For these 30 days I want to help you
achieve greater sexual self-control and management, spiritual renewal, and
greater resolution of your SSA (same-sex attraction) dilemma. For each day there
is a:
(1) Bible passage for your self-reflection in which God speaks
to you. Ask, "What is my Father God, in the Lord Jesus, saying to me personally
in this passage through the Holy Spirit?"
(2) There is a helpful
Reflection, insight or understanding, and
(3) There is an Action to
take which will enable you to grow in some way.
Living for it!
AGAINST! WITH! 1. Ideology: The Holy Spirit through Paul says, Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God--this is your spiritual worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will. (ROMANS 12:1-2)
If you are not established in RESOLUTION work it may be because you are in conflict ideologically. Your thinking, your mind, your theological, psychological, biblical thinking, beliefs, convictions, assumptions, perspectives about H and sin are unsettled or conflicted. What do you really believe about H? Is H normal, natural, healthy? Is H sin? Is H a deviancy, a disorder, a disorientation? What do you believe about gays, gay rights, etc. It is best to have a well-thought out ideology of convictions, rationale, beliefs; than a fuzzy one. Rate yourself:
2. Bio-Chemical/Physical/Medical: The body is a chain of links between emotion, feelings, chemistry and sexuality. Therefore sexuality is positively/negatively effected by such things as play, rest, tiredness, depression, anxiety, anger, hunger, loneliness, physical and medical conditions. HALT (hungry, angry, lonely, tired) is used to describe set-ups for impulsive, compulsive behavior. Some people need medication assistance because their emotional and psychological stresses and management have been dysfunctional. Some need better diets, exercise, health habits and attention to other contributing medical conditions. Do you need to do anything in this area? How do you rate it?
3. Social/Cultural: There is much in the world which supports living as a gay and sexually permissive person. There is little support for X-Gays or overcomers (Christians resolving SSA). Are you pressured, contaminated, influenced by your surroundings and environment (people, companions, ideas, news, etc); which undermines your ability to maintain resolution? What can you do about this?
4. Psychological: Your self-image, self-esteem, inner child-adult-parent self-talk, mental health, personality issues of de-vitalization (OCP, PA, PD, ED) Your psychological life undermines your ability to maintain resolution. What can you do about this?
5. Emotional: Your emotional economy. The way in which you manage stress, pressure, anxiety, depression. The ebb and flow of your emotional life. Your stress-relief cycle. Your emotional needles.
6. Sexual Temptation: You are experiencing sexual, erotic and lustful inclinations. You feel unable to manage, self-control, discipline your lusts or "flesh" (imagination, mind, thoughts, behavior). Five areas: Masturbation, Visual Indulgence, Sexual Engagement with others, Pornography, and Emotional Dependencies. What can you do about this?
7. Interpersonal: Personal relationships are unrewarding. Or, how does H effect relationships you have? You do not have adequate encouragement, support, intimacy or rewarding relationships which undermines your ability to maintain resolution? Rate this area! What can you do about this?
8. Work: What kind of work do you do for a living? How rewarding and satisfying is that work. Does it bring enthusiasm, interest, challenge to your life? What avocations do you have? Hobbies, pastimes, recreational interests? What vocation, ministry or service do you engage in for God's kingdom?
9. Spiritual: You are experiencing spiritual weakness, numbness, dry, de-vitalized, distant from God, unmotivated, prayerlessness, biblically undisciplined, disinterested in Christian fellowship, worship and church life. This undermines your ability to maintain resolution. What can you do about this?
10. Satan: Let's neither exclude Satan's efforts to destroy and defeat your walk with God; nor over-credit Satan with your struggle. Satan and his evil servants will attempt to oppress you, regress you, depress you or possess you.
Are you AT RISK in three areas?
1. Where do you stand with the three accommodations?
Living against it!
Living with it!
(l) You can live For it as a committed gay person, as a homosexually active person in or outside of an on-going relationship. Call it The Gay Lifestyle Option.
(2) You can live Against it; that is, try to deny, repress, suppress, segregate it, or dissociate yourself from it as best you can. Call it The Conflicted Option, or
(3) You can find a way to live With it in some mature, emotionally healthy, responsible and redemptive way which is compatible with your Christian values and biblical faithfulness. Call it The Resolution Option.
For, Against, With! Those are the only options you have with regard to your homosexual issue.
FOR!
Now if you are a biblically faithful and committed Christian who desires to grow and mature, the first option, living For homosexuality, is not morally acceptable to you. Homosexual behavior and the Christian walk are opposed one to the other. They are biblically and theoretically polar opposites. Homosexuality represents both a psychological blockage in psychosexual development and a powerful inclination to sinful behavior. The second, your life in Christ, represents a powerful force toward wholeness, completeness, healing and holiness. The second is the natural victor and healer of the first.
It is clear that only one can become master of your life. Your life in Christ must dominate a life driven by your sexuality. This is true for any Christian with a sexual obsession or compulsion. Jesus said, "No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other." You cannot make both masters of your life. Christ will have no competing master. Sin cannot co-exist with holiness and wholeness. God wants to be your only Lord and Master!
But the second option - living Against it - is not psychologically healthy for you either. It is filled with stumbling obstacles, as we saw in the parable of the Crossroad. Each of the three men came to the crossroad in his life after spending some difficult time living Against his problems.
To live Against your SSA means continuous contention, backsliding, conflict, feeling hypocritical and phony, spiritually compromised, going through cycles of falling sexually, repenting, asking forgiveness, and falling again and again. Feeling drained, disgusted, frustrated by the battle against your flesh! Having no peace and integrity! It is a psycho-emotional nightmare! This is where many are now, or have been, or are from time to time!
The whole thing is a dilemma. What's the solution? You can’t change your Christian beliefs to accommodate homosexuality! You can’t seem to get rid of or eliminate homosexuality altogether! God hasn’t removed it from your life!
Now here is another of God’s great principles and methods: He seems to be saying to you what He said to Paul in 2 Cor 12:7-10. "My grace is sufficient for you! For when I am weak, then I am strong."
As with so many problems Christians must live with, God says to us that He will supply the grace and support we need to find a way to live with SSA as a Christian, even if it continues to be a present reality in your life. This is the resolution option in which a biblically faithful Christian responds to the on-going grace of God to resolve and manage SSA. Notice the two important elements! It includes both Resolution and Management of SSA. This book is all about helping people live With SSA.
Practically speaking, how does one move to a place of Resolution; of living with SSA in maturity and holiness?
Point One: If you are living in continuous Conflict AGAINST H (and not substantially living WITH H in Resolution ) then one or more of these ten areas are being negatively effected or are in conflict and unsettled for you. These ten areas may need your attention (and God will also attend to them with you) in order for you to move to greater Resolution. These should be the practical areas of your focus.
Point Two: These ten areas are the fluid and changing areas of our lives. Every Christian must deal with these areas. They are the battleground for all Christians. They may be more or less fixed, but they are always subject to positive or negative changes. They are the "stuff" of life with which we are always adapting, dealing with and coping.
Point Three: When you are functioning well in most or all of these ten areas, you are most Vitalized, alive, functional. You are living as an Adult, Christian, Sexually Mature, Man. When you are not, you are most De-vitalized; experiencing life as empty, stressed, unfulfilling, lonely, unrewarding.
Point Four: I have a little theory that comes from my work with SSA Christians. It's this: if any THREE of these areas are effected negatively (weakened, vulnerable, threatened, stressed), and you allow exposure to a homoerotic TRIGGER, you will be SET UP for sexual temptation and a fall. One or two are not sufficient to weaken your psycho-social-sexual strength. But Three will do it!
Point Five: When you can't pinpoint what causing your problems, look to 2, 5 , and 10 as undermining factors.
Let's develop your Profile Stability as an ADULT, Christian, Sexually Mature Man or Woman. For each category, rate yourself:
5=Very Secure or Strong -to- 1= Very Insecure or Weak.
Like all vulnerability to specific sin areas, Satan knows that he can oppress you, wear you out, tire you and weaken you with sexual temptation. He can also cause you to regress; that is, cause you to be impulsive, childish, immature, wanting your way now, not acting like an adult. He can play on depression as well and make you discouraged and ready to give in and give up. He likes you empty so that he can rush in; see Matthew 12:43-45. Rarely, but sometimes, he can take possession of a person through compulsive, addictive behavior, thoughts, imaginations, and fantasy. Do you need to make a general prayer of renouncing Satan and all his works, pleading the blood and the cross of Christ?
OVERALL RATING:
40-50=very strong;
30-39=strong;
20-29=at risk;
11-19=vulnerable;
5-18=very vulnerable
2. Journal your BIble Passage.
3. How did you do on the above Practically Speaking material? JOurnal about it.