Yes, you read that headline correctly. A man claiming to be a gay Christian has predicted that the gay community will destroy the Christian church – those are his exact words – and he hopes it will happen sooner than later.

Allow me to give you a spoiler alert. The Church that Jesus is building – by which I mean the community of His true followers around the world – cannot be destroyed. Or canceled. Or silenced.

As for much of what goes by the name of “Christian church,” that’s another story.

Perhaps that is what this gay author is describing, namely, the dismantling of so-called Christianity? If so, how on earth could he imagine that the gay community will lead the way in destroying it?

Writing on Medium.com, Keith Michael states that, “The Christian Church is imploding on itself. Fewer and fewer people are filling its pews, at least in North America, and the leadership of the various Christian Church denominations know it. They see the trends.

“It’s literally scaring them. And they are powerless to stop it.

“They are powerless to stop it because it’s happening by the hand of GOD.”

And then this: “In all fairness, it’s not really the Gay community that is destroying the Church— GOD is destroying the Christian Church—but we are the catalyst, a very visible sign whom GOD is using to illustrate the Church’s errors, the Church’s arrogance, and the Church’s unloving sin.”

The truth be told, there are people who have left churches in America because they feel the church is not loving towards gays. There’s no denying that. In other cases, people have left because they themselves are same-sex attracted and they feel that they are not accepted for who they are.

But the reality is that, worldwide as well as in America, when biblical standards are upheld in love (and those standards forbid homosexual unions), when Jesus is lifted up without shame, when the Spirit is allowed to move freely, then people are flocking to these churches. In fact, many of them are growing rapidly.

It’s also true that the churches that are the most compromised, the ones that claim to be the most “progressive,” those which are most affirming of gay “marriage” and practicing gay clergy are the ones in the greatest numerical decline.

Study it for yourself. The statistics worldwide speak for themselves, largely undermining Michael’s narrative.

In his mind, though, the church is guilty of arrogance, writing, “They are doubling-down on stupid instead of seeing and correcting their own hate for Gay people, and their own embracing of Pagan beliefs GOD never ever once told people to do or believe.”

Yes, he continues, “Christians honestly don’t ‘see’ that it is their blind adherence to a systemic lying man-made ancient outdated dogma that is the root cause of the Holy Spirit-led exodus of their churches.”

So that’s the key to church growth according to Michael. Abandon what the Bible says about marriage and family and sexuality – he brands these values “Pagan” and calls this “hate” – and instead embrace what God rejects. Talk about turning truth on its head.

As for churches “hating” gays, I’m sure there are gay-hating churches in America, and I and many others have called them out. They are the exception to the rule, and they misrepresent God.

But it is not hate to tell someone that God has a better way. And it is not hate to declare that, not only did Jesus die for every human being, He also wants to change every human being.

Michael, however, has completely abandoned the teachings of the New Testament in the name of an imaginary Christianity that never existed, writing, “Jesus never taught what the Church of today teaches. In fact, the historical Jesus would have been horrified of what the Church now teaches in his name!”

But he does not mean that the way many of us mean it. (In other words, plenty of us agree that Jesus would be – and is – horrified over the state of much of the church of America.)

What he means is this: “The Christian Church is NOT what Jesus and the Apostles founded. It’s what Paul of Tarsus founded and was later amplified by Constantine. In fact, the religion should more be called ‘Pauliantiy’ than ‘Christianity’.”

Not only so, but “the ancient Priesthood meddled with the Law (Torah) with their ‘lying pens’,” which he tries to support with a mistaken reference to Jeremiah 8:8, which does not teach that the Torah that we have today was corrupted by ancient priests.

So, not only is much of the New Testament unreliable in Michael’s eyes, but much of the Old Testament is unreliable as well.

And, worse still, he claims that “the Church literally worships another god of its own making, namely Jesus. The 1st Commandment states that we are to have no other gods other than the one worshiped by Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”

Yes, “The Church manufactured it’s own ‘Jesus’ and its own ‘gospel’ using its so-called ‘New Testament’, but this was a tome that wasn’t even around when Jesus and the Apostles preached.”

And what’s the answer to this massive deception? “The LGBTQ+ Community needs to be on offense with real facts and real history we can use to educate our Evangelical friends.”

Reading this, you can only feel sorry for men like Michael who claim to be gay Christians while rejecting the Law of God, disparaging the New Testament revelation, and indicting the Church for worshiping Jesus as Lord.

All the more do I pity them for thinking that, armed with these new “insights” and “facts,” the gay community will set the church right.

Do I agree with him that the church needs to demonstrate much more unconditional love, including to the LGBTQ community? Absolutely. “More love” is always a word the church needs to hear. After all, Jesus is our example, and no one practiced selfless love more deeply than He.

At the same time Michael has things completely upside down. It is when the church of America returns to preaching and teaching the Word of God, as written and without apology, full of the Spirit and full of love, that our buildings will be filled with seekers and sinners alike. The truth that will set them free.