Believe it or not, I am a worship leader.

I'm sure if my church knew I am gay, I bet I'd be pulled out of the ministry faster than you can say "God hates fags."

The funny thing is, I've been leading worship in church and my youth group for the past couple of years. I often imagine the worst-- the church being utterly shocked that a *shudder* homosexual would be allowed into the church and even serve in the worship ministry! That a gay person could serve as a youth leader in the church's youth program! How can this be? He'll screw up our kids! Quick, we must pull them out of that godforsaken youth group!

All this despite the fact that I've been a member of the church for far longer than many of them; my family has been part of the church for four generations, and I've been serving in the church worship ministry for about four years now. Is the worship tainted because a gay person is leading it, despite the fact that said gay person desires to do God's will just as much as anyone else? Is his sin so different and so much worse than those of anyone else who comes to worship God?

I've been an active member of the youth ministry, eventually becoming a leader. So tell me, why should things change if people suddenly find out the truth about me? Will the youths suddenly turn homosexual if they knew the truth? Have I been putting some sort of homosexual propaganda into hidden reservoirs in their minds only for them to be activated if the news got out?

I suppose I would be asked to step down from these ministries to avoid "stumbling people", since not many people are very accepting of a gay person serving in ministry. It's like they're saying "You're gay, and we don't condemn you, but we condemn your sin. Oh, and because you're gay, you can't lead worship or lead our youths because it's not something a homosexual should do."

Well, if you mean that a sinner like me shouldn't be involved in ministry, I'd question the fairness of that statement. It seems that just because my sin is homosexuality (and it seems even just the being is considered the sin, what more the practice), I am lumped into some special, extra-bad category of sin where God's forgiveness and grace don't apply, or at least, applies less than it does for others.

If homosexuality is such a heinous sin, worse and more evil than the other sins, why is it that in the gospels, Jesus does not mention it specifically in his preaching? In terms of the sexual, He talks about lust, and here's a newsflash ladies and gentlemen-- the sin of lust applies to both sexual orientations.

So why the focus on one sin out of many others?

I love being a youth leader because it's where my passion lies. I want to see the youths come to God and experience His presence and power. I want to see them pray and lift high and holy hands in worship to Him. I want to see them do great and mighty things for Him and be used in incredible ways to spread His love.

But apparently all that is for naught because a gay Christian can't have the same dreams as a straight Christian. It's just not right. It's different.

But you know, nothing warms my heart more than to see God's people and youths in worship. To see them totally abandoned to His praise. To watch them as they close their eyes and enjoy His presence as they're filled with it.

But most of all, I love leading worship because it keeps me focused, and it reminds me of who I am in Jesus, and what He's done for me. It's in praise and worship that my perspective gets realigned so that everything is secondary to God, and it's in worship that He reminds me of who He has called me to be-- His servant, His loved one, and most of all, His friend.

Sexuality be damned.

I haven't posted in a while.

I suppose it's all due to the fact that because I don't embrace the gay side of me, I feel like I have less to talk about. If you asked me why I am in denial about that part of me, I would probably say that it's because I don't want to give it any room to grow. I don't want to acknowledge it because by acknowledging it, I'd be giving it room to grow and justify itself.

On the other hand, it's getting hard to deny myself the reality of the desires that come with that side of me. I'm incessantly turned on by so many things around me. I find that it's becoming more difficult to say no to the desires within me, and I often catch myself fantasizing, or staring at someone I'm drawn toward.

Sometimes I'd like nothing more than to give into my desires. To satisfy my carnal urges. I stare at the object of my desire and notice the little things about him-- the way his hair sways, the way he walks, the way his jeans crease and fold and frame his butt when he moves... the way he laughs at jokes, the things that get him angry...

And oh man, the smile. I melt every single time.

Images of ear-nibbling and neck-kissing and licking dance in my head, with my tongue leading adventurous jaunts around his body, always exploring. Even just holding him would cause my heart to flutter.

And amid it all, I just don't know what to do. I feel like just shrugging everything off and jumping headlong into the reality that tears away at my insides... friends, family and people who judge me be damned. I get all these feelings inside, and I just don't know what to do with myself. I don't know how to get away. I'm angry, I'm bitter, and I just want someone to tell me it's OK.

Is that so much to ask?

We Christians are such hypocrites. No... actually it's people in general. But Christians bear a bigger responsibility simply because we're called to strive to God's standards. And we fail so many times. But never has there been a bigger example of our failure than the lack of understanding of what it means to be gay and Christian. Or simply gay for that matter.

Everytime I hear a Christian friend make a negative comment about gays, I feel a twinge of annoyance and guilt inside. I often agree, or play the part and say how gross a gay display on TV is, or whatever else I happen to see with my friends. But then, I feel hurt because it's like they're talking about me. I feel bad because I myself am being such a hypocrite.

But what's a guy to do? Being gay and Christian does not ostensibly go together, and I'm often torn between my desire and my faith. I'm pained by what I imagine my friends in church would say if they knew the truth, but at the same time, I'm bitter because a part of myself dares me to try it and tell them... just to test how much they believe what they all say about loving your neighbour.

Then, when they shun me and walk away, I can laugh at them and jeer at them and tell myself I was right about those hypocrites all along. I can tell myself that I didn't really need them anyway, 'cause they're not real friends. Real friends wouldn't walk away. Real friends would support me! Yeah, I'll laugh and I'll sneer and I'll show them their lies.

Because maybe then I can forget that I'm alone.

Kids says the funniest things.

THE GOOD SAMARITAN....

A Sunday school teacher was telling her class the story of the Good Samaritan, in which a man was beaten, robbed and left for dead. She described the situation in vivid detail so her students would catch the drama. Then, she asked the class, "If you saw a person lying on the roadside, all wounded and bleeding, what would you do?"

A thoughtful little girl broke the hushed silence, "I think I'd throw up."

STORY OF ELIJAH
The Sunday school teacher was carefully explaining the story of Elijah the Prophet and the false prophets of Baal. She explained how Elijah built the altar, put wood upon it, cut the steer in pieces, and laid it upon the altar. And then, Elijah commanded the people of God to fill four barrels of water and pour it over the altar. He had them to do this four times. "Now," said the teacher, "can anyone in the class tell me why the Lord would have Elijah pour water over the steer on the altar?"

A little girl in the back of the room started waving her hand, "I know, I know," she said, "to make the gravy!"

LOT'S WIFE
The Sunday School teacher was describing how Lot's wife looked back and turned into a pillar of salt, when little Johnny interrupted, "My Mummy looked back once, while she was DRIVING," he announced triumphantly, "and she turned into a Telephone pole!"

NOAH
A Sunday school teacher asked, "Johnny, do you think Noah did a lot of fishing when he was on the Ark?"

"No," replied Johnny. "How could he, with just two worms."

DANIEL
A Sunday school teacher was telling the youngsters about Daniel and the Lion's Den. She had a picture of Daniel standing, brave and confident, with a group of lions around him. One little girl started to cry. The teacher said, "Don't cry. The lions are not going to eat Daniel."

The girl said, "That's not what I'm crying about. That little lion, over in the corner, isn't going to get any food."

BIBLICAL KINGS & QUEENS
A Sunday school teacher said to her children, "We have been learning how powerful kings and queens were in Bible times. But, there is a higher power. Can anybody tell me what it is?"

One child blurted out, "Aces!"

MOSES
Nine year old Joey, was asked by his mother what he had learned in Sunday school. "Well, Mom, our teacher told us how God sent Moses behind enemy lines on a rescue mission to lead the Israelites out of Egypt. When he got to the Red Sea, he had his engineers build a pontoon bridge and all the people walked across safely. Then, he used his walkie-talkie to radio headquarters for reinforcements. They sent bombers to blow up the bridge and all the Israelites were saved."

"Now, Joey, is that really what your teacher taught you?" his mother asked.

"Well, no, Mom. But, if I told it the way the teacher did, you'd never believe it!"

LORDS PRAYER
A Sunday School teacher decided to have her young class memorize one of the most quoted passages in the Bible; Psalm 23. She gave the youngsters a month to learn the verse. Little Bobby was excited about the task. But, he just couldn't remember the Psalm. After much practice, he could barely get past the first line.

On the day that the kids were scheduled to recite Psalm 23 in front of the congregation, Bobby was so nervous. When it was his turn, he stepped up to the microphone and said proudly, "The Lord is my shepherd and that's all I need to know!"

I was talking with my youth leader yesterday.

He just came back from some Christian conference... I'm not totally sure what it was about though.

I told him what I've been up to these past few weeks, including the birth of this blog and what I've been reading about what it means to be Christian but gay.

And it was this conversation that got me thinking about my own position about this whole "homosexuality within the church" debate.

For a long time after starting this blog I was confused, more so than I was before I knew about the online gay Christian community. Reading blogs like Eric's and JJ's really showed me that I'm not alone in my struggle and my questions. I'm not alone in my guilt and confusion and despair, in the same way that I'm not alone in my quest to seek what God has in store for my life in spite (or perhaps even because) of my circumstances and my problems with my sexuality.

Before, I used to see homosexuality within the church as an issue separate from myself. There was always an underlying level of denial inherent in my perspective. In discovering gay Christian blogs and the community they belong to, and in starting my own blog, I began to seriously think about what my position on homosexuality is. I began to ask-- How do I feel about myself?

I suppose I would have to fall under Side B-- I believe that sex should be within marriage between a man and a woman. I believe that homosexuality is unnatural. I believe homosexual acts to be wrong.

Moreover, I'm very hesitant to accept that I'm a homosexual. By dictionary definition, I admit that I'm gay, i.e. I'm attracted to other guys. But biblically, I now deny the label of homosexuality on my life. I was thinking about one of the clobber verses, 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, which lists the kinds of people who will not inherit the Kingdom of God. Initially, I was torn... If the verse was right, then would that mean that as a homosexual by definition of same-sex attraction, I would not go to Heaven? It seemed so unfair, so final... like there was nothing I could do to change that.

But then I realized that I'd been so fixated on that one word (homosexuals) that I'd totally forgotten to look at the rest. Take 'thieves' for example. If a person who was a thief stops his robbing ways, is he still a thief? In the same way, if I don't engage in homosexual practices, am I still a homosexual? In that sense, I agree with certain translations of the aforementioned verses, such as the NIV which says "homosexual offenders".

So ulitmately, this would mean that I believe in celibacy. I believe that God can do anything, and if God has plans to heal me, then He will. But if His plan calls for me to be celibate for the rest of my life, then I will trust in His purpose.

This does not mean I have not had homosexual experiences before. I would be lying if I denied the fact. But I am still a virgin. And as it stands now, I want to stop whatever I've been doing. I want to put God first. I want to deny myself and turn away from the label of homosexual. I want to follow Christ and do His will.

And no, having had homosexual experiences in the past does not make me revert to being a homosexual . Failure does not equate a return to a previous unsaved state of being. A thief who steals in a moment of weakness does not demonstrate his return to being a thief. Thus, failure to hold to my desire to be celibate does not mean I am a homosexual again (By the way, I'm still talking biblical definition here).

Christ said we are new creations in Him. And because of that declaration, I am allowed to fail. What matters is not the failure, but that I continue my walk with Him no matter how many times I fall.

I was chatting on MSN the other day, just talking to my cousin about his friend's problems and giving him advice about God and stuff like that. The problem of sin is one that we all have to think about, whether we're gay, straight or otherwise. It's something we face everyday, and we have to understand what God wants for us if we are to handle it properly.

I guess the more you know and understand of God, the less you let sins get you down because you know guilt's not the point. Of course, that's not to say you shouldn't care about sins. You should care insofar as caring about trying not to sin is concerned. And that's really hard, because we're all only human.

Paul is a very good example for us. He himself said in 1 Timothy 1:15 that "Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all." (I wonder, if Paul was one of the worst sinners, could he have had a problem with homosexual tendencies at one point in his life? Then again, maybe he didn't; I'm pretty sure killing people is a more heinous crime than being a sexual deviant and thus qualifies him to be called the worst.)

Some people may say, "Hey, here's Paul, and he says he is the "foremost" of all sinners! So look, he's still a sinner and doing all those bad things!"

But that's, of course, not true at all. In verse 13, Paul says that Christ saved him and used him as a servant "even though [he] was formerly a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent aggressor" (Emphasis mine). In verse 15, Paul was claiming to be the foremost inasmuch as the history of his sin and his current possibility of tendency to sin is concerned. We all know how many sins can come back to haunt and tempt us, regardless of how well-intentioned we are.

Moreover, in verse 16, Paul continues, saying, "Yet for this reason I found mercy, so that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience as an example for those who would believe in Him for eternal life."

So here we have it-- Paul tells us of Christ's mercy and perfect patience. Mercy and patience that is ever-present for those who do His will and set their hearts on it, despite the danger and possibility of committing a sin due to their weak bodies and natures.

We turn away and fall, and feel all the guilt. Then God tells us it's OK and encourages us to get up and turn to Him again. "Give Me the sin, and keep running the race," He says.

In 2 Corinthians 9:6-8, Pauls says that we should all try our best to do our best; we should do all the good that we know we should do, because God has taught us how to be good people. And God is able to make all grace abound to us-- He can give us the strength and resolve we need to be the best we can be... that we can be ready for every good deed.

Paul also says in Philippians 4:6-8:

⁶Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.
⁷And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
⁸Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.

So, all we need to do is ask God.

Once I give my anxieties about my sexuality to God in prayer and trust Him to help me, all I have to do is focus on whatever is good. I may fall from time to time in the future, but if I keep my eyes on God, my heart set on His will, and my mind on all things pure and good, I can rest assured that I will always be on the right path in this race, regardless of my sexual circumstances.

No doubt there will be times when I fail. But I've learnt that you should never let sin make you give up. 'Cause that's what Satan wants-- All he is trying to do is make you give up. He knows that once you want to go back to God, you can because he knows that God's love knows no limit. Satan's ultimate agenda is to make you lose hope and stay down when you've fallen.

Cause that's when he can build on his work. Defeat is the one of the foundations on which he builds his evil. Defeat is what empowers the other evils. If you keep hope and faith, then whatever gets you down is thrown off easier because you have God reminding you that it's not over.

But once you give up and stay fallen, then the sin and evil just keep piling on. It's like falling down and getting dirt shovelled on top of you-- the best way to get it off is to stand up and keep running... if you stay down, you'll risk getting buried.

Peter said it best in 1 Peter 5:6-10:

⁶Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time,
⁷casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you.
⁸Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.
⁹But resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brethren who are in the world.
¹⁰After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you.

Amen to that.

I'm very much still in the closet.

The fear of people knowing my secret, especially in church. I don't know how people would react, you know? Even those I call my friends-- What would they say? Can I really trust them?

I suppose really trusting people is something many find hard. We find it hard to trust others, because as we grow older, we experience things that make us all cynical. Basically, people are paranoid. We hear about all the evil and pain in the world, and we think that the only way to avoid being subject to it is to keep away from it. So we don't trust people. And even in church, where we're meant to find safety within a family of believers, we are fearful of the judgement. Often the condemnation can come from those who are supposed to love you the most.

Trusting others in the church is especially hard for anyone who's been burnt before. If they've been hurt by a Christian brother or someone else who was close, they feel betrayed. They feel more paranoid than they did before. They suddenly think, "Oh God... if someone who I know so well can be like this, what about all those other people I don't know so well, or am bound to meet in the future?"

So they decide to be cautious. They'll be more careful, and this deprives them of incredible friendships that they could experience and benefit from.

Now, of course they aren't exactly wrong from acting so. I mean, this world and this society has rammed down our throats the idea that people are insane. People are crazy, people are bad, people are sick. And all that is hammered home by all the things happening around us, e.g.:

"This girl was raped by some guy she met in an Internet chatroom who claimed that he too was 12 years old and that he wanted them to meet so they could bitch about their parents to each other."

"This man killed his wife, his best friend and himself after finding his best friend in bed with her."

It's stuff like this that makes us think that people are nuts. So we go through our daily lives guarded and suspicious. The paranoia even follows us into the church... "What if this guy turns out to be some lunatic axe-murderer?" Ok, that's harsh. "...but what if he's just pretending to be a nice guy and wants to use me?"

Sure, we do trust the occasional person, but not totally. There's always something secret, something dark, that we keep hidden. Another hidden part of ourselves that we guard in shame and fear. We don't think they would understand. We think maybe they'll judge us, and perhaps even dislike us for it. We're afraid of being an outcast, thrown out of the church environment forever, never fitting in. Amidst all this fear of being an outcast, there's the fear of losing our friends. We're afraid we'll be alone.

In reality, we're being selfish, because we are judging our friends! We judge them to be people who will hate us just because of something we've done, or some trait we have. We think they are narrow-minded. In actual fact, we think they have the capability to be such bastards because they can have the ability to hate us for discovering something about us, despite the fact that the friendship might have existed long before the discovery.

"Who do they think they are? Who are they to judge me?! They don't even really know me! I don't need them!!"

You see, what we don't realise is that we don't really know anything about them, in the same way that we think they don't know much about us. And why is that?

Because we don't trust.

How do we remedy this? How do we get out of this paranoid rut where we are unable to see the good in people? I'll tell you how:

We just trust. Plain and simple. We learn to trust people. If you feel that someone you know is close to you, and you enjoy that person's company and friendship, then by all means trust him/her. Of course the risk of being burnt is present. It always is. But you may discover something so incredible that you wonder how you ever got by without it. You'll have found a friend. Someone who you can trust with your very life. Sadly enough, total trust is almost non-existent today. I myself can only admit to totally trusting maybe just two people. Three at best.

Why is this, you ask?

Because I'm a paranoid freak. Because I'm exactly what I've said... just like many others out there, I pre-judge my friends. I so want to trust them; there are so many of my friends I want to tell my secret to, that perhaps we could become closer friends, that we could become brothers/sisters like Christ intended.

But I can't. I doubt they'd understand. I doubt they'd see my side of it, and that they'd be close-minded and hateful. Why the hell can't I trust them?! Am I really this judgemental? My friends can't really be that bad! What the blazes is wrong with me?

Nothing. I'm just human.