or, “I resisted it.” Resisted what, exactly? Evil desires in your own heart! Your heart wants something forbidden! Of course it’s sin, and no amount of deceiving rhetoric can change this fact.
8) Sprinkle claims that some Christians have argued that there are two forms of temptation, internal and external, and he claims this distinction comes from John Owen, from the 1600s.[24]
Sprinkle is ignorant of church history on the doctrines of sin and temptation. Literally, all Christians believed there were two forms of temptation throughout Church History. Consider Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Philip Melancthon, and Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox:
A) Augustine, a champion of Protestants, Roman Catholics, and Eastern Orthodox, in his final work against the Pelagian Julian, asks him, “Who, I repeat, apart from you tries to persuade us that the desire which is admittedly a desire for sins is not a sin & is not something evil, though one does an evil action if one consents to its persuasion?”[25]
B) Thomas Aquinas, a champion of Roman Catholics, wrote of Jesus’s wilderness temptation in The Summa Theologica, commenting on Hebrews 4:15,
As the Apostle says (Heb 4:15), Christ wished to be tempted in all things, without sin. Now temptation which comes from an enemy can be without sin: because it comes about by merely outward suggestion. But temptation which comes from the flesh cannot be without sin, because such a temptation is caused by pleasure and concupiscence; and, as Augustine says (De Civ. Dei xix.), it is not without sin that ‘the flesh desireth against the spirit.’ And hence Christ wished to be tempted by an enemy, but not by the flesh.[26]
C) Philip Melanchthon, Martin Luther’s successor, said that all Christians before him believed fleshly desire is sin, & only the philosophers argued otherwise:
“But they contend that concupiscence is a penalty, & not a sin [a burden & imposed penalty, & is not such a sin as is subject to death & condemnation]. Luther maintains that it is a sin. It has been said above that Augustine defines Original Sin as concupiscence. If there be anything disadvantageous in this opinion, let them quarrel with Augustine. Besides Paul says (Rom 7:7, 23): “ I had not known lust” (concupiscence), “except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.” Likewise: “I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, & bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members!” These testimonies can be overthrown by no sophistry. For they clearly call concupiscence sin, which, nevertheless, is not imputed to those who are in Christ, although by nature it is a matter worthy of death, where it is not forgiven. Thus, beyond all controversy, the Fathers believe. For Augustine, in a long discussion, refutes the opinion of those, who thought that concupiscence in man, is not a fault, but an adiaphoron, as color or ill-health is said to be an adiaphoron of the body [as to have a black or a white body is neither good nor evil]. But if the adversaries will contend that the fomes [or evil inclination] is an adiaphoron, not only many passages of Scripture, but the entire Church also [and all the Fathers] will contradict them. For even though perfect consent were not attained [even if not entire consent, but only the inclination and desire be there], who ever dared to say that these were adiaphora, viz. to doubt concerning God’s wrath, concerning God’s grace, concerning God’s Word, to be angry at the judgments of God, to be provoked because God does not at once remove one from afflictions, to murmur because the wicked experience a better fortune than the good, to be urged on by wrath, lust, the desire for glory, wealth, etc.? And yet godly men acknowledge these in themselves, as appears in the Psalms and the prophets. But, in the schools, they transferred hither from philosophy, notions entirely different, that, because of emotions, we are neither good nor evil, we are neither praised nor blamed. Likewise, that nothing is sin, unless it be voluntary [inner desires and thoughts are not sins, if I do not altogether consent thereto]. These notions were expressed among philosophers, with respect to civil righteousness, & not with respect to God’s judgment.”[27]
D) For the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Canons of Carthage (Africa, 419) are part of their canonical law. The meeting wasn’t an ecumenical council, but their canons were ratified at the ecumenical council of Trullo in 692 and added to their body of canonical law with the other ecumenical councils:
i. Canon 110. (Greek cxii. bis)
That infants are baptized for the remission of sins
Likewise it seemed good that whosoever denies that infants newly from their mother’s wombs should be baptized, or says that baptism is for remission of sins, but that they derive from Adam no original sin, which needs to be removed by the laver of regeneration, from whence the conclusion follows, that in them the form of baptism for the remission of sins, is to be understood as false and not true, let him be anathema.
For no otherwise can be understood what the Apostle says, By one man sin has come into the world, and death through sin, and so death passed upon all men in that all have sinned, than the Catholic Church everywhere diffused has always understood it. For on account of this rule of faith (regulam fidei) even infants, who could have committed as yet no sin themselves, therefore are truly baptized for the remission of sins, in order that what in them is the result of generation may be cleansed by regeneration.
ii. Canon 114. (Greek cxv.)
“That not only humble but also true is that voice of the Saints: If we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves.
It also seemed good that as St. John the Apostle says, If we shall say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us, whosoever thinks that this should be so understood as to mean that out of humility, we ought to say that we have sin, and not because it is really so, let him be anathema. For the Apostle goes on to add, But if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all iniquity, where it is sufficiently clear that this is said not only of humility but also truly. For the Apostle might have said, If we shall say we have no sins we shall extoll ourselves, and humility shall have no place in us; but when he says, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us he sufficiently intimates that he who affirmed that he had no sin would speak not that which is true but that which is false.”
iii. Canon 115. (Greek cxvi.)
“That in the Lord’s Prayer the Saints say for themselves: Forgive us our trespasses
It has seemed good that whoever should say that when in the Lord’s prayer, the saints say, forgive us our trespasses, they say this not for themselves, because they have no need of this petition, but for the rest who are sinners of the people; and that therefore no one of the saints can say, Forgive me my trespasses, but Forgive us our trespasses; so that the just is understood to seek this for others rather than for himself; let him be anathema. For holy and just was the Apostle James, when he said, For in many things we offend all. For why was it added all, unless that this sentence might agree also with the psalm, where we read, Enter not into judgment with your servant, O Lord, for in your sight shall no man living be justified; and in the prayer of the most wise Solomon: There is no man that sins not; and in the book of the holy Job: He seals in the hand of every man, that every man may know his own infirmity; wherefore even the holy and just Daniel when in prayer said several times: We have sinned, we have done iniquity, and other things which there truly and humbly he confessed; nor let it be thought (as some have thought) that this was said not of his own but rather of the people’s sins, for he said further on: When I shall pray and confess my sins and the sins of my people to the Lord my God; he did not wish to say our sins, but he said the sins of his people and his own sins, since he as a prophet foresaw that those who were to come would thus misunderstand his words.
Canon 116. (Greek cxvii.)
That the Saints say with accuracy, Forgive us our trespasses
Likewise also it seemed good, that whoever wished that these words of the Lord’s prayer, when we say, Forgive us our trespasses are said by the saints out of humility and not in truth let them be anathema. For who would make a lying prayer, not to men but to God? Who would say with his lips that he wished his sins forgiven him, but in his heart that he had no sins to be forgiven.”[28]
Therefore, Sprinkle’s teachings on the doctrine of sin are heresy because they go against what Christians have always believed according to the History of Christianity. The Protestants, Roman Catholics, and Eastern Orthodox, according to their doctrinal statements from Church History, all condemn Preston Sprinkle as a heretic for teaching a heretical doctrine of sin and temptation.
9) Sprinkle then tries to use John Own to argue that concupiscence, or indwelling sin is not morally culpable. Sprinkle writes,
“After all, Owen argues, actual sins require the consent of the will. If the will isn’t involved, no moral action takes place, which means there can be no actual sin: ‘Moral actions are unto us or in us so far good or evil as they partake of the consent of the will. He spake truth of old who said… “Every sin is so voluntary, that if it be not voluntary it is not sin.” It is most true of actual sins. The formality of their iniquity ariseth from the acts of the will in them and concerning them.’
Thus, although Owen never addresses what we now call same-sex attraction, his discussion here seems to align with our view that a pattern of sexual attraction is not (and, by definition, can’t be) a morally culpable sin from which Christians are called to repent. Without an act of the will, there is no moral action, which makes repentance the wrong response. Keith Johnson describes Owen’s approach this way: ‘For Owen, indwelling sin and actual sins involve differing gospel applications. Actual sins require confession, repentance, and forgiveness while indwelling sin must be resisted and battled through the power of the Holy Spirit.’”[29] (19).
This is startling because anyone who has read much of John Owen, knows that Sprinkle has slandered/libeled him. I can produce over 100 quotations from John Owen that contradict what Sprinkle has written here, but I’ll list just a few:
A) “There are four ways in which this opposition of sin toward God is seen. First, it is seen by sin’s general inclination to lust (Galatians 5:17). Second, it is seen by its warfare (Romans 7:23; James 4:1; 1 Peter 2:11). Third, it is seen by the way it captures the soul (Romans 7:23). Fourth, it is seen by the way it grows and grows, ultimately generating madness (Ecclesiastes 9:3).”[30]
B) “1. Sin opposes God by lust.
Hence all the actions of sin are called “the lust of the flesh (Galatians 5:16). “Make not provision for the flesh,” the apostle warns, “to fulfill the lusts thereof” (Romans 13:14). The mind as well as the flesh lusts. Sin opposes God by this lust in two ways.
First, the heart has a hidden propensity to do evil. The heart habitually wants to do evil in us…it is like poison in the bloodstream that has no antidote to allay its virulence. Here a distinction should be made, however, between the habitual frame of the heart we all have, and the inclinations of the heart which may be changed by the grace of God.”[31]
Notice that Owen says all actions of sin are called the lust of the flesh. Our flesh serves the law of sin, but its inclinations can be changed by God. Owen taught that we must put to death all indwelling sin, all inclinations or lusts of the flesh. Sprinkle, however, believes same-sex attraction is not a lust of the flesh, but a pre-lust of the flesh. But Owen believes the only thing before lust is sin! He says it probably 1,000 times in his book The Mortification of Sin.
C) “On the other hand, we may be doing something good, and sin suddenly enters our consciousness to entice us unexpectedly. How much communion with God is spoiled in this way. How often meditations are interrupted, defiling the mind and conscience. I know of no greater burden in the life of a believer than these involuntary invasions of sin within the soul.
These invasions of sin appear to be involuntary because they lack the consent of the will. Yet it is the corruption of the will that is the source of those incursions of evil within our consciousness. For this reason the apostle cries out, “who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” (Romans 7:24).[32]
Notice that Sprinkle says your will is not involved in same-sex attraction, but Owen says the lust of the flesh or evil inclinations come from “the corruption of the will.” Sprinkle does not understand biblical anthropology or the will. When Church History speaks of involuntary, they don’t mean “without the will,” they mean, “without the mind” or without deliberate choice. But it’s still your will that wants evil. And same-sex attraction is a corruption of the will, a lust of the flesh, that only wants evil.
D) “React strongly against the first stirrings of your evil disposition.
Do not allow it to get the least start in your life. Do not say, ‘I will let it go so far, but no further.’ If you allow it to have one step, it will take another, for it is impossible to fix limits on sin. It is like water in a channel; if it breaks out, it will follow its own course. This is how James describes the process of lust by stages in James 1:14-15.
Rise up with all your strength against the first suggestion of sin, and be not less indignant about it than if it had already accomplished its aims. Consider what an evil thought it is that involved you in filth and foolishness. Ask envy what it would have; murder and destruction are its aims. Set yourself against it with no less vigor than if it had already involved you in its final desires. Without this course, you will never prevail, for if sin gets grounded within the affections, it becomes much more difficult for the understanding to cope with it.”[33]
Owen repeatedly throughout his writings calls lust sin, and its root, sin. And he says we must respond to the first suggestion of sin in our hearts the same way we would if we acted on it. There is no moral difference between the mindful choice of sin and the impulse to sin. They are the same in nature. The difference is only in heinousness. It is worse to mindfully commit sin than it is to have the impulse that began the sin, but both are of the same nature. They both come from the flesh, which is sin, and end in death; and therefore, are morally culpable.
E) In 1658, John Owen, Thomas Goodwin, Philip Nye, William Bridge, Joseph Caryl, and William Greenhill were present to craft the Savoy Declaration.[34] They declared, concerning original sin,
v. This corruption of nature during this life doth remain in those that are regenerated; and although it be through Christ pardoned and mortified, yet both itself and all the motions thereof are truly and properly sin.
vi. Every sin, both original and actual, being a transgression of the righteous law of God, and contrary thereunto, doth in its own nature bring guilt upon the sinner, whereby he is bound over to the wrath of God, and curse of the Law, and so made subject to death, with all miseries, spiritual, temporal, and eternal.[35]
Like the Westminster Confession said, Owen declared that corruption of nature and all its motions are truly and properly sin. And that original sin and actual sin are transgressions against the righteous law of God; and are therefore, morally culpable.
10) Next, Sprinkle argues,
“According to Paul, it’s the Spirit (and not the Law) who gives us the ability to resist the sin-directed desires of the flesh. The Spirit does not, however, erase our capacity to experience these desires and be tempted to sin. In other words, the Spirit doesn’t nullify the presence of the flesh—our fallen nature. Instead, the Spirit gives us the power to resist any desire for sin, including sexual sin, that wells up inside of us.
Paul’s command is not “repent from having a sinful nature,” but “don’t gratify the desires of the sinful nature.” Such gratification would take the form of lust or immoral sexual behavior. Paul makes this point clear when he says that people who walk by the Spirit and not the flesh won’t “do [poiete] whatever you want” (v. 17). That is, we know we’re obeying Paul’s words when we aren’t doing whatever we want—what Paul describes as the “works of the flesh” (v. 19)—but doing what God wants.
Most Christians are attracted to the opposite sex, the same sex, or both sexes. When we apply Paul’s words about “the flesh” to our sexual attractions, we see that are called to not give in to desires for sin (in mind or body) that arise from our various sexual attractions. However, Paul isn’t calling on believers to erase our sexual attractions altogether. He’s not commanding us all to be asexual.”[36]
Sprinkle is clear that he doesn’t expect Christians to repent of being a sinner in nature. He’s also clear that he doesn’t believe, like John Owen and about every Christian in Church History, that Jesus can change your sinful desires. Sprinkle doesn’t believe your sinful desires can ever be changed by God. And he also doesn’t believe evil sexual desire in your heart can ever be changed. Sprinkle grounds sexual desire in original sin, in the flesh. In other words, for Sprinkle, sexual desire is the flesh and cannot be changed, instead of it being the lust of the flesh, a motion of the flesh as Paul says in Romans 7, and as Christians have always believed.
In Church History and Scripture, the flesh serves the law of sin. It is generally and broadly sin, according to Paul in Romans 7. But when it moves, like with lawless sexual desire, it moves a particular direction, coveting evil, a particular sin that God can change in this life. The bottom line is that Sprinkle doesn’t believe God can change any sin at the root. Regardless what sins you desire in your heart, according to Sprinkle, those can never be changed by God. And Sprinkle doesn’t believe you and I have a responsibility to repent of them.
But the Bible says we do. We must repent of them. And it’s precisely this repentance that the Spirit uses to sanctify us, to kill the particular sinful lusts in our hearts. In other words, you indeed can repent of particular motions of sin, kill them, and never have them any more in this life. The flesh is sin, so you’re a sinner in this life, and the flesh will move. But your responsibility as a Christian is to repent of every sin, every coveting desire, that you’re aware of, starve it, and walk in the Spirit.
Yet, because Sprinkle never calls homosexual desire sin, those who believe him will never be freed from the desire, because part of being free means agreeing with God that it is sin. It’s coveting, according to the 10th commandment: You shall not covet, you shall not desire anything that belongs to your neighbor (Deut 5:21). Sprinkle says that this refers only to mindful sin, but the Hebrew word for covet is the same Hebrew word for Eve’s first desire for the forbidden tree in Genesis 3:6. Sprinkle has created a new category and put it between lust and the flesh, calling it “not sin.” Why? Because he says personal experience tells him he didn’t choose it.
His entire theology is built on the personal testimony of sinners.
11) Sprinkle then quotes John Piper to argue that sin often begins as an innocent desire.[37]
John Piper is wrong. His interpretation of James 1 is terrible, a theology from below. The apostle Paul explicitly says that the flesh and the Spirit are opposed to one another, and that the flesh serves the law of sin but the Spirit doesn’t. When we desire something good, the flesh may produce an evil desire, but the good desire came from the Spirit not the flesh. Innocent desires do not come from the flesh according to Paul in Romans 7 and Galatians 5, and according to James 1:13-15. But Sprinkle believes good desires become sin. And he also believes that the flesh can produce good desires.
Listen to Paul in Galatians 5:16-25,
“16 But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. 17 For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. 19 Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, 21 envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. 24 And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit.”
Paul says the works of the flesh are evident and none of them are innocent! And he also says the fruit of the Spirit is nothing but good. And these two don’t become one another. Remember what James said, that sin begins as lust in our hearts or inner temptation? And it conceives mindful sin and ends in death. How can an innocent desire lead to sin and death? That’s not what the Bible teaches anywhere. Paul says it’s the desires of the flesh, not the Spirit, that we cannot gratify.
But Sprinkle teaches that the Spirit and God’s design both can produce good desires that become evil. He writes, “…A desire that points toward a good object still has the potential to lure us into sin, and a desire that points toward something God says “no” to isn’t necessarily a sin in itself.”[38]
That’s the opposite of what James and Paul taught, and what Jesus taught. It’s also the opposite of what the rest of Scripture teaches. Sin doesn’t begin as good or neutral in our hearts. And Holiness doesn’t begin as evil or neutral. Rather, the flesh is evil and the Spirit is holy, and these two are opposed to one another. For Sprinkle, every sinful action could have started as a holy desire. And every holy action could have started as an evil desire.
He gets his anthropology from the mirror and through taking polls from homosexuals, rather than the Bible.
12) Next, Sprinkle tries to use Jesus to justify homosexual desires. He writes,
“To see how desires contrary to God’s desires for us can still be stewarded in holy ways, consider the example set by Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane:
Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.” (Matt. 26:39)
The natural, human desire of Jesus in this moment is to have the cup of suffering taken from him. He wishes for this even though he recognizes that the Father’s will for him is to drink this cup down to its dregs. In fact, the very core of Jesus’ prayer recognizes that what he desires and what the Father desires are at odds: “not as I will, but as you will.” If Jesus’ will had been instinctively identical to the Father’s will, he wouldn’t need to differentiate between what he wills and what the Father wills.
Is Jesus desiring a good thing or an evil thing in this moment? He wishes to avoid suffering, which is an instinctive human desire. And yet, because this suffering is the will of God for him, turning away from it would be wrong. Jesus recognizes that his own instinctive human desire must be disciplined to match the desire of his Father. By choosing the path of obedience, Jesus acts without sin. The mere fact that his instinctive desire differs from his Father’s desire for him is not itself a sin.
This logic applies not just to Jesus but to the whole human race. Think of a recovering alcoholic who feels tempted to drink to the point of drunkenness—but, because their desire to obey God outweighs their desire to get drunk, they choose sobriety. This person follows in Jesus’ footsteps by saying to God, “Not as I will, but as you will.” Scripture never condemns a person like this for committing a morally culpable sin. Neither should we.
Similarly, if a person experiences an instinctive sexual desire, and they choose God’s will over their own will by not acting on that desire, they are also not sinning. This difference between their own will and the Father’s will is a temptation to sin, not a morally culpable sin in itself.”[39]
First, contrary to Sprinkle, Jesus did not desire to disobey His Father. Luke summarized Jesus’s prayers in Gethsemane in Luke 22:42: “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.” Jesus prayed for God’s will to be done first. Then, He asked if God would permit His cup of wrath to pass from Him. Doing God’s will is what Christ was born for, what He lived for, and what He continues to live for even to this day (John 6:38).
Second, Jesus should not desire the upcoming unjust treatment He will face at the hands of lawless men. After His prayers in Gethsemane, He endured the betrayal of Judas, His arrest, beating, scourging, mocking, and beard-plucking that resulted in His humiliation, suffering, pain, and death. Remember how Peter described at Pentecost Jesus’s death as both God’s will and man’s sinful will: “This Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men” (Acts 2:23). Christ’s death was both God’s definite plan and the work of lawless men. Jesus’s agony in Gethsemane indicates His understanding of these two realities at work in His coming death—God’s holy will and man’s sinful will.
After all, when Jesus finished praying in Gethsemane, He said to the disciples, “See, the hour is at hand, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand” (Matt 26:45–46). The angel God sent in Luke 22:43 evidently strengthened Christ, God the Son Incarnate, to endure the evil will of man, but Christ’s obedience to God’s will through His human nature, desires, and actions was never in question. What happened to Jesus was both just and unjust. God’s providence in Jesus’s suffering was just since Jesus was a willing participant, but man’s role in Jesus’s suffering was unjust. Jesus desired God’s will but did not desire man’s evil.
Third, should Jesus have desired to become sin (2 Cor 5:21)? Should He have desired to be forsaken by His Father, to drink the cup of His Father’s wrath (Matt 27:45–46)?[40] The words Jesus used were precise. He requested that the “cup of wrath” be removed from Him (Luke 22:42). The cup of wrath refers to God’s wrath while also referring to the suffering Jesus was about to experience.[41] Since Jesus is holy Man, He should not desire to become sin, to be forsaken by His Father, or to drink His Father’s wrath.[42]
Imagine Adam in the garden of Eden before he sinned when he was still holy, desiring God to forsake him, desiring to become sin, and desiring God to pour out His wrath on him. Would not these be sinful desires for Adam? If so, then surely, they would be for Christ who is God the Son Incarnate! Yet, Christ should desire to do His Father’s will, which is exactly what He prayed, beginning His prayer with, “Father, if you are willing” (Luke 22:42).
Fourth, God the Father approved of Jesus’s prayer since the text says that an angel came from heaven to strengthen Him (Luke 22:43). From Luke emphasizing where the angel came from, one must assume God the Father sent the angel to strengthen His Son, not because His Son was trying to get out of doing His will, but on the contrary, because the Son’s obedience to His Father peculiarly required Him to want to do His Father’s will while not wanting to endure the evils that came along with it.
Additionally, Sprinkle claims that when Christ desired to not go to the cross, He desired something that was morally bad for Him. But what command does Sprinkle think that Christ desired to disobey? There is nothing in Christ’s prayer that indicates that He desired to not be obedient to the law or the additional commands revealed in Scripture in the eternal covenant of redemption (John 6:38–39; Eph 1:3–5; 2 Tim 1:9–10; 1 Pet 1:20). After all, Christ starts His prayer with, according to Luke, “If you are willing” (Luke 22:42).
Plus, we have already seen that Jesus desiring God’s wrath to pass from Him is not disobedient. Since He was not a sinner, never desired to sin, and never actually sinned, Christ did not deserve God’s wrath. However, those who have desires of the flesh, like all sinners, deserve God’s wrath. It would be unjust for God to permit His wrath to pass from sinners without payment for their sin because they are in rebellion against Him. God’s wrath is upon sinners because they deserve it. But God’s wrath was on Christ at the cross because of His definite plan, His covenant of redemption, and Christ’s voluntary obedience.
In other words, a person who has fleshly desires is in violation of God’s commands in Scripture (Exod 20:17; Deut 5:21; Rom 6:12–13; 7:7–25), and is deserving of God’s wrath, but Christ is not in violation of any command by desiring God’s cup of wrath to pass from Him. Therefore, Sprinkle cannot use Jesus asking for God’s wrath to pass from Him to justify a man’s sinful desire that brings God’s wrath upon Him.
To compare Jesus’s prayer request to not have to drink God’s cup of wrath to an inner desire for evil within us is blasphemy. Neither Scripture nor logic follows. As a matter of fact, because Christ is God the Son Incarnate, perfectly holy, and perfectly one with His Father, it is a holy desire for Him to not want to drink the cup of His Father’s wrath even as He wants to do His Father’s will. Yet, it is a purely wicked and evil desire for us to want anything that is contrary to God’s design or law (Rom 1:26–27).
Therefore, Sprinkle comparing Jesus in Gethsemane to a Christian desiring drunkenness but resisting it, is a false equivalency fallacy. Desiring drunkenness is always sin. Jesus, who is holy Man, should not want to drink His Father’s wrath. That is the perfect righteous response for Jesus. He could not have had a more holy desire, because He is holy and so are His desires. He shouldn’t want to drink His Father’s wrath even as He wants to do His Father’s will. Both are holy desires for Jesus. Sprinkle seems to think that Jesus should have went hopping and a skipping to the cross, wanting to be treated like a sinner, wanting His Father’s wrath. But that’s not what the text says. It says the opposite.
You butcher Scripture if you look at Jesus in Gethsemane and think you’re like Jesus when you desire evil but resist it. Jesus never desired evil, and He never desired to disobey His Father. Trust in God and His word, not disobedience, is also why Christ cried out on the cross, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me” (Matt 27:46)? God only forsakes the wicked (Ezek 39:23-24; Micah 3:4), not the righteous; and Christ is perfectly righteous. Therefore, He rightfully cried out to fulfill Psalm 22:1, questioning God forsaking Him. Christ was not doubting our disobeying but rather trusting in God’s word. After all, a few moments later, Christ cried out, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit!” And having said this he breathed his last” (Luke 23:46). He never doubted God for even a moment. We too can question God, so long as it’s according to His revealed will, His word, but we cannot doubt God or His word or desire evil by tempting ourselves to sin, for that is always sin.
13) Then, Sprinkle writes,
“All of us have plenty of sin to repent from in our lives—including sins of the mind and heart, like lust and greed and coveting. We gain nothing by also trying to repent from our patterns of sexual attraction and sexual temptation.”[43]
Sprinkle explicitly says that you don’t have to repent of the habits of your heart. How exactly are you ever going to be sanctified if you always have the same sinful desires? And why would you even want to be rid of them? They’re not sin, according to him. So, why would you ever want to be free from them? The bottom line is that Sprinkle must argue that the command of God to love Him with all your heart, soul, and mind doesn’t include the evil desires of your heart. Sprinkle says you don’t have to repent for not loving God with all your heart, soul, and mind. Evil desires are fine for Christians, as long as you don’t act on them. You won’t find this in the Bible anywhere.
14) Next, Sprinkle argues,
“Both Moore and Butterfield appear to reject singleness as a worthy calling for people who experience same-sex temptation, while affirming that a small minority of people—apparently only opposite-sex attracted or asexual people—have the gift of singleness. This delineation goes against both Jesus (Matt. 19:10-12) and Paul (1 Cor. 7:1-40), who never make such distinctions between different kinds of attractions as they celebrate the value of singleness.”[44]
Again, Sprinkle has created differing categories for sexuality: heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, and asexual. And then says that Jesus and Paul “never made distinctions between different kinds of attractions as they celebrate the value of singleness.” Sprinkle has created sexualities beyond male and female. It’s blatantly unbiblical.
And the fact remains that “I’m gay” is not a biblical reason for singleness. The Bible says there are two sexes/sexualities: male and female. Sprinkle says there are more because he separates sexuality from God’s design, from what the Bible says. And then he makes an argument from silence to say that a man who was designed to marry a woman, but his flesh has told him “he’s gay,” shouldn’t marry a woman and should instead pursue singleness. That’s not what the Bible says.
15) Then, Sprinkle writes,
“Some of those who teach that experiencing sexual temptation is a morally culpable sin seem to wind up condemning single Christians for denying their sexual attractions (and thus facing the temptation of unmet sexual appetite). Their belief in the sinfulness of sexual temptation leads them to believe that any single Christian with any amount of sexual attraction would be holier if they got married and completely satisfied their sexual appetites. Scripture, on the other hand, enthusiastically celebrates single Christians!”[45]
Notice that Sprinkle says a Christian who has gay desires, if he repents and marries a woman, he will have “unmet sexual appetite.” Sprinkle doesn’t believe God’s design can satisfy a Christian, that a man doing what God designed him to do with a woman in marriage, will not satisfy him. Again, Sprinkle teaches that homosexuality is who a person is, contrary to Scripture, where Paul says men exchanged the natural use of the woman (Rom 1:24-27); so-called “gay men” are no different than any other man except in their sin; their sexuality is no different than any other man.
Instead of homosexual desires being a lust of the flesh that Jesus can change, Sprinkle teaches that it’s who a person is, without any Bible to back him up. What he’s done is polled “homosexuals” and then tried to fit Scripture with their testimonies. The tail is wagging the dog in his theology. And it’s no wonder, if a Christian believes he is not sinning and cannot be changed, it’s no wonder that he persists in his evil desires. The very word of God that the Holy Spirit will use to sanctify him, if he’ll believe it, Sprinkle says don’t believe it; rather, he teaches you should believe your feelings. “You are gay,” and will have unmet sexual appetite if you do what God designed you to do, which is marry a woman.
But if you follow Sprinkle’s logic, that you’re a Christian but you’re “gay,” won’t you still have unmet sexual appetites if you’re single? Of course you will; that’s why Sam Allberry just resigned for having a homosexual relationship. Paul says if you burn with passion, you’re supposed to get married (1 Cor 7:8-9). But Sprinkle says to stay single because if you marry, you’ll have unmet sexual appetite? What he’s encouraging is a bunch of men and women who profess Christ, and who constantly talk about their sexual appetites for homosexuality by calling themselves “gay Christians,” to pursue singleness because they’ll always be gay. They literally tell themselves they’re “gay” every day and tell everyone else that they’re “gay.” No wonder they believe they are! They’ve believed Sprinkle and denied God’s word! If you will repent of who you feel you are and believe who God says you are, you will be free from your homosexual desires!
16) Next, Sprinkle argues, “Requiring that faithful Christians must experience a change in the direction of their attractions adds unbiblical requirements to the gospel.”[46]
Sprinkle is explicit here. You don’t have to love God with all your heart, soul, and mind. And requiring Christians to pursue God and His design is unbiblical according to him. Literally, every Christian is required to be like Jesus, who never desired sin. We’re all supposed to repent of every lust of the flesh and to live the fruit of the Spirit. We’re not merely to have evil hearts and be outwardly righteous. That’s the Pharisees!
This teaching of Sprinkle is directly what Jesus preached against in His Sermon on the Mount. Only the pure in heart shall see God (Matt 5:8). That’s what we’re aimed it. We’re not sin-managers, we’re sin-killers. Sprinkle, however, wants to help you manage your sin, not kill it. And he acts like he’s preaching the true gospel. Telling Christians with evil in their hearts that it’s ok, that they can be faithful and can’t change, can’t repent, is the opposite of Scripture. The bottom line is that Sprinkle does not believe you can kill your sin in the power of the Holy Spirit. And all those who agree with him are shocked that they’re “still gay.” If I told myself that my desire for murder wasn’t sin, do you think I’d ever stop desiring murder? Or, if I told myself that I’m worthless over and over again, do you think I would ever believe God’s word that I’m God’s valuable image-bearer and that He’s conforming me to the image of Christ? Sprinkle’s false teaching renders Christians helpless sin-managers rather than sin-killers.
If you believe him, you will stay ensnared in your win.
17) Then, Sprinkle writes,
“We admire DeYoung’s evenhandedness in recognizing that sinfulness is a struggle for all people, not just some. But we think that, when DeYoung argues that all Christians’ lives are marked by nonstop morally culpable sinfulness, he misses the mark of Paul’s words in Galatians 5, as we saw on pages 18-21. Paul draws a stark contrast between the acts of the flesh—morally culpable, willful behaviors of both mind and body—and the fruit of the Spirit. While Paul clearly expects our flesh and its allures to remain constant on this side of eternity, he sees this perpetual fallenness as something very different from the sinful acts of our flesh. The notion that Christians are continuously mired in an involuntary state of morally culpable sin seems totally foreign to Paul’s optimistic vision of life by the Spirit.
The Bible’s vision of freedom in Christ offers no guarantee that our temptations will disappear. It also doesn’t guarantee that the patterns of attraction our temptations exist within will disappear. But Scripture does teach that, when we are set free by Christ, we are no longer trapped in a state of perpetual morally culpable sinfulness.”[47]
Again, Sprinkle says that you won’t change. Why won’t you change, because he says “homosexual attractions” are original sin. But if this were true, everyone would be “gay,” because everyone has original sin. He unbiblically argues that gay desires are the flesh instead of the lust of the flesh, and thus, because of this error, he teaches that since Christians always have the flesh in this life, they’re always “gay.” But where does the Bible teach this? In Romans 7:24-27, Paul says men exchanged the natural use of women and the women exchanged the natural use of men. These men and women were no different in nature than anyone else, except for their sin. But Sprinkle teaches that homosexuals are different than other men and women, ontologically, in their very natures. So, Jesus can walk out of the tomb, but He can’t change your sinful attractions? And the Holy Spirit raises the spiritual dead, but He can’t sanctify sinful desires out of you? Thus, whatever sin pattern you have in your heart, you will always have in this life, according to Sprinkle. And he calls this “hope.”
What’s also heinously wrong here is that Sprinkle says only actions you mindfully choose are sin. Therefore, he must teach that unbelievers and Christians are sinless when they sleep. And he must also teach that it’s possible for Christians to be sinless in this life. Not because they love God with all their hearts, souls, and minds, but because evil in their hearts is not sin. So, if you want to be truly holy Christian, you need to sleep all the time. Salvation and sanctification by sleep alone.
Conclusion
By Preston Sprinkle arguing that “being gay” is not sin, and by him separating sexuality from one’s sex, he’s telling men and women that they do not have to live according to God creating them male or female, in their hearts. About the most effeminate thing a man can do is to “be attracted to another man.” For a man to be attracted to another man, he must look at men the way that Eve looked at Adam. And Eve is a woman. Therefore, in teaching that men and women do not have to live according to their God-designed sexuality, as male or female in their hearts, and that they can desire the same-sex in their hearts and it’s not sin, Sprinkle teaches that the fall and the flesh produce neutrality that can either become good or sin. Homosexuality is rooted in sin, only produces sin, and always ends in death, according to Scripture. It wouldn’t exist without sin and will not exist in the sinless new heaves and new earth.
Sprinkle is an undertaker while claiming to be a doctor. Do not follow this minister of death. Follow Christ instead.
[1] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, https://centerforfaith.com/pastoral-paper-19-is-same-sex-attraction-a-sin/, Accessed May 6, 2026, 4-5.
[2] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 4-5.
[3] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 5.
[4] Allen P. Ross, Creation and Blessing: A Guide to the Study and Exposition of Genesis (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1998), 136. Also see Gordon J. Wenham, Genesis 1-15, Word Biblical Commentary 1, ed. David A. Hubbard, Glenn W. Barker, and John D. W. Watts (Waco, TX: Word Books Publisher, 1987), 75-76.
[5] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 9-11.
[6] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 10.
[7] Augustine, “Unfinished Work in Answer to Julian,” in Answer to the Pelagians, 3, part 1 – Books, vol. 25 of The Works of Saint Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century, ed. John E. Rotelle, trans. Roland J. Teske (Hyde Park, NY: New City Press, 1999), 436-37.
[8] Donald A. Hagner, Hebrews, New International Biblical Commentary, ed. W. Ward Gasque (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1990), 79.
[9] William L. Lane, Hebrews 1-8, Word Biblical Commentary 47A, eds. David A. Hubbard, Glenn W. Barker, and John D. W. Watts (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1991), 114. Also, F. F. Bruce, Commentary on The Epistle to the Hebrews, of The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964), 84-85. As well, Thomas R. Schreiner, Commentary on Hebrews, Biblical Theology for Christian Proclamation, eds. T. Desmond Alexander, Andreas J. Kostenberger, and Thomas R. Schreiner (Nashville, TN: B & H Publishing, 2015), 153.
[10] William L. Lane, Hebrews 1-8, Word Biblical Commentary 47A, eds. David A. Hubbard, Glenn W. Barker, and John D. W. Watts (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1991), 61.
[11] Donald A. Hagner, Matthew 1-13, Word Biblical Commentary 33A, ed. Bruce M. Metzger, David A. Hubbard, Glenn W. Barker (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2000), 53–54.
[12] Hagner, Hebrews, 78-79.
[13] Lane, Hebrews 1-8, 114-115.
[14] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 12.
[15] Preston Sprinkle, The Upside-Down Kingdom Study Bible, 1236, 1238.
[16] Bauer, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 157.
[17] Hagner, Matthew 1-13, 120-21.
[18] Preston Sprinkle, ed., Upside-Down Kingdom Bible (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2024), 841.
[19] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 14.
[20] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 14-17.
[21] Allen P. Ross, Creation and Blessing: A Guide to the Study and Exposition of Genesis (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1998), 136. Also see Gordon J. Wenham, Genesis 1-15, Word Biblical Commentary 1, ed. David A. Hubbard, Glenn W. Barker, and John D. W. Watts (Waco, TX: Word Books Publisher, 1987), 75-76.
[22] Kenneth A. Mathews, Genesis 1-11:26, The New American Commentary 1A (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 1996), 238.
[23] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 17.
[24] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 17.
[25] Augustine, “Unfinished Work in Answer to Julian,” 427.
[26] Thomas Aquinas, The “Summa Theologica” (R. & T. Washbourne, LTD, 1914), 203-204.
[27] Philip Melanchthon, “The Apology of the Augsburg Confession,” in The Book of Concord: or, The Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, ed. Henry Eyster Jacobs (Philadelphia: General Council Publication Board, 1916), 81-82.
[28] Council of Carthage (A.D. 419) at New Advent, Accessed May 6, 2026, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3816.htm.
[29] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 19.
[30] John Owen, Sin and Temptation: The Challenge to Personal Godliness, Abridged and edited by James M. Houston (Portland: OR, Multnomah Press, 1983), 24-25.
[31] Owen, Sin and Temptation, 24-25.
[32] Owen, Sin and Temptation, 24-25.
[33] Owen, Sin and Temptation, 180.
[34] James T. Dennison, Jr., ed., introduction to “The Savoy Declaration (1658),” in 1600-1693, vol. 4 of Reformed Confessions of the 16th and 17th Centuries in English Translation (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 2012), 457-58.
[35] “The Savoy Declaration (1658),” in 1600-1693, vol. 4 of Reformed Confessions of the 16th and 17th Centuries in English Translation, ed. James T. Dennison, Jr. (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 2012), 465.
[36] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 21.
[37] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 21-22.
[38] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 22.
[39] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 23.
[40] Stephen Wellum, God the Son Incarnate: The Doctrine of Christ (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2016), 460.
[41] Robert H. Stein, vol. 24 in The New American Commentary, ed. David S. Dockery (Nashville, TN: Broadman Press, 1992), 558.
[42] Wellum, God the Son Incarnate, 215-217. Also, see Norval Geldenhuys, Commentary on the Gospel of Luke, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans Publishing, 1966), 574-575.
[43] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 24.
[44] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 25.
[45] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 25.
[46] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 26.
[47] Sprinkle and Coles, “Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin?”, 27.