Sex Talks Pt6 . James Parker

All righty.

Well welcome everyone.

If you are not

presently in the auditori we can hear my dulcet

tones.

Follow the sound of my voice.

Come on in, grab a seat.

Thank you all for coming out tonight.

Pretty excited about tonight.

Tonight.

It's going to be a rollering.

Good time.

Yes it is.

And as you can see here, we have a Slido.

So if there is any questions that come up for you

tonight, then, I'd encourage you to

put them onto Slido.

Can't guarantee we're gonna get to every single question, but I did just

talk to James A. Little while ago and asked him if he would be willing to do

part two if we think that is needed.

And he said

part 7, 8, 9, 10.

So, whatever is needed.

So don't get too discouraged if your question doesn't get answered tonight.

And just so you also know, just due to the sensitive nature of the

topic tonight, you know, you can submit your questions anonymously.

We're not gonna know, who submitted them just on that though.

for those of you who

are prone to putting other people's names for the name in

Slido, can we not do that tonight?

Can you anybody know what I mean?

It's some, some, some funny thing that some people like to do.

Sometimes when we use Slido, pretend to be someone

else.

But let's just, not worry about putting

names on our questions tonight.

Okay?

Whether they are ours or someone else's, that would be grand.

All right.

So how tonight is going to roll is that, I'm gonna throw to a video in

a moment, which really helps explain,

James's story.

And then, Paul and James are

gonna come up here and Paul is gonna interview James, and they're

gonna have a chat together, and then they're gonna get into your questions.

And we'll just keep monitoring Slido throughout tonight to

see what other questions.

And even if you don't have a question, you can always jump on Slido and vote

for if there's a question there that you're like, oh yeah, I'm, I really

wanna know the answer to that one.

But just as we prepare ourselves, for

tonight, can I just, encourage you for a

moment to just consider your posture?

And by that I don't mean your physical posture, although a lot of us could do,

we're sitting up straighter and putting our shoulders back on all of that.

I'm talking about the posture that you have come with

tonight internally.

and I would encourage you to adopt.

that humble learning posture.

James is somebody that

we profoundly

trust in this space.

James and I were talking

a few weeks ago and we're actually, remember James has actually been

to our house, Adam, but neither James and I can remember why

James was at our house years ago.

We are assuming it was for good, not

nefarious reasons.

but our paths have

crossed.

We had a great chat a

few weeks ago and, most of you are familiar with, Mr. Morrison over here,

and he is very good mates with

James.

And so James's, story is incredibly powerful.

but due to the na,

like I said before, the sensitive

nature of this topic, I just wanna encourage

us to make sure that we are, as

we're in, I guess, engaging with tonight, as we are considering

our questions and how we're wording our questions,

to just be kind, to be Christ-like in

our posture.

Um.

You know, sometimes we can get very strong feelings

around issues like this.

and I would just encourage

you, if you're having

strong feelings to, just, you know, just

take a deep breath,

lean in, listen, pray.

in this room there

will be a gamut of different perspectives on this

issue, and that's okay.

we're mature followers

of

Christ, and, we can, discern and glean and have kind, conversations around

what is a really difficult topic.

And I also just wanna acknowledge that perhaps.

You know, some of you have come here tonight, some of you come with questions.

You really wanna know how to just be well equipped to have conversations in

this space with people that you love, that people you are journeying alongside.

And that is great.

You know, that is one of our aims here at the Red Door, is to quit the saints for

the work of the ministry, whatever that

ministry might be.

but also perhaps you

might be here tonight, and this is profoundly personal for you.

And our hope and prayer is that in what can be incredibly challenging, difficult

place that through what James shares tonight, through his story, that you

would feel seen and known and understood.

Because we don't make any assumption, any assumptions here

about where people are at in

this journey.

And, I would like to think that, red door is a safe

place.

That if this is something that is deeply

personal for you, that we are more than happy

to

hear your story and to do what we can pray

with you, encourage you, however the good Lord leads.

Hey, so let me pray and then I am going to throw to the screens.

So, Lord, we submit tonight into your hands.

Holy Spirit, would you come and would you lead and guide

every part of the conversation?

And Lord, would you, help us all to be.

Just, just adopting that posture

of leaning in.

And, holy Spirit, would

you minister profoundly in

this place tonight, for whatever needs are represented here.

and Lord, we thank

you for James and we thank you for his story and his testimony and his

willingness to be so very brave and courageous in sharing his story and

ministering so powerfully in this place.

So would your blessing and your grace rest upon him and just guide Paul and

James' conversation into the places where you know that it needs to go?

In Jesus' name, amen.

All right, well, let's have a look at the screens.

When I was 14, I plucked up the courage.

Oh man, it took some courage to call the National Lesbian and Gay helpline.

The man on the other end of the phone, when I explained to him my situation,

he said to me, yes, you are gay.

And that he told me this was my only option, that I needed to embrace this.

And then, and only then would I find happiness.

I remember thinking, is this it?

Is this the only option that I've got?

But I couldn't think of any other option, but to pursue my future as

a gay man, it was when testosterone kicked in around puberty that that I

suddenly was left erotically craving man.

And most prominently in the areas where I'd.

Failed to be touched and where I'd failed to be filled with

that fatherly and brotherly love.

I found myself just trying to, to fill this with so much pornography

and, and masturbation and I was lost in a world of sexual fantasy.

I came out to my family and to my close friends when I was 17 years old and all

of them affirmed me, wishing me well.

At the age of 18, I moved to London for university and I threw myself

into the gay community and I saw it as my duty to challenge different

organizations and institutions that dared to turn around and say in any

way whatsoever that Gay wasn't okay.

I said, this is the way we are.

This is who we are.

Back off.

I'd learned to believe myself to actually be a heterosexual

woman stuck in this male body.

I was just desirous of trying to find my Mr. Wright, and then I found him.

He was everything that I wanted, and he ticked all my boxes and

other people looked up to us to model their own relationship.

On the relationship that I had with my long-term boyfriend called Steve.

It was while at university, I made a decision that I wanted to put God

into the driving seat of my life with other young Christians my own age.

These young people had an intimacy with God that I didn't have.

But I wanted it the more time that I spent quietening my soul in prayers.

I began to see that my boyfriend was craving from me a sense of

affirmation in his masculinity, and that neither of us really had what

it took to truly affirm each other.

I came to the tough realization that I needed to break off my relationship

with my long-term boyfriend.

So I did, even though I'd been in a long-term relationship, I'd actually

used and I'd been used by over 200 male sexual partners in quite a short space

of time, such as my craving need to connect, such as the craving need of

all these other men to connect there.

We were using, and really we were abusing each other.

We put me into a place where I began to question more deeply what was happening

within me, and I came across this fatherly older Christian man who basically, he

would hold his gaze and look into my eyes.

He would embrace me with this deeply appropriate, non sexualized touch,

and he didn't see me as this gay man with a label or inside of a box.

He wasn't frightened to go back and to look at a number

of incidents from my past.

I'd been abandoned at birth, I'd been incubated, I'd been fostered.

I'd been orphaned before being adopted.

He helped me to face the pain and the grief that I'd been sexually abused by

an older Christian man, a married man, and by an older friend of the family.

These men had literally stripped me of my dignity and they'd left me in depravity.

I was brought to a very specific place where I knew that there were five people

that I had to go and face, and not just to face them, but to forgive them.

I had to go back and meet my childhood abusers.

And I wasn't letting them off the hook.

I was saying to them that they had to be sorry for what they'd done to

me, but I was there to forgive them.

I was there to release myself from the pain and the misery that they

put upon me during my childhood.

I went and I found my two birth parents, and I made peace there with my past.

So forgiveness became paramount on my journey.

And I remember reading in Joel two verse 25 in God's word, where he

says, I will restore to you the years that the locust has eaten.

So my addictions and my sexual fantasy and my craving for pornography just

began to reduce my anxiety reduced, my self-harming, disappeared.

My feelings of suicide were no more.

My voice had dropped, my walk had become much more masculine and very deliberate.

I learned what it was to take my place as a man among other men, and

nobody was more shocked than me when I began to notice the curves of women.

I began to start dating women and then before too long I entered into

marriage and then I became a father.

A joy that is absolutely indescribable, and this was something

that I was told outrightly that I would never and could never be.

Even though there are still some rare occasions when I experience

same-sex attraction, the way in which I deal with those attractions

has completely changed Christ.

Jesus took onto himself on the cross, my victimhood.

I now see that I'm not just a victim and a survivor of my past,

and I leave you with this question.

You, the viewer.

What do you think I am today?

The victim or the victor?

That answer is yours.

Awesome.

There you go.

This is James.

Everyone, put your hands together.

James.

Hey buddy.

Great to be with you.

Great to be

with you.

Great video.

I was just, we were

trying to remember

before 2013 we met and,

yeah, 12 years ago.

Yeah.

When you just, you'd moved from the uk you, were you immediate

liaising for the Catholic Up?

I was the head of media and communications to

begin with for the, Catholic archbishop

and the Archdiocese of Perth.

Yeah, yeah.

All of that joined the Royal Commission as well.

Yeah,

so that's what I began.

Yeah.

Introduced her, a mutual

friend, Ian Cameron.

And, we've stayed connected

and

That's right.

And a few things together and just, he's such a beautiful soul.

You'll see

that tonight.

But, I just wanna reiterate

what Dale said.

Just grace upon grace for tonight, for all of us, you know, with,

but for God's grace, go, any of us in life, you know, other stories.

And so it is something

that is, is, is deep.

you know, touching

on the issues of identity, you know, in such a

profound way.

And so, you know, the irony

for me, a complete redneck from Penley, you know, walking through

this, this nuanced conversation, it's such a privilege even for, to think,

well, God's done in my own life.

But let's talk about James.

So is he a victim or Victor?

Oh, me.

We are more than conquers in Christ.

That's it.

Strong and victorious in everything.

And, and you, you know, Dale, you said thank you for James.

It's James' story.

Well, really it's Jesus' story because it, it's, it's literally,

as you heard in my own story, gosh, I got really moved by that tonight.

I, I watched that video a hundred times and tonight just, it moved me in a whole

different way because I, I'm, I'm very aware of so many who struggle in pain in

this topic, and I'm very aware of people.

I have a cousin who took his life at the age of 40.

He was gay and the world promised him everything, but it wouldn't give it, he,

he couldn't provide and he had enough.

And so there's many there, you know, so am IT victim, may I'm

unquestionably the victor because of what Jesus did on the cross.

Yeah.

Awesome.

Awesome.

So what, why are we here tonight?

Like for, I guess we've heard a piece of your story, but the conversation

we're talking about, you know, sex and gender with James Parker.

For you to be in this space where you want to actually be so

vulnerable in this context, what's happened to bring, to make that

in some way, that last line there in the screen come out, come home,

that phrase come out is normally associated with LGBTQ, qia, AP

plus two s things, whatever.

We'll just might just say L GB a bit in the

later anyway, but, but actually everybody

has to come out and that's why I'm really grateful to Red Door for being willing

to, to actually address this topic.

You know, I'm looking around the room and no offense to those of you above 40,

but there's quite a number here who are under 40 and that says a lot about Red

Door, but it says about the importance of this topic to this present generation.

This is the topic.

This is TikTok, this is Snapchat.

This is what's going on out there.

It's just, for the most part as ever, God bless the church and I hope he does.

No, I know he does.

But actually this is, these are the conversations we need to be having.

This isn't just the, in some way, that plus at the LGB is, is, is

probably actually really quite

prophetic in some way, in the sense that it

just says we all need at some point or other to come out of our hiddenness

and our darkness and to be able to have the conversations that we need

to be able to have around a topic and topics that affect all of us.

I mean, I. I, I, I cannot meet a family today that doesn't have somebody in

it where somebody's come out as LG or B or, and by the way, for those of

you over 40 or whatever, you've got lesbian, gay, you've got bisexual,

you've got transgender, you've got queer, you've got questioning, you got

intersex, you've got allies, you've

got, asexual, you've got polysexual.

You've got pansexual.

You've got, I mean, a whole gamut of different things.

If we start going into gender names, whoa.

You know, we tell you the first five, and most people fall off the

edge of the cliff because, because things are moving so rapidly.

And this is a topic that is not just affecting each family and in some

way or other, all of us, through the media that we see, whether we

like it or not, it's everywhere.

It's in the supermarkets.

It it, I mean, I went to buy some Oreo biscuits and it was all about

being an ally for the LGBT community.

Oreo biscuits.

Gimme a break.

You know, I just want my sugar fix.

Anyway, that's another place I need

healing.

But anyway, but the long way short

of it is, is that this is something that affects everybody.

And Jesus, when he said on the cross, it is finished, he meant I

have done everything necessary to bring every stray sheep that he

talks about in Isaiah 53, and we've all gone astray, like lost sheep.

He says, I provided a way that every one of you can be restored.

And I'm here because it is literally a miracle that I

sit here before you tonight.

It's just that I'm work, walking and working and serving in this area, and

I'm seeing God do miraculous things.

And I'm saying where the church doesn't wanna wake up to it, God

is still doing miraculous things.

I'm just watching God build people up outside of the church because the churches

aren't necessarily opening their doors.

Whatever color they are, bread's a nice color to people who

are struggling in this area.

Yeah.

So that, that, that's why we're having this discussion tonight

because this is the bread and butter of what our societies are.

Let's, I, I was gonna go here later, but let's just go straight there.

That tension, that dichotomy of

the world with, with, rainbow flags on Oreos

at the supermarket, and you told me y yesterday, 500 churches

in 700 churches in Singapore.

500. There

are 300, 300 churches in Singapore, sorry.

200 of them are supporting ministry specifically in this area.

And, and here in Perth, nobody, you don't, you dunno of one, there's not

one church that says, we really wanna walk with you and walk alongside you.

We want to have, in a sense, I don't care what you call it, a person that's

really gonna take a hold of this topic and wanna understand it so we can

walk with those in this congregation.

So that's

what I'm asking, like what do you, why, like, what's going

on that this is so prevalent.

You know, it turns up in your shopping aisle and we are going,

well, what's happened?

If this is, why

is it such a hot, but why?

Why?

Because the stigma for the coming out you like our language is we come

out in terms of we confess our sin.

We've all got something to come out from.

But why is this such a, it so hard to hold?

Partly because what's happened is, is the church has

in some way it's become very black and white in its thinking on this topic.

Again, older people realize this was a topic you wouldn't discuss in church.

20, even 30 years ago you wouldn't, you know, pornography

and masturbation on a screen.

Oh my god.

You know, the pastor would have endless letters 'cause they wouldn't

have had emails in those days.

Might have been easier, Adam.

You could have burnt the letterbox anyway.

But the bottom line is this is, is the church has remained

silence, but society and politics has moved on with these things.

Yeah,

yeah.

And what's happened is, and look, and I'm not blaming

politicians, I fight politicians.

Some of'em.

I really love some of 'em not so keen on.

But God says you love 'em, so I do.

But nevertheless, the bottom line is this is they're only for the most part

responding to where people's pain are at.

And they're trying to find answers.

That the world can give.

Mm.

But the answers the world can give, I don't care how heterosexual, whatever term

your knowledge you use for yourself, we have all gone astray and we all need the

blood of Christ to come and to redeem us.

We just do.

You cannot live a complete life and life to the full as Jesus was talking

about, until we surrender at the cross.

And so what's happened is the church has not been in, in a sense, it has

not been listening to the voice, or it's not been listening to the hearts

and the stories of people in our own families, in our own society, et cetera.

It just hasn't been doing that.

Yeah.

And that's why we are where we are today.

Yeah.

And so then we see the attempt of the world and the language

they're using, which unredeemed it as, as it is inclusion.

What a profound word.

Like what does inclusion really, really mean for those who, who

might actually hold the answer?

What?

What are we talking about?

Well, the challenge becomes this is is, and this is where in a sense we've

gone into a world now that's about rights rather than responsibilities.

Mm-hmm.

You know, as you watch my video, there were many people deterring

me away from following Christ.

They thought I got involved in some cult when I started hanging around

with a group of young people who liked this thing called worship.

You know?

Well, no offense, we were doing our own type of worship in

the bedroom and other places.

I can assure you.

Just looked different.

But what happened is this is, is they, they were trying to deter

and, and pull me back from that, but it did demand surrender.

There are three really important words here.

And again, I don't know that the church itself, we as believing believers in

Jesus Christ, have fully understand and stood the need for respect

for sensitivity.

And the third word, this is probably the most important one for me, is compassion.

It's broken down into two Latin words, compassion, which means to suffer

with someone in some way or other.

We all suffer around aspects to do with sexuality or identity.

And if we don't today, we have at some point in the past, only in the past, there

was a pretty clear cut pathway to follow.

Today there is an invitation into so many different rabbit Warrens

and pathways that seem to be lit with every color of the rainbow, but

actually leads to a very dark place.

Mm. And that's why we as a church, need to engage with this.

And that's why we, first of all, those of us within the church

need to take this topic seriously.

Because let me tell you, if you've been hurt by anybody, and in every

L-G-B-T-Q story, I listen to and I've heard thousands, there's pain.

Mm-hmm.

And if you are not sensitive to that person's pain and respectful of their

story and willing to walk a journey, then you discover it often on the way.

'cause every story's unique.

A story of suffering with that person and compassion to the degree that you can do.

If you're not willing to do that, they will smell a mile off.

You can't be trusted.

Yeah.

And they'll stay away.

Mm-hmm.

So if our own churches don't become a place where we can come out and come

home, why should we expect anybody to walk through the front door?

Mm-hmm.

And if they do walk through the front door, let me tell you, I was

gonna say it takes balls, but for some of them they've lost those.

Sorry, you gotta laugh about this topic,

but it takes a lot of courage.

Yeah.

It takes a lot of courage.

For some of you, it took courage to walk through the door of this

church and this may not be your key topic that you were struggling with.

Mm-hmm.

So when I say this is why we have to be incredibly sensitive.

Mm-hmm.

Look, at the end of the day, every, when we're talking about this

topic, we're talking about unique individuals with unique stories.

We're talking about a heart that longs to be loved and to love.

In return, we're talking about somebody who is already their biggest judge.

The biggest judge of you is the person that often looks in the mirror.

Yeah.

Not your neighbor, it's you.

Our society teaches us that.

So if we haven't got a welcoming open heart to be able to meet where

people are, that people where they are, then in, in some way, we aren't

gonna be able to move forward.

This topic.

Yeah.

Yeah.

The irony that the holders of the light, in this case seem most

afraid of the dark shouldn't be, let's change tact, compassion,

suffering your life at the moment.

Tell us what it looks like because we, yesterday we covered a lot of ground,

but just some of the things day to day, some of those stories you mentioned

that where God is moving, like Yeah.

You know what I'm talking about?

Yeah.

What you're up to and the, and the places you get.

I know you can't give,

but, you know, look, I, so what happened is, is I got, I

got to a point and I, at the stage when

I quit my job, I mean, I was on a six figure summer, got the company

car, you know, and as much fuel as you want on that, the fuel card.

Loved the fuel card, but then Jesus said, give it up.

So I did.

And my life is richer than ever now because I don't know what each day

is in some way, in the sense that I don't know what's gonna come my way.

Now there's quite a structure to my life.

Don't get me wrong, I couldn't do this without it, but I felt the

Lord was asking me to set up a peer support network called True Identity.

So that is what I do today.

And underneath the heading of True Identity, there's a

number of different strands.

And True identity is concerned with education to some extent.

That's what I'm doing here with a microphone

in my hand tonight.

advocacy, which means

standing up for the

little guy if you like.

who can't do anything.

Thank you so much, Adam.

This has a little bit

about true identity, but also recovery.

And I've made that word bold and underlined because the recovery

thing is accompanying somebody to the cross when they're ready.

And even if they're not ready and they don't want to hear the word God.

'cause some people have been so damaged and hurt by the church and by God stuff.

We just talk about love because God is love.

But we respect people where they are.

And true identity looks at sexuality, gender, and identity.

And it looks at the

whole issue of porn, of sexual abuse, anything

to do with L-G-B-T-Q stuff.

And then the whole issue today of male and female.

I never thought that, you know, 30 years ago, that we'd have to

be upholding and discussing what it means to be male or female.

But we do today, and that's done through various things.

I, I

run a couple of, parent support groups, helping them to love

their children in the midst of what's going on.

My favorite name.

Oh, the transparency.

That's, that's a Holy Spirit thing.

God say, call the group transparency.

I'm like, oh, I like that.

That's quite good.

Anyway, so TPS Transparency.

Yeah, family and free and support.

That's right.

In the clear is for, is for friends and

family

members of those who, have transitioned.

and it's meeting people

across the spectrum.

So when we say the, the trans thing, you know, parents may call me and

go, ah, my child wants to, to,

to transition.

and so helping them

to understand possibly a little bit that's going on in the child's

life is one thing, but then also

walking with that child.

I personally, I, I've

only dealt with adults

in this area, and, but if it's an adult

guy in his early twenties and he says, look, I'm, I'm a woman in a man's

body, and will he come to the gender

clinic?

Well, I'd rather.

attend the gender clinic

with him and support him and walk on his journey and accompany him

while seeking to be someone who's respectful, sensitive, and compassionate

to him than to abandon him on his own to that, that, that journey.

Now, the other thing I'm passionate about, and this is where my own journey

went astray, is the video said that I went, I called the lesbian and

gay switchboard at the age of 14.

The reason I called them is because I didn't know anybody

at school I could talk to.

There was definitely nobody in my church that I could go to, and mine was

a strong believing Christian family.

We were in church twice every Sunday, nearly every week of my life I was in

Christian schools, but I didn't feel there was anybody I could talk to.

So I called the helpline that then turned around and basically gave me a

secular or a worldly identity, and I just imbued that into myself, said, this

is what I am, this is what I must be.

And so I took their word, the word of the lords of this world as gospel rather

than the word of the Lord himself.

And so this is where we have to be, be very sensitive, but in, in the midst of

some of these groups, there's, there's, it's meeting people wherever they are.

There are some people who want to detransition, but then what happens

is the, the trans community, for the most part then turn around

and they are arch enemies of anybody who wants to detransition.

Well, their life is all, I mean, there is such a major crossroads.

It's so important that we have a space and the place for this person

to be able to work through in their own way, particularly before God.

Ideally before God where they're at so they can make their

journey out they needed to make.

It was interesting, you know, again, in my own journey out of homosexuality.

So I came to Christ while in a long-term gay relationship and I was still

wearing my makeup in those days and I was very much the feminine partner.

I can assure you

of the relationship.

but nobody challenged

me on homosexuality.

They led me in the the Sinner's prayer and it basically looks at me

like this, Lord, if there's anything that stands in the way of your

love, I'm sorry, bring on the love.

That was my prayer.

Very simple.

But that was my surrender prayer.

And God of course goes, I'll take that, gimme a crack.

He says, I'll take a mile.

And he does.

And so bit by bit by bit somebody intentionally discipled me.

This bloke at University said to him, come, I wanna teach you how to

steal your soul like a welfare child.

I said, that's a nice line.

He said, yeah, you'll read it in the Psalms.

And within six, six weeks I'd learned to be still for eight minutes a day.

Now, mate, this is the calm version of me.

You see me?

I was like a mouse on acid.

That was the nice phrase.

They called me.

For me to be still for eight minutes a day was phenomenal.

And he taught me what it was to be able to go into God's word

and said, this is the story.

Your story's in this word.

And I'm like, well, I, I can't find it.

He said, it's being written.

He gave me a vision for my life.

He never told me, oh, you are gay, you are wrong or anything else.

What happens is my boyfriend saw the changes within me

after about six, eight weeks.

He said, I want a dose of what you've got.

Wow.

So then he came along and he got deeply touched by the Holy Spirit.

Then we became this sort of ideal gay Christian couple in

London, you know, so we'd be at church early than everybody else.

We'd be there with our bibles, you know, almost trying to be

the welcome team and everything.

It was crazy.

And at that time we believe, oh, this, this, we found our place again,

as the video said, the deeper I went into that intentional discipleship

and that walk with Jesus, I began to learn to listen to his voice

whispering in the depth of my heart.

So this wasn't the world's view or a helpline's view, or even my

family and friend's view, 'cause they were all affirming me, pat me

on the back saying, this is great.

What happened is God began to draw me through a narrow gate.

And he began to feed me through his word, and I began to realize that there's an

angst in me, not because of my life, but because I'm not living in accordance

with his word and what he says, what he's prescribed my creators described for me,

or prescribed for me as his creature.

You know, it's a bit like trying to use an Android phone as an iPhone.

You can say, Hey, Siri, to it as much as you like, it ain't gonna answer.

I mean, that's literally what it's like.

So we were drawn to that place.

What happens is somebody saw my heart, Paul, and they walked with me

to teach me what it was for my heart to be surrendered and for my heart

to learn to hear the voice of God.

Mm-hmm.

You the, the, you're touching on something we spoke about, the fixation we have

with where people are on the journey versus who they are speaking to, that

it's a bit like the woman at the well.

You've got Jesus savior of the world meeting this woman at the,

at the, the Samaritan moment, at the well in the midday sun.

First of all, Jews don't talk to Samaritans.

Big nono blokes don't talk to women like that.

Even more big nono and no fool goes out in the midday sun to go and get water.

You get burnt for goodness sake.

But Jesus goes to meet her where she is.

And he asks her questions.

He doesn't preach at her.

He doesn't dictate it to her.

He meets her where her heart is.

So, I mean, I'm looking around this room.

I mean, this is beautiful.

God's work of art right in front of me, but I don't know your stories.

And in some cases, some of you are married and your spouse doesn't actually

know your full, full life story.

That's how far we've become removed from what it means to be present to

one another and to really listen to the joys, the sorrows, the pains,

the profound inner rejection that we do everything to keep pushed down.

Mm.

So you went back also and asked about my day-to-day life is a,

I know I can talk a lot, man.

I can talk, but I, I learn to listen.

I learn what it was to sit there, some cases to have almost six shots

of coffee, double largest, whatever it is, you know, flat, wide, and

just listen for two, two and a half, three hours to somebody's story.

And then at the end of it, and this is really important, if somebody's willing to

sit and tell you their story, I invite you to invite them to, again, to their story.

You may say, but you've just heard it.

I'm like, no, you didn't.

You heard the sanitized version that they're trusting you with this far.

If they've trusted you with two, two and a half hours of telling their story, if

they come to you next time and tell you their story again, it'll come from a

different angle, a different perspective, and there'll be other aspects to it.

Because what's happening is this is, we have lost a sense

of trust with each other.

These things don't help 'cause we can block and delete and everything else,

particularly in our younger generation.

But overall, I I, I, I was reflecting on this today, you know, when my, when my

mom wanted to talk to my dad, she'd wait till he got home and she'd talk to him.

Everything they discussed was a conversation.

She didn't write him a note or a letter.

She couldn't send him a text.

They didn't exist.

We learned to talk.

We heard the intonation of the voice.

We engaged with the person.

And what's happening today is more and more and more we are

disengaging from one another.

And it's, we know who we are through that accompaniment and

that engagement with one another.

You know, it's, I have come to a great understanding of my

strengths and my weaknesses by others being very honest with me.

There's some things I go and think I'll embark upon, and

people say, don't go near it.

You're rubbish at it, mate.

Unless God says otherwise.

Of course.

And, and, and they're often right because they're discerning.

We've lost a sense of what it is.

As iron sharpens iron, one man sharpens another.

I do believe that's also true for women as well though, particularly for men.

We need to be sharpened.

But that's, that's so much of what's missing.

So my day to day is a lot of listening, a fair bit of writing and a lot of

bringing people to the cross and walking through their story and also setting

up networks where people who feel incredibly isolated can start to be being

really honest with where they're at.

Yeah.

But there's a, there is a cost to that journey, isn't there?

I mean, getting right in the mess with people, having them in your

life, it's not, not easy, is it?

You like in terms of, I was talking to someone dear recently that the

disciple that the way we show the love of Jesus is in relationship.

We don't have relationship, say, with this church, you can't.

You say, I'm angry at red door.

'cause it's not.

It's a person and it's like saying with this whole movement that,

oh, I'm so frustrated at this.

The LGP we're not, it boils down to, well, who do we know?

That's fine.

And who, who are we next to?

Yeah.

And that's what you've literally gone, okay.

I'm gonna take the time to walk with look time.

Look,

we had a brief chat yesterday, so, and you might remember me talking about the fact

that, I was in, one of our leading mental wings, last week.

And I went

to see a, a, a beautiful, wonderful friend of mine who identifies as a trans female.

And I say that because first and foremost, they're my friend.

That's it.

My friend who identifies as trans female.

And,

and while they're, two other trans females turned

up, and, I've now got three

friends and we just had this beautiful conversation for two hours and

they threw a lot of things at me.

And they talked about the church, they talked about Christianity, and

they talked about conversion therapy and all these different things.

And we had a, just a profoundly robust

conversation.

And, I loved it.

I just

loved the, the, I loved the fact they were so free to, to fire these things at me.

And I just said, you know, I I, and I'll be honest, I I love those guys.

Can't wait for our next time

together.

And, one of the men made

some quip about the church, and I said, I just want you to know that,

that church, I, I am that church.

That's me because I follow Jesus.

And a follow of Jesus is part of his body, and his body is the church, and that's me.

And they apologized.

I, I'd never seen it that way.

And I don't know what the fruit might be of even those two or three

different lines, but it, but it took me to be in that situation.

I, I, I, I left the place and it was, I remember the trench or rain

that's been around, it was one of those afternoons, I'm like, oh,

I've gotta walk to that car and I'm gonna be bathed, you know, thank you

Lord.

Anyway.

But, it was one of those

moments I felt like I'd, I'd just been at the well with the, with the smart woman.

'cause nobody else was gonna be there for this guy or for these other

two, apart from the trans females.

And that's, and that's how they identify and that's how they see themselves.

But actually one of 'em said to me, I just want to be normal,

but yeah.

Was that the one that you said about the, you're not a real guy.

They,

I can't remember what I said yesterday.

I said about being loved by a guy.

And you said, well, is that the kind of guy that is really?

Oh, that's, that's, oh, that's right.

Yeah.

So, so one of them was been one of the trans females were talking

about her boyfriend and he's not stepping up to the mark and he's

not, you know, the rest of it.

And I just said, and I just looked straight into my friend's eyes.

I said, listen, let's get real.

You want a bloke that's gonna step up to the mark and be a bloke, but no

offense, he's seeking after a chick with a dig that, sorry to be so crude.

That's what I said.

I said, you, this is not, this is not reality.

I said, if you're not careful, you are being taken down a rabbit warren that is

just not going to answer where you are.

Forgive me if I use

phrases like that.

uh.

It's called street

talk.

It's,

yeah.

But it was profound in the honesty that you absolutely present to them.

Absolutely.

And we, and we talked about intimacy and we talked about what does your heart want?

And we ended up in this conversation, and then, look, I'm gonna be honest,

we went into the nitty gritty of what does somebody trans female do sexually?

Mm.

And we got raw.

We had to get raw.

And I said, there's all sorts of implications linked biologically,

scientifically, medically linked to what you are doing.

Are you aware of this?

And I began to talk into them and eyes opened widely said,

nobody's ever told us this.

I said, no, they're not going to tell you.

It's clearly written in the Anglo-Saxon world in America.

In the Britain, I think here in Australia that the, the, the most rapid areas

of cancers we're experiencing are anal and colon, oral and esophagal cancers.

And the area that's seen a significant rise, an age group more than any other

one, is the 15 to 24-year-old age group.

You buy a packet of cigarettes, it says to you very clearly, this is gonna kill you.

But we are promoting all sorts of activity.

So is our government and nobody's challenging it, that it's

actually leading possibly towards an early death killing people.

And I'm not out to shock, I'm just telling you the science

and what the medics say to me.

That's it.

Wow.

And yet we are not learning this.

We're not engaging with this.

We're not having the conversations that we need to have.

And then it's not so much about wagging a finger at somebody.

It's, we were going back to that question of, but what does

intimacy look like for you?

Mm-hmm.

The idea of talking to people about what does, can you be

intimate and not be sexual?

Absolutely.

There was a significant line in that video, and it said that the older

Christian man, he looked at me, he gazed me, saw me, and he was willing and open

to embrace me with a non sexualized touch because of my sex childhood sexual abuse.

And it had been so much of it.

I'd learned that that to the arousal and, and the, that dopamine adrenaline

rush that comes with anything sexual, well, that must be what intimacy is.

So he stepped into the breach and he taught me bit by bit what it was.

That intimacy is so, so, so much more than sex.

In fact, it, I would, I dare say, because even you want to prolong

the sexual act for a long time into me, something you can live 24 7.

With the right relationships, it can grow and grow and grow.

And these are discussions that we need to have.

This is, these are things we need to learn to practice if we truly are to be arms

and legs and eyes and hearts of Jesus walking around to each other, but also

to those outside of our church doors.

Yeah.

And just that picture of you being willing to journey with that person

into their, you know, they're gonna have a meeting about their, the, you

know, their operation or whatever.

I, I'm thinking, you know, the incarnate, incarnate call that we have to enter

in, like Christ came into the world to be amongst the muck and the filth

and, and to bring the light and love.

And you are just living that by going, yeah, I'll go with you.

Like, you're not afraid of that darkness.

Well, I, I'm not, and in some way I shouldn't be.

You've seen my

story and, you know, yeah.

The, the, these

topics in some ways are, are my bread and butter.

They have become that.

But partly because what happened is, is the Holy Spirit nudge, nudge,

nudge, nudge, nudge me to be able to bring these to the foot of the cross,

convicted as I have become, that there is nothing that is impossible for God to do.

Yeah.

And glory be to him because when his power is working in us, he really

can do infinitely, infinitely more than we could ever ask or imagine

in the church and in Christ Jesus.

Because that's what his word says.

And he's proven to me time and time and time again that his word is infinite.

It's always present.

Jesus.

Same yesterday, today and forever.

That's why I was able to come to the cross and he was able to take me

back to the moment of my conception.

He was able to take me back to being born premature.

He was able to take me back to being abandoned.

He was able to gimme the courage to spend 12 years finding my

birth father to go back to face my ex-boyfriend many years later and

to do all these different things.

He said, come on, I've already gone ahead of you.

You have nothing to be afraid of.

Nothing.

'cause that's what his word says.

So I'm able to go to others as well and say, you know, I

have absolute hope for you.

How can you say that?

I said, because I know that God doesn't lie.

I know you do.

And I know I do, but I know he doesn't.

His words very clear about this.

He will restore to you the years the locusts have eaten.

He's done that to me.

He's still doing it.

I'm not the perfect work, you know that.

But nevertheless, I mean, and I'm watching him do this.

Let me tell you just three little stories.

You know, I've got one guy who came to my doorstep and he was for 19 years.

He, well, he

transitioned at the age of 32.

he's what we might

call a total lefty.

No time for God, no time for.

The establishment really, you know, a bit of a hippie.

A lot of a hippie.

But he wanted to be a dad.

He had this sense, he wanted to be a father.

So he'd met with this lady who identified as a lesbian, I use

my words quite carefully as I say this, and she too wanted children.

So they ended up with two kids, both as biologically.

So I assume the act might have taken place, I'm not sure, none of my business.

But then there were two kids, clearly there was a desire between

the two of them to raise these children having given birth.

So he suddenly had this rapid onset gender dysphoria and he went to see his gp who

then sent him to an endocrinologist.

And within a matter of weeks he was on cross-ex hormones, which means he's now

starting to really think he's a woman.

So within nine months he's lying on the table.

Not quite a few understand, but in the, in the gender

clinic in Melbourne and, about to have his genitals

removed and he says to the nurse, just before they give the anesthetic,

I, I'm not quite sure about this.

And she stroked his hand saying, it's okay, you'll

soon have everything you want.

It'll all be fine.

Wakes up of course, carrying a couple of bottles of blood.

And there's another guy in recovery area who's had the

same, who operation beforehand.

And he said, I said to the nurse, I wasn't sure about this.

So we've got two guys here who've both gone to the point, that

extreme point of having their gen, their healthy genitalia removed.

I was, I said to myself, first of all, who was there to walk

with them on this journey.

That's why I'm so passionate about being there with people.

Whatever stage of the journey they're at.

He went through that journey for the next 19 years.

He made his two children call him mom.

And then one day he was on Rot Nest island love Roddo.

And the rain came and he's at the bus stop.

And if, you know, the bus stop is on Martin List Island, it's kind of

middle there when the rain comes, mate, you're just in the rain.

You're all swept up in it.

Some of you know that.

Well, anyway, he, he just wanted to get out the rain and he raced into one of

the little churches that were nearby.

And this is his first time in a church in decades.

And suddenly God's caught him and he starts this conversation with God.

And to cut a long story short, within three days he starts watching

Detransition videos on YouTube.

And within a matter of literally a few more days, he's detransition.

So I met him when he'd given up being captain of the women's soccer team.

'cause of course that was gonna happen.

He's got male skeleton, the rest of it.

But he gave all this up because Christ had

touched his heart.

And, he seemed incredibly

androgynous, androgynous when I first met him several years later.

Now he's God calling him nobody else.

If we don't take out God's word, the the rocks themselves will

take God's word.

But, what happens is today

this bloke is one of the most.

Fiery spirited hearted men.

I know.

And I came to understanding just by walking with him, and we've

traveled a bit around Asia and talked to different governments

about not bringing in different

policies, that are, are going to harm people's

lives.

But the thing is this, I've come to understand that

masculinity and femininity are,

if you like, in their purest form.

I, I dunno I'm even allowed to say that, but masculinity and feminity

are invisible, first and foremost.

This literally carries that.

But I mean, this man, he might say, well, he can't be a proper money.

He's got no genitals like a bloke.

I'm like, yeah, but look at what his spirit is and it's his

soul that'll be joined with God.

And so that's one story of Jesus calling someone.

Another lady I know, she'd been in a 15 year lesbian partnership.

This is people all here in the Perth area, 15

year partnership.

And, her girlfriend said

to her Saturday morning, I think we should get married, and I want a decision

from you by the end of the weekend.

Or this is the overview of the story.

Saturday night she goes to bed, she has a dream, and she dreams.

She's in hell.

And it's such a realistic dream.

She believes she's died to the point that when she wakes in the morning,

she's, she can't believe that Jesus has given this other chance.

She goes to church that morning by Sunday night, she says to her girlfriend, no.

I can't do this.

It's, I can't.

Partner goes mad, splits the relationship and this other woman, through her dream,

the Lord has called her back into a deep, intimate relationship with him.

Incidentally, her girlfriend who split, she's now with a bloke,

God was doing that another guy five years as a marketing guy, driving to work from

house where he shares his boyfriend and God speaks to him, says, you are mine.

This must end.

And he knows what God's talking about because God's very clear.

It's like, you know, so he

said to his boyfriend, look, I just want a

bit of a break on a Sunday morning.

I wanna go for coffee and whatever, a bit of a time for myself.

Boyfriend says, yeah, okay.

Of course, he goes off to church, doesn't tell the boyfriend.

After about four or five months as he's learned to pray and instill

his soul like a welfare child, he gets to a place where he says to his

boyfriend, I need to talk to you.

His boyfriend said, yeah, okay, great.

A couple things I wanna say to you.

And he says, look, I've not been fully honest with you.

I, I've not just been going for coffee, I've been gonna church.

He's come out,

he's come out, he's come home.

Yeah.

And his boyfriend looked at me and said, I've not been honest with you.

I've been doing the same.

They've been going to two separate churches.

Do you know why?

Because God spoke to his boyfriend as well.

Yeah.

Wow.

Beautiful.

Now, when I say this to you.

This is not, oh, well, I just need to keep my mouth shut.

God will do it.

What I'm saying is this is we need to be ready and responsive.

And it's not just to LGBT.

Please understand that I, you know, the devil loves that phrase, L-G-B-T-Q.

And it's not that we shouldn't turn around and recognize this

is where somebody's attracted to.

This is somebody's journey.

But actually I I, there's as many varieties of homosexuality or

transgenderism or, or all this other stuff as there are people,

because every single story is unique and needs to be surrendered to the

cross of Jesus, every one of them.

It just happens to be that there are some issues and, and key points, comorbidities

is a more scientific word we might use that align to these different things,

but, but overall it, it's all of

us.

Just a human story.

Just the human spirit, bro.

Yeah.

Another one.

And so we're gonna get onto some questions, but I just think haring

back right almost to where we began the, the world trying to include

and somehow meet the people.

But like Jesus said to the woman out the world, like you are

thirsting, but I will give you a drink and you'll never thirst again.

Never thirst again.

And we hold that, but we have to.

Be inspired and have the courage to not just say, Hey, we've got

it, come to us, but actually to go and meet people where they're at in

love.

That's right.

And, you know, people will, we can only meet, we can meet people

where they're at, but you know, it takes on our part as well.

It takes vulnerability.

Yeah.

You know, I, I, I've, I, I've got the great honor of, doing some mentor work

one day a week in a rather well known Christian rehab.

It's a place of peace that's a little ho, you know, hint for you anyway.

But, you know, whenever I sit down with any of the guys there, the first

thing I say to them is, you know what?

I could be where you are and you could be where I am.

I said, and why should you turn around here and tell me your story?

I said, if you don't know where I really struggle and where I smell of sheep

to, you know, so I go and I just say, this is some of my story, and I've come

to realize that people will only go to the depth that we are willing to go.

And if we are not willing to go to that depth with each other and to risk

with each other in a place where we can each access and approach, he who

is the lover and the source of all love Christ himself, then in some way

we, we don't take God seriously with his word to live life to the full.

We are still having life stolen from us, destroyed around us,

and we're slowly being killed.

As John 10, 10 verse eight says.

And in some ways we're being held accountable as a church to go, well,

how good is this drink of yours?

Is it good enough?

Will it, can it quench my thirst?

And we, well, do we believe it or not, you know, so it's a, it's a call to us

if they are the lepers in some ways of the colonies of today that we can meet.

That's right.

That's

right.

And you know, the, the, one of the important things to say is

this is every one of us, if we are really honest, not one of us, is

a short term journey to the cross.

If you are write a book about it, I wanna buy it, it'll be a bestseller.

I mean, seriously, we are all a long-term journey.

And when we're dealing with the delicate issues of sexuality, gender,

and identity, and again, even the use of those three words splits

these up into separate things.

I love the Hebrew understanding, the Jewish understanding of a person

is that we are, it's all combined.

You can't split up bits of, you know, sort of, well, I've got this bit here.

And that bit there.

I was thinking even just earlier today, I thought we have psychotherapy, psychiatry,

psychoanalysis, psycho psychology and all.

And, and, and I'm thinking 150 years ago, we didn't have any of those anyway.

We just had people.

Now that's not to push that down, that these are, these are great tools

or great insights, but if we're not careful again and again, this comes

back to the core of the message.

I'm hoping you are hearing tonight.

If we see ourselves as this compartment and this bit of identity

in that bit, in some way, we fail to surrender ourselves before Jesus.

It's a full job that needs to be done on all of us.

We can't cut corners.

We can't have little bits hidden there.

And you know that we don't want to surrender what happens.

We will be drawn back into those places of darkness.

We just will be.

But it's important that we not only see ourselves totally and utterly

loved by the Lord, that we would love ourselves and therefore love

our neighbor as we love ourselves.

And that means if you are willing to accept the fact that you are broken

and that you need a savior and that you've got stuff hidden away that you

need to come out and come home and bring into the light, well play that

same deck of cards with your neighbor.

In other words, give them the same grace that you are receiving as well.

There's three other, you know me, there was a million things to say.

Sorry.

I

dunno.

I apologize.

again, another key

thing for each one of you, and it was there inside the story.

And, and, and if you are ch, if you hear one thing tonight from me, hear

this and people often say, how do I deal with, and we're probably gonna

come to it in the questions anyway.

How do I deal with my friend who's LGBT, whatever, or my family

friend or my uncle or whoever it is, and I just say the heart's cry

of every human being is a, a a.

Attention.

We've lost what it is to look each other in the eyes and see the beauty and the

uniqueness and the dignity of who we are.

Border security knows the needs of who we are because they use our

face to see isn't out the country.

But we miss that with each other.

I won't ever see another face like Dale's in my life

now.

No.

And what God has created here, the attention is everything we need to

see each other, to let our eyes meet, move off these things for a time.

They've got the benefits.

Love seeing my mom's face on FaceTime.

Hi mom.

She's not called me yet.

I dunno why.

But anyway, the second thing is this is affirmation.

We live in a world that's grossly critical of all of us and telling us we need to buy

this other thing and we need to gain this thing and we need to qualify in this thing

before we can be even just a somebody.

Otherwise, we're a nobody.

We're definitely not an anybody.

There are beautiful affirming things.

You know, in my three friends who identify as trans female.

The courage in each one of those people to have gone through to the extent they

have on their journey is phenomenal.

They assume their family is just criticizing them and judging them for

the most part, their Christian families.

And I'm saying, well, I want to recognize there is deep courage within your soul.

The third thing is this.

The third A is affection.

And we live in a world that is very fast moving.

I can be affectionate just sitting here.

And the way I look at you, Paul, there's just an affection between us.

It's this brotherly thing.

I love you, you love me, I get it.

Now sometimes that means an arm around someone.

It might mean a hand on the knee, whatever it may be.

And we have to be careful in a world today that turns around and will sue you for any

form of inappropriate, affection.

But if we

don't have healthy affection, then people will go to the wrong

places for inappropriate affection.

And we are seeing that to the nth degree today.

So when we have, and we need to practice this among ourselves, attention,

affection, and affirmation bring about a deep sense of self-acceptance.

It's my elevator speech by the way.

It's, he says, what do I do?

My grandson?

I said, a go ahead practice that come back to me in 10 years time

when you perfected it a bit and we'll, I'll tell you the next step.

And they come back a couple years later saying, I've been doing it.

It's amazing.

It's restored our relationship.

Yeah.

Awesome.

We are gonna move slightly.

We're gonna get onto some questions and start addressing what,

what you guys have.

I've got a few to get

the ball

rolling that have and gonna take a drink.

Everyone going okay?

Is this okay?

Hanging in?

It's cool.

Keep breathing.

It helps.

That's cool Way.

Haven't lost anyone.

We've lost the pastor.

Where did Adam go?

Oh, there he is.

Hey bro.

See you

on the light there.

okay, let's roll this

one out.

How can we hold to a traditional view, biblical view of sex

and gender while still being radically hospitable and loving,

hospitable and loving in some way?

We've kind of covered that already.

We need to be a place that is real

and you see the gospel to, to be bi, to be aligned with the

biblical teaching on sexuality.

To be able to turn around and say, well, hey, guess what?

None of us have perfectly arrived yet.

Come and join us.

We all smell of the sheep, but we should do.

We're all a mess.

You know?

Do you know what's interesting for me is, um.

I dealt with years of childhood sexual abuse in my twenties,

I'd forgotten, I'd forgotten.

I'd so deeply repressed my being sexually abused.

And some of you may say, well, how do you know you were really sexually abused?

'cause I faced my abuser and eventually actually became a

national court case in the uk.

Long story, let's park it.

But at the age of 48, a few years ago, I'm that old,

my family went through a traumatic time.

My

18-year-old nephew, suddenly died.

And

it left us in a, in a, a chasm of deep, deep grieving and mourning.

And, and there I was.

I, I'd got, I'd flown back to the uk and in my prayer, the Lord

showed me what was like a video.

And he showed me a whole new series of abuse at the age of 10.

And I said, why are you showing me this now?

Why didn't you show me that 20 years ago?

He said, my timing's perfect.

James.

It's not for you to question this.

Now I tell you that for this reason, you may think you're in a good place,

but actually many of us have no idea of things that we might have buried.

We don't go digging.

That's God's job, not us.

But what it does say, I hope, in sharing that story is that we

are to meet each other with that incredible sensitivity because we

don't know where each other's at.

And let me say this as well very clearly, and this is my hoorah for me, my friends

in the LGBT community, some of them are a lot holier in the way in which they live

out their lives and deal with their lives.

The many heterosexuals and people who regard themselves as heterosexual

in the church, they're in a much, much more robust, honest, authentic,

integral place that doesn't make one person better than the other.

It just means that we all need to wake up a little bit.

We need to stop being judged of each other, and we need to recognize that

authentic biblical teaching on sexuality, et cetera, means that we are a hospital

for sinners, not a hotel for saints.

I'm hoping that when we walk through the red door marked with the blood of

Christ, that it's like, you are all welcome because you too need a savior.

Here.

We do too, 24 7.

That's how we can be authentically stand up to.

Biblical understanding and to teach it and uphold the traditional biblical

understanding of sexuality as well.

The other thing is this,

it's Revelation 12, 11, you know, that they overcome the, the devil through the

blood of the lamb and the word of their testimony.

I, I'm delighted to talk my story here, and I've been around

wa with the whole group of

people who, who've left, who've rejected the,

the titles of L-G-B-T-Q.

They may still experience same sex attraction to differing degrees and

that's fine, but, but they, they wanna talk about what Jesus is doing in their

lives and how their anxiety's gone down, their depression's gone down, their

suicidal ideation, Hass gone down, how they've stopped self-harming so much or

how they've left behind prostitution or their, their class a drug addiction or, or

whatever it might be.

this is Jesus at work

in our midst, but we also need to be able to share those stories and

people will need to understand and know that this is a place where that

story and their stories are welcome and that in some way they align with

other people in the congregation too.

Beautiful.

This you might have touched on as well when you talked about the

Hebrew idea, but it, what is the biblical

vision of the body and how does it shape our understanding of gender?

One Corinthians six 20, do you not know that your body is a temple?

A palace, a dwelling place of the Holy Spirit who lives in you,

who you receive from God, and your body does not belong to you.

You've been bought with the price, with the blood of Jesus Christ,

and therefore you are to glorify and honor God with your body.

That is true for all of us, and I know that in my own gender dysphoric

struggle that I had, believing I was a woman in a man's body means again,

that I, I I had to have people gently and delicately being able to recognize

the slight things in me at the time that were masculine, and also to be

able to begin to affirm me in, in those

things, you know?

it's almost too, too

big a topic to even begin to touch on tonight.

The, the whole issue of the body.

But, but the, see there, there are many people, particularly in

the transgender community today, who really honestly believe that

everybody else is quite at peace of their bodies and that they're not.

And so if they think that everybody else is at piece of their body,

they really feel I'm at war with.

Mine was actually, you know, one of the most popular

books at the moment is, van Kessels book.

The

Body Keeps the Score.

You know, I've got people galore reading it, you know, I'm thinking my own book

club so that we can read it intimately.

The rest of it, because it's such a popular book, because we have become so

divorced in what it means to actually, um.

Have a body.

I mean, they can shut down your mind with drugs, somebody can break your heart, so

you don't wanna ever feel anything again.

But you can't leave anywhere and say, I'll leave my body there and I'll walk off.

Our body goes with us everywhere.

Mm. That's why you can't, the devil loves to divide.

Split this up, split that bit up.

Split that bit up.

Split that bit up.

But this also hit me in my prayer this morning, Paul, when Jesus said,

father, may they be one, as you and I are one now, we see that as well.

May our hearts just be one with theirs.

And actually what hit me today was like, was Jesus praying that we would

see ourselves as one created in the image and likeness of our creative,

our maker, that we wouldn't fall into that trap of trying to split

ourselves up in little bits as well.

Vision.

Yeah.

That's good.

I can, it's kind of a segue, I think this is what you are referring to.

Okay.

How do you respond to people who say that someone can be born gay?

Do you believe it's a hundred percent nurture upbringing, 0% nature?

well, look, in my video,

you, one of my favorite lines is back off.

You know?

Mm-hmm.

When you've only ever felt same sex attraction or you've only ever experienced

gender incongruence or, or, or dysphoria, that's what you're going to believe.

That's exactly what I believe.

That's what made me go into gay pride and become a gay activist in London, as I did.

I didn't come to Christ to deal with my homosexuality.

My homosexuality was fine.

Thank you very much.

I mean, it was, I, I didn't question, it's what I was, I'd come out, I was quite

at peace with it, you know, I waved all the flags in my little, in those days

it was just a pink triangle, et cetera.

But, but I was quite happy with that and I'd reconciled it with Jesus.

That's why I thought when Steve and I, my ex-boyfriend and I would,

you know, we'd come to Christ.

That was it.

We've made it.

Mm. Arrived.

Yay.

You know?

It's only later.

Once the Lord began to unlayer me and help me to see that I did have different

comorbidities through a different issues that I had to deal with, bit by bit, by

bit did I come to a realization that's that famous line again in the video, I

then began to notice the curves of women.

Nobody warned me that could happen.

Mm-hmm.

It was very scary.

Ladies, you can be very scary.

You know?

You are very beautiful.

Very beautiful.

Thanks Peter.

God.

But the thing is this is, is that so born gay?

Well, let's go back to August, 2019.

Science Magazine released the results of research on nearly half a million people.

That's a big research project, and it was Find the gay gene and

they came back from that research.

Now, there was a, most people engaged in the research with

themselves identifying as LGBT.

This was in their favor to find the gay gene.

They came back and they say, we can say categorically, 100%.

There is no gay gene.

What they did come back and say is that sexuality and identity

are formed through our emotional responses to our environment.

There's a pale blue slide there, Adam, chuck it up on the board.

Would you On the, the board, the screen sexuality and identity

are formed through our emotional responses to our environment.

Trauma, trauma

or things that are so painful and don't get resolved, that we respond outta those.

This is what I see in just about every victim, survivor of childhood sexual abuse

that I walk with is they now, they're set the way they see themselves, they see

themselves as sexual being, the way they deal with intimacy and identity is all it.

It's all tied back in their emotional responses to the environment.

If we're able to get back in touch with that emotion, what that emotional

response was, anger, fear, profound crippling sadness, shame, attachment

loss, or deep detachment, whatever it may be, and we can bring this to the

cross and they're able to go back to that time and leave that with the Lord.

Then what happens?

I what's called the Divine exchange happens.

Jesus gives us the redeemed version of ourselves in that pocket or

that experience, and we leave in the crucified, wounded body of

Christ what our trauma has been.

And that's how we see people getting well.

Now, are people born gay?

Well, there's been the, research on identical

twins who are genetically the same.

And one is says, I'm gay.

I've always been gay.

And the other one says, well, I'm not gay.

Never been gay.

That in and of itself says, genetically that can't be true.

Now, could there be something genetic that in some way

could lead to form or, affect the way in which

we see ourselves as sexual being The jury seems to be slightly still out

on that one, to say the least, but the degree to which we now have people

coming out saying they are LGBTQ plus

the numbers are so high because if you understand how somebody ends up being

layered to end up identifying as this, we literally are, Western Society is a

factory that is making L-G-B-T-Q people.

Wow.

Left, right, and center.

Comprehensive sexual education is something that is pushed from birth

upwards, whether it be through drag queen story hour, through the

books in our children's libraries, in our school libraries, in some

of our Christian school libraries.

The whole shebang.

It is there.

It's on A, B, c, me, it's on SBS, it's on Nickelodeon.

Did you know that Nickelodeon means in Latin?

I hate God.

But you didn't know that there.

We didn't know that.

It also means silver screen, Nickelodeon as we know.

But Nickelodeon means I hate God.

And so there's, there's so many aspects and ways in which, in a

sense, propaganda is affecting us.

Yeah.

Hypersexualized.

That's it.

And so it's, and then what happens?

The government's got every right to say, well, we need to protect people from this.

We need to protect people from that, et cetera.

You know?

I mean, I'm gonna be blunt with you and I, I will stream

this till the cows come home.

This idea of putting a child into childcare at six months is

crucifying that child's ability to have a deep sense of wellbeing.

The government know it.

They're saying, we're gonna give you longer days in kindergarten

so you can go to work.

Parents, aren't we kind?

No, you're just trying to destroy my family.

That's it.

And it's coming from every angle.

But as church in some way, we haven't woken up to that.

Oh

wow.

There's, we're getting down some.

Yeah.

Okay.

So if,

I like this one.

where did I read it

there?

So what about, does using pronouns affirm someone, something untrue,

or is it an act of respect?

I thought long and hard on this one.

First of all, I do everything I can not to use pronouns in

the company of my friends who

identify as trans.

why do I do that?

Because

I don't want to lie to them.

I mean, the bottom line is, do you want somebody to lie to you?

That's the first thing.

The thing I'm challenged with in this, and this is where, again, the joy's

out on this one for me a little bit.

I, I also don't want to push somebody into a place where, where they're in

pain, I've got the salt shake, and I'm just shaking salt all over their wound.

That is not respectful, sensitive and compassionate.

It's not.

Therefore, my advice to people is stay as far away from

pronouns as you possibly can.

Do not entertain them as much as you can, because in some way, this is

another go at trying to have power.

Over somebody to shut them up and say, you dunno what you're

talking about, et cetera.

Well, I'm sorry, but we all need respect for ourselves.

I don't expect people to lie to me.

So if I did say to somebody, and I did the other day, I referred to one of my trans

female friends as he and I got a shock

from them.

And I said, I said, well, I'm not

turning around and saying you're not a trans female.

That's how you identify.

That's how you

present.

I said, but, I said, you will, if

you respect me, then, then, then, then I will respect you too.

I said, I don't expect you to ever lie to me.

That would not be loving to towards me.

And therefore I can't be, I can't lie to you.

You know, I accept your circumstances and I meet you where you are.

And you know, if we can walk together, who knows where that'll lead.

But lying to each other is not a place of respect.

It's not, it doesn't help.

Wow.

And as you, you know, even thinking of the pronouns that turn up on the bottom

of emails and stuff, and the divisive, it, it's just another layer of division.

As opposed to God saying in the beginning he created them, male

and female, he made them bloke.

Well,

that, that's right.

You know, in this

inclusion thing, you know, interestingly, my local

beach, and I dunno, it's true of your surf lifesaving club, but they put the

trans, they put the, the new pride flag at the end, all the rainbow colors and the,

the, the pink, the pink baby blue, the white, the, the, the brown and the black.

And then the, the yellow

triangle with the, the, the purple circle and

whatever

else has been added.

anyway, I, I wrote

to the surf

lifesaving guys and I said, could you please remove

these from the end of the tail fins of the surf

lifesaving boards?

I said, I turned up with a group of, victim survivors of

childhood sexual abuse for a, an, an outing to the beach so that we

could feel the sand beneath our feet and we could enter into the water

and feel it against our bodies.

And for people who've dissociated through abuse, it's very, very important.

One of the guys in that group who identifies as gay was raped by a gay

man in a place where there was a big rainbow flag hanging in the room.

When he sees that flag, he's triggered into his trauma.

So there's the surf lifesaving Club.

We're inclusive.

And I'm like, well, actually, the very person you are excluding is

this gay man here who's been raped.

And if he's out in the water and he suddenly panics and dissociates

for himself, et cetera, and you start bringing one of your surf

lifesaving boards towards him, he could go into a serious panic attack.

This is why we have to be willing to where we can respectfully

yet firmly challenge that, which offers a false sense of inclusion.

I also met somebody from the Surf Lifeing Saving Club and said, you

ask all the Muslims on the beach.

I don't know.

They'd find that quite inclusive, but that's nothing altogether.

A KD you view same sex attraction and gender dysphoria is two

different sets of beliefs and in your opinion, one are at their core.

Probably touched on some of this.

That's some that's a really, it's a good question.

What's very interesting today is that many of the, what we, there are

two types of, of transgender person.

There is, well there's probably more than that, but there's two key headings.

One is autogynephilia and the other one is the heterosexual transsexual.

Autogynephilia speaks for itself.

Let's break down the that word auto me gyne womb stuff.

Elia love.

So basically the autogynephilia trans person, always a man wants to

basically almost get back into the womb.

What does that say and what have I noticed in all the, these, these

electrophilic trans females is that they have, they have almost void of nurture.

So the world feels a very, very difficult and a very threatening

place that they can't even be in their own skin and their own body so much.

So they want to have a womb because if they can't climb back into 'em, they

want to have something that resembles it or they want to be as close to being

like their mother as they could be.

That's serious stuff.

What is happening today is that we've got many young people who are

transitioning, who actually deep down inside them, they don't want to be gay.

So you've got a number of autistic kids or people with a

DHD and there's numerous reasons

why people could be, who could want to transition.

But actually, and this is where the LGB community are getting really angry

because the TQ community, the trans queer community, is now poaching the LGB

teenagers to say, come into our community.

And then the, this is what's interesting is the trans teenagers then feel

if it's a boy who fancies boys, but then thinks, oh, I can be a girl.

Then deep down inside himself, he says, I'm heterosexual.

What's that?

Speaking natural law?

It's that conscience that God has given us that somehow male

and female, he created them.

So there's a sense in which even the trans community is trying to

almost pull the LGBQ community back towards natural law, but they're

pulling him in a sense further away.

But, but God's word cannot be shaken.

It will not return to him until it's fulfilled.

What he promises it'll fulfilled.

So this is what we're seeing here.

So is it different in some way?

They're like two concentric circles.

Aspects of the LGB community dovetail with the TQ community, but they

are rapidly becoming two different facets and two really two different

battalions that are starting to absolutely be at war with each other.

You know, the TQ community hate the turfs, TERF, trans

exclusionary radical feminists.

So basically

cannot keep out with the turf.

Exactly.

So

basically you've got, you've got the, the trans females who, if it's

a heterosexual transsexual, you've basically got a bloke who wants to look

and dress like a woman, but likes women.

So he transitions.

What does he wanna do?

He wants to go out with a woman.

Well, which woman is going to go out with somebody who looks like a woman would

say a lesbian, but a lesbian doesn't want to go out with a chick with her.

Yeah.

And this is so basically this entire, and understand this, please.

From a Christian perspective, I am watching that community which I've

lived in and served and fought for.

I am watching it rapidly begin to fragment.

That means we will have a lot of people who are already in

pain, but they will want to find a new community and a new home.

And I do believe that the further towards the darkness we become,

even the slightest little light shines more brightly than ever.

And that's why this is a prime time for us as follows of Jesus Christ,

to sort our own stuff out and to be real and not to feel ashamed

about it at the foot of the cross.

'cause that's where your shame ended.

Awesome.

But we learned to be so supple and sensitive in this, that these people have

got a new eternal community to come into.

I love that man.

That's good.

A Oh it's getting, it's good a a Yeah.

Farmer's boy.

Yeah.

Sorry mate.

We can't all come from London.

Uh

oh mate.

I'm

not from London.

Are

there any questions, you'd recommend avoiding

winning conversation with a member of the L-G-B-T-Q community in order for

your chat to remain comfortable for them?

Yeah.

Don't ask about L-G-B-T-Q stuff unless it really is a genuine

thing that you can sensibly ask.

Yeah.

Do you know what?

Most of what I deal with, with my friends who are in or out or wherever

they are, they're L-G-B-T-Q stuff.

They wanna talk more about

how the exercise regime isn't happening,

rest of you as well, and how much debt they're in.

Yeah.

Or concerns about something to do with health or really deep down that

they, they just want somebody to listen to what happened yesterday.

Make that your priority rather than going for L-G-B-T-Q questions.

What you mean?

Yeah.

Meet people, talk to 'em like a person.

Yeah, yeah, person.

Well, I never, oh my goodness.

You know, and the more draped they are in rainbow cars, everything

else, the more we need to recognize this is a person, this is a soul.

The CR god has made.

We with an eternal value to it.

Are you able to mention the guy you're telling about the painted nails?

Or is that

Oh yeah.

I'd love to mention that.

Yeah, so I, so I got, the guy, the painted

nails, she, there's a lot of those, but I'll talk about one.

Sorry.

So I, no, it's great.

So parents

contacted me, you know, so what's the transition?

I said, okay.

So I met with him.

He said, when are we going to the gender clinic?

I said, we're gonna go to the gender clinic when you are

fully and fully enough informed.

What does that mean?

I said, well, tell me what you understand about transitioning.

So he gave me about 12 facts.

I said, oh, you've got 12.

I said, right, we need to give you the 1,562 facts about transitioning.

Then you can make your decision.

But let's walk it together.

I'll be your friend and we can walk this together.

Oh yeah.

He goes, great, because he hasn't got many friends.

So we began to walk this journey, and as I began to meet with his parents

and see what home life was like and the rest of it, and there's never

any blame on parents, never, never any blame on anybody for that matter.

People just do the best they can in this world.

They really do, however difficult circumstances are.

But, but I came to the understanding

that, that he, he had, the strong people in

his family were the women.

His mom ran the business, his mom did the international flying around the place

his mom barked at dad that everything needed to happen in the family home.

And his sister had gone ahead and, and got a better qualification than he had.

He still got a degree, by the way.

But what happened is he never felt he was

quite enough.

And, he'd done lots of blokey

things to try and get there, and he just still felt this deep interest

within him.

So anyway, met with him and realized

he never had a sleepover.

This guy's in his mid twenties, lots of things had never happened to him.

He had

friends at university, even though he'd done quite, what I might call a

blokey degree, but there, he'd befriended the women on that course at university

a. And so we realized that actually he'd never taken his place as a man among men.

So I

said to him, I said, why don't you come

over to, to my place?

There's gonna be a couple of guys hanging out, a certain rest of it.

Come over and have two, three

nights come and stay.

so you wear, you now

polish, whatever, bring your, bring your women's clothes, you're fine.

You can wear those.

'cause see, I don't care what the outside looks like.

I care about his heart.

That's what I care about.

So he turns up,

kind of sat in his hand for a time and said, oh, come show

me your hand then like this.

I'm like, oh mate, you're really bad at painting your nails.

If you're gonna do this regularly, I'll teach you how to do it properly.

I mean, it's paint on nails for goodness.

I mean this, if we're not careful as Christian, like

who do they painting nails?

I'm like, you.

So what?

I've called in a few nails before.

We all have get over it.

Think about the heart.

Three days you never wore these women's clothes.

I said, you, you, you can murder me if you like.

He says, no, it's okay.

It's okay.

He left and then he, he didn't wear

them after that.

And so that's not true.

Once or twice he fell back in towards that place and then he got rid of them.

But what we began to do is we began to look at the areas of his life where he

had not received what everybody else has received to find their place to be able

to feel secure in their body, in their own gender and their sex and everything else.

And as we began to place those things around him, and we began to engage

with his heart, giving him attention.

Giving them the appropriate affection, affirming him and not

worrying about the external stuff.

It's like we kickstarted for him the opportunity for him to just

grow in his relationship with God.

I mean, he, he was a security guard at a rather large church in Perth

to say that you would never have guessed that's what his struggle was.

I mean, he's a big bloke, you know, muscles twice the

size, 15 sizes, size 15 si.

Anyway, but he was a big bloke.

But, but that's where he was at.

He, but he needed somebody to see his heart and to treat him the, the, the

invisible aspect of him with a deep respect, sensitive and compassion.

And to call that forth before the cross.

And that's what we did is a bunch of broken blokes together.

Amazing.

Should someone who is trapped in sexual sin or any kinda sin really be allowed to

continue in church leadership positions while they're still working it out,

do you know?

It's a, it, well, if that was the case, we wouldn't have

any church leaders, would we?

I mean, to, from what I'm saying is look, there is, there is sin and there is sin.

Well, there isn't actually, there's just sin.

But I think you understand what I mean.

There, there are, there are, there's an attitude towards us.

Sin, you know, most people, I meet one-on-one today.

My conversation with them is, how's your porn addiction going?

I don't say to them, are you struggling with porn?

I just assume they are because most people are.

So I think let's make this easier and just ask how their porn addiction's going.

What's your favorite categories at the moment?

So I'm only asking 'cause that just tells me where your heart's

at and what's going on for you.

There's hundreds and hundreds of categories, but if you're only going

through these two or three, it just tells me a lot about where you itch inside and

where you're trying to scratch yourself.

But it still isn't working.

'cause it can't and it won't.

But I'd love to help you with this and to walk with you.

Now, if you've got a church leader that is struggling with porn,

well he slash she and I deal with a lot of teenage girls who are dealing,

struggling with hardcore porn today and a few grandmothers I hasten to add.

That's how prevalent this stuff is and why we need to face it.

But if there, if this challenge and problem is literally thrusting them

before the cross and helping them to grow, then it may well be a bit like the

man that was born blind deliberately.

'cause he was used by Jesus.

Like, is this the sin of his parents?

Is this the sin of whatever?

She says, no, no, my father's design I, so who are we to judge in some way?

But what happens is this.

Now, if the person isn't willing to want to surrender that to Jesus and to be

doing all they can do to surrender it to him, if the law's not changing it, this

person might be the one who's becoming holiest fastest in the whole congregation.

Don't waste them.

Would be my point.

So it's an attitude of heart that we have.

If somebody is caught in sexual sin and does not really want to face

that and does not want to permit the light of Christ to shine to their

darkness, then we do them an injustice.

By keeping them in leadership, the most loving thing is to remove them so we can

help them and love them and support them.

No judgment and say, Hey, we aren't perfect either, but we can't.

You can't.

This is, this is not fair.

This gives a counter witness to the gospel, and that means

that others could be harmed.

Our God doesn't go about harming people.

He goes about healing people.

That was good.

As parents, you're going right, eh,

I'm still breathing.

Are you breathing?

Yeah.

Gone.

As parents, how can we equip our kids to think biblically about sex?

In a world where they are exposed to conflicting messages from

friendship groups, media and schools

make your home

a place of open conversation,

and above all, ensure that it truly is as much as possible A Christian home.

The image that comes to mind is oil and water.

You mix the two together, oil will always rise above water.

If you live in a biblical home, then I don't care what's talked about sexually,

if the light of Christ is there, it will shine itself upon whatever is dark

and the darkness cannot overcome it.

As it says in John one, it cannot,

our challenge for parents is this is, most parents don't want to go near

discussions and conversations that yes, are quite challenging and quite hard.

I've learned that kids most know more than parents do anyway.

Let's be honest.

They just do.

So if anything, it might need to be the other way around.

Parents may need to say, the kids teach me to be a bit more street savvy.

About what?

Sexual, what have you been learning?

What's, what's, what's society telling you about it today?

Just so I've just got an understanding, because if I don't understand it

now, I'm never gonna understand it.

If you have kids and I, and I wanna be there for my grandkids too, I, I mean,

these are throwing out answers, but my point is this is, is, is we are not to

run away from the difficult conversations because what happens is this, and I'm

delighted to see there's a number of people with their reels and their shorts

and their, their tiktoks, et cetera.

There's a lot of young people now that are starting to turn around and say, I reject

social media for so many hours a day.

I. I'm looking after my body.

I'm concerned with what I eat.

I make sure that I'm in God's word within the first hour of being up in

the morning, and I'm learning the word.

There's all these new young witnesses.

I've got a 16-year-old daughter.

She's like, oh, dad, have you seen this guy's really good?

And I'm like, oh, yeah.

I'm like, oh, I'm inspired and I to go and do something, but

she's throwing the stuff at me.

There's already a number of witnesses out there.

So in other words, go with the flow of those who are rejecting this stuff.

But if they're not rejecting it, then we need to come alongside

them and understand as much as we can where they're coming from.

But again, the oil and water thing is what comes to my mind.

You know, if the light is being shone in your home, then people will be convicted.

I've got one young guy, you know, who was, I think on his about four eighth split of

the day, you know, and he went and pressed the wrong button on the stereo at home.

And I don't think it was quite Sunshine radio that came on, but I think his

mom's kinda Spotify list came on or something, and a worship song came on.

He said he literally was thrown across the room

because that worship music and the presence of God hit him that called

him outta the gay community and away from living off the green, you know,

the four 20 of the, the part and

stuff like this.

And, now, now, Eli, I'll

talk to you later.

And anyway, but

it, and that's what happened to him.

And, and so if the worship is in our homes, if God's word is there.

And if there's an open atmosphere, let me tell you, children will talk.

They are desperate to wanna talk, but you've gotta be receptacle

that's willing to listen to them.

Beautiful.

Well, this is a tricky one.

What is the correct way to deal with a hermaphrodite baby born with both sex

organs according to God and the Bible?

I mean, clearly a hermaphrodite baby, which would be

somebody who's born, we, we'd call that

intersex today, so it's not significantly clear.

There might well be,

evidence of, a vulva and also the penis, whatever.

I. What I can say to

you is this is, is when you understand the world of, of, of intersex,

which is 0.08% by the way of births.

It's made out to be this large minority.

It's not at all.

And I have a number of intersex friends who I would never have guessed were

intersex unless they down with me privately and told me, I'm intersex,

I'm xx y chromosome says the guy, I take extra testosterone, I'm infertile,

but I can't bear this thing that people don't think I'm a bloke 'cause

I'm a bloke like everybody else.

If it really is distinctively the hemato thing, there's a, there's people tend to

look at what the, today we can look at the DNA, we'd look at the genetic makeup.

What seems to be dominant here that's likely to happen or

what happens depending on how

developed those, genitalia are, the

private parts are.

It may be that you need to sus sustain almost the child, almost androgynous

for time until they can make their own decision as to what they want to be.

I think what we have to be careful with this topic is there's many

people would say, well, this is just how God makes people.

No, we're all a result of the four.

That is a result of the fall.

That doesn't mean say, oh, that's how God just properly wants people to be designed.

You know, when somebody comes out with just a hand sticking out of

here, we don't say, oh, that's just the way God designed 'em.

It's like, did you take th demy?

We realize, yes, that's the harmful nature of that, et cetera.

So what happens is, is we've gotta be careful that that's not used as an

excuse to try and put into the limelight.

Well, there's all these variations and your God doesn't make any,

your god stuff doesn't make sense.

On the contrary, God makes a lot of sense.

If anything, God can help that person to discern was I originally

supposed to be male or female?

Because that's what his word says.

That's what I believe.

That's what we all believe, and I've met too many intersex people

who come to that belief too.

Thank

you.

My Christian, my friend became a

Christian this year, but has walked away because of the church's hurtful

responses to their sexuality, fear and judgment based to, what can I do?

You can turn round and admit to them that actually you two

have a problem with a church.

When it's so fearful and judgment based,

you can say to them, well, I, oh, let's do church in your room,

then we'll come to my house.