Evangelical and LGBT+ Ally: Why You Can’t Be Both (thegospelcoalition.org)
Monday, August 29, 2022
Sunday, August 28, 2022
These Are Dangerous Times To Be Living Alone. Especially If You've Established A Perceived Anonymity Involving Both The Internet & Sexual Sin.
I love meeting new Samson guys. Hearing their stories and supporting them therein via my listening ear is what it's all about. There's no judgement there. It's all about simply listening, asking questions and listening some more. Perhaps eventually, they'll be a recommendation or two tossed from my lips, but those are always at a minimum (though I must admit their seeming authoritativeness can be off putting to some) until I feel so moved.
I'm fortunate to have listened to hundreds upon hundreds of hours - throughout my life - as either a Silas or simply a Samson brother. If you know Rob at all, you know that I adore men. Hence, meeting new guys and listening to their stories is an incredibly enriching experience for me. You'll also know though that I don't miss much whilst listening. And I'm fairly certain this is tied to how God has tuned me overall towards the same sex.
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Many years ago, I was an avid CNET fan. This website interested me enough to browse there moreso than occasionally (in spite of the fact that I'm by no means a tech nerd). I especially enjoyed their weekly (Fridays) wrap up summary video which captured the "tech news" over the past seven days. The host of this weekly video was comedic, the writing intelligent and the editing was anything but generic. It was entertaining stuff.
During one of these weekly wrap-up videos, the host featured the first (supposedly) iteration of webcam roulette URLs. Essentially, per what the host described; this URL allowed one to play webcam roulette with whomever else was logged in simultaneously (with their webcam turned on).
And as an aside, the host made it very clear that what she had experienced therein was quite sexually explicit in nature as she "played around" with this new website invention.
Who'd a thunk? Strangers being sexually explicit online? Shocking.
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The Internet is all about efficiency, is it not? Instantaneous satisfaction. No matter the need.
Keeping that in mind, webcam roulette URLs most definitely meet a distinct need via the power and anonymity of the Internet. And the keyword here is anonymity.
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Somewhere around 2008 or '09, a beloved Aussie friend (who I'd met online via Yahoo! Groups), and I were beginning to establish a webcam routine. For reference, at the time, my PC barely met the minimum computing requirements for Skype. Prior to this, my Aussie friend and I emailed each other voraciously (for well over a year). Like myself, this guy was a writer at heart, but who also happened to be a husband / father who struggled with unwanted same-sex attraction.
Unfortunately, it didn't take too long for Scott (after we'd established our webcam routine) to decide to expose himself to me unannounced. From there, during that episode, he began masturbating to climax. I have to admit, it was initially quite erotic observing him doing this through his laptop's webcam, but it didn't take long for me to feel the ickiness associated with this sort of Internet-centric experience, particularly in contrast to where our friendship had been. Hence, after that one time, in line with a mutual agreement, he and I both kept our zippers zipped up.
Not too many months after this eye-opening event, I asked that we take a year-long friendship sabbatical. He agreed to this with a broken heart. As you might imagine, our relationship never recovered from that "extended vacation".
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Let me stop here and define what I mean by ickiness.
Whenever I engage with other men, I feel 110%. The experience is akin to me walking in their shoes. It's for sure emotionally exhausting, but as such, me simply being me.
This being my normal, I am deeply fearful of what a sexual experience might look like with said men because of the damage my involvement would bring about. In other words, think of it as me taking a massive overstep into their lives. Now, viewing a pixelated video, fed through an anonymous guy's webcam, isn't the same as real, face-to-face sexual experiences or even (as described above) a friend-to-friend webcam one.
All that being said, ickiness feelings are essentially those which alarm me to the fact that I've either entered in or are fast approaching the cesspool of human experience. The lowest of the low. Debased. Repugnant. To expound on that a bit, I'd put it in the same category as visiting those plywood-assembled "private booths" oftentimes found towards the back of the adult bookstore. You know the ones. Where the red and pink incandescent bulbs dangle above your head as you anticipate yet another anonymous hookup.
In my opinion, webcam roulette is right there in the thick of those pollutants. Particularly if you're participating therein as a Christian.
Here's my plea: Value yourself and the Holy Spirit in such a manner that you're unwilling to stoop to this level. No matter how lonely you may feel. Value your witness as a Christian in such a manner that you're unwilling to stoop to this level. Pray to God that your ickiness barometer stays sensitive and sharp. Ask him for the self-control to heed its warnings reflexively.
And never forget to pray for those who're submerged in the filth, getting pulled deeper and deeper into the dump. For ickiness to them is what normal looks like.
Saturday, August 27, 2022
Friday, August 26, 2022
"The Blueprint Of Dysfunction" - JR Everhart
Three things that beat us down and keep us down:
1) An overbearing parent who is controlling or very disciplinary. [Amen-Ed.]
2) High levels of shame
This equates to self-hatred and toxic self-talk.
3) A lack of purpose
Feeling empty or hollow is a direct result of a lack of purpose in your life.
I heard this recently on a podcast. I believe it was Jay Stringer that said it. I have all three of these things operating in my life. It’s very helpful to know and start working through, but it reveals a rocky road ahead. Knowledge without application is useless, and we are more educated these days than ever before in the history of mankind, but also more lost than ever. Knowledge only blooms when it’s put into action. I myself have read countless books and studied the Bible a thousand different ways over the last 28 years, yet I still have days where I feel like I know nothing. Lost in my own desires, I walk down a familiar path of temptation that almost always leads to sin and momentary separation from God. I know God can bring about purpose in sin. Hence, it keeps me constantly looking toward him for help. But I also know God desires better for me.
Every time I fall down, the enemy reminds me of how I’ve been "resourced" to death. Resourced to not fall. He uses that to try and convince me that I am far too broken to ever believe I can be loved. If he can rob us of hope, and convince us God doesn’t care about our suffering, our goose is cooked. It’s these thoughts that lead to emotional and psychological death. He tempts, we fall, and then he accuses us of our own brokenness until we have no hope or faith in God's goodness. That’s when he moves in for the kill. That’s when we may very well start entertaining death as our only relief from the suffering of this world. I’ve found there to be suicidal thoughts in my life for years. I think that if I kill myself, the pain will stop and the stress of being lovable or successful will just fade away. And truth is that is correct. The enemy always sprinkles truth over his deception like a creepy candy coating. But what these thoughts blind us from is the mountains of beauty God wants to show us. The healing that can and will take place in our lives if we just stop listening to the enemy’s lies.
Yes, this world sucks! BUT, it doesn’t have to suck all the time. A season of uncomfortable growth does not define our entire lives. I have to stop isolating before refocusing my thought life on truth in order to step away from the hopeless suicidal mindset. It’s a lie, and whenever I feel that stuff, I know I’m staring straight into the eyes of evil itself. I’ve been through this so much that at present, it ignites a knee jerk reaction to start counting my blessings and readjust my focus on heavenly principles. Depression can be a deep dark hole if we choose to live there, but we have a choice and there’s always a way of escape. We just have to apply some of the Biblical truth and trust God. Sin will always bear witness with our flesh and the enemy’s lies will mostly feel true. But this is why God's word directly tells us to not trust our feelings but to only trust his word. The enemy may be very good at showing us the truth about our weaknesses and struggles, but God’s word tells us the truth about Christ’s redeeming blood! Whose report are you going to believe?
Thursday, August 25, 2022
"I'm Officially Done With Samson Society!" (Can Mavericks Long-Term Thrive Within This, Or Any Other, Similarly Loosely Organized Community / Ministry?)
Maverick: A maverick is an animal, usually a form of cattle, that does not carry a brand. It is a word also used to describe a person who acts free from constraints or organizational guidelines. A mustang is by definition a maverick horse. [My friend, Peter, is by definition a maverick human being.]
I have one maverick friend, and it's the most unique friendship I have / have had up to this point in my life. This friendship is marred with frustration (on both sides). From Rob's point of view, it's frustration that's aimed at Peter's unwillingness to yield to much of any authority. From Peter's point of view, it's my willingness to behave in an opposing manner (effectively creating a relational short circuit).
I've known Peter for +/-15 years. There was a serious, longstanding cooling off period, relative to our friendship, that began around year three / four, but then, unexpectedly, he gradually came back into my life in an arguably even bigger way. Since he and I had last communicated (taking the +/-7-year hiatus into consideration), I'd long since dived headlong into Samson Society by committing to both local Jackson, Mississippi groups combined with the National Retreats. Hence, at this point of platonic reconnection with Peter, I encouraged him too to jump in (initially by personally inviting him to attend the 2018 National Retreat). Logistically, he was unable to do this at that point in time, but when November 2019 came around, he was there undeterred. And as you might imagine, it was a tense period in our friendship for both of us, having not engaged with each other for so very long. Especially considering the implosive circumstances we'd left off with, seven years prior.
Immediately prior to our aforementioned "cooling off" period setting sail (resulting in a cut of all communication efforts), Peter dubbed himself a "maverick" within a long-winded explanatory / commentary email he sent me. And that moniker he self-identified with has perfectly suited him ever since.
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Peter's life has been a "soap opera" (his excusatory words). As such, throughout the early / initial years of time as his friend, he & I both agreed that he'd given himself an awful lot of leeway relative to meeting others' expectations. Combine that with him being, by nature, an uber-loner. Hence, time spent alone is his thing; an awful lot of which (again, during our pre-hiatus years) was burned up via entertaining himself (porn, video games, college sports commentary, and on and on).
Until...
he'd find that the clock had run out prior to it being time to execute (make a presentation, mow a lawn, write a paper, take an exam, etc.)
From there, he'd pull whatever was demanded of him directly out of his ass (little to no prep). And overall, he was quite adept at this technique, but as you might imagine, it no doubt came across as qualitatively mediocre regarding most everything on his resume.
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What I love about this guy is his unerring belief in himself. I used to imagine him looking at himself naked in the full-length bathroom mirror and exclaiming, "Damn, I'm awesome!", each and every time. No matter how many disappointing grade cards Peter's been given, he simply subjugates them / chalks them up subconsciously to his "maverickness" shining through. As such, he's constantly on the move relationally. Therefore, for me to (again) be as close to him as I am today, in many ways is a surreal experience.
And all of this leads me up to yesterday (I dialogue / pray with Peter once a week over the phone).
He's now decided to raise his middle finger at Samson Society. In particular, Samson's decisionmakers for refusing to respond to his immediate wishes. And this wasn't a surprising turn of events for me to observe once it sank into my psyche. For it's precisely in line with how Peter has always operated / continues to operate as a maverick.
I realize there're a handful of Steve Jobs / Elon Musks out there who fall into the category of maverick. But these men are of extraordinary intelligence / creativity / drive. None of these descriptors are appropriate for Peter. He's as average a bear as I am.
Honestly, I don't know how to feel about all of this. For I care about Peter, but I also believe wholeheartedly in Samson Society. I know being critical of his newfound position will only fall on deaf ears. For it's directly in line with his modus operandi as a maverick.
Here I am again, with this old friend, feeling truly powerless. For now, as he's done so many times before, he's set sail from a community that benefits tremendously from his commitment therein. Forever again, thinking exclusively of himself and his identity as a maverick.
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