Juli Slattery: This Is How the Church Can Begin the LGBTQ Conversation

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“We’ve got to understand that even those who are followers of Christ in many areas of their lives have really been discipled to think about sexuality from this perspective of, ‘God wants me to be happy and I can’t possibly be happy if I’m not living out what I perceive as my authentic self.’” 

“God’s people always tend to mix God with the idolatry of their day.”

“When we apply the [purity narrative] to the LGBTQ conversation, there is literally no context to understand gender dysphoria, same-sex attraction, other than, ‘God wants you to conform and get married.’”

“A narrative will only be received if I can fit it within my personal story. So we see a lot of young Christians in particular deconstructing from Christianity because they can’t find themselves in what they understand as God’s narrative of sex.”

“From Genesis to Revelation, what is the story of sex in the Scripture? And what we see is that the story of sexuality in the Bible is much more about the metaphorical significance of sexuality…sex speaks of the nature of God.”

“Sex is significant, gender is significant because it’s a profound form of revelation that teaches us about the covenant relationship that God has with his people.”

“What makes sense of your sexuality is recognizing that our sexuality is an earthly, temporal aspect of humanity that foreshadows the ultimate union of Christ with his church, including male and female, including the covenant promise of marriage.”

 “I think what the biblical narrative does is it really points to gender as being much more profound than our roles.”

“If my body is revealing something profound about God, then I don’t want to be part of the enemy muting that revelation.”

“When you realize this biblical narrative of sexuality, you realize we all fall short.”

“One word really grounds me, and it’s the word ‘humility,’ because humility is really the posture Jesus showed us…When I think about these issues, I always want to remind myself first, am I humble before God?”

“While humility before God is going to ground me in truth, humility before everybody else is going to ground me as being a gracious person.”

“I’ve had to really get over this feeling that it’s my job to ‘fix’ somebody or convince somebody. That’s not my work; that’s God’s work.”

“Repentance begins with me…I think when we as leaders model [repentance from our own struggles] and are honest about that, we’re not just calling the people who struggle with gender dysphoria or same-sex attraction—we’re not just calling them to self-denial. We’re saying that Jesus calls us all to that.”

“I think we have to begin with an understanding and an empathy that the reason these bills are coming about is because people genuinely believe that they will bring about human flourishing and happiness.”

“We have to say that actually, it is not sexual expression that brings happiness. It’s true intimacy with God and with other people.”

“I don’t think we need to be talking about sex a whole lot. I think we need to be talking about Jesus.”

“Our friends, our neighbors, our world’s biggest problem is not what they believe about sex. It’s what they believe about God.”

“People in pain are open to even a very offensive truth.”

“We need to be very winsome representatives of who Jesus Christ is.”

Mentioned in the Show by Dr. Juli Slattery

Ephesians 5
Matthew 19:5
Philippians 2

Authentic Intimacy
SexualDiscipleship.com

Follow Juli and Authentic Intimacy on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter

Men and Women Have Never Been More Politically Divided” by the Intelligencer’s Eric Levitz [contains info on the study Juli mentioned on women identifying as LGTBQ]

Juli Slattery: Embracing a Biblical Narrative of Sexuality
Explainer: What You Need to Know About the Equality Act
19 State Bills Seek to Restrict Transgender Athletes This Year

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Jason Daye
Jason serves as the Chief Strategy Officer at PastorServe, a ministry committed to strengthening the Church by serving pastors through personal coaching and church consulting. He also hosts FrontStage BackStage, a podcast and YouTube show, that helps pastors embrace healthy, well-balanced leadership as they develop a sustainable rhythm for life and ministry. Prior to joining the PastorServe team, Jason served as Vice President of Ministry Mobilization at Outreach, Inc., and as the Executive Director of the National Back to Church Sunday movement. Additionally, Jason served for nearly two decades in pastoral leadership, primarily as a lead pastor, in several contexts, including church plant re-launch, multisite church, multiethnic urban church, and an established suburban church. His experience as a lead pastor has provided numerous opportunities to coach and mentor pastors across the country. Jason and his beautiful wife, Monica, are the proud parents of six children and live on Anastasia Island, Florida. @jasondaye

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