Does Christs-Bride affirm
or deny gay marriage?

Christs Bride

Christs-Bride is an interesting topic. From 1976-1978, long before I came out, I attended the Pensacola Bible Institute, a conservative fundamentalist Bible school for street preachers. God has an interesting way of getting His gay children into some interesting places! The Founder of PBI, Dr. Peter S. Ruckman, 11-19-1921 - 4-21-2016, was still going strong at age 94 and rancorously anti-gay.

In his later years, he was fond of name-calling from the pulpit, spitting epithets like fag, fairie, homo, bull dyke, Frisco fairy, queer and sissy boys to demean gay people. He didn't do that most of the years I was there, only in his later years.

Dr. Peter S. Ruckman, street preaching
in Pensacola, FL in 2014 at age 92

Dr. Ruckman's view of Christs Bride
gets really weird in a
tin-foil hat kind of way

As Dr. Ruckman taught Ephesians 5 verse by verse in Bible class, he shared his personal belief that Christ's bride will be ALL male and ONLY male, with no women or girls. This is sometimes referred to as the "no women in heaven" theory. He arrives at that view by assuming that all saved women will become men at the Rapture - they will be changed into "the [exact] image" of Christ, or so says the good doctor.

That's a pretty weird belief, which shakes out to mean, according to Dr. Ruckman, all transgender folks NOW are sinfully wrong but according to Dr. Ruckman's idea, ALL women from the church age will become men and thus be transgender in heaven (women becoming men) and THEN,  it will be okay.

If you didn't know that some independent fundamental KJV Baptists believe and teach that, please raise your hand.

Rapture of
the church

"Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is."
- 1 John 3:2

"Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body..." - Philippians 3:21

"And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly." - 1 Cor 15:49

From those three verses and a few more, Dr. Ruckman derives his teaching that in heaven all Christians will become exact replicas of Jesus Christ. All Christians will become bearded, circumcised 33 year old Jewish men. He then taught us in Bible class that this ALL-MALE bride of Christ will literally marry Christ in heaven and, he said,  "physically consummate the marriage." In that same Bible class back in 1976-78, Dr. P.S. Ruckman Sr,  described life in heaven as "an orgasmic high."

He was teaching this perverse private interpretation in the late 1970s. It's difficult to avoid the conclusion that this belief says more about Dr. Ruckman's interior dialogue than about the realities of heaven.

Christs Bride Update

As of 2010, Dr. Ruckman was still teaching his private interpretation in print. In the May 2010 issue of The Bible Believer's Bulletin, pp. 10-11, Dr. Ruckman reiterated his odd belief with these words. Bold emphasis is mine.

"In the Millennium, stupid, Christ is right on a throne in Jerusalem where anybody can see Him. If that weren't enough, with Him will be all the saved people between Pentecost and the Rapture; according to 1 John 3:1-2, Philippians 3:21, and 1 Corinthians 15:44-49, each one will be a perfect replica of Jesus Christ. During the Millenium, there will be across this world a minimum, I would say, of 500 million exact reproductions of God's Son, minus the wounds." -Dr. Peter S. Ruckman, Ph.D.

Christs-bride - Does it contain a billion men or more?

On the subject of Christs-Bride, Dr. Ruckman teaches that God will transform all Christians into exact replicas of Christ so that everyone who gets saved in the church age, young and old, male AND female, will become 33 year old circumcised Jewish men because according to Dr. Ruckman, that's how old Jesus was when He died. Dr. Ruckman's bizarre belief sounds more like the fake Gospel of Thomas than Christian doctrine.

(114) Simon Peter said to him, "Let Mary leave us, for women are not worthy of life." Jesus said, "I myself shall lead her in order to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every woman who will make herself male will enter the kingdom of heaven." Gospel of Thomas 114

These bearded circumcised Jewish men who used to be women, will then marry Christ, become Christs-Bride and physically consummate the marriage, according to Dr. Ruckman's teaching in Bible class at Pensacola Bible Institute between 1976-78.

That's another pretty weird belief, which shakes out to mean, according to Dr. Ruckman, all gay marriage NOW is sinfully wrong even though it is culturally accepted and legal and blessed by God in many places just like polygamy was culturally accepted and legal and blessed by God in the Old Testament.

But every saved person from the 2000 years long church age, all of whom will be men, according to Dr. Ruckman, will marry a man, the Lord Jesus Christ and THEN,  in heaven, gay marriage or same sex marriage will be okay and physically consummating the marriage will be okay THEN, in heaven.

If you didn't know that some independent fundamental KJV Baptists believe and teach that, please raise your hand again.

Dr. Peter S. Ruckman Sr,

11-19-1921 - 4-21-2016

Pensacola, FL

Folks, you just can't make up stuff this weird.

This strange teaching from an Independent Fundamental Baptist pastor, that Christians, Christs-Bride will have sex with Jesus in heaven, did NOT come from the "homos" and "bull dykes" Dr. Ruckman delighted to attack and make fun of.

This odd-ball theory was taught by Dr. Peter S. Ruckman, the anti-gay, street-preaching pastor of Bible Baptist Church in Pensacola, Florida. I wonder why he didn't preach his Christs-Bride theory outside the gay bars on Friday and Saturday nights in downtown Pensacola?

I and many others regard Dr. Ruckman's teaching about Christs-Bride as "way out in left field without a ball cap" false doctrine (and that's being charitable).

But the standard teaching about Christs-Bride from anti-gay Christians and the oddball musings of anti-gay Dr. Ruckman about Christ's bride raises interesting questions.

Marriage Supper of the Lamb

I have wondered as you may have wondered:

1. How can Christs-Bride, which includes men, actually marry Christ?
2. Why does the Bible depict Christs-Bride as having lots of men, perhaps more than one billion men in it?
3. Since Complementarians use Christs-Bride typology to demean and argue against gay marriage, how can they then defend the concept of men being the bride of Christ and marrying Jesus Christ, who is also a man?

Bride-Groom typology is one of
the main Christian arguments
against gay marriage.

Remember, Bride and Groom typology is one of the strongest supporting arguments for anti-gay Complementarian theory. They argue that the example of Adam and Eve (the first opposite sex marriage on earth) pictures, through typology, the relationship Christ will have with His bride, the church.

Since according to Complementarian theory, gay marriage breaks the type, God could never affirm gay marriage. Of course, the problem with that incorrect thinking is that saved gays and lesbians are ALREADY part of the body of Christ.

"And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus:"
- Ephesians 2:6

"For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church. - Ephesians 5:30-32

Naturally that raises
some interesting questions

Two happy grooms

1. If same sex marriage is wrong on earth, why does the Bible use bride typology to describe men (masculine gender) as part of the bride (feminine gender) which marries Christ?

2. Why is same sex marriage perfectly okay in heaven according to Dr. Ruckman's demented theory (Christs-Bride, which contains men, marrying Christ) but not okay on earth?

Please understand. I am not questioning the truth of the Bible. I believe every word of the Bible. I AM questioning why anti-gay Christians get away with using the Bible to exclude gays and lesbians. When you think about it, the Christs-Bride teaching just doesn't make sense, the way they use it to exclude gays and lesbians.

In other words, God did not intend us to think that all believers will become exact look-alike replicas of Christ and then, as men, marry Christ and physically consummate the marriage in heaven. My advice is simple. Keep believing the Bible but don't accept everything anti-gay religious nuts tell you it means. Start reading and studying the Bible for yourself, 2 Timothy 2:15 in the old KJV and 2 Timothy 3:15-17.

God gave you a brain and a mind and when God saved you, He gave you the Holy Spirit to lead you into all truth, John 16:13, 1 Corinthians 12:13. Use those gifts from God to read, study and research the Bible on your own. You will be surprised at what God shows you. Use the excellent FREE resources on our eDisciples page and supercharge your spiritual growth!

God listens and God cares for you.

God does not intend gay people to spend their lives alone and lonely even though that's what Focus on the Family and Desert Stream and other ex-gay "ministries" would have us believe.

The "love" of the anti-gay crowd is not mediated through the prism of Matthew 7:12 or Matthew 22:36-40. The anti-gay crowd would never be satisfied to be treated the way they treat gays and lesbians.

I believe God knows the longing of our hearts because He made us. God's loving care for Adam, in providing the orientation compatible help meet that Adam needed, Genesis 2:18, encourages me to believe that God is faithful to provide gays with the orientation compatible help meet that we need. The help meet God provides us will be same sex instead of opposite sex.

Many of you have already learned
this foundational truth.

"When you trust God,
everything is going to be all right."

We learn better and deeper lessons about God and His awesome love for us in the furnace of affliction. You can't have the message without first experiencing the mess. You can't have a testimony without first going through the test. Mountaintops are the place for rejoicing but life's greatest lessons are learned down in the valley where God's grace is made perfect in our weakness, 2 Cor 12:9. God teaches us, not by immediately taking away everything that causes pain and distress but by giving us grace to lean on Him in our need. Weeping may endure for a night but joy comes in the morning, Psalm 30:5.

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