Your life. It feels like there is no hope, trapped in a well of darkness, no way out. You pray to make it all go away, if only tomorrow never dawned. The constant ping of pain ricocheting within your soul, torturing your every breath. It’s all you can do, to put one knee in front of the other, crawling down this path of living hell.
Nobody seems to hear, to understand, the screams screeching from your soul. All alone on the stage of life, if only to be heard. Crushed by the weight, drowned out by the volume of culture’s condemnation, sinking their bigoted teeth deep down, piercing your every hope. You’re slowly dying, a song inside, afraid to be born.
Not to mention religion, the Christianity that is forever assaulting you. Hate-bombs exploding. Discrimination, isolation, marginalization, shrapnel-packed spirituality. Vests full of death, waiting to be triggered, disguised as children of Light. Your every step, paralyzed in a mine field of ignorance, arrogance, and evil. Terrorism pimped as Truth.
It’s hell, it’s all hell. And you’ve had enough.
I’m not on the same path as you, but I do know what it’s like. To come to the wall, to the place in my mind, heart, and soul that concludes, this is where it has to end. I can’t take it, I can’t make it, anymore.
I’ve been that close. Looking my wife and my children in the eye. Just a trigger, a pill, an exit door away. That was me.
I am begging you, don’t do it.
Before you take your life, give anymore seriousness to the thought. Before you make your plans, plot your course.
There’s some things you need to know, you have to know, before it’s too late.
You are so Beautiful. You are the smiling gleam of your Creator’s eye.
There’s nothing wrong with you. No sin to manage, no stronghold to overcome, no flaw to repair, no tangle to unweave. The heavens declare, you are the joy of the Father, beautifully and wonderfully made. No if, ands, or buts. You’re not a question waiting for an answer, a disease searching for a cure. You are a statement from God, the period at the end of His sentence… everything He makes is good.
God loves you, completely, thoroughly. Not out of some divine obligation, but out pure, radiant pleasure. Everything about you, His hands have made. You are the intentionality of the Creator. Loaded with sacred purpose and design.
To lose you, would to be to lose Himself.
You, are that beautiful.
Religion Has This Wrong. The problem isn’t you, the problem is us.
The Christian track record is sure.
We are the authors of more confusion, division, and death than any other. Much of church, flat out sucks. Harboring some of the most bigoted, racist, discriminating, judgmental, over-fed people on planet earth. And quite frankly, they like it that way. Hell hath no fiery like an arrogant fundamentalist.
History tells the tale. Wrong about simple astronomy, wrong about black people, wrong about women; wrong, wrong, wrong. Now, leather-bound, name-engraved, wrong about you.
Those people condemning, reclined in their clubs with crosses on top. They’re wrong. Utterly, completely wrong. They are not Jesus, and they are not His heart for you. Close your ears, board up your soul. What they have done with the Bible, those six verses. It’s all wrong. Intentionally or not. Twisting, rewriting what God inspired for good, using it for harm.
Run from it, all of it, emancipate your heart. Don’t let their voice to you, become your voice to you. It is not of God, it’s of pure evil. Spit it out, every last drop.
Religion, has this wrong.
Your Struggle is Real. You didn’t ask for this, you didn’t choose it.
You’re not making this up, looking for a quick fix of attention. This isn’t some drama you’re orchestrating, sucking people in. The pain is real. Your heart is not a fool.
Your plight is genuine, deeply personal, uniquely individual. Those are real scars, fresh from the floggings. Those are real haunts, spinning in your head. Those are real cries, real blood gushing from your eyes. Nothing small about it.
No need to convince, no need to explain, no need to give reason, justification, permission for your pain. Who you are is who you are, where you are is where you are, what you are going through is what you are going. No need to pretend, to amend, to edit for for your audience. Just be you.
There are many who get it, who know it to be true.
The struggle is real, that’s all there is too it.
You are so Loved. There are lovers amidst the haters.
Maybe you didn’t get it, not from the people who should. But there is so, so much love, from people who do.
You are not alone, countless others are walking this out. Day by day, step by step. Ready to journey with you, intertwine their story with you. Curse dark skies with you, wrestle out depression’s claws with you. Stomach rejections’s vomit with you, dine at homophobic tables with you. Beat ignorance’s chest with you, pull back the knife in your hands with you.
Nothing is impossible when love is the answer. You are so loved.
Feel the hands reaching out, the hearts wide open. Hear the voices weeping… “You are deeply loved.”
God loves you. Everything about you. I love you. Everything about you.
You deserve to be desired, and all of heaven desires you.
You are so loved.
There is Hope. You have a song to sing.
A beautiful, strong, elegant, human, cosmos-penetrating hymn of life. Your life.
There is nothing more tragic than to die with your song still inside. For heaven’s sake, stand up, take your place, and frigging sing it. Be who God created you to be, with all abandon, without restraint. For such a time as this, you have been created.
It feels like the end, but this is just the beginning. Set aside everything that holds you back, believe in the beauty of all that you are, see the horizon, filled with promise. For your life is nothing less than the life someone else needs, to live theirs.
There are good people, good churches, good communities. More and more, it’s getting better. Because of you, it gets better.
Be brave, sing your song, live your life, embrace its worth.
Be brave, I say, and live.
There is hope.
You are hope.
I beg you.
Be brave, and live.
Resources for your journey:
Chris Kratzer: 980-295-0230 // ckratzer@ymail.com
Article “A Six Pack of Gay Affirmation: The Clobber Passages Revisited”
Article “Be Brave: God’s Ardent Message To Every Gay Person and The People in Their Life”
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