?He who conceals his sins will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes
them will find compassion?. (Proverbs 28:13)
MINISTRY UPDATE
This week, I have joined with our dear friends and ministry partner, Desert Stream Ministries, in the Harrisburg, PA, area for their annual East Coast Living Waters Training; 6 days of intensive ministry and equipping for pastors and lay-leaders. It is an honor to serve and lead with this team of seasoned ministry leaders and wounded-healers.
Back in 2004 God used Living Waters Training in my life while I was serving on a pastoral team at a large church in Upstate NY. Even though I didn?t fully understand it, I was in great need of deeper freedom. My experience with Living Waters Training had such a powerful impact on my life that in 2005 our senior pastor, worship pastor, executive pastor and two other lay-leaders went with me to experience and evaluate Living Waters as a possible program for our church.
God met with each of us in personal and profound ways and we knew God indeed had something special in store for our church as well; we brought the 20 week inner-healing program of Living Waters back to our area, for the benefit of our church as well as the area churches. We saw hundreds of men and women go through the 20 week commitment, walking in new freedom from old areas of bondage and wounding. God is so good! In fact, God had more than deeper healing for me through Living Waters. I actually met my wife, Melissa, at my first training and we have been married for 12 years.
These opportunities to serve a couple times each year, as well as invite pastors, leaders and lay-people to training, are clear reminders of the deeper freedom and joy our Father intends for His sons and daughters. So many of us as leaders are serving out of and living under the weight of unhealed wounds, lies and labels, and the guilt of sin that Jesus died to set us free of.
Over the years I?ve learned to notice the stark difference in the countenance of participating men and women upon arrival in contrast to the openness and joy they radiate on the final day; a fresh cleansing has come, God has brought healing to areas that were so old and so familiar they previously didn?t even recognize the burden they were carrying, deeper forgiveness has been released, etc. God is a good, good Father.
This week of ministry at Living Waters Training is folded into a broader 16-day ministry trip for me in the Northeast. From Western and Upstate NY to central PA and Eastern NJ, I will be teaching and ministering in 12 churches/ministry events. I am especially looking forward to sharing with a gathering of United Methodist pastors in Western NY, laying the groundwork to return for a Saturday conference, February 1, 2020.
These ministry and equipping opportunities are just a few of many throughout the year that your financial partnership and prayer covering help to accomplish. Thank you for standing with us! Please spread the work of Love & Truth Network to other faithful believers who love the word of God and want to see the hope of transformation and holiness remain as a beacon of hope to lost and hurting men, women and young people.
YEAR-END GIVING
In addition to prayer covering, we still need to financially grow Love 7 Truth Network in order to effectively minister in the midst of the cultural conflict we inhabit. We survive on far less than organizations such as Reconciling Ministries receive ? organizations that seek to liberalize, weaken, and water down the teachings of Scripture. When it comes to a traditional, biblical understanding of human sexuality and orthodoxy, RMN and others encourage all churches to compromise God?s message of sexual purity and identity.
Because Reconciling Ministries is in sync with a culture determined to cast off moral limits and redefine human identity, they receive grants and other income from secular sources, in addition to their members? contributions. They work with more than ten times the financial resources available to Love & Truth Network. Yet, ministry opportunity us abound. The only thing holding us back is lack of resources.
Will you join with us and partner financially in these final weeks of 2019? Would you prayerfully consider committing to a monthly gift? We cannot begin to do this ministry without your prayers and support.
EQUIPPING CORNER
As you know there has been an ongoing battle within the Christian church over human sexuality and LGBTQ+ inclusion at all levels of leadership for the last 40 years. The orthodox congregations have rightly embraced the clear teachings of scripture regarding LGBTQ+ behavior; these practices are incompatible with Christian faith and practice, while also affirming the worth of all people.
However, even though we?ve stood for the truth of God?s design for male and female sexuality we have neglected to compassionately and effectively address the pervasive issue of all sexual brokenness and the epidemic of heterosexual sexual sin and addiction which thrives in secrecy in every congregation.
The statistics are startling, compelling us to recognize the absolute necessity for thoughtful, prayerful, effective equipping in this profound area of need in every church. Our abdication of solid, prepared spiritual leadership in this area is impacting the vitality and witness of every congregation and every denomination. This is the reason our ministry, Love & Truth Network, exists. We equip the church and Christian leaders to develop environments of transparency and restoration of relational and sexual wholeness. Take a moment to ponder the reality of these statistics:
· According to a ChristiaNet survey, 50% of Christian men and 20% of Christian women are addicted to pornography, 60% of Christian women admitted to having significant struggles with lust, and 40% of women admitted to being involved in sexual sin in the past year.
· Most pastors (57%) and youth pastors (64%) admit they have struggled with porn, either currently or in the past, Barna reported.
· 34% of female readers of Today?s Christian Woman?s online newsletter admitted to intentionally accessing Internet porn in a recent poll.
· Research indicates that pornography rakes in $8-13 billion every year (Covenant Eyes) ? bigger than the NFL, NBA and Major League Baseball combined.
· 90% of children ages 8-16 have seen online pornography (guardchild.com).
While there has rightly been great debate over human sexuality and the LGBTQ agenda within across all denominations, there has been little to no serious teaching or support for the massive numbers of men, women and youth caught up in sexual sin and addiction, or hope-filled ministry for men and women who experience unwanted same-sex attraction and gender dysphoria.
I am not using these statistics to shame any particular church, or pastors and leaders who are pouring their hearts into ministry and the care of those they lovingly shepherd. Rather, I?m highlighting the epidemic of emotional, spiritual and soul-level sickness that sexual immorality (of all kinds) has fostered and has spread like cancer in our churches through secrecy and shame. These can be some of the most difficult and awkward issues to teaching on, but more importantly to model to men and women in our care and spheres of influence.
A once-a-year sermon cycle is clearly not enough to effectively address the deep chasm of sexual and relational brokenness impacting the lives of countless Christians. These are deeply rooted, shame-based realities that we desperately need the church to lovingly and truthfully speak into. Christian men are in great need of a band of brothers who know everything about each other and walk together toward Jesus. Christian women are in need of a band of sisters to do life with. Christian leaders also need a trusted and faithful group of same-gender peers they are in relationship with.
A pastor friend of mine rightly asks, ?How can the church speak the truth about sexual sin and the error of embracing LGBTQ identity, and yet not offer a shred of real hope, guidance or authentic companionship for the difficult and often excruciatingly lonely journey of life??
How can we leave people completely unequipped to know how to steward such powerful issues as sex and how to thrive as sexual beings made in the image of God as male and female. How can we stand against taking the life of a vulnerable, unborn child, but be squeamish about sexual discipleship? How can we pretend everything is ?fine? in our churches, in our homes, and in our own lives, while the truth is the souls of many Christian men, women and young people bare the pain and scars of past and current sexual damage?
The sexual revolution promised fun and freedom ? in the end it delivers neither. Solomon gives an identical warning in two different places in the book of Proverbs, ?There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death.? Proverbs 14:12 & 16:25. Paul warns us to ?Flee immorality. Every other sin that a man (or woman) commits is outside the body, but the immoral man sins against his own body.? 1 Corinthians 6:18. However, we don?t actually believe that. We think that because it?s just porn and no one knows, or I?m in love with my boyfriend and committed (without marriage) or it?s a consensual relationship, and what my wife and I have after 20 years can hardly be considered marriage any longer, somehow it minimizes or justifies our sexual immorality.
We think we can go to church most Sundays, dump a little offering in the plate as it?s passed by, engage and laugh with others in the fellowship hall and escape for another week without anyone knowing our secret. Or, perhaps we feel the conflict deeply. We hate what we?re doing. We?ve been addicted to pornography for decades, or we?ve become far too emotionally involved with someone who isn?t our spouse and feel powerless to end it. Either way, we need churches that model and live out transparency as a core value. Rather than it being strange for people to actually speak the truth about their struggles in a safe church setting, it should be strange not to.
Instead, church leaders and the broader body of Christ are largely silent on such topics. Where are the stories that give God glory for rescuing us out of dark places and sexual addiction? Why are we so afraid to talk about sex and sexuality? Why are we leaving sexual discipleship to our schools, to movies and entertainment, to peers and friends, or mentors such as ?Planned Parenthood? (an organization that thrives on a sexually active society and resulting abortions)?
I had the privilege to teach a session at a conference alongside Dr. Julie Slattery in 2018. Dr. Slattery co-founded ?Authentic Intimacy? a ministry that also equips leaders on sexual and relational wholeness. I just finished her excellent book entitled, ?Rethinking Sexuality?. One of the statements she made at the conference that has forever been engraved in my mind is? ?In today?s culture we cannot begin to fulfill the great commission without addressing sexuality?. It was from Dr. Slattery that I first heard the term ?sexual discipleship?, as a positive and vital responsibility of the church. We can no longer ignore the profound need all around us.
Our children and loved ones are being taken captive by the enemy to do his will, II Timothy 2:26. What is the church intentionally and actively offering as a solution to the deceptive allure of the world?s view of sex any way and every way we want? How are we as Christ-followers finding freedom from our own sexual sin and becoming equipped to help others? Are we correcting with gentleness or are we just quarrelsome? II Timothy 2:24-25.
The church has become known to outsiders as being against everything that often defines the wider culture, while clearly living as hypocrites (based on the above statistics, and many others). God help us break the mold of silence, shame and secret sin. God help all churches to become known as many compassionate, teaching hospitals for hurting people?that we would get honest ourselves and find the healing we need?rather than spouting a lot of empty platitudes or hollow-sounding truths that alone won?t quell the ache of loneliness or the pain of unhealed wounds that often drive us to use sex and broken ways of relating as counterfeits for the real relationships that God has intended to meet some of our deepest needs.
As mentioned earlier in this article, Love & Truth Network exists to equip pastors and leaders on how to effectively develop healing environments for the restoration of relational and sexual wholeness. Whether a person is experiencing heterosexual or LGBTQ desires or conflict we believe God?s power to transform lives is just as available today as ever. Most brokenness occurs in the context of relationship. Likewise, we are made whole through whole-enough relationship. While prayer is always a vital part of transformation, there?s no such thing as ?pray the gay away? or ?pray the porn away.? We need others over the course of a long journey with Jesus, toward our true home.
