ARTICLE: FOR SUCH WERE SOME OF YOU!

I don't want to lend my voice to things I have never lived through, and I don't want to try to describe a journey's path and terrain, if I have never walked in familiar footage and recognize the scenery myself. There are many similarities that I can relate with the men of the Bible, because they too were human and challenged with having to struggle with the sinful nature of mankind. But, as they too found out, "nothing is impossible with God" (Matthew 19:26).

In lending my voice and recognizing the journey, I can speak to the Sin of Homosexuality and the reality of this delusional and destructive lifestyle. When I talk about this particular sin, I want to make it very clear that I love the gay or lesbian-- IT is "The Sin" and the lies and deception of Satan that tells these beautiful people that causes a holy, righteous anger to rise up in me. Satan has deceived them into believing they "were born gay or lesbian" and/or "if they do not embrace this choice in their sexuality then they are NOT BEING AUTHENTIC to themselves or others around them". I wholeheartedly understand this erroneous mindset and paradigm, because I too used to believe these same lies. The issue of Homosexuality, on the surface, seems like it's about two people who have same-sex attraction and they are only asking that others respect "a person's right to choose who they will love, with hopes of perhaps discovering a life partner". They are right about one thing and it should be their "choice" because God gave man a Will and didn't make us puppets. But He has also given us "The Truth" and in many of our willful decisions we disregard and reject God's Principles. Just because we HAVE our own "will" and "freedom of choice" doesn't mean we don't make MANY wrong choices and bad decisions that leads us to suffer the consequences of sin. BUT the real issue of "homosexuality" is that it is an "Issue of Sin"; and another thing I could relate to when I was living my life as a gay man, was that I didn't want to recognize Homosexuality as a "sin that Father God calls an "abomination" (Leviticus 18:22). This biblical statement, and anything or anyone who served as a "threat", or "object of conflict and disagreement"; or represented, what I considered to be, a "hater or bigot"was my enemy-- CHRISTIANS and GOD were those I believed to be my NUMBER ONE NEMESIS. What I did not see (AND I didn't WANT to see, and blatantly REJECTED and REFUSED to see) was my REAL enemy; the enemy of ALL OF MANKIND, as well as GOD Himself-- and his name is Satan, Aka: The Father of Lies and the one who "appears as an angel of light". This "counterfeit angel of light" was actually "the Devil of Darkness"-- an "evil pied piper who leads lost and wandering souls into delusional and evil deception. Satan deceives many souls and because of man's sinful nature. Satan seizes every opportunity to pull individuals into the soulish realm called "sin". Sin comes in many forms: drunkards, adulterers, fornicators, thieves, and so on -- pick one and I guarantee you that the sin (and "vice") you choose, will ALWAYS be an intricate part of Satan's strategy in keeping YOU and I as far away from God and The Truth as he can. My "venue" of SIN was believing I was born gay and choosing to militantly do whatever I had to do in order to live as a gay man (regardless of social opinion, peer pressure, or religious or "Holy Bible" passages)--ALL telling me I was wrong for living out what I sincerely believed was the right choice for me and my journey in seeking happiness, fulfillment and achieving authenticity-- ""being true to myself and not living in what someone or something said "was normal". Allow me to clarify that these aforementioned paradigms were what I believed in the core of my being, before I met JESUS Christ and "my eyes were open to the truth that set me free"!

Like ALL who are deceived by Satan and find themselves entangled in the consequences of bad decisions and choices, I was a sinful man because I was born into "the sinful nature of man" and I made incredulous, and in hindsight, horrific decisions, that lead me to live so far from "God's original blueprint for my life". There are so MANY people in the world who are lost and greatly deceived by Satan's lies and deception, and they are not living the life God has always had for them. Like I, and ALL Believers and followers of Jesus Christ (authentic Christians), we also were once lost and blind to sin (FOR SUCH WERE SOME OF YOU" (1 Corinthians 6:11)). In truth, these precious souls are trying to live out a "blueprint" that God, our Creator, never intended for them to live. They are in need of "the truth that sets the captives free (John 8:32)--

Again, I say. "for such were some of you" and we have no right to judge, but we do have the God-given right and we are "commissioned" to get out there are leading others out of darkness and into the Marvelous Light of God's Truth. As I always say to these lost individuals "cut me and I bleed too, but there is no redemptive power in my blood, but there is Redemption and Salvation in the Blood of Jesus that He shed on the Cross at Calvary-- there is POWER in the shed blood of Jesus. I also refer to the scars I have endured along my journey with CHRIST, but my scars are only reminders of past pains; unlike the Scars that JESUS Christ still carries with Him in heaven as a constant reminder of His crucifixion and the truth that He chose to die for all mankind--and in His crucifixion, death, burial and resurrection, He now sits at the right hand of The Father! ALL GLORY TO GOD!

Please see the lost and blind as precious souls that are where many of us once at as well before we met Jesus Christ and our eyes were open to truth. Go forth in God's Power and May His Spirit give you courage, boldness, strength and wisdom and as God promised Joshua (Joshua 1), "I will be with you everywhere you go". May Father bless you today as you allow yourself to be used to reach out with the love of Jesus Christ and the totality of God's Transformational power. SELAH and Amen!!

02-09-16 J.