I feel like someone out there needs to hear this.
I don’t remember when the lies started. But I know that sitting through our recent 'guy time’, I’ve been hearing them loud and clear. This sinking feeling starts, this alienation – it draws you in slow motion further and further outside the circle, and something in your stomach explodes and eats you slowly from the inside out – that sharp, icy, condemning lie, “you don’t belong here.”
I’ve mentioned this before, in my testimony. For as long as I can remember being attracted to anything, I’ve found that the predominant object of my sexual affection has been other men. And I look back at all God’s brought me through, the depression and the emptiness and the self-loathing, and then the inexplicable freedom and overwhelming love, the Sonship, the peace, the pain, the temptations, the stumbling, the fight, day after day, one foot in front of the other, to walk out a life of celibacy on His strength, to His glory.
And now I’m here, almost two years into my walk with Christ, and I look back on the battlefield of my life, surveying the damage done by this fight He’s been waging, Christ in me, and I can’t help but feel two things: 1) I never expected to make it this far. I remember how overwhelming this walk seemed from the start, dying to self every day for the rest of my life, when all of society was telling me that my identity should be placed in and fully experienced through my sexual orientation. I just can’t believe He’s held me this long – the Lord be my keeper. 2) From here, it is almost clear just how incredibly pervasive my struggle with same-sex attraction has been. Every facet of my perspective, every relationship, every root of pride, seed of doubt, bitterness, desperate affection, passion – it’s all somehow linked to my sexual orientation in a way that saying ‘simply don’t hook up with other guys’ completely understates the situation in every way.
Walking into this month, I’ve finally been confronted by the Lord as to what’s the best way forward. You’ve called me to be a Man of God, what does that mean?? What does that look like for me? Is that even possible, given what I’ve been through.
Guy time is important. It’s great even. But there’s this small psychological blow I take when guys get together and the first and only topic of conversation pertaining to our development as Men of God is “How are you doing with lust towards women?” And immediately, without anyone even intending, I’m out.
I don’t struggle with lust towards other women. Sexual perversion of women has never been my struggle. And I hear, shouting for my attention,
“You don’t belong here.”
“You’re different than everyone else here.”
“Nobody cares what you struggle with.”
“It’s better if you keep your mouth shut, you have no place in this conversation.”
“You don’t fit in with the guys on this squad.”
“Your struggle condemns you.”
“Go home, you’re wasting your time.”
“Your homosexual orientation disqualifies you from being a Man of God.”
It’s been tough, honestly. It would be so easy to wallow in this condemnation. But somehow God’s put on my heart a desperate desire to seek His truth in this. And as I’ve come to learn more about my identity as a Man of God in light of what I was, I’ve come to a beautiful revelation: there is nothing that disqualifies me from being a Man of God, and nothing that excuses me.
And that is true, unshakably true, for every single person on this planet.
Did you know that the only verse that explicitly talks about lusting towards other women, excluding the adulteress women theme primarily carried out in Proverbs, is found in Matthew 5:28. I’ve looked. And in every other case, sexual sin is dealt with generally, as ‘sexual immorality’, ‘impurity’, ‘fleshly desires’ etc. Lust is biblically defined as idolatry, having desirous affection towards something other than God. And in all these cases that sexual immorality and lust is mentioned, a long list of sins follows, that somehow get lost in the discussion of the attributes of Men of God, when perverting women and pornography are made the headline issue, the exclusive shared struggle, the defining, unbeatable battle for Men of God.
My sexual sin does not disqualify me, no matter what the world says, no matter how often topical conversation excludes me or condemns me, no matter how many lies the enemy speaks. This is something I’ve had to learn, to know, because I don’t ever hear it.
My sin is covered time and time again in sweeping declarations that just as I once was dead in my sexual sin, excluded from inheritance, I have now been washed, I have now been sanctified, and I have now been justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ – (1st Cor 6:9-11). It is over. When the Lord looks at me, He will never again see sinner and He will never again see sin. He will only see His Son, His perfect Son.
Man of God. Child of God. Heir.
I promise you, the Bible doesn’t disqualify. The power of the Blood works out your full forgiveness, the power of the Cross your full deliverance, and the resurrection of our Lord our full glorification as pure, perfect, loved Saints.
I’m at the point where it makes me passionately angry. I don’t care how many times your struggle with same sex attraction resurfaces – you are not disqualified. I don’t care how many children you’ve aborted – you are not disqualified. I don’t care if you’ve murdered your sister or slept with her, I don’t care if you’ve committed adultery and you commit it again 10 years down the road, I don’t care if you’ve been molested every other day of your waking life, or you’ve spent every other day molesting someone else – there is nothing that disqualifies you from salvation, from the new life Christ brings, from the new heart the Spirit gives, from the grace He has so lavishly poured out, from the inheritance He offers, from the title of Son or Daughter or Child or Man of God; there is nothing you can ever do that makes you disqualified, if you’ll just sit here and realize what He’s done for you, and let that be an anchor for your soul, your driving strength, your inmost peace.
It’s something I needed to hear, that my identity as a Son of God and my fight as a Man of God is not conditional on my past and not dependent on my sin. He offers freely, without qualification, and does the work so thoroughly for our transformation that for us to claim any part in it and move to do anything undermines the fullness of the work He’s already done. It is not about you, but it is all about you, because He is in you. And He’s stuck there, and He’s never gonna leave there. And if He’s not there yet, ask for Him to be there, and He will be, and He’ll be there forever, right inside you, making that claim on your life that you are His and you are His Child and you are a Man or Woman in His name, not only despite but because of everything you’ve ever done. He died for us as we were. He knew what we were before we did. And He doesn’t disqualify us and He doesn’t excuse us to be His children or His Men or His women, despite the diversity of our sin and our experience, for “we are all one in Christ Jesus.”
For those of you on the race, keep racing, you’re supposed to be there. For those of you about to start, keep getting ready, you’re supposed to be here. For those of you at home watching your sons or daughters or siblings or friends race and thinking you could never do the same, don’t ever doubt, you’re supposed to be here. For those of you looking for a voice, or for an ear, for someone to listen to your heart because you’ve finally had enough, don’t ever doubt, you’re supposed to be here too. For those of you who I don’t know, for everyone I do, I love you and I’m praying for you, you are in no way, and never will you be, disqualified.
Love,
Danny
