Theology in the Raw - S9 Ep976: Embodying Jesus with the LGBTQ Community: Elizabeth Black

Episode Date: May 30, 2022

Elizabeth Black has served as an evangelist and minister in New York City for almost 10 years. Most recently, Elizabeth serves as the co-founder of Kaleidoscope–a ministry that provides LGBTQ+ people opportunities to engage with tangible expressions of Christ. Originally from Baltimore, Elizabeth attended Washington Bible College for undergraduate studies. She has a heart for New York City, and she loves sharing Jesus with those in the LGBTQ, Jewish, and African-American populations – and beyond. She is currently working on her Master of Theology in contextual theology atAll Nations, a missions college in the UK. Elizabeth loves to cook, entertain, watch documentaries, and read about culture. Last but not least, she is a proud wife and the mother of two young boys. –––––– PROMOS Save 10% on courses with Kairos Classroom using code TITR at kairosclassroom.com! –––––– Sign up with Faithful Counseling today to save 10% off of your first month at the link:  faithfulcounseling.com/titr or use code TITR at faithfulcounseling.com –––––– Save 30% at SeminaryNow.com by using code TITR –––––– Support Preston Support Preston by going to patreon.com Venmo: @Preston-Sprinkle-1 Connect with Preston Twitter | @PrestonSprinkle Instagram | @preston.sprinkle Youtube | Preston Sprinkle Check out Dr. Sprinkle’s website prestonsprinkle.com Stay Up to Date with the Podcast Twitter | @RawTheology Instagram | @TheologyintheRaw If you enjoy the podcast, be sure to leave a review. www.theologyintheraw.com

Hello, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Theology in the Raw. If you would like to support the show, you can do so through Patreon at patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw support show for as little as five bucks a month. If you don't want to support the show financially, that's totally awesome. You can also share this episode or leave a review below. It won't take very long and it really does help people find this podcast if it's a podcast worthy to be found. My guest today is Elizabeth Black. Elizabeth Black is the co-founder and president of Kaleidoscope Ministry, a missions organization that's aimed at reaching the LGBTQ community. Or according to her own mission statement here, it's providing LGBTQ people opportunities to engage with tangible expressions of Christ. I had a wonderful engaging conversation with Elizabeth. We talked about her journey. We talked about bisexuality. We talked a lot about Jesus. And then we spent the last 40 minutes or so talking about Kaleidoscope and the work she's doing there in New York City, which led to some very interesting and engaging conversations about faith and sexuality. So please welcome to the show for the first time, my new friend, Elizabeth Black. All right. Hey, friends, welcome back to another episode

of Theology in the Raw. I'm here with Elizabeth Black. Elizabeth, I first saw you at Revoice. That's where I first came across you. And you actually killed it in your talk. I'm like, who's that? I'm like, oh, you haven't met Elizabeth yet? I'm like, no, but I want to. And then you came out to the Theology in the Raw conference, which was so awesome to meet you there in person

for all of eight seconds or whatever. Yeah, you were a little busy. You were a little busy. It's okay. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that was a whirlwind experience. But thanks so much for coming on the show. I'm excited to get to know you more. And why don't we just start with your... I always have people kind of tell their story. And then I would love to, at some point, get to your ministry, Kaleidoscope, which is a fairly new thing you guys started out there in New York, which sounds really interesting. So yeah, who is Elizabeth Black?

Yeah, well, thanks, Preston, for having me. It's funny that you say, you heard me at Revoice and was like, who's that? Because the whole time I was at Revoice, I thought no one knows who I am at all. I don't even know why I was asked to speak here because I am at Revoice, I thought no one knows who I am at all. Like, I don't even know why I was asked to speak here because I am a complete stranger, but that's fine. My feeling is strangers are just friends I haven't met yet. So I felt like I was in good company. So yeah, Elizabeth Black. I grew up in Baltimore, Maryland in kind of the county podunk area. A lot of people, when I tell them I grew up in Baltimore, they're like, oh, yeah, like The Wire.

And I'm like, no, not like The Wire at all. If you watch that HBO show, that was not my upbringing. My background is ethnically. I'm half Mexican-, half African American. But where I grew up was almost exclusively either like white evangelical, you know, upper middle class. So I was always very much a minority in my upbringing, but really loved it, actually. I think because I came from a multi-ethnic background, I just felt it was always really natural to hang out with people who are different from me and kind of appreciate other people's stories and ethnic backgrounds.

So what was interesting is that though I grew up in a Christian home, came to faith when I was about seven. Church was a big part of my life. Grew up in a Southern Baptist church. Because our community was also so Jewish, I fell in love with the Jewish community and learned more about the Jewish religion and the Jewish story. So at about 14, I was convinced that like God was calling me to, to do Jewish ministry in some capacity and particularly in like the, the realm of evangelism and discipleship. So, um, when I graduated from high school, went to Bible college and spent a lot of my time at Bible college, um, kind of back and forth actually in Israel doing internships there

and, um, you know, doing different short term missions trips because that's, you know, where my heart was joined a synagogue. Like when I, when I fall in love with something, I'm all in. Um, so, so yeah, that was really my trajectory. Like when I fall in love with something, I'm all in. So yeah, that was really my trajectory. And I met my husband, who is a Jewish believer in Jesus. So it was a match made in heaven. And shortly after we graduated, got married, and then started on the mission field here in the States, but doing work among Jewish populations. So that's what I had been doing before I started Kaleidoscope, really, for about 12 years and really loved it.

It was a great, great field. But what's interesting is kind of how it brought me to where I'm at now is that the last three years of my ministry, I noticed that so many of the Jewish people I was sharing the gospel with, talking with, kind of having these building relationships, were asking questions about sexuality, faith, gender, identity, spirituality. And I didn't really have a good answer. I didn't really, I didn't have a natural place to have that conversation. And I knew like something's missing here. You know, we, I spent so much time of my life contextualizing the gospel to a Jewish audience. However, you know, now there's kind of this new nuanced part of the audience that I don't really know how to talk to in a way that they would feel, you know, would be helpful for them. So I spent the last three years of my ministry within the Jewish community contextualizing or learning to contextualize the gospel to a Jewish LGBTQ audience. Oh, wow. Which was very niche in and of itself. But there are,

you know, it's crazy. Like in the time that I was doing this, I discovered, you know, through research and stuff that one out of seven Jewish people identify as LGBTQ, which is a huge part of the population. And there's, because the Jewish community tends to, outside of like Orthodox and ultra Orthodox communities as a whole, they tend to be really more of a liberal kind of embracing community, socially liberal. So they had, they were like a million steps ahead of kind of where the Christian world was and where I was in my ministry. So it gave me a really great learning space, you know, to go into these Jewish contexts, these Jewish LGBTQ contexts and learn what's going on in the community. So that's kind of

where I started and what ended up leading me to Kaleidoscope. Obviously, there's more to the story, but that's a good start. I'm curious, where did you go to Bible college? I went to Washington Bible College. So it's not, it was a small college, unfortunately. Yeah, Lancaster ended up buying it out maybe five years after I graduated. It's affiliated with Capitol Bible Seminary. So I don't know if you know Capitol, but is that Mark Deber or no? I don't think so. No. I'm also bad with names.

Yeah. Yeah. Me too. Me too. Um, was it like a Southern Baptist or conservative Bible college or? No, I mean, I think it had Baptist or Southern Baptist roots. But by the time I was going there, it was a pretty old school. By the time I was going there, it was non-denominational. So, you know, there were professors from all kinds of theological positions and backgrounds teaching, which I loved because it gave me a very diverse, you know, education. I loved because it gave me a very diverse education. So I studied in Israel for fall of 1999 and have been back a few times. I absolutely love it.

Love it. Where did you study? It was with the college I went to, Masters College back then. They had a whole semester in Israel program where you go and you basically get a – you take classes there. They had a whole campus. Wow. Just – was it 15 miles west of Jerusalem? Okay. Yeah.

So it was so cool because I was able to like really soak it in being there for four months or three and a half months, whatever. Totally. It was amazing. Oh, my gosh. I loved it. I fell in love with, yeah, the culture. I mean, obviously studying the Bible in Israel is unbelievable, but I mean, I fell in love with just Middle Eastern culture. Like I actually love hearing the Muslim prayers over the loudspeaker and everything. And like just

the smells of the old city and just the, it's just so unique, the Middle Eastern culture. And I just fell in love with it. Absolutely. love it so much it's totally different from like what people would expect i think who haven't been there or who are familiar with like jewish american culture it's like a totally different animal um but i really love it because i i feel like people are very open and honest and very blunt. And so it makes conversations really fun because no one's trying to like, you know, just be nice to you for for niceness sake. It's so real. Yeah, it's so relational. I love seeing, you know, old men playing backgammon and drinking coffee all day, smoking outside their shop.

Anytime you want to just engage in a conversation, that's what people do. It's just so relational. Yes. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, it was great. We ended up, my family and I, we were there a few years back, and we basically lived there for like a semester doing outreach in Jerusalem. And I, after that time, I was convinced, I was like, I want to live here. This is amazing. But New York has its perks too.

There's lots of Israelis here too. And you know, it's a good place to visit. It's a hard place. I think it would be a hard place to live. But yeah, I mean, I'm thankful for my time in Jewish ministry. And my hope in many ways is that even in Kaleidoscope, that part of that isn't over because there's such a huge LGBTQ population among Jewish people. But, you know, it's part of what I have been reflecting on in that part of my story is the idea of sentness. Um, and just thinking about how I was, you know, I was recently reflecting and I was like, God, was all of, was that 12 years just, was it self-motivated? Was it fake? Like, what were you doing? Like now I'm, I'm working with LGBTQ people and I'm like, so immersed in that culture. Why did I spend 12 years doing something else? And it just, I felt like the Lord was reminding me

that setness is like where he places you. It's not necessarily like always this grand calling where you have to move across, you know, state lines or across the world, you know, to really follow where God is leading you. But I think something that I've really realized is like God put Jewish people in my life really intensely for a season and now has like set me like clearly open this path to open my horizons to another, you know, audience and a really a group of people who I've, who are also very marginalized, misunderstood. And like, quite frankly, I would call an unreached people group in many ways. The LGBTQ community. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So similar to like, I see the similarities to my work with the Jewish

population, because not a lot of people are out there doing like work to Jewish audiences. You know, there's not tons of like missionaries in Israel. A lot of the ones that I know are missionaries towards like Palestinian communities, which is amazing and beautiful. But I think a lot of people, even theologically, are a little bit intimidated or don't know kind of where to place Jewish people in the whole story of things. You know, I met so many people who told me, well, why do you have to share the gospel with Jewish people? They're going, they're God's chosen people anyway. So they have like the golden ticket, which I'm like, I don't think that's how it works.

Salvation by ethnicity. Exactly, exactly. So, and I think there was also a level of intimidation. So I, I, I've learned a lot from my season in Jewish ministry. Well, tell us about Kaleidoscope. What birthed this? What is it all about? And yeah, I'm sure I'll open up all kinds of different conversation opportunities. Oh, yeah, for sure. So yeah, like I mentioned, my last three years in Jewish ministry really paid the way for me to want to start this. And a lot of it was there was there were a few people who really were inspiring, one of which was an intern at the time who was working with Jews for Jesus.

Her parents were missionaries for like 30 plus years. So she grew up in this kind of Messianic Jewish ministry world. And for all intents and purposes, everyone just assumed like she's a Christian and she's like on the right path. And she was interning for like five years and I struck up a relationship with her, started discipling her and noticed with every step forward kind of towards a deeper relationship with Jesus, there was this massive like chasm that was like between her and her faith. And I could see it, you know, but I didn't really, I could sense it, but I didn't really know what it was.

But you, it almost felt like a burden. Like I could see a physical weight on her back from, from something that was going on spiritually. And then eventually with like massive, you know, fear and trepidation, she had shared with me that she was gay and that she knew she was gay all of her life. And she the only voice that she could hear from God was the voice from her parents saying that God does not could not love her, does not love her, and that there is no way that she could have a relationship with him. So though she like desperately desired to follow Jesus with all of her heart and soul, it just, she just felt like there was no reconciling it. And at the time I felt completely ill-equipped to have a conversation, like I said. And I just, the best that I could do, which I feel like is still so great. And when I meet people who feel like they don't know what to do, it's always to say like, you know, don't let your sexual orientation, your gender identity, any other parts of you

stop you from experiencing the good news of Jesus and like the goodness of God. Don't let it because he's not, he's not in the way. Like it's only kind of those, those fears that we have. So it only took, you know, one, two conversations until I saw her open up and kind of take off those burdens. And obviously it was a process, but just immediately, just being able to share her story and hearing other people affirm her as a person, as someone that God not only is capable of loving, but actually already does love. Um, I, you know, at that

point she said, I came to faith. I didn't even believe, like I couldn't truly believe in Jesus before. And I came to faith. So just watching her grow and then also seeing her experience massive rejection from the ministry that I was working with at the time, because she wanted to be open about her testimony as somebody who identifies as gay, believes in Jesus, committed to a traditional sexual ethic and was told that there was no room for her in the ministry. Um, and it was, it was through that moment and that circumstance, that relationship and many others that I was just like, there's something wrong here. Like we're not doing something well as the church where we can't even really listen to people's stories, let alone trust the work of the Holy Spirit in other people's lives.

And then in the process of doing that, interestingly enough, when, when she first came out to me and a few others did the same, I had this, like this feeling in the pit of my stomach, like, Oh no, God, what are you about to do? Because I knew that there was something about what she was expressing and what other people are expressing that was too close for comfort for me. But I couldn't ignore where God was leading me, where I felt sent. So I just kept on the path and then found Revoice, like you mentioned. And at one of the previous Revoices, I don't even remember who was talking, what they talked about, but I heard the Holy Spirit say,

even remember who was talking, what they talked about, but I heard the Holy Spirit say, Elizabeth, you know that you've also experienced same-sex attraction all of your life, and you've never been able to even say it. And it's true. I wasn't even able to pray to God about it. I used to say, God, you know that thing that we don't talk about? Can you just take that away? That was about as close as it would get. Or, you know, I look forward to dying because once I die, then I'll be free from this. That was the extent of my prayer. And the Lord just invited me. Like he just said, you can be honest about your own experience now and trust that I'm going to be on the other side of that honesty.

your own experience now and trust that I'm going to be on the other side of that honesty. Or you can keep it quiet between us and I will love you all the same. And I think this was the first time I even let him finish the sentence. I think this is the first time I let him give me two options. And I just was like, okay, I'm ready to take the leap. And I've seen the way he's loved others. And I trust that he can do the same for me. So now it's become, you know, it's not just for the sake of others, but there's a personal attachment to the experience as well. So this was just, I mean, how long ago was that when you were able to? Oh, it wasn't very long ago. Yeah, because Revoice hasn't been around that long.

No, it was probably around, you know, I say it kind of embarrassingly. I think it was about three years ago, which is crazy. I'm 35. And I think one of the first things that I felt was like a sense of embarrassment. Like, Lord, why did I wait so long? Like, this is so embarrassing. But I think like the wisdom and grace from other people that I shared my story with was that, you know, everybody's story is different. And I'm almost grateful for it also, because I think it's a testimony to our churches and Christian community that there are probably, I know I'm not the other one, only one.

There are others, other grown adults. We're not just talking about youth, young adults, people who are trying to be trendy. I'm not trying to hitch on the trendy band bandwagon of the lgbtq culture please i tried to avoid it for most of my life um but you know that that these experiences are are more are are more common i think than we we think would you describe yourself how would you describe yourself i mean um i thought i heard you at revoice say bisexual or is that was that i don't want to put words in your mouth yeah that's no no no no that's correct yeah so okay i think um so part of my my story experience and part of

the reason why i could wait so late was that like i had had a very clear attraction to men from, from the beginning of like puberty. So it wasn't, it was something that I could ignore because I had something and in a sense I had something to replace it. Do you, do you know what I mean? Like I could, I could suppress the attraction to women because my attraction to men was was there and it was genuine so um yeah so I would say I identify as bisexual can you if as much as you want to share um sure my our bisexuality can be very misunderstood it can be kind of mysterious it's um even within like, um, you know, in, in more academic, like psychological circles, you know, their views range from like, it doesn't exist to everybody's basically bisexual on some level. And then you have the whole like female and bisexuality, which, you know, there's a decent

number of people who would say, you know, female sexuality already kind of lends itself to some form of bisexuality in a much, much higher percentage. Can you help, can you just pretend like our audience has never even heard the word bisexual? Sure. Can you maybe, yeah, describe what this experience is, at least, you know, I know people maybe experience it differently, but according to your own experience. Totally, totally. Yeah, well, I think, so one thing I was just sharing with a group of pastors the other day about this is there's a common misunderstanding also between like bisexuality and pansexuality, which are the two groups that are similar that are talked about a lot so bisexuality is basically the umbrella term for anyone who experiences attraction to uh their own gender and then a second or third or other gender so it's not just necessarily most of the time we when people hear bisexual they think okay you're attracted to men and women.

For a lot of people, that's the truth. But the truest definition is you're attracted to people who are your own gender and then a secondary gender. And that could be multiple or one or however. or one or however, where pansexuality, and I think, again, just going back, a distinction is also for many people who identify as bisexual, gender has to do with their sexual attraction. So like, I'm attracted to my husband because of who he is and his soul and his spirit and his character and also the fact that he's a man like his male form is a part of my attraction whereas those who identify as pansexual often would say it is kind of despite gender identity that their attraction lives so the attraction kind of lives in this like it it is, I I'm attracted

to the person, their personality, and it doesn't really matter what gender identity they hold. Right. So, so that's a way of clarifying it. Yeah. I think there's a lot of misunderstandings around the experience. There's a lot of people who would say, you know, it's a phase, you know, because when you're a teenager, there's so many people questioning. I, that was one thing that was actually like such a relief to me was to hear my straight friends talk about how they also questioned their sexual identity at one point. And I was like, oh, good. I'm not alone. Um, identity at one point. And I was like, oh, good. I'm not alone. But I think for a lot of us, it's a persistent thing. But even in that persistence, there's a lot of different experiences. So for me, I've noticed it kind of comes in waves. So someone had explained gender identity like this for me, and this is great

for, for my experience too. It's almost like a dial. Um, so sometimes the dial is pointed really far up towards like female attraction. And then I find myself almost, I would find myself almost exclusively attracted to women. And then sometimes the dial is all the way to men. And then sometimes it's somewhere in the middle, a little bit here or there. So the, it kind of goes in ways where other people it's always consistent. Um, they're always consistently attracted to men, women, transgender people, non-binary. So, you know, it's just different for different people.

so you know it's just different for different people but I think the consistent persistence of attraction is what distinguishes the experience and I do think women tend to experience bisexuality at a higher rate than the men well I mean just on an identity level if you take just the I mean the data is pretty clear. If you take the percentage of people who identify as bisexual, females, outnumber men, I don't have the number in front of me. But it's very – much, much higher. And the younger you go, the higher it is. I don't know the latest study on that. I should know these numbers.

But like teenage females who identify as bisexual are almost i i don't don't quote me on this but it's almost on pace or has almost surpassed females that would identify as like straight you know yeah it depends on your social environment too which that raises i don't know i don't know how how deep in the weeds we want to get but i mean in your yeah in your experience experience, have you noticed like – how do you – well, do we want to get it? The higher rates among Gen Z. Well, here's the latest – not Pew. What's the – gosh.

I'm blanking on the famous – the research they do every year. Anyway, 20.8. I know. Barna. Barna. You know, it wasn't – that's the Christian one, but there's – maybe Gallup. Oh, yes. It's the Gallup poll.

Yes. It was – in January, the latest one was 20.8% of Gen Z identifies. That's LGBTQ. But even then when you break it down like how many of that percentage would identify as bisexual on some level i think it was i want to say more than 50 percent um again you can fact check all that but no no no that that's that's pretty accurate at least as far as i know as well in doing the research but it's actually very consistent. The fact that it's 25% of Gen Zers is much higher than, you know, my generation, millennials and above, which was like 5%. Right.

But what is interesting is bisexuals and people who experience like multi-attractions to different g genders we take up about 50 percent of the lgbtq right accurate you know like we are we're the biggest group within the lgbtq world which you don't really hear about um so there's this whole concept of like bi erasure that because um the experience the people who are the bigger voices in the LGBTQ world tend to be either gay or transgender or lesbian, you don't really hear very much from bisexual people. And I think when it comes to women or girls experiencing or seemingly experiencing bisexuality more. I think, you know, again, this is just my opinion and my experience, but I feel like because there is a sense of like a natural interconnectivity that women tend to have.

Like we're just really great at connecting with people in a very natural way and can kind of hold a network in that sense. And I think also deep levels of empathy. I have this whole theory that I think bisexual people are probably some of the most empathetic people in the world because we, you know, can really feel and relate to so many people and have that deep longing for connection. But I think when it comes to men, I think it's very societal. And you alluded to it, but I think it is more socially acceptable for women to identify as bisexual than men. than men. I think from one end of the spectrum that would say, well, it seems very greedy for men to identify as bisexual. Like it's, it's very much like the, you know, masculine kind of patriarchy that would say men can have everything from that kind of perspective to the other side where it's like, well, it's de-masculating for

men to identify as bisexual. And it's actually, you know, this is also part of, I think, some cultural issues that women are more sexualized in our society. Therefore, it's acceptable for women to be bisexual because there's some kind of sexual appeal to the idea that women would want to be physically or romantically connected to other women. I really want to hear more about your ministry, but this isn't it. We'll get there. I, cause I, for me, like pastorally, I get a lot of leaders and especially the last couple of years wanting guidance or just explanation on like half of my youth group is either bisexual or non-binary among the female population typically. Um, what do I, what do I do? Or, you know, it's, it's, um, What do I do?

Or, you know, it's – yeah. And I have been – I mean, in the past, I have been – this is going to sound – this is going to come out wrong, but I'll just say it and clean up my mess later. Like I've been really fascinated at – well, I'm fascinated at the differences between male and female sexuality as a whole. And when I say that, of course, I'm talking about generalities, not exclusivity. Sexuality is way more complex. But I mean, it's pretty well established now that female sexuality does have a certain level of fluidity to it. Again, I'll say it one more time. Not in every case, but on the whole, more than men.

And there's a blurriness, right? And I need to ask this as a question because I hear I'm talking to a female. I'm going to tell you about female sexuality. But like as people describe it to me, like the lines between an emotional attraction, an emotional draw, an intimate attraction, a sexual attraction, maybe a physical admiration, maybe even physical jealousy. I want that body. physical jealousy. I want that body. And then you throw in just the chaos of being a teenager and hormones and adolescence. You wrap all that up into a ball, plant that in 2022, where there's all kinds of messaging on sexuality and explore and try. And it's like, I can't imagine being a 15-year-old female with all that going on. And then, yeah, throw that person in, say, a more progressive environment where, you know, where, yeah, you're being encouraged to interpret things sexually, to explore yourself sexually.

If all of that's somewhat true, then, of course, many or most teenage females would say they're probably bisexual because the second you feel some kind of emotional spark when you look at another woman, where 20 years ago it might have just been like interpreted to like, you just, yeah, you saw another girl's body and you wish you had that body and you got a little emotional like, but now I feel like, is there, let me ask it. Is there pressure or a push or draw to interpret some of those complex emotions through a sexual lens? Is that – I'm going to stop talking and let you go. No, no, no, no. Thanks for clarifying. I hear you.

My first thought is I don't envy teenagers who are growing up in this time and place now. But at the same time, I don't know what's better. Like, I don't know if my context was really any better. And I'll say that because, like, when I was about 13 and it became undeniable to me that I was having, you know, sexual attraction towards other girls. I was at this crossroads of like, do I pick God or do I like address or acknowledge my sexual attraction? And that was a lot for a 13 year old who was like really committed to Jesus. Right. So I was too afraid to tell anybody. But finally, I thought I was going to Jesus. Right. So I was too afraid to tell anybody, but finally I thought it was going to explode. I came out to my mom and my mom's response was, you know, it's okay.

Everybody feels that way. So it was a very like universal response where I was like, mom, I didn't know bisexuality was a thing. So I was like, mom, I think I'm gay. And she's like, you're not gay. And I was like, well, but I really like, I have a crush on my teacher. And I was trying to really like, it felt like bearing, bearing it all, like explain to her, you know, when I hug her, I have these feelings. And when I'm with her, I want to hold her hand. And it's just like this very confusing thing. And she's like, she literally said, everybody loves a hug, Elizabeth. Everybody loves a hug. So at the time, I was grateful.

I was like, yes, like good. Apparently, everybody's attracted to everybody, you know, to any gender. And good Christians choose the opposite sex. You understand? So like that, that's what I did. I was going to be a good Christian who, okay, this is a universal experience, but I will pick the opposite sex. So I think like for, for me, that was hard because then I spent the rest of my adolescence

and adulthood, not only kind of suppressing something i i don't i didn't feel compelled to experiment you felt normal you felt normal right i felt normal ish but it was normal but in your mind probably wasn't interpreting what was going on correct it was kind of like because you really were feeling sexual attraction it wasn't like oh every girl you know um so that might not have been helpful it's a hard distinction like you were saying you know in your question like do you do you interpret it as sexual attraction do you interpret it as you know emotional attachment or experience or friendship do you interpret it as, you know, emotional attachment or experience or friendship? Do you interpret it as jealousy? So I would say like, that was a constant thought in my mind throughout my whole life was before really coming out was like, okay, I'm looking at this woman, but am I looking at her because I

think she's attractive or because I want her body because I want to have that body or because I like her clothes? And I always landed on, oh, it must be because I like her clothes, you know, or I want to have her figure because Lord forbid, I really, you know, acknowledge and be honest to myself that it was actually something else going on. Yeah. My ultimate motivation for even wanting to explore this more is I think that there needs to be some discipleship, better discipleship among teenagers across the board. I could end that just period. But especially, I don't know, there is a unique need, I think, of teenage females in our youth groups, in our homes. Because you have the added theological piece here, like, okay, if I have this feeling, then what does this mean for my future and my faith and everything? So you have the added faith element, which should be beautiful,

but can be very anxiety producing, unfortunately. So I don't know. I just, I keep getting, yeah, leaders, they're just at a lot, like, how do I walk with somebody who, the many people now who are saying, I think I'm experiencing, you know, some form of bisexuality. And it's hard because a lot of leaders, they don't even know what they, like, I don't even know what that means. Kind of like like, kind of do, but I don't know. I don't even know what to say, you know? I don't know. I feel like the biggest thing that's lacking in the church as a whole, and then I would say probably, I mean, I haven't been in youth group for a very long time, but is that we just have a very warped approach to human sexuality, period. Right.

So I think I never understood or was taught from a biblical perspective, what does it mean to be a sexual being? What does it mean that God has created me to have sexual desire? What does sexual desire even look like? What does it mean that God has created me to have sexual desire? What is sexual desire even look like? What does it mean? So since that was never really explained to me, how could I distinguish? girls or guys today or kids today, how can they really distinguish between this is my best friend versus I have a crush on this person versus I just idolize her as this like ultimate female figure. And I think something that I've heard many times from LGBTQ Christians, particularly girls, is that now that they've come out maybe in their twenties or late teens, they look back and they're

like, Oh, that girl that I was friends with for three years, we were absolutely dating and no, like I didn't know it. And she probably didn't either. But we had an undying love for each other and were together forever. And there was sexual tension. But because there was no conversation around what that even means and looks like, they didn't even acknowledge it. Yeah. Which is scary. That's scary to me, that we would have kids in our youth group that are potentially in romantic or even physical. Some of the girls that I've talked to, like very physical sexual relationships.

And in their mind, because there's no context, they're not doing anything. You know, so there's no one who's really speaking into those areas of their lives. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They're definitely. Yeah. There needs to be like leadership. Hold on. Yeah. I mean, this there definitely – yeah, there needs to be like leadership. Hold on. Yeah. I mean this is what we do, right? I mean it needs to be – Yeah, exactly.

This is why what we do is – why we exist to do what we do. I mean leadership training specifically on people working with youth and parents on this more narrow specific question of helping teen – and I do want to say especially girls. Not that guys don't need it as well there's that they have their own issues but um help teenage girls walk with walk through this really complex time of their life i do like the idea of norm the the few people i've kind of talked directly to like especially if you're raising a church and you have these spikes of emotions you're not sure what to do with it. And you start getting really freaked out,

right? Because you're like, wait, no, I can't. No, no, you know, I can't be that. I'm not allowed to be that. I just hear negative, negative, negative messaging. So that produces all this anxiety. But to almost normalize it, and the word normalize can be taken different directions, but like to say, no, this is a normal human experience. Let's work through this. You're very, this is very common. This is very natural. This is very, and normal doesn't mean acting on whatever emotion you have is okay. You know, but just that alone is say, you're, you're just a beautiful human being going through what humans go through. Like, it's great. You know, it's okay. Exactly. Yeah. And having people to really open up to and talk about it, who are going to care about you, not just because of your story, but because they care about your soul, you know,

because they care about you spiritually. I think like, I wish I would have had that kind of messaging or relationship in my life. And I think now there is like you said, there's all of this push to like, well, if you are questioning, then experiment like that. You won't know until you experiment. And there's a rush to identify with a label. And I think labels are great and can be very helpful. And for some kids, it's very, it is very black and white. And I'm glad that they have labels to explain their experience.

But I think, you know, for people who maybe aren't sure, for kids that aren't sure, I don't know if labels are always the most helpful. That's actually why I love the label queer. I love the term queer because it embodies kind of, I don't know yet. And it's okay that I feel different because somebody is here looking out for me, who's talking to me, and I don't need to go out and sleep with somebody to verify my attraction. with somebody to verify my attraction. But I think until we're willing to talk, this is, this is the experience when you are sexually attracted to someone, this is what happens to your body. This is what happens to you in your heart. These are the feelings that, you know, these are the things that you want to do and the feelings that are kind of brought up. How are we to know? Yeah. Yeah. You know, it's funny that the term, I and the feelings that are kind of brought up, how are we to know? Yeah. Yeah.

You know, it's funny that the term, I don't, I'm kind of undecided on that. It's not my, who am I to have an opinion on it, but it's interesting. The tension between older gay and lesbian people,

they typically really don't like the term. Like Andrew Sullivan, who's like, the younger ones love it. I know. Andrew Sullivan says, I'm so offended by this term. And he even said like, what did he say? Queer is the – what did he say? Queer is what straight people call themselves when they want access to a minority community or something.

I mean, they're really hard. Have you talked to an older lesbian about the like they get or people in academic they see it as kind of so tied to like queer theory and this whole academic thing which is brings this whole thing in and i but then other people like you said like it it kind of desexualizes the experience and leaves a little more because i i do get nervous about airtight black and white boxes you know especially with younger people that have the confusion of youth added to this whole journey to have these airtight boxes who am i i am this and that's who i always will be it's like you're 14 like yeah let's hold off on these boxes so that i think the queer label

the vagueness or at least the flexibility of it can be helpful there too so i don't i don't know it's it i'm like in the stands you know with my popcorn and watching people debate this term and the helpfulness of it but anyway well i think there's like there's no fighting it now um yeah you know maybe in the in church context yeah we can still have the conversation but in the in church context. Yeah, we can still have the conversation. But in the in the broader LGBTQ conversation. Yeah. Queer is just a part of the normal vernacular. And I, I actually had a really fun conversation with Greg Coles about this, who, you know, is like a word nerd at his finest. nerd at his finest. And, you know, I think that there is, it reminds me a lot as a minority of some minority or some terms that were used as derogatory terms in the past that we're kind of, we have reclaimed and are using now as a form of camaraderie. So queer, at least I think at this point, though, it's moving in a different direction, is more of an insider term.

You know, I wouldn't necessarily say to a pastor, if you're talking about this from the pulpit, don't say. And all those queers, because that's not going to go over. Some old white pastor goes talk about the queers. Please don't do it. That's how that, that, that, that distinction is really good. It's an insider term. So outsider. Yeah.

No. Yeah. That's good. Well, we, Elizabeth, we've got to talk about Kaleidoscope. My gosh, this is a long intro. Okay. Now we'll do it. Now we'll do it.

So what do you want to know? I just tell us if somebody said, what do you do? And you say, I am the co-founder and president of Kaleidoscope. And they say, what's that all about? Go. Sure. Sure. Okay. So yeah. So Kaleidoscope, our mission and our vision is to really engage with the LGBTQ community with tangible expressions of Christ. Like in many sense, in, in, yeah, in the most basic sense of it, we're a missions organization that is reaching out to the LGBTQ community at large right now, you know, centered in New York, but our hope is to see it really spread and grow because we would identify the LGBTQ community as an unreached people group in many ways. Very similar in the way that we talk about other unreached people groups.

what Meg and I, who is the co-founder with me, have really seen. We haven't seen a lot of what we call indigenous LGBTQ leadership. So when we think about missions, the hope is that you go into a community, you love on them, you share the gospel and word and deed, you start to build this community centered on Christ, and that you're able to step back and let those people create the context of their faith that makes sense to them, and that there's leadership that's brought up from the inside. And that's our hope, is that, you know, even though all of us are people who are would identify as a part of the community, we don't want to be we're not creating an empire. And we don't want to to just train pastors and other Christian leaders to be good witnesses, though it is essential to the spread of the gospel. We really want to help also empower LGBTQ Christians to go back out into their community and do the same. I have a soft, or actually, no,

I have a hard question for you. I literally never thought about this, but given everything you're saying, in my anecdotal experience, I'm not going to name any names, but I have three names in particular um well okay no i i can name that there's um i can name at least at least two when i think of people who were converted like the people you're trying to reach then they convert to christianity they if they were steeped in the unchurched non-Christian LGBT community for years,

whatever, then they get saved. Sometimes their approach to these questions ends up being very conservative. I'm thinking like Rosaria Butterfield, Chris Yuan, or several others. What's my question? Is that,

is that good? I mean, is that so that, or even I know a lot of people who are maybe converted who would have more of like almost like an ex-gay narrative now. Like it's almost like, wait, are you into reparative therapy? Or it's like the conversion is so clean, a clean break, black and white that those converts typically we get really not excited about something like revoice or more of a side B kind of whatever. Would you say, Hey, that's, that's the work Jesus is going

to do among the leaders and that's then go for it. Or would you get nervous about that kind of, um, experience? I don't know. I mean, obviously I don't love it. You know, like I am not, I am not, have never been and will never be in favor of any type of conversion therapy. I find it to be very destructive and harmful. We don't handle anything else like that in the church. So I don't know why this is the one area. If you need to add something, I named some names. So I do have to add some clarification because there's thousands of people listening to this. I am not at all saying Rosaria

or Chris Yuan or others advocate for that. I do know they're very much against like a revoice. I think that's public. That's not a surprise. And I would say personally, I've learned a ton from both of Chris, Rosaria, that more conservative approach to these questions. We've obviously hold to the same theology. We disagree on several things, which is fine, but I really, I'm not saying anything. I think they have contributed great to this discussion in many ways. Yeah. I think everybody, you know, hopefully we can see the good in a lot of what other people bring, despite maybe the theological differences or different approaches. And I think that's another distinction in our ministry is that we don't really front line. We don't really talk heavily about theology because that's not our that's not our goal that's not

really what we're doing we're really grateful for people like you Preston who are having like very deep and complex theological conversations and debates about this and really engaging with church leadership and and just Christian academics on that level. However, our heart is the people on the ground. You know what I mean? So because of that, we have people from various theological backgrounds. We have people who are in same-sex relationships.

We have people who are committed to celibacy and our approach is there's room at the table for everyone to experience the goodness of God, you know? So, so we, we're not a church. We're not, um, we're not officiating any weddings. We're not, you know, doing anything like that. However, we feel like there is no service that we're doing to LGBTQ folks. If we say, oh, we don't have the same theological conclusion about marriage, go find somebody else. I never want to leave an LGBTQ person out in the cold spiritually with nowhere to turn. You know what I mean? Like I, I, we want to be

there for, for everyone. Um, and so, so all that to say, I think now we're experiencing something a little different, a different approach, uh, where a lot of LGBTQ people who are coming to faith, they don't necessarily see it as an exclusive experience where I, now I have to be ex-gay. I think they want to say, well, what do I do with this very real reality that I've experienced? Many, most people who are LGBTQ, they don't, they don't have the, the experience where they pray and then they're not right they don't have some question anymore they're not transgender anymore like that that's not the common experience yeah so they want to be able to reconcile the two and i think that you know

thankfully we and other you know hopefully other churches and organizations like us can provide opportunities for LGBTQ people to tell their story and to be leaders in really significant ways. Yeah. So you're it's I mean, you said a missionary organization, but it's not. I guess it is evangelistic, but you're saying it's more like embodied love is the evangelism, not so much. I don't want to say like not leading people to Christ, but. I mean, it's definitely both. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

more on the kind of living with people and being an example and kind of loving your neighbor as yourself and all of those things. But we also, so that's a big part of what we do. But we also like do like straight up old school evangelism where we're going out on the streets in New York, in prevalent LGBTQ communities. So places like Hell's Kitchen, like the West Village, where Stonewall is, and other historical LGBTQ sites. And we set up tables and we engage with people around the gospel. Wow. So it's so fun, Preston.

It is so fun because of the cognitive dissonance also. Like people are like, wait a minute, you're here telling us about Jesus? Like I thought you guys hated us. Like I thought Christians didn't want to have anything to do with us. Why are you here wanting to love us? It's amazing. It's really fun. Do they get, I mean, maybe I need to envision more of what you're doing because i would imagine that especially in new york city or any kind of more progressive city when you start saying we're christian we're gonna tell you about jesus and if they're queer lgbtq plus um they'd be like almost like it seems like they wouldn't they get like annoyed at that or

like whoa whoa whoa like or is it are they interested in saying, well, wait, tell me more? Are they generally interested in like, how are you a Christian coming here and wanting to love on me? I'm not phrasing this right. I'm asking a question. So it's not a turnoff that you are a Christian in their space? Because I can imagine some context where that would just be a turnoff. Yeah. I have not experienced any backlash, any kind of negative responses ever.

It's funny. The people who tend to ask me that question of like, well, do they even like that you're there? Aren't they turned off by the fact that you would be talking about Jesus's love? It's really only Christians who asked me that, which is funny because it, to me, it shows me there is a true openness in the LGBTQ community that like, we don't always see, you know, we're not always considering. But the reality is people are like, oh, like, tell me more. Or, yeah, I used to go to church and then I came out and, you know, my parents kicked me out of the home or I knew my church wouldn't listen to my story. So I just left. So now they're looking for outlets to say, OK, what would it look like for me to follow Jesus? Like, really? So it's been, that's all. Yeah.

So again, that's another question. I think I hear a lot from the church perspective, which is great. Like, I'm glad people ask me because now I get the opportunity to say to your audience, like, no, I have never done outreach like street evangelism and had anyone asked me, well, what's your, where do you stand on the, you know, anything like that? Not once. Um, and I think maybe twice have I had anyone, um, that I've been like walking with ask me anything about it? Wow. Like for the most part, that's because for for us, it tends to be a primary issue, you know, like it tends to be like that's where our minds always go. I think in the Christian world.

One second. Sorry, my computer. Got issues. Got issues over there. I know. And there's, you know, whatever. People are working on the door. So tell me if it gets too loud.

But yeah, I think that's where our minds always go is like, well, but what, what do you think about marriage? What do you think about marriage? And people, because it's embodied experience, like we're talking about a lifetime of experience, of attraction, of culture that's embedded in people's lives, though I don't want to dismiss the questions about marriage equality or, you know, same-sex partnership. Like, it is a huge part of this conversation, but it's really not in the way that I think many Christians would assume it is. Like that's not an upfront deal breaker for a conversation to happen. Where are you,

where do you stand? And then we can go from there kind of thing. No. Oh. And, and also I think people, people just recognize that there's more to the experience. We know there's more to the experience than just who should I marry? Can I marry? What does it look like to get married? What does God think about marriage? I mean, so many LGBTQ people are single. Like that's not where their minds are going. You know, there's your experiences, your experience, like we were saying about youth, despite what you've done or who, where you've experimented or who you're dating. It's a part of your identity. So no one really.

No, it's a it's a topic. It's not really a primary focus of conversation. I mean, can be loved in my. Well, I have both some data and also anecdotal experience. The data, according to the Marin study from several years ago, right? 83% of LGBT people were raised in a church, about 50% leave the church after 18. And when they were asked why they left, only 3% said the number one reason why I left the church was because of the theology of marriage and sexuality.

The top five reasons they list had to do with like hypocrisy in the church. They were kicked out when they came out as gay. The leaders, there's a disconnect between leaders. And all of these things are relational tensions that they've had with the church. And that's a large study. 1712 LGBT people were surveyed. In my anecdotal experience, it's funny because I asked you the question, but in my anecdotal experience is typically either very progressive or very conservative straight Christians who want to

know right up front. Most of my pastors are getting emails from people. Where do you stand on same-sex marriage? You know, I mean, this isn't a literal statistic, but it seems like nine times out of 10, it's typically a more hyper-progressive or it might be a conservative saying, you know, you're not a liberal church, are you? You know, but almost in every case, it's a straight person who kind of has a, you know, they might be very on the progressive side, very, very justice minded. And I can't go to a racist church. I don't want to go to a homophobic church. And they kind of draw the line around the theological question. So all that to say, as shocking as your experience may sound, to me, as I look back, I'm like, no, that's actually, that's not,

it's actually not too shocking to hear that. Yeah. And I think that like at Kaleidoscope, we really benefit from the fact that we're para church. So we're not being asked the same, like, you know, we're, we're not having the same kind of conversations with people. We're not having the same kind of conversations with people. And we also have the freedom to experiment a little bit more with what our messaging looks like and how to truly contextualize. Because our audience is not the church. Where for pastors or churches, understandably, you have to consider your denomination. You have to consider your congregants. You have to consider all of these things.

And I think for us, you know, we really focus on how do we best communicate the truth of the gospel in word and in deed to the LGBTQ community. And hopefully Christians, we've found many Christians in many churches and pastors who want to get on board and help us do that. But if people don't like it, there's nothing I can do about it. I think we do tend to stir up some controversy sometimes, but I like that. I don't know. I can imagine Elizabeth being in a ministry where it's controversial. I don't know how I'd handle that.

So you would see yourself as, I mean, you're on the front lines of helping people experience the tangible love of Jesus. Maybe that they haven't experienced that before. Maybe they're even raised in a church they haven't experienced that before. Maybe they were even raised in a church and hadn't experienced that before. Tell me if I'm correct. You wouldn't see your job really as kind of the long-term discipleship questions that they may have. And is that why you, while you hold to a certain sexual ethic, it's not like that's a primary thing you're trying to introduce people to because you're just trying to get the conversation going. Would that be a correct way of seeing it? Whereas a pastor does need to ask questions about where are we as a church and what does

discipleship look like and what does membership look like and who can serve on leadership? They do have to ask those more maybe further down the road discipleship questions, whereas you're saying that's not really the space you're in? Yeah, I think it's less the long game, because I would say we're definitely in it for long-term discipleship. We don't want to just see people come to faith and then drop our hands and say, you know, okay, go and hopefully you'll find a church or community. Like, you know, we're here to live lives with people for as long as they want discipleship and community. I think the biggest difference, again, is that we're not functioning at a church in the traditional sense. People are not coming to us because they want to, you know, have us officiate their wedding or people aren't coming to us

because they want to know our doctrinal statement. You know, it's just a very different approach. And I think, honestly, again, I think it's just a very different approach. And I think, honestly, again, I think it's such a blessing because it's so refreshing for the LGBTQ population to interact with Christians who are not just there to say, who are not there to say love the sin or hate the sin, to say, well, I need you to really understand how much God hates your partnership before. And not that that's what all Christians do. It's just, that's not our posture. We're just not in the game for any of that.

Yeah. Here's another question or maybe a thought slash question. And it's in the context of, I, I, I love the way what you're doing really. I mean, and you're in spaces that most Christians wouldn't have a clue how to do this. When I hear, and I'm not even saying, well, I would love to hear if you, if you would say this, like when people say, you know what, we just really, really want to focus just on Jesus. We don't really want to talk about sexual ethics. I, I, I would, I guess I'd push it a little bit because following our sexuality is such a huge part of our humanity. And the, I don't know if we can separate sexual ethics from following Jesus. Like part of how we follow Jesus is how we steward our

bodies. Like that's a really basic part of what it means to follow Jesus. How would you navigate that? Like, I don't know, like if somebody saw you, this Jesus person seems really fascinating. I grew up in the church and I never heard about this kind of Jesus and you're loving me and I thought you hated me and I want to explore this more. I want to go down the road. It seems like it would be, I don't know, not helpful to just kind of push aside. Well, now you can kind of go wherever you want with sexual ethics. Like, yeah, that just doesn't seem to resonate.

I don't know. Like Jesus doesn't seem to do that. Yeah. I mean, I think you're going to get me in trouble, Preston, but that's okay. I don't mind. I don't bring people on the podcast. So like, I'm not trying to corner. It's a genuine, yeah. Genuine question. No, it's a, it's a great question. I I'm, I'm really, I love it. I, I think, I think a lot of things about this first. I think that, um, the way that we approach things isn't necessarily parsing out or saying that we don't talk about sexual ethic

at all. The biggest thing I would say is that we, that is not how we start the conversation. That's not where the conversation starts. It's not where the conversation lives. Okay, that's fair. We're willing, and I'll say it from my perspective, I'm willing to accept the fact that people are going to have different, come to different theological conclusions than I do on many different things. Like I once said to somebody, I would not be surprised if when I go to heaven, I was 98, 99% wrong on all of my theology. And the only thing I was right on

was, you know, that the fact that I'm present with the Lord because of the death and resurrection of Jesus, it very well might happen. You know what I mean? And so I'm not saying I guess what what I am saying is I think some of these theological differences culturally we have turned into first like frontline issues where I would say they're probably in my mind, they're more secondary issues. So I have met many affirming pastors and many affirming friends who I could not honestly say, oh, well, they're not Christian because they're affirming. Like, no, I see like God's presence in their lives. I see the fruit of the Holy Spirit. And we come to a different theological conclusion. And that is going to there might cause some distance there in different things. But for the most part, I respect you and love you as a brother and a sister in Christ. And I would say the same with a lot of the people that we we minister to.

minister to, again, I would rather be a home and a space where people can ask questions and people can feel like there are other people who are invested in their spiritual well-being than to say, well, unless you follow this particular sexual ethic, then you can't be a part of this community. I just don't see the benefit of it, particularly in my context, in our context. And I don't really think that that's how Jesus operated. I think, yes, there are parts, there are things within the gospel where we do see like, you know, the sheep and the wolves being separated and, you know, the weeds and the wheat. And there is some kind of like gleaning. But in my interpretation, a lot of that has to do with salvation and issues of like justice. And, you know, I would say, yeah, issues of justice.

And, you know, I would say, yeah, issues of justice. So I don't really see like, for example, Bruce Miller, I was reading his book. Yeah. Guiding the Church in a Time of Sexual Questioning and are leading the church in a time of sexual questioning. And a section that he was sharing was outlining the story of the woman at the well. he was sharing, was outlining the story of the woman at the well. And he had said, you know, the way that Jesus approached this woman wasn't that, first of all, he didn't necessarily like call her out on her sin, though that's how we tend to look at, or at least that's how I grew up looking at it. Jesus was like, oh, you don't have one husband? I know because you got a lot of men at home. That wasn't really the approach. He was inviting this woman to share her story with

him. It was an invitation. And an invitation, I think, with grace and humility. But then when he said to the woman, what I'm offering you is living water, he didn't say with the caveat that you leave all of those men that you were with. Like that that wasn't a part of the conversation. It was I'm going to offer you living water. Obviously, we would all conclude that what God didn't want was this woman to then go back and live this like terrible life of sin and selfishness. But what he was offering her at the moment was living water that she then accepted. And then what Bruce was, she had said was she was the first missionary. She went back to her community and was like, Hey, let me tell you about this Jesus figure who offered me living water. He's the Messiah that even our community has

been waiting for. And we see a community come to faith and there's no, the authors of the gospel didn't make it a point to say, and she lived happily ever after with one husband. So again, I think like in our society or in our cultural context here now, we really want to have like that bow wrapping up the story really well. And I think unfortunately, a lot of what's happening in our conversation around LGBTQ identity and faith doesn't always have a nice bow that can be, you know, wrapped around it and make it look pretty. There's a lot of stickiness and, and gray areas, but I hope that it, the grayness of some of our conversations doesn't stop us from loving people the way that we know Christ loved others. Right, right. Woo, preaching girl. I got a lot of, I got a lot of thoughts. I got to jump in here. And I resonate with so

much of what you're saying. I really mean that. With the woman at the well, I want to kind of pull the rug out from underneath all of that, but in a way that you're going to appreciate. She's, we think of her as promiscuous. She's a victim of a male-dominated patriarchal culture where she was tossed to and fro from man to man. We read this through the lens of like, oh, she's just sleeping around with all these men. No, she was abused, maybe even literally,

but I mean, just like she was taken advantage of. So I don't even see her as like, oh, Jesus encountering the super sinful woman. I see him encountering a woman with piles of shame and victimhood here. Once you read it through the first century Jewish Samaritan context, it's like, women didn't get the divorce their husband. That was something men did. Yeah, absolutely. And that's part of it too. Do we really think that she had the luxury of going back and say, like, excuse me, all of you men that I have been like in relationships with are benefiting off of because I have no freedom in the society. And walk away from it. Like, no, that's not the way that society worked at the time. And what I love about what you just said is that we have to understand the story of the woman to really understand the context, not only of her experience of Jesus, her experience of living water, like how deep is this living water for this woman? But also the difficulty that she was walking back into, like it would be unfair. And I think a very like, you know, unfair and lazy read if we just assume that like, and she lived happily ever after. That's not how life

works for any of us. So I think with LGBTQ folks, we also have to look at it the same way. Like there's a depth of story here. Again, it is, is not just about who somebody wants to marry or not. This is not just about who's, who somebody wants to have sex with or not. Yeah. This is, there's a, there's family dynamics, there's cultural dynamics, there's story, there's life that needs to be like shifted through. And only the Holy Spirit, you know, through his faithful servants, but only the Holy Spirit can do that work. It's not up to me. Yeah, I 100% agree. And there's so much like deconstruction that often has to happen when somebody who's LGBTQ is reintroduced or introduced to Jesus.

There's so many layers and layers and layers that to kind of introduce sexual ethic or marriage so quickly would just be, none of that is even going to make any sense until they have a completely deconstructed and reconstructed view of who Jesus actually is. So everything is downstream from understanding who Jesus is,. So everything is downstream from understanding who Jesus is, having that encounter with Jesus, understanding Jesus in light of the biblical story. Sexual ethics only makes sense once people understand it. So I am not at all saying that, man, yeah, we need a first, second, even third conversation. All right, now let's get to sexual ed. I think that's been utterly unhelpful, especially when straight people haven't really understood some of the decades of just walls that the church has erected between the church and the LGBT community, all the way back from Stonewall to the AIDS crisis and the global majority. And there's just so much. We need to be better missionaries. If we went in, it's almost like, and I've used this analogy before.

It's an extreme analogy, so it's not a one-on-one. But if we're almost in some ways are like German missionaries to Israel in 1951. If we have no clue about what just happened a few years earlier between Germans and Jews, yeah, we might need to understand that and unpack that before we say, hi, my name's Franz, and I'm here to tell you about my German Jesus, how it may come out. Like, no, no, no, no, no. We need to back up and understand the context we're living in. So I would, I guess, and you and I may disagree on this, it's totally fine. Once we – I guess I would still see how we steward our bodies not as a secondary issue. I don't like primary, secondary, like those two kind of camps.

But when I read the new – so going back to Jesus, when Jesus is – when he's ministering to other Jews and confronting them, this, that, and reaching out to the margin, there's kind of an established sexual ethic that everybody agreed upon. Like that was never in dispute within Judaism. So it's not like he needed to kind of introduce them to, you know, all right, to follow me, here's what it looks like. But Paul did, you know, Paul's going into Greco-Roman context where Christianity had a really, really distinct countercultural, I would say humanizing sexual ethics so that this is why in Paul's letters

when he's going into the Greco-Roman communities and you have recent converts where he's constantly dealing with questions of sexual ethics. And this is where I would say that's more parallel to our context. And I just don't like when I look at all the statements in the New Testament about what it means to follow Jesus, to be a convert, and how often and sometimes how quickly and how serious questions about sexual immorality do come up, that's where once we do get to that place of, okay, they're down to a discipleship, They want to follow him. I would say this is what that looks like. And that, you know, everybody's going to draw the line. Everybody

has a sexual ethic. So they're going to draw the line somewhere. And that's where I'm going to say, yeah, I mean, I do think that what it means to follow Jesus is going to, this is what that looks like. Not, well, here's various options to take whatever path you want to choose. You know, not that I'm putting words in your mouth, but that's not what you said. Yeah, no. I mean, I, I wouldn't say that that's my approach. I don't say, you know, you know, pick from the same. Choose your own adventure. But I think I, at least from my experience, when the Lord presents opportunities and when there are these very difficult conversations surrounding, well, what does it look like for you with your own biblical interpretation?

And how would you then instruct me? I mean, they are not easy. You know, it is not, they have been some of the most deepest and most painful conversations I have. Um, but again, I think that there's, there's so much to somebody's life and story and journey to following Jesus in the way that we steward our bodies and the way that we steward our minds and like all of the different elements that, you know, I've seen not only grace for myself from the Lord, but I've seen grace from other people who like, I'm asking them to count the costs in ways that I don't have to count. You know what I mean? Like, sure, I, you know, identify in the community, but I'm a woman married to a man. Like, I don't, can I say that I have sex on this podcast? Not on Theology in a

Rod. No, we. I have sex. Never mind. But you know what I mean? So to tell somebody, and I'm married, so to tell somebody, I don't think that this is the path that God has for you, that's not an easy conversation to have with somebody. So that being said, I don't think that that means you can never have it or that it isn't important. I just think the way that we also steward the conversations and see it as a journey, as opposed to a, you know, like you said, a third conversation or even a fourth conversation, I think matters. But I think even more than that, I have, and this one sometimes I think can be misunderstood as well. Like, I think because of my approach, sometimes people leave and say, oh, well, she's not really, she, she doesn't really hold a traditional sexual ethic

because if she did, she would be more opposed. I can assure you that I do. I've never done it. I'm not saying that you think that I'm just, just the caveat. And I think, I think something that we as the church and myself included have not really put my trust in very often is the work of the Holy Spirit in people's lives, including my own. I believe that, and I have, I really believe that what God needs from me is to defend him, defend the Christian way, defend Christian morality, both inside and outside of the church. Because if I don't do it, if we don't do it, then the truth of the gospel is going to collapse. You know, like the testimony of the gospel, but also the

truth of the gospel itself. Like then what are we even believing in anymore? If we're staunchly telling people, you know, this is how you should live your life in this way or that. This is how you should live your life in this way or that. And I think over the years, what I've learned and then have seen is that transformation in someone's life is not up to me. It is up to the work of the Holy Spirit. I cannot convince someone of anything. So the example of the young lady I mentioned earlier, when she came to faith and she, she was dating a girl at the time. And all I wanted to do was to tell her, this is not good for you. Break up with this girl. It's a terrible relationship. And I said once to her, because she asked, you know, what, what do you

think God would have for me? And I don't think this relationship is really where God wants you right now. And she listened and she said, okay, I'm still going to date this girl. And I had to just, I had to say, okay, like, what am I going to do? And I went back to my husband and I'm crying and I was, I want to tell her again, like maybe we'll invite her over the night that she's going to go out on this date. Because I knew what night her next date was. So I was like, let's invite her over and try to convince her to not go on the date. And my husband was like, it's not your job, Elizabeth. Like, do you trust that you believe in a God that, like, supersedes any of the efforts that you could ever make? Do you believe in a God

that like calls us into his presence that speaks to us, who is long suffering, who, who transforms our lives and our desires and our hearts and our wills and our way? Like, do you really believe in that? Then you said your peace and now you also need to let it go and trust that God is going to do what he's going to do. And my husband didn't say, trust that God is going to make her have her be single. Trust that God isn't going to let her go on dates. It was just to trust that the Holy Spirit is going to be present and loves her more than I could ever love her. So I listened and I didn't anything. And then the day of her next date, it was a Sunday.

We were all at church together. She joined us for church. And I was like, okay, you want to come over my house? She said, no, I have plans with my girlfriend. And then picks up her phone, over my house? She said, no, I have plans with my girlfriend. And then picks up her phone, looks at her phone and said, oh, my girlfriend canceled. She's sick. And I was like, oh, that's interesting. And she's like, yeah, yeah. I didn't really want to go on the date anyway. And then after that, never saw the girl again. Like that was the end of the relationship.

And I don't give that example to say, and that's how God is always going to work. But it was testimony to me that like, oh, when God really wants to do a work in someone's life, it's not up to me to do the job. Like it's not up to me to do the job. Like it's not up to me to convince anyone if he is truly good, then his goodness will be compelling. And I believe that. Yeah, no, I'm, I'm with you and I'm, you know, practically that's how I operate. I'm just not a, I don't know, not a very controversial, no confront of kind of person or whatever's, for what I wrestle with is, well, first of all, I mean, it's been shown like,

people have to kind of come to a conclusion on their own. Like a lot of just even psychologists have shown like, you can't force feed belief. Like somebody else has to be convinced of it. If you're trying to convince them and you strong arm them and okay, fine, I'll comply. That's not going to produce lasting obedience. It's like they do have to come to something on their own. I just, I do wrestle with the tension of absolutely God's the one doing the work, but we are agents of God too called to, I don't know, come alongside. And for me too, I, and this is for me, like there's, I often see inconsistency in my own heart of like, oh, you know, this,

they're living this way and I'll let God deal with that. But then if I turn around, like if I was, say one of my friend was just a blatant racist or something and I'm like, well, no, that's not allowed. Or if somebody was, you know, maybe they were just having like an adulterous, if they're sleeping with their neighbor's wife, like I'm going to say, dude, like you're not, that's not the Christian way. You got to stop it. I mean, look at all the, and people say, well, yeah, those are sins that are hurting others. And these are private sins that aren't hurting others. I just don't see that

distinction really in the Bible, like sins that hurt others and sins that don't, or I don't know. So I feel like there are certain things that if somebody was living this way, I'd be like, Oh no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no about the poor and whatever you know but it's like i don't know does the bible make that distinction like how do i get the right to make the distinction between sins that i would really hold people to and others that i'm like and let god do the work on them you know um yeah i don't know i truly wrestle with that like i don't know i feel i feel like i live in consistency in that way there's certain things i would not tolerate other things. And I'm like, yeah, I do, but I don't know. Yeah. I mean, I would, I would find, I would say I find Paul's, Paul's approach to, to sin and to morality very clear. And, you know, so like, I, I, I can't argue with Paul, you know, but, but I also would say Paul had a very distinct setness or calling that doesn't mean that, that sins are, you know, irrelevant or that we should approach, um, right living as, you know, something that can be interpreted. However, I don't think that everyone's job within Christendom is to be Paul.

Like Paul was establishing the first century church, you know, all like in the known world. Like that's a very different call than what I have. Um, so, so not again, not that that means that I don't have to hold the same ethic or the hold the standards that I feel like Paul has blatantly said, like absolutely or hold or hope and encourage other people to do the same. I do. However, I don't think that I need to be the end-all, be-all voice of someone's life. And I understand what you're saying, not making the distinction. Though, I do think if somebody is having an affair, not that sins are on some kind of scale in terms of how God sees them, but

if someone's having an affair, we're talking about a totally different story than if someone's casually dating someone of the same gender. I'm not saying that one sin is greater than the other or bigger than the other. It's just a different narrative. You just can't approach everything the same way. Yeah. And I feel like the affair, anyway, we were getting lost way deep in the weeds, but like an affair does seem to be kind of a universal, like this is clearly sin to the person.

Everybody knows it's wrong. Everybody knows it's wrong. The most secular atheist knows it's wrong. That's just wrong, right? And same thing in the first century, adultery was illegal. Like Rome, for all its immorality, was on the same page with adultery. Well, men can have adultery. Well, no, no. Men can get away with having sex as long as it's not somebody else's spouse. But that was because women were believed to be owned by the man.

And you're more offending the man that you're sleeping with his wife than you are, you know, so it had its own misogyny built into it. But, um, whereas, you know, in, in 2022 in America, dating somebody, the same sex, the person might not even have the same kind of like moral framework where they know this is absolutely wrong. That doesn't mean it's not wrong, but I understand your point. We are comparing maybe two sins, but two sins of different, different kinds of sins. I don't know. It's just, it's different situationally. It's just a different.

Yeah. And I, and I would say the same thing, you know historically, too, which this might get me in trouble as well. But we have to consider what was happening at the time when Paul was giving these rules and regulations to the church. And I think what same-sex relation, I can't even call it same-sex relationships, same-sex behaviors, or I hate to say homosexual behaviors, but for lack of a better term in a biblical context, was not the same as what, in terms of like its societal norm. It didn't function the same way that it's functioning now. Does that mean that now it's right and then it was wrong or vice versa? No, that's not what I'm saying.

But what I'm saying is Paul was talking in the context that he was. So I think the way and the nature of the conversation had to be different from the way and the nature of the conversation had to be different from the way and the nature that the conversation can be had today. You know, like then a part, part of the conversation or part of the elements of, of what was going on was also chat, like relation, uh, sexual intimacy with children, you know, like we were basically like pedophilia and things like that. And again, I'm not saying then, oh, so then all things are permissible now by no means. But

what I'm saying is I can understand some more of the urgency. And we're also talking about, you know, cultural contexts where orgies were part of worshiping ancient Near Eastern gods. So there are like all of these different aspects in play. So the way that Paul's going to address it, I would imagine if Paul was coming today, you know, he would have the same message. But I think the way and how it's addressed is going to obviously depend on the cultural context that, that we're in. Yeah. I would push back on a lot of that, but I think you do so much. I want you to.

I don't want to get lost though. I hear what you're, I do. Yes. Well, I would, get lost, though. I hear what you're – I do, yes. Well, I would – no. Yes, there's definitely – there's similarities, there's differences. Certainly, same-sex relationships in the ancient world, they took a wide diversity of forms. Yes. forms. Pederasty was a dominant form among males. Not exclusive, but dominant. And, you know, the orgies and prostitution and slaves raping their, or masters raping their slaves and everything. You don't see that among women in the ancient world. This is something that when people bring that up, I'm like, yeah, but all that doesn't really apply to female relations, which were almost exclusively same social status, adults, even like marriage-like relationships. Even the first century Rome was no choice. I have to interrupt.

Yeah. If you don't mind, I just want to make an interesting point. Within the Jewish tradition, that cultural context that you just talked about for women, that's why in many of Jewish kind of thought around queer theology, it's women, same-sex relationships are absolutely and completely permissible because there wasn't the same cultural kind of standard or experience. So I just thought that that was an interesting fact. Well, you even have that in later rabbinic literature. This is hundreds of years after the New Testament.

But you do see rabbis coming down softer on female same-sex relations. Yeah. Because in the Jewish – well, in the ancient context, sex meant penetration. And there's even some weird – this is actually – I love the ancient context. You even have weird like poets and stuff that they didn't know what to do with women having sex. Like how are they having sex? Like there's no penetration. Like what's going on?

They would come up – these men would sit around and come up with these wild ideas of what women were doing with each other. But yeah, so even in some forms of ancient Judaism, by ancient, I mean still later in the New Testament, the rabbis did seem to come. They still thought it was wrong, but it wasn't nearly as wrong as a man penetrating another man or something. Yes, yeah. Anyway, yeah.

No, there are definitely, there's an overlap. There's similarities and differences between sexuality in the ancient world and today. But you were were gonna push back well um yeah so i mean when people there were a wide variety of different forms that same-sex relationships took in the ancient world um so that we can't say it was all this or all that and totally and even like a pederasty wasn't quite pedophilia. It was an older man having sexual relations with like a teenage boy, typically after adolescence before they grew a beard.

And some people say, well, that's what Paul saw wrong was the age difference. I'm like, well, male female relations had massive age differences. Like if what Paul saw wrong was, oh no, we can't have a 10 year gap here. It's like, well, that's how marriage just existed back then. 30 year old men married 14 year old girls all the time. So, and there's no, Paul never, there's lots of Greek words for pederasty and Paul never uses those. He uses generic male, female. But yeah, certainly when Paul was thinking of same sex relationships, probably the majority of images that popped into his mind would be very um yeah debauchery is that the um or or really yeah well and i would say it would it would definitely be broader than the way that

we talk about it now and i think yeah it's it's just yeah we could go on and on about some of the difference in terms of like consent and but it does does like, again, all that to say it doesn't change what God's ultimate plan is or where I land theologically. It doesn't change. It just, I think we tend to feel like, again, we have to defend a sexual ethic first and foremost, or that it really is a question of salvation. And I would want to push back on that a little bit to say, let's not let this issue always be so divisive, but what are ways that we can all come to the table and we can all trust that the Holy Spirit is going to do what the Holy Spirit does best in transforming lives? I've seen it myself. So it's not always perfect, but it is perfect, actually.

It is always perfect. It's not the way I always see it, but it is always perfect. Well, Elizabeth, I planned an hour, and I've taken you an hour and almost 40 minutes. So thank you. Thank you for what you do. I really enjoyed the conversation. And you're living in spaces that I think few Christians would want to go, which is sad, but would even know how to go.

So I'm really excited about what you guys are doing out there. Seriously. Thank you. Thanks. And I think, you know, you guys are doing out there. Seriously. Thank you. Thanks. And I think, you know, it's definitely uncharted waters. And for us, we don't, I will confidently say that I am not always confident in all of my approaches of the way that I do things. But I'm so thankful that I have a God that is bigger than my, my understanding and my confidence. And I've seen him, I've seen him do great things. So I really appreciate, thanks for supporting the work. And

I'm excited to see how, you know, what else God is going to do is he, there's definitely a movement. There's something happening, you know, in the church around these conversations. And I believe outside of the church, you know, seeing people come to faith in Jesus, they're part of this community. Don't be afraid to make mistakes, take risks, learn, regroup, you know, I do it every single day, man. You can't grow if you don't take some risks and say, Hey, I, I think this is the right thing. And later say, yeah, that, you know, that maybe I wouldn't do that again. But if, yeah, I mean, I don't need, I'm preaching to the choir. I mean, your whole ministry is one huge, messy risk.

So yeah, thank you. Thankful for what you do. I appreciate it. Thank you for the encouragement. Thank you so much. Yeah, and yeah, we'll see. I'm already like seeing the fruit and it's gonna be, it's a wild ride,

but Jesus seems to always call us on these wild rides. Doesn't he? Like it's never just so cut and drop. I wish it was, but that would be boring if it wasn't. Yeah. Yeah. I could take a little lull every now and again.

Well, thanks for the privilege to be able to talk with you Preston my pleasure my pleasure it was an honor yeah all right take care God bless you