I am your
friend. I’m gay. Homosexual if you like. I have always felt this way. I have never been
able to connect with heterosexuality and I believe that because I cannot tell
you how it began that it is part of my being.
I therefore don’t know if anything can really change. I know the words of the Bible because I
follow Christ. Now what? ---
My friend is
gay (or homosexual, as my friends put it). He doesn’t know how it started or
when it started. So he believes that
it’s always been a part of him and therefore born with it making it something God
accepts and is open to. ---
Searching for
answers, I spoke to someone who said they were in the gay lifestyle and they
also followed Christ and he (Jesus) led him out of the lifestyle. Is that really possible? What does it mean for
someone to be led out of the lifestyle? I don’t know what to think.
Here is how
our conversation went:
He asked me
what my prayer is for my friend. I thought that was an interesting question, since
I’d never really thought about it. I just simply prayed that he would change,
that God would do something to change him. Having to face that question caused
me to realize that I didn’t know what to pray for. I just know that Jesus loves
us and I wanted my friend to be loved by Jesus.
I never realized
that Jesus would love him where he was at and that he would bring him to
salvation. All because it’s a free gift,
available to everybody and that they don’t have change anything with their
lives before they can receive it. From that point (Salvation) it is in God’s
hands to do with them as he pleases. The man I spoke to said, “Yes that’s true”.
In fact, he pointed out that there is a responsibility of the person (who is
dealing with homosexuality) toward God as well. This was a comfort, but not an
easy comfort.
He went on to
ask me again what my prayer was for my gay friend. I told him it was that my
friend would stop being attracted to men.
That he would be heterosexual and that God would be pleased with that. As I spoke the words, I realized that my
prayer was less for him and more for me. It was less about him finding the love
and the peace that Jesus has to offer and more about me just wanting to change
him to something that I could relate to. My need to relate to him as a
heterosexual is why I cannot seem to get answers from God because I’ve blocked
God’s ability to talk to me and give me the words to speak to the friend I love
so dearly.
What if my
prayer and my speech to my friend was only about the love of Jesus, this man
said? What if I never spoke about the sex that he has with his friends? What if
I never spoke about what I think is a right relationship with another man in his
life? Again, he went back to, “What if I only told you how much Jesus loves you. That your creator died and rose again, so
that you could be with him for eternity.”
What if? What if?!
He went on to
explain that so many have failed their friends and the world has failed its
people. The church has failed its people, because they try to change people
into something they don’t know can be done. We try to make them into the mold
of what’s right in our minds to make it easy to accept them. But that’s not what Jesus did.
Jesus was accused
of being with sinners. Are
you being accused of being sinners? Is
the church pointing at you and calling you names and calling you out because
you’re with the sinners, telling them about the grace of Christ? If not, then
shouldn’t you look at your walk and relationship with Jesus? Discover the truth of the grace that Jesus
brought to all!
The Bible
says that we are sinners saved by grace through faith, lest any man should
boast and not by works (EPH 2:8). If this is true, then it doesn’t matter what
sin someone is in when they receive Christ. It matters that they receive Christ!
From this point, he leads them on and out of their trouble(s) by his Grace. It
has nothing to do with your leading them where you think they should or need to
go.
Your job in this area is to walk with them and lead them into the truth and
knowledge of Christ and what the Bible says about the love of Jesus. So I said
to him, “Well, there’s Scriptures that speak against these behaviors and so
that’s what I tell them.” What makes you think they need you to tell them that?
Are you the “be all” and the answer to all the needs in their mind? Without knowing it you say, “Hey, you have to
stop living this way so God can love you.”
Someone (or you) just got done spending all this time with them telling
them about Jesus and bringing them to salvation and you’re there to tell them
what their salvation did not do. Who are you, what are you talking about, what
God do you serve?
He told me
all of these things and went on to say, instead of looking at the sin, look at
the light. Instead of looking at ones’ lifestyle, look at the light of God. Let your goal be life because we are called
to be light, which brings life. Jesus said in John 10:10, “He is life and he brings
life more abundantly”. He is life
everlasting. He is the truth, the life
and the way (John 14:6). It is not for
you to decide when or how one experiences life in Christ. That’s what he said
to me.
From that
short conversation, I realized that the love I have for my friend is true and real.
It’s good and it’s healthy and God will bless it. But, he went on to show me,
it’s flawed too. Because (in some ways),
I have been putting myself in the equation. I put my opinion where God needs to
be. I put my opinion in what God needs
to do and how God needs to do it, when God needs to do it and why God needs to
do it.
I was shown
that when I put myself in a position of making it my correction of your sin or
your need, I become God. Not thinking that’s a good idea!
And I know
now that I will always fail because I have no better handle on the knowledge of
good and evil, than Adam and Eve did after they ate the fruit of the tree.
God has
knowledge of sin. He knows what it is and he knows what he died for. He knows that he covers us and that we are
saved from the death that sin brings through a relationship with Christ.
I know now
that the love of Jesus transforms everything.
He conquers all, he is the change.
He is the one who makes us a new creation in him. “I am the
righteousness of God in Christ” (2Cor5:21) said my saved “gay” now Christian
friend. God is the power that changes us
and transforms us into his image.
So I will no
longer pray for heterosexuality. I will
no longer pray for changes that I think have to be made in someone else’s life.
I choose now to follow Christ and pray
for my friend and let God lead me into what specifically needs to be prayed
for. I choose to listen to Christ when he says to reach out to my friend and
ask them what they need prayer for. If ever I wanted to know what they need (from
God) in their lives, I need only ask them. I no longer need to pray my opinions
into their lives.
I get it
now! What they need (their prayer
request), what they tell me, is exactly what God is trying to tell me they
need. Why don’t we all understand that? Why don’t we all listen to the people to whom
we are speaking? Receive their prayer
request and receive it from their heart.
He has shown
them his power and his will for their life. I do not need to pray against
them. I don’t need to pray my opinion or
my self-righteousness. I need to pray
what they said they need and want from our loving father.
I pray that
we come together.
My name is
John. I am a Christian and I am from the gay lifestyle and it was because of
the love of Christ that I am where I am today and I do what I do. The love of
Jesus is for all! I will never ever back off of that truth!!!
If you
struggle with same-sex attraction, homosexuality, sexual identity, pornography
or anything else that has taken over or devastated your life, we look forward
to walking with you. I want you to know
how much I love you and how much Christ loves you. Free Indeed is a ministry.
But the truth of it, the basis of it, is that we are people who simply have a
logo but greater than that we have a heart for you.
We have a God
that we serve that loves you because he created you. Just like us he wants to save you and have a
relationship that will last an eternity.
He wants to give you eternal life right there where you sit in the midst
of your pain. Maybe you’re drinking or doing drugs to dull the pain because it
seems there is no other way out. He wants to meet you right where you are.
Don’t be afraid. Don’t be afraid that the darkness is so dark that you cannot
find your way out. We are reaching our hand to you. We love you.
I love you and I know God is so powerful that
he can do anything (for you) that needs to be done.
God bless you
and keep you!
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