Christian, Find Something Better To Do (Stop Bullying The LGBT Community)

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We get it, you think it’s all so wrong, offensive, and dangerous. Homosexuality is a grotesque abomination, and transgender people, a product of out-of-control sexual anarchy. To have it all just go away—your secret prayer. You hate it, everything about it. The conservative America of your dreams, where people think, believe, and live as you do—with little white churches and women in kitchens, it feels like it’s all slipping through your fingers. To the privileged, the emergence of equality always feels like war.

Your best idea? Fight back, give them hell, that’s where they’re all going anyways, right? Condemn, discriminate, marginalize, and demonize every face that bares the image of that which you would eradicate. Silent treatments, church discipline letters, legislations, a swift kick in the crotch—whatever it takes. Sure, we hear the talking points that plead your obligation to the “clear teachings” of the bible. We hear your messages of believed hope that a cure is just a sobbing, knee-bent, repentance session away. Besides, you’re just doing your job—the sum of your faith, to wield your sword in defense of a holy God. You want us to believe your cause is filled with such divine honor—the purity of God’s holy word and His people, the safety of women and children, the rights of faithful, Christian business owners are all in the balance.

Your love-dilemma is sady all so clear—to worship your god and proclaim his gospel with all your heart, mind, and soul requires you to pump the breaks at ever turn and love people with restraint and carefulness for fear a sinner might actually conclude that love is all that’s needed, and from God, all that’s given. To be sure, you have my deepest sympathies, for what a hell it must be to live and love like that.

Correct me if I’m wrong. Love—this is what you call it, is it not?  This is what it looks like, among those in your faith franchise, to “love God and people” in adherence to your mission statements. With the same breath with which you praise His name, it seems you have no problem, not even a prick of reservation in weaponizing a good dose of shame and packaging it as love. You know it hurts, you know is destroys, you know it kills, but you pull the pin anyway—the shrapnel of condemnation blowing gouging wounds deep into the soul. The cold, resolved look on your face tells us you’re ok with that, because that’s what your sin-focused version of Jesus requires, and what best justifies and validates your faith. In your mind, God loves people where they are at, but He doesn’t leave them there—and somehow, it’s your job to do the policing and the rehabilitating. 

When it’s all said and done, like a needle needs a vein, your brand of Jesus needs an enemy—it’s a kind of spiritual addiction where one can easily become a special kind of junky, and not just a junky, but a bully. For what’s a bully to do without someone to bully? What’s a spiritual junky to do without a fix of people-condemnation from which to pull a rush of self-righteousness? Those are the ultimate questions for your Jesus-hijacking religion. You know exactly what you are doing, yet you do it anyways—like a spiritually pubescent, playground bully whose best idea for free time is to find someone to devour.

It’s no wonder that everything you do and say falls flat, because your every move and motivation is lined with fine print, hurt, condition, self preservation, and self justification. This is what we see, and the impact your walk is making.

Truth is, Jesus has far more noble things for you to be doing than throat-punching the LGBT community and calling it a handshake.

In fact, when all heavenly power and authority were given to Jesus, His first impulse was to kneel down and wash feet—and that, without condition nor agenda, serving humanity because it’s the God-thing to do.

So let me ask you, where do we see you bowing down, harnessing all power and authority, having an overriding impulse to serve the LGBT community, without condition nor agenda? Where do we see you on hands and knees, dying to serve this community?

In the face of harsh, spiritual conservatism, we see Jesus boldly breaking religious laws to render aid to the outcast—healing and feeding the broken, going against fundamentalist grain for the sake of a fellow human because it’s the God-thing to do.

So, let me ask you, where do we see you doing whatever it takes, even rebelling against popular, modern conservative Christianity in order to help the LGBT community? Where do we see you breaking free, blazing through religious barriers to be unconditional love to this marginalized community?

Jesus aimed the tractor-beam of His ministry towards the inclusion of the very people religion left out—women, children, foreigners, those deemed to be the “sinners,” the “unclean”, the sick, the outlaws, and the murderers, all because it’s the God-thing to do.

So let me ask you, where do we see you aiming the sum of your energy, efforts, and influence towards the inclusion of the LGBT community? Where do we see you fighting for the equal rights, the human dignity, and the justice of the religiously discarded and dehumanized—this entire community?

There are only two occasions on which Jesus is specifically recorded as being angry.  In both moments, it was at people who were withholding grace, because getting up in the face of grace-withholding people is the God thing to do.

Fine, you think LGBT is a sin, that’s your conclusion. So, let me ask you, where can we see your anger on display towards people who are withholding grace from the LGBT community? Where do we see you passionately denouncing condemning rants and judgmental allegations?

Unconditional, serving, grace-giving, people-embracing, condemned-defending, religious rule-breaking, all-inclusive love is the only thing on God’s “to do” list.

My simple question for you is, is it on yours? And if not, why?

Christian, find something better to do, stop being a bully, and calling it believing.

The only one being fooled, is you.

4 Comments

  1. Lori

    I appreciate the way you advocate for this. I think it’s neat that you mentioned feet washing. I washed an LGBT woman’s feet and three prayer meetings later, God set her free. I didn’t say a word, God did all the work. I started praying and by the end I knew what He wanted from her. I just told her the pictures I saw and let her decide what she wanted. She opted to get set free. She may have to walk this out, I don’t know but she does know that those thoughts were not from God and we love her deeply even though she had them. She may have them again, she may not, I’ve seen both results. Either way she’s on a path to freedom in Christ.

    • Keith A. Jenkins

      God “set her free” from what, Lori? Why do you think being LGBTQ is something someone needs to be set free from? If she was born that way, why would she need to change or be set free?

      You say, “I started praying and by the end I knew what He wanted from her.” This statement of yours is quite frightening. Back in my college days, in our Christian community on campus, we referred to this kind of thinking as “God told me to tell you.” It was invariably connected with a self-righteous, manipulative, holier-than-thou attitude. I’m not saying that’s what you intend, because I don’t know you. I’m just saying you might want to be careful about how your statements come across.

  2. Tad Petrie

    OK first of all, God’s Grace is there for ANYONE to appropriate ANYTIME. It is quite literally impossible for anyone to “Withold” God’s Grace. If it were possible for us to “Withold” God’s Grace from someone, that would mean we would have the power to choose who gets saved and who doesn’t. Not one single human has that kind of power, period.

    Having established that people do not have the power to prevent anyone from being saved, let’s continue. Your statement, “Fine, you think LGBT is a sin, that’s your conclusion.” is breathtaking in it’s absurdity sir! Homosexual behavior is sin, just like heterosexual behavior outside of marriage is sin, just like murder is sin, just like theft is sin, and the list goes on and on and on! Sin is sin, that’s reality. You can say that two plus two equals five all day and night, but in the end two plus two is going to equal four, no matter how many times you say it equals five. You can say homosexual behavior isn’t sin all you want, but the reality is, it is sin.

    I have dealt with homosexuality issues in my life since I became a Christian, lo those many years ago. It is one of the sin issues in my life I will have to struggle with until I die. I went to a trusted brother in Christ and asked him for help, he prayed with me and I found strength and forgiveness there. When a Christian is doing something in opposition to God’s Will, the Holy Spirit is there to guide us and restore us. Because living outside of God’s Will eventually leads to a miserable life. I know this from long years of personal experience!

    The best way we can serve the so-called “LGBT Community” is to bring them into a relationship with God, period! Oh and by the way, there are a LOT of our brethren who treat people in the so-called “LGBT Community” HORRIBLY! Why do they do that you ask? Well, to start with, they sin just like the rest of us do! And we are called to forgive them and to encourage them to change their ways. In other words, God’s Grace applies to them, just like it applies to anyone else in sin. You might want to consider that.

  3. Lindsay

    This is BEAUTIFUL!!! If I am ever in Orlando, I would love to pay a visit to your church. I’m a Jew, not a Christian, but The Creator is THE CREATOR, and your words resonate lovingly across any differences. (BTW, all religions have those who set themselves up as judges, juries and self-appointed mouthpieces for The Eternal. Never good. So that rings true across the differences, too.)

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