When the fruit is good don't call it bad

David Runcorn

David is a convenor of Inclusive Evangelicals. He is the author of Love means Love - same-sex relationships and the bible (SPCK) and the editor of the forthcoming Evangelical and Inclusive - a future and a hope (Canterbury).

In the church of her youth Rachel recalls hearing speakers from communist countries where those who were ‘out’ as a Christian were persecuted. There were stories of suffering and hardship, and the talk would always end with a challenge. ‘If you were told you weren’t allowed to worship God, what would you do? Would your faith stand the test?’

For Rachel that story is being relived in today’s church. ‘LGBT+ Christians are here today as a living community of people who passed the test. When banned from the worship group, or from praying in public, or in some cases even from attending church, we refused to stop worshipping God. Like the prophet Daniel in exile, turning to face Jerusalem to pray, even though those around him forbade him to do so, even though he could not go to the Temple itself, and he discovered God was still with him even in that foreign land. In the same way, we continued to worship and in that process, we discovered that God was with us in this place too, and thus our faith has continued to grow and develop and mature.’

'When banned from the worship group, or from praying in public, or in some cases even from attending church, we refused to stop worshipping God ... and we discovered that God was with us and our faith has continued to grow and develop and mature.'

Rachel Humphrey is a Baptist minister and a convenor in the Inclusive Evangelical (IE) network. She is a contributor to our forthcoming book, Evangelical and Inclusive – a future and a hope, being published in the Spring 2026. Her chapter, ‘How being gay made me a better Evangelical’, from which I quote here, tells at more length why she finds it ‘such a privilege to serve the LGBT+ Christian community.’ It is deeply inspiring. Such stories are repeated across the IE network and beyond - as well as testimonies of the cost and pain of being disciples of Christ who are LGBT+ in today’s church.

The evangelical tradition has always strongly encouraged personal testimony. From my Christian Union days, I remember being taught how to respond when others deny our faith and we can’t match their arguments: ‘Just tell them your story. They can’t argue with that.’ In today’s church though, many are doing precisely that - arguing with testimonies of blessed faith and witness. Why? Because they are found on the lips of Christians who are LGBT+ and their allies.

The dilemma itself is a genuine one in the evangelical world. Whether gay or straight we share our daily lives with family members, friends, and fellow Christians who are wonderful gifts to us. In our churches, however, we are told scripture teaches that God regards homosexuality and same-sex relationships as sinful. On the one hand, there is the genuine desire to be faithful to scripture. On the other, there is the apparent contradiction of meeting the undeniable life and grace of Christ among those we are told God cannot bless.

But God is clearly doing exactly that. Blessing. How can this be?

The meaning of ‘orthodox’

Those holding conservative convictions about same-sex relationships often claim the word ‘orthodox’ as their own. In ancient secular Greek ‘ortho’ meant true or right. ‘doxa’ meant belief or opinion. ‘Orthodox’ can thus be understood as ‘right belief’, and it is in this sense that conservative Christian believers are using the word today. They hold the ‘true belief’ - what they believe to be the clear, unchanging, biblical and historic faith of the church. Those with progressive views are not just considered to be unorthodox therefore – they are heretical. It is a serious as that. (1)

In secular Greek ortho-doxa meant true or right belief. When the word came into the New Testament, ‘doxa’ took on a meaning previously unknown in Greek. To reduce this to 'right teaching' misses the heart of this revelation.

Doxa means glory.

However, there is more to be said. When the word came into Christian usage in the New Testament, ‘doxa’ took on a meaning previously unknown in Greek. The old meaning of right opinion/belief disappears. What is ultimately incomprehensible to human intellect has chosen to be made manifest in our human flesh. To reduce this thought to 'right teaching' misses the heart of this revelation. The word now carries the sense of ‘divine radiance’, ‘majesty’, even ‘the being of God’.  Doxa means ‘Glory’. To be an orthodox believer is to be caught up in the glory of God’s life and presence – ‘lost in wonder love and praise’.

So, when the word is used to claim right or correct belief it has significantly narrowed in its meaning and reverted to something closer to its original secular meaning. It is arguably no longer a biblical word.

The developing of doctrine and experience.

Without a more creative and dynamic understanding of orthodox faith we will remain deadlocked.

There is a collection of theological resources currently before the House of Bishops of the Church of England – the work of the Faith and Order Commission (FAOC - to source these papers see footnote 2. The following bracketed references are from document GS Misc 1429). The relationship of doctrine, experience and the possible development of belief is explored through a number of theological voices. Among them, Kevin Vanhoozer insists that ‘instead of categorical resistance to any alteration in doctrinal expression, the church must be open “to change in a way that would be faithful to, even though different from, Christian beginnings”’ (para 13, p4).

Ellen Charry stresses the pastoral role of doctrine. Its task is ‘to assist people to come to God … guiding Christian living’. There is no single method for doing this for simply applying in any and every age.  She stresses pastoral doctrine as work of a community discernment in a way that strongly resembles the Living in Love and Faith project (paras 128-131, p37).

Alistair McGrath notes that the way ‘Christian doctrine discloses and mediates truths are relational and not merely intellectual [and] are better expressed as stories than a set of ideas’ (para 112, p33).

Mike Higton suggests that ‘on the one hand we have to trust what we have received – that the Spirit has been at work in the processes by which the tradition was formed. On the other hand, we need to accept that our current grasp of God’s gift is partial and distorted. However diligent we may have been in holding fast to what we have been shown, we are not freed from the fact that all our understanding is marbled with sin. In facing what we have inherited and are passing on, it is therefore necessary to be sharply suspicious. In binding ourselves to what we think we have heard from God, we might be (and in some ways certainly will be) binding ourselves to idols’ (para 136, p38).

Good fruit

There is one test of truth that is being widely ignored in the present debates. It is the one that Jesus himself taught. For Jesus the marks of true faith do not start from conformity to particular biblical interpretations or precise doctrinal definitions. The test he taught was altogether more practical. ‘You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles? In the same way, every good tree bears good fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit’ (Matt 7.15-18).

Put simply: if you want to know what Christian faithfulness and truth look like, look for the fruit.

There is one test of truth that is being widely ignored in the present debates.

It is the one that Jesus himself taught.

‘You will know them by their fruits.

The test of fruit applies in a variety of ways.

The test of fruit is a pastoral test.

All Christian truth is pastoral truth. It is revealed in the taking of flesh and lived out in our human relationships and communities. We are created in the image of a God who is personal and relational and whose name is Love. When Christian belief and doctrine is pronounced at a distance, without pastoral engagement with people’s actual lives and experiences, it becomes repressive and coercive. Writing on the use of the bible in pastoral care William Challis, then Vice-Principal of Wycliffe Hall, Oxford, described the function of Pastoral Theology as being ‘to prevent theology becoming oppressive, denying the truth of people’s experience’ (my italics) (3). This insight has too often been missing in the present debates over human sexuality.

the function of Pastoral Theology as being ‘to prevent theology becoming oppressive, denying the truth of people’s experience’

The test of fruit takes experience seriously.

The test of fruit teaches us to have a proper confidence in our experience. We are to look for the fruit that reflects the grace of Christ. In the New Testament this is the formative work of God’s spirit. ‘The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things.’ (Gal 5.22-23). We can trust those among whom such fruit is found.

The test of fruit requires relationship.

Fruit needs tending and care if it is to grow at all. It is impossible to discern what is growing from a safe, sanitized distance. It needs our hands-on commitment. It requires us to be in touch. We are to taste and see.

Fruit needs tending and care if it is to grow. It is impossible to discern what is growing from a safe, sanitized distance. It requires us to be in touch.

Recognising the fruit of our own lives.

Most of us fairly quickly form opinions about the qualities in other people’s lives. What is far harder is to be aware of the fruit of our presence in the lives of others. Does my faith, and my life, enable a flourishing among those called, like me, to gospel faithfulness and obedience? How would I know? It has been rightly said that the last thing we discover about ourselves is our effect. Only others can draw it to our attention. The harrowed eloquence of the Dean of Canterbury sharing his experience of being a partnered gay man in today’s church (4), or the Dean of Southwark’s moving sermon (4), are two of the more public examples, reminding the church of what it continues to inflict on the lives of faithful LGBT+ people who long ago passed the test.

Of course, not all fruit is good. We are part of a broken and sinful world and our lives bear the marks of that. There will always be bad fruit and I know no LGBT+ Christians who do not take the task of consecrated living as seriously as any. The bad fruit is not always being named for what it is and where it is found in the present debates though. These include hostility, exclusion, prejudice, false witness, the breaking of the hearts and souls of the faithful, and the narrow weaponizing of biblical texts and doctrine. Some of this is all too vocal. Even where churches outwardly express a welcoming attitude (and no church ever claims to be unfriendly), they may still use silence as a means of managing (or simply avoiding) the unsettling and divisive questions surrounding human sexuality. This too is bad fruit. ‘All the cups of tea in the world won’t change the hurt and the sense of vilification that comes from a version of Christianity that while outwardly using the language of welcome in fact condemns gay people’s most intimate and preciously expressed love, their gentle interactions with their partners, their sweet tenderness, and shared union. If a Church holds these views, gay and lesbian people will feel it. They do.’ (5)

When the fruit we are testing is new or ‘strange’ to us, particular care is needed.

Can we be sure we will recognise the good fruit when we see it though? Jesus warns us against judging those who don't fit our agenda or expectations. When his disciples attempted to stop someone from ministering because they perceived them as not being one of them, Jesus rebuked them. He said, “Whoever is not against us is for us.” (Mk 9.40). 

Those who watched Jesus were repeatedly scandalised by where, and among whom, the fruit of his ministry and preaching took root and flourished. The evidence before their eyes did not fit their learned expectations. The challenge for Jesus’s followers was to recognise and accept the good fruit of the Kingdom where it was now appearing. That meant encountering faith in strange places and among very unexpected people, even in places they had been taught were bad and to be avoided. A similar challenge faces the church today. For some this ‘strange fruit’ is not to their taste or preference. Well so what? Of what possible relevance is - ‘I don’t like this’ - to unfolding life in the Kingdom of God among us?

Those who watched Jesus were repeatedly scandalised by where, and among whom, the fruit of his ministry and preaching took root and flourished. The evidence before their eyes did not fit their learned expectations.

There are parallels here, of course, with stories of how people have come to celebrate, receive and welcome the good fruit of the ministry of women, having previously opposed it on biblical grounds. Those stories are being repeated where the good fruit of the lives of Christian men and women who happen to be LGBT+ can no longer be denied; instead, they are coming to be seen as a blessing and gift.

Glorious orthodoxy

I have long loved Bishop Michael Marshall’s summary of the character of Anglican faith. Anglican theology, he said, has sought to see ‘the whole world as sacrament, and to claim the potential within heaven and earth for glory, all waiting to be revealed’. That expresses so well where we find ourselves.

We are reaching after that life of glorious, widening orthodoxy, waiting to be revealed.

Sources

1. For a more extended discussion of the use and abuse of ‘Orthodox’ in the present context see Paul Robert’s blog: https://www.inclusiveevangelicals.com/post/on-the-use-and-abuse-of-the-term-orthodox.

2. The papers can be accessed from here: https://www.thinkinganglicans.org.uk/general-synod-papers-llf-etc/. I am quoting from GS Misc 1429: The Nature of Doctrine and the living God.

3. The Word of Life – using the Bible in Pastoral Care. Harper Collins, 1997. P10.

4. Dean of Southwark - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLM_J8YH8Fk (video)

Dean of Canterbury - https://viamedia.news/2025/10/22/winded-after-the-death-of-llf/

5. The words of an un-named contributor on a social media discussion thread.

Evangelical and Inclusive – a future and a hope, ed David Runcorn, will be published by Canterbury Press in the Spring, 2026.