There is Divine Freedom in Being LGBTQ+

Ex-gay ministries often contend that living as an LGBTQ+ person is living in false freedom. Supposedly, you may feel like you’re happy and free, but in reality, you’re enslaved to your sexuality and identity in ways that separate you from God. Ironically, what is tacitly implied and rarely explicitly stated by leaders is that freedom is only available to you if you denounce the LGBTQ+ community and if you live a lifestyle that mirrors your ex-gay peers. There is only one real option available to you if you want to stay within the group, even if it is presented as being freely chosen. Individuals are stripped of their spiritual agency when beliefs are placed on them rather than freely accepted through personal conviction. The belief within ex-gay theology that either you can be LGBTQ+ or you can be a faithful Christian is a false dichotomy that causes explicit harm.

In Genesis 1, we are told that we bear the image and likeness of God and that when God looked over all of creation, God called it “good”. As LGBTQ+ Christians with a plurality of beliefs represented in our community, there is the freedom to be exactly who God made you to be—no strings attached. There are no caveats or fine print or unspoken rules or expectations that you have to abide by to stay in God’s good graces. Song of Solomon 4:7 says, “You are altogether beautiful, my love; there is no flaw in you.” That does not however mean we remain stagnant in our spiritual growth or allow sin or destructive behaviors to go unchecked. Within the New and Old Testaments, we see that God both extends grace and calls us to grow.

QCF Board member and conversion therapy survivor, Darren Calhoun, expresses this sentiment beautifully by saying;

Our Scriptures encourage us to change and grow to be more like Jesus—loving, generous, truthful, and merciful...But there are some things about us that God doesn’t want to change, because God made us who we are, in our “innermost being,” as the Psalmist says. And God made us for good, all created in God’s image and likeness. It is from this place that we do the difficult and nuanced work of figuring out what in us must change, because it’s not like God, and what is absolutely a reflection of the divine working within us.

Take some time to read Darren’s moving UNCHANGED story.