[cheers and applause] Well, first of all I want to, uh, greet my lovely wife. Today is our 22nd anniversary. [cheers] [applause] I must say, through the difficult times of life, she has blossomed and just has become even more beautiful
than ever before. I'm just really grateful to be on this journey with her. It was actually about a year ago that we, um, you know, we came to our first GCN conference. We told people it was our anniversary. That's why we were going to cold Chicago. We didn't want anyone— [laughter] We did not want anyone to know
we were going to a gay conference so we came secretly. Um, and so we were one of those couples
who came nervously attending our first conference and I remember going to the registration table and they asked us the question, you know, "Do you want the red lanyard or the blue one?" and I was in my mind thinking, "Maybe we should get the red one because we don't want anyone to know we're here." And it's funny how things turn out because now I'm up front. [laughter] [applause] But I'm deeply honored to be asked to keynote just this amazing conference. I'm thankful to Justin and the staff
for entrusting me with this— this tremendous responsibility, but this morning I'd like to share my story and before I go into that, let's begin in prayer. Father, we're grateful for just this beautiful gathering that, God, we can come and
hear the stories of one another, how, God, we have so many different journeys and, God, right here, right now, our stories intersect, they collide and, God, we are brought together. And so, Father, we pray that You would use each of our stories that even now You would speak for me to bring encouragement, to bring about Your kingdom that, God, You might be glorified. And so bless our time in Christ's name Amen. So about 17 years ago— thank you— I helped start a small Southern Baptist church in La Mirada close to a Christian university and so as a result of that, every year, I discovered that different people would come out to me as a pastor, and— as their pastor, and share with me about some same-sex struggles. And I remember not knowing what to do with it because it wasn't something that I had any training in in seminary and so I would just tell them I'd pray for them and I'd pray for their recovery and that somehow they would be "cured" of— of their same-sex attraction, and at times I would send them over
to reparative therapy and, you know, that was pretty much my process for— and so for about 16 years, people would— at least one to three people would come out to me and just confide in me and at times, I would get into a debate, and every time I got into these conversations I always felt uncomfortable as if I wasn't giving life in the way I was— I was giving counsel to these people. And then I developed a deeper friendship with one of the college students that came to church about eight years ago. Her name is Cara and she's here with us today at this conference. [cheers and applause] And she allowed me to walk with her, to pay attention to her struggle and her anguish and we got into these dialogues and these debates. And I remember one time we were meeting at Starbucks and I was trying to tell her the Biblical way,
that she had to stay celibate, and that she had to change,
and I would help her to change and she looked over at me, and she said, "Look at that man that's sitting close by." And she said, "What would it— what would it feel like to you if I told you
that you had to look at that man and change the way you thought of life, that you would— you would have to learn how to be attracted to him. You would have to learn how to hold his hand and eventually, you know, be intimate with a guy like that." I remember thinking how—how— inconceivable that would be. And it dawned on me that that's the message that I was giving to so many people and that's the reason why so many people were being so psychologically damaged. And eventually Cara, you know, left the church because
she got involved with another lady at our church and they realized that they couldn't stay at New Heart Church anymore because they were in a relationship. They couldn't teach Sunday School and they would probably be prohibited from taking communion. And so when they left,
something in my heart bothered me. I knew that there was, you know,
something wrong about this. Why couldn't gay couples, you know, feel safe in our church? And so I decided to go on a little journey and ask, you know, myself the questions, you know: Are we— are we applying Scripture correctly? And the main question I suppose I was asking is, you know, how can we love well when so many people in the LGBT community are feeling judged and marginalized and so the question in my mind was how can we love well? And I suppose I kept telling myself that I was loving you, and that's why I'm saying these things to you. But in the same way that I can say all I want to my wife that I'm loving you, but if she's not receiving it as love, then I need to pay attention to why. [applause] And so that's what I did. I decided to go on a little journey and learn as much as I can and I realized that one of the problems was that I had a pretty homophobic upbringing. Whenever I thought of the word "homosexual" or thought about people who were "homosexuals," immediately I thought of disgusting, sinful, just sexual, you know, perversion kind of things, and so if I was going to engage in the study I needed to kind of detox myself and so I thought, one of the best things to do would be to visit, you know, a gay neighborhood of West Hollywood. [laughter] And I thought maybe I could just, you know, go and— and, you know, try to make friends with people. [laughter] I met a man that worked at the AIDS clinic and he gave me a tour of— of West Hollywood. And so I decided one day, I'm going to do my sermon prep at one of the coffee shops in the gay neighborhood. And so I brought my books there, my computer, and I was trying to study but I couldn't
because I felt like I was in this— this arena of sin and I was just like, thinking, God, what am I doing here? And so all I could do that first day was kind of look around at the gay magazines that was on the— this wall and just watching people come and go and trying to you know, get a sense of—of the gay community, but one of the things I immediately recognized was "Man, this coffee is good." [laughter] But slowly but surely my stereotypes of the gay community began to change. I began to realize that these were beautiful people. That they were normal. And so as I began my study, I decided that it would be good for me to not read into the Scriptures a Western understanding of what homosexuality is. And so I decided to look as much as I can into every homoerotic literature in Greek and Roman antiquity and so I started to immerse myself in a missiological sort of way to try to understand what that culture was actually talking about and what kind of— what kind of understanding Paul might have. And the more I read into it, the more I realized that wow, this—this homoerotic, you know, culture in antiquity was very perverse. I mean, there was pedophilia, there was— there was cult prostitution, there was slavery. There was all these things and I remember thinking, "This is the reason why Paul and others would condemn this, because there was so much evil," but I remember being engaged in one of the books, and— and meeting up with Cara and Leah, you know, at that same meeting where I—I closed my— my notes and I was having coffee with this— this gay couple and thinking, "Wow, the world I came from and these books, and now sitting down with a gay, lesbian couple, is so different." What I read here and what I'm experiencing
from this couple who is fearing God and loving Christ
and loving one another and loving on me— these two things are different realities. And so it wasn't so much that their arguments were— were convincing as much as it was
their apologetic of love. That the presence of Christ was in them and it really made me question more,
you know, what was going on. And to make a long story short, in August of 2013, I was at the beach just kind of having a moment with God and I was trying to think through all the— the thoughts I had about, you know, LGBT people and about Scripture and there was this thought that came into my mind, "What if I'm wrong?" And then I realized, maybe I no longer believe the things I used to believe. And then it went from there, and I realized,
you know what, I think I no longer believe my traditional understanding of Scripture. And I remember it startled me, that thought in my mind, and I thought, "Oh dear God, did I just become liberal?" [laughter and applause] [crowd chatting] And I seriously was afraid of it. [laughter] I didn't know how to process my thoughts. I decided, you know what? I'm just— maybe that was just a fluke of, you know, a freakish moment. And so I was, you know, I remember listening
to the song on the radio, you know, and it was a gay-friendly song and I was thinking, "Oh dear God, I like this song." [laughter] "I"m actually enjoying it." And so that song came up again,
you know, a few weeks later. I was taking my son, Drew, 15 years old at the time into school and the song came on and I asked Drew, "Drew, who sings this song?" and he said, "Dad, it's by Macklemore." And he said, "Why?" And I said, "Son, I think I like the song." He looked at me and he said, "Dad, you know what the song is about?" [laughter] And I said, "Yes, I know what the song is about, and that's why I like it. I think I've changed my— my theology on this." And I could tell he was a little bit disturbed. [some laughter] And so we get out of the car and I'm walking him to school, to the off—just to register. And I look over at him, and I ask him,
"Drew, why, what do you think about homosexuality?" And he looks over at me and he says, "Dad, I'm gay." I remember all I could do was turn and just embrace him with the biggest hug
I had ever given him in my life. And I asked him, "Drew, why did you wait? Why didn't you tell me this before? You know that I've been on this
8-year journey of trying to figure out, you know, how to be
compassionate to LGBT people. Why did it take you so long to confide in me?" And he said, "Dad, I know you've been compassionate. I know you've been trying to figure this out and it wasn't about you at all, it was about me because I knew that if I had confessed it to anyone it meant that I would have given up and I didn't want to be gay." And so I said, "Son, that makes sense." And so he began to tell, you know, my wife, and he actually told
his brothers beforehand and soon enough the whole family knew his story, and we were in the car one day and he was just, you know, being thankful and he said, "You know what, I'm really glad that all of you have accepted me and embraced me but I want you to know that if I had a pill right now that would change who I am, I would still take it." And so, you know, I remember hearing those words and just thinking why that didn't sit well with me. And so the next day, you know,
I looked over at him and I said, "Drew, as your father, I want you to know that if I had a pill
that could change you, I wouldn't give it to you." [applause] "Because, Drew, [applause] this is who God made you to be and I love you just the way you are. No more fighting this, Drew. No more fighting this." I remember for the first time in my life speaking to a gay person, that the first time in my life, I felt like I was actually giving life, and I was thinking, "Wow, the fruit of this feels so familiar." And so, you know, as we were trying to process,
you know, through, you know, what it meant, my wife and I raising a gay child, you know, we decided to go to GCN, you know, last year, and we were that—like I said—that couple that was, you know, going in there secretly. Only a small group of friends knew that we were here, but at GCN, I began to look around and realized that there was this safe space where both sides could coexist. I realized that the theology wasn't as important as— as the aspect, the family. And that this place was striving to understand what it meant to be the body of Christ and I remember the keynote address by— by Dr. Wiley, who— who began to share her own journey as a pastor, and as she was speaking I wrote in my journal, "Ministry suicide." And I underlined it. [laughter] And I knew that when I got home, I would have to tell the church. I knew that I would most likely get fired. I knew that I would never be invited
to camps and conferences again. But at GCN, I heard story after story
last year of people being hurt. I heard stories of college students being expelled
from their Christian universities. I heard gay, lesbian, transgender people being told that they couldn't go to family functions or being told that they couldn't teach Sunday school, being made to feel like second-class
Christians within the church and after story after story,
I began to just feel this weight in my heart and realized, "Dear God, I've been part of this problem." I've been part of the clergy. I've been part of the evangelical community of pastors that have been bringing shame to a community. And so what I said last year
in the open mic sharing time, and what I share to all of you, my LGBT brothers and sisters that are here this year, is that I am so sorry. I am so sorry for the shame and the hurt that our teaching has caused you. I'm so sorry to make you feel like there was something wrong with you. For not valuing who you are. And I made a promise last year that to the best of my abilities and by the grace of God, I would go back and I would try,
by the grace of God, to be courageous, to be strong and to stand up for people who are being marginalized. And so within two weeks of last year's conference, my wife and I began our journey of telling the church and— immediately, we realized, began to create chaos. And so the leaders of the church, you know,
realized that, you know, I had— I had fallen off, you know, our—our statement of faith, our traditional understanding of the Scriptures, and there was this realization that I needed
to be terminated, but that they gave me one more— one more time to preach so that
the church can understand, you know, what happened to me,
that they can hear my story. And as I told my story, you know, the church said, you know,
we're moving a little bit too fast. Let's give it some time. Let's give it four to five months, a period of prayer and discernment where we'll invite people from both sides, and so I got a hold of— of James and Rebecca Farlow of—of Sanctuary Ministry and they hooked us up with Justin Lee
and he actually came to speak at our church and James Farlow as well on the Side A theology and then we had a Biola professor come to speak on the traditional side as well as others, and for about four months,
there was this heaviness in our heart as we engaged in this dialogue and this debate, and it was so painfully difficult because I felt like our church was falling apart and I actually told the leaders,
"I don't think our church will survive this. I think it's better that you just terminate me
right here and right now. Because our church was OK before—before
I shared, you know, what I shared." But one of the ladies of our church said, "Danny,
our church wasn't OK before this. Our church was marginalizing people. And so I think you need to stay the course." And so as our church went through the process, there wasn't a clear majority. Instead, our church went through a— a separation, a split. 60% chose to keep me on as the pastor
and transition to become a— a Third Way church, a space, much like GCN, where there are differences of opinion, but we're trying to understand what it means to be the body of Christ in spaces of disagreement. And 40% chose to— to move on, and I remember how painful that was, and especially as— as the online community began to hear
about our stories, and, you know, I was hearing words of praise, and also, you know, words of anger and then I started hearing people demonizing, you know, the people that were leaving my church and I remember just feeling sick to my stomach because one of the elders of my church, who I consider as a father figure, was being portrayed as this evil man, and I was thinking, "You have no idea who this man is. He is a man who fears God. He's a guy who would probably take a bullet for me." I know him well, and so in my mind
I was trying to, you know, understand what was going on and trying to keep the— the unity of the church and realized that everything was falling apart. But our church went through a very painful— painful split, and— and as the church split, I began to meet with several pastors and church leaders and professors, and time and time again, they kept asking me the same question: "Danny, how can you abandon Biblical authority? How could you, as a pastor, accommodate sin?" And so one of the things I've been telling people is I feel like I'm a—I'm a pastor who has
this bag full of medicine. And so in this bag full of medicine,
there's 99 of them that work, you know, for—for things like, you know, diabetes and lung disease and cancer and so I can offer up these prescriptions for— for people who are struggling with lust and adultery
and all kinds of sin, but for some reason there is one pill
in my bag of medicine that isn't—isn't bringing healing, in fact,
it's doing the reverse, it's causing harm. And so as a practitioner of faith, I have to question whether or not this traditional understanding
of Scripture is— is actually something that I'm going to continue to teach because if I'm going to pay attention
to what Jesus says, when he says the way you can tell the difference between a false teaching versus a good one is by its fruit, and what I tell my theologian friends is it's kind of like you guys are the— are the— are the scientists. You're trying to exegete the text correctly, but I'm telling you that in the field, it's not working. It's not working. Either the medication is expired, or it's for some specific form of homosexuality that it doesn't exist anymore, or doesn't apply to same-sex monogamous relationships, whatever it is, it's causing harm. It's causing psychological damage. It's not giving life, in fact, it's doing the opposite. When I think about transgendered persons, it's actually leading them to suicide. And so because of that, this needs to be recalled. It needs to be reevaluated. We need to really look long and hard at how we are interpreting Scripture because when I look at the way
Jesus interpreted Scripture, it was to give life. And so I look at the Gospel of John
when John was being put to a test. John chapter 8 says, he was— he was, you know, being led on by these— these teachers of the law, and in order to trap him,
they found this woman who had committed adultery. They would try to figure out would Jesus obey what the Law of Moses
had commanded? Because according to Leviticus 20, if someone commits adultery they must be put to death. This was the clear teaching of Scripture. There was no other way. There's forgiveness about a whole lot of things, but if you want to be true to the Biblical text, if you want to hold a high view of Scripture, then you have to obey the Law of Moses that whenever someone commits adultery, they must be put to death. And so everyone was trying to figure out, how would Jesus apply the Law of Moses? Because the purity of Israel was at stake. This woman had to be removed or else her sin would contaminate the nation. Would Jesus be strong on sin? But Jesus, we know, asked the people, "Whoever among you hasn't sinned, cast the first stone." And oftentimes, my evangelical, conservative friends will look at this story and the thing that they point out most is that doesn't Jesus say, "Go and sin no more"? That wasn't the scandal of this passage. The scandal of this passage was that Jesus was going against thousands of years of tradition. The first readers of this passage were thinking, "Wow, Jesus isn't applying the clear reading of Scripture. Maybe he isn't the Messiah after all." And it dawned on me that my— my strict interpretation of Scripture
was misaligned with Christ, that maybe if I had been living in the time of Christ, I might have rejected him as Messiah. And so Jesus showed us a different way
to look at Scripture. It was a hermeneutic of compassion. It was being able to look at Scripture
and say, "What gives life? What is more compassionate? What is just? What is merciful?" And thankfully, we don't stone any people anymore but our modern-day equivalent is to cast them off. It's to kick them out of our churches and to feel like LGBT people are somehow contaminating the Church and what Jesus says is, "Don't cast that stone." Because we're all equally in need of God's grace. And so time and time again Jesus is butting heads with the religious leaders and time and time again, you know, Christ is showing a compassionate way to understand the Scriptures. He does it not only for the adulterer, but to the lepers, the people—the woman with an issue of blood, the prostitute, you know, those with skin diseases. He's interpreting Scripture, you know, in a whole different way from tradition and he goes to the Sabbath, the very apex of—of the Law of Moses,
written into the very Ten Commandments, and the teachers of the law, the religious leaders, they're wondering how will Jesus interpret the Sabbath, and Jesus allows his disciples to pick grain. Jesus heals, and I'm thinking, "Jesus, couldn't you have waited one more day to heal those people?" But Jesus was trying to push something on them. He was trying to show them that you are interpreting the law not in accordance to God. He was able to say that the Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath, In other words, you have to interpret Scripture in the way that humanizes people and not the other way around. And so Jesus, when confronted with— with healing a man whose hand was shriveled, he was accused of working on the Sabbath, and he asked the people, "Which is lawful on the Sabbath,
to do good or to do evil? To save life or to kill?" And so Jesus was saying, the way you interpret Sabbath is to give life. And so I ask my evangelical friends that are we giving life to LGBT people? Because in my understanding,
and looking at the LGBT community, we are continually pushing them out of the churches. We are causing psychological damage. And I don't think this is the way of Christ, telling people that they are mistaken in their gender identity, telling people that their identity is a choice and that somehow they are choosing to sin. And so Jesus now is— is crucified. He's resurrected. And he ascends to heaven
and now he leaves his disciples. And so he's no longer holding their hands and trying to teach them
what the commandment means. He's trying to see if they will apply
this hermeneutic of compassion. And so now they are put to the test
in regards to circumcision, a topic Jesus never speaks of, and he's wondering, how will my disciples apply what I have shown them throughout my years on earth? And so here the disciples are in Acts chapter 10. Peter receives this— this vision and so now these— these early disciples are astonished that these Gentiles are now receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit without being circumcised. And they're beginning to realize that maybe we— we have to do away with physical circumcision because this might be a stumbling block, and you can imagine what was going on through the disciples in the early church. Paul hadn't yet written the letters to Romans and Galatians. There was nothing in the Old Testament that ever imagined that the literal form of circumcision would ever be abolished and put aside. But the disciples knew that if
we are going to move towards inclusion, that circumcision may be a stumbling block. And if it's a stumbling block, it must be put away. And that's what the disciples chose to do. And so Jesus and the disciples take these two very huge things, the Sabbath and circumcision, these very things that defined what it meant to be a Jew, these two things that defined what it meant to be a follower of God, to belong to God— this was— this would— this was their identity— and Jesus and the disciples showed us that there was a different way to look at Scripture that reevaluated towards compassion and they set into motion this arc towards inclusion, this arc towards justice that the Church must follow. And so if you look at historical theology, you'll find out that the Church didn't wrestle with every major doctrine
in the infancy of the Church. The early church dealt with Gnostic heresies
in regards to Christology. The Church dealt with modalism
in the doctrine of the Trinity and the Pelagian Controversy and the meaning of grace, and every time there was this—this threat, you know, it caused the theologians to wrestle, you know, what the Scriptures were trying to say, and only recently have we tried in the Church
to wrestle with justice issues like slavery and women's issues and biracial marriages and civil rights, and these wrestlings were in response
to pushback from people who before didn't have a voice. But it were the abolitionists who were saying that people were being harmed,
people were being marginalized, and these abolitionists were speaking out against the conservative theologians. And so time and time again, you know, the Church is having
to wrestle with these things and so now we are in the period where the LGBT voices are finally being heard. And we are in the infancy of the debate and one of the problems of every generation is the belief that we are the generation that has finally understood the full counsel of Scripture and that our long understanding of our beliefs no longer need to be challenged, but I'm telling you, historical theology
proves this is wrong. [applause] We must always have a posture of listening. We need to have a posture of allowing our challen— our assumptions to be challenged. It was Helmut Thielicke, who wrote in "The Trouble with the Church," "He who speaks to this hour's need
and translates the message will always be skirting the edge of heresy. He, however, is the man who is given this promise: the promise that only he who risks heresies can gain the truth." And for a lot of my conservative friends, I know this feels earth-shattering. I know it feels like the carpet is being pulled from under you. But I'm telling you that there's nothing
that compares to the reevaluation of the Sabbath and circumcision in the time of Christ. And so it's kind of like this— the seed that falls to the ground, the smallest of seed, that Jesus plants during his time, and it's allowed to germinate. And like a patient farmer, he waits and waits and in the fullness of time, when the time is ready— God waits over 1700 years for slavery to be abolished in America. He waits even longer for— for women's issues and women's rights, you know, to—to take the floor in our churches. And as this tree grows, it becomes this— this great tree that spouts up and invites people to take shelter, to take refuge, and what I see happening is the slow growth, and that even though the Church has
taught something else for so long it's only because our God has been a patient God, waiting for the right time, for the right season for this dialogue to take place. And so as my church went through a split, the Southern Baptist Convention heard about our story, and one of their leading theologians, Albert Mohler, wrote an article online saying there is no third way. There is no possibility that this should be allowed to exist. And after our church kind of went viral online, I began to receive a lot of hate mails, a lot of e-mails and angry phone calls
and packages delivered to my front door. It got to the point where I didn't want
to answer my phone anymore. I was just kind of startled by it. So many people were calling me a heretic, a deceiver, an anti-Christ, a teacher of the doctrine of demons. There was a lot of things being posted online, and a lot of friends saying all sorts of things, and my wife agonized through so much of it, and she was asking me, "Danny, why
aren't you saying anything? Why don't you defend yourself?" And I found myself being led by God
into a period of silence, into a period of trying to figure out, "God, what in the world are you trying to accomplish here?" And so I began to look more closely
on the Sermon on the Mount and began to preach through a series at my church as we were trying to go through this period of healing, this restart, this transition, and the passage that stuck
in my mind over and over again were Jesus' words of "You have heard that it was said,
'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I tell you, love your enemy and
pray for those who persecute you that you may be children of your Father in heaven." Jesus would go on to say, "Bless those who curse you." Bless them. And so I decided to go back to those letters. I began to open up those hateful e-mails. And I began to read them, one by one. And I began to sit in the moment and reflect on— on the person behind those letters. That each of them had a story to tell, each of them were real people. And in some of those letters, I sensed a lot of fear. In some of those letters, I sensed that they were truly believing that they were honoring God in what they were saying. But I began to realize that each of these people were dearly beloved by God and I had to bless them. And so each letter I would put down and I would offer up a blessing that "God, would You help this person live the fullness of Christ. Would You bless them." And as I went through this process, this weight began to be lifted from me. It was no longer about trying to salvage my reputation, trying to justify my journey. It wasn't about trying to affirm my theology, but it was more about trying to understand how to humanize the very people that were trying to hurt me in my mind. I began to realize that the most important thing was to end the cycle of violence and in trying to end the cycle of violence I began to realize that God, in calling me to be more loving, was calling me to be more human. And so it wasn't about trying to prove Side A or Side B. It was about learning how to be like Christ, learning how to love well. And so as the Southern Baptist Convention
moved to dismiss our church, I was invited to Nashville to speak to the 83 national executive directors and for a two-day meeting, I was—I met with the— the committees, and I stated my case, and answered all the questions that they— they asked of me. And on the second day, right before the vote, I said to these executive directors, "In a couple of hours, you will most likely move to dismiss our church. But I want you to know that the vote that will happen
in a couple of matters won't— in a couple of hours won't matter in the eyes of God because God will still see us as one church and therefore, even though you move to dismiss us, I will always uphold you as
my brothers and sisters in Christ." [applause] "I will always pray for your blessing. I will always pray that God would use this church
and I will always be with you. I will never say a disparaging remark against you." And so some people have asked me, "Danny, why didn't you just walk away when your— your church changed its stance from the Southern Baptist Convention?" And my response was because I don't re—I don't look
at the Southern Baptist Convention through the lens of just our disagreement. I see that the Southern Baptist Convention
is much more than that. They do the work of justice. They—they feed the poor. They care for the hungry. They care for issues of racism. They're trying to preach the gospel, and yes, there's a strong place of disagreement, but most importantly, they are brothers and sisters adopted into the family of Christ by grace just like me. And I have to keep that. [applause] I can't walk away from that. And so this hermeneutic of compassion doesn't approve an affirming theology but at the very least, it ought to make us reexamine
how we interpret Scripture. It ought to make us examine and work towards inclusion rather than separation and it ought to make us look at
Jesus' high priestly prayer, when Jesus prayed for the unity of the Church. It ought to make us see that no matter what, we are just broken people. And all of us, to our core, just wants to be loved. That's who we are. It was Tomáš Halík, in his book, "Night of the Confessor," he writes a story of a rabbi asking his students how one recognizes the moment when night ends and day begins. And this rabbi asked his students that, and so one of the pupils asked, "Is it the moment that it is light enough to tell the difference
between a dog from a sheep?" The rabbi said no. "Is it the moment when we can tell
a date palm from a fig tree?" And the rabbi said, no, it's not that either. And so the pupil asked, "So when does morning come?" And the rabbi responded, "It's the moment when we look into
the face of any person and recognize them as our brother or sister. Until we're able to do that, it is still night." The goal of our faith is not marriage equality. The goal of our faith is not religious freedom. The goal of our faith is to love. To love God with all of our heart,
mind, soul, and strength and to love our neighbor as our self. We might be totally right and totally moral, but we could still be so far from the Kingdom of God because if you have not loved, we are nothing. And what God is calling us to is much more than a debate, much more than trying to prove who is right or wrong, but He is asking us to look at our enemies, to look at people who have— who disagree with us, who condemn us, to look at people on all sides of the spectrum and God is asking us to love the other person because our faith isn't this propositional statement where we are trying to prove what's right and wrong. Scripture is much more than that. Truth is a person. Truth is the person of Christ and when Jesus was asked by Pilate, "What is truth?" Jesus didn't answer the question in the verbal way and I remember thinking, "Jesus, of all the times you could have just defined for us what truth means, you could have done it there." But in Jesus' non-answer, he did answer because if he were to speak, he would have packaged truth
in the form of a statement and that's not what truth is but instead, Jesus, in his silence, said, "I am Truth." "You are looking at it." And so our argument, our apologetic, is not done by words. It is not trying to prove who is the greater scholar who knows the Greek, who knows the Hebrew, who is trying to find the more convincing arguments. Our goal is not about trying to be right but trying to understand how to love well, how to be practitioners of faith, how to fight for the unity of the Church, the love of God, how to learn to love our enemies well, and by doing so, the world will know that we are His disciples and the stumbling block will be removed. I will close with a letter I received shortly after my February video on homosexuality was posted online. It's a letter from a 60-year-old CEO from Australia. And he writes, "Danny, I began life in the church and trained for ministry, but my journey as a gay man and my ministry collided like a train wreck in slow motion that has led to the decades of mental illness and anguish. I listened to your message just now
and every fiber of my being is with you and your family and your beautiful son and I listened with tears running down my face and my shoulders heaving with sobs as you said the words I have always
wanted to hear from a pulpit. You said you were sorry, and for the first time in my life, I shared tears with a Christian pastor who—who so completely understands me and brings Jesus' message to me with pure love and acceptance. And last night, I listened again to your message,
Danny, and felt my spirit overflowing with joy and love, and I watched your son Drew's
coming out video over again and wondered at the depth of his wisdom that it takes to make a young gay man
so full of insight and love. And dear stranger, despite the distance, I feel very connected to you in a way
I could not have imagined. From the other side of the world,
I am now on my own journey. I have described myself as an atheist for 30 years because I know God prefers me to be either hot or cold, I could never be lukewarm, it isn't who I am, but from this moment, Danny, I describe myself as a Christian because you have brought Jesus back to me." [applause] "And please be strong no matter what happens. I wish there would be some way I could give to you
what you have given to me, that I could give you back
the feeling of love and courage and hope and acceptance you have shown me. But all I have is this e-mail,
and I'm sure you will get many. May God bless you and give you strength. That's the first time I have used those words in 30 years. With love and hope, Ken." For me, this has always been about the Gospel. Why have I been on my journey? It's because so many people like Ken, so many people like Cara and Leah, couldn't feel safe within our churches. And you know, the funny thing about Cara and Leah was that they left our church maybe four years ago because they— they got involved with one another. They became committed in this—in their relationship. But ever since our church went through
their split, they came back. And before, they felt like they couldn't take communion. But now they bake our communion bread every week. [applause] And so my prayer is that all of us would reevaluate our understanding of Scripture and be moved by compassion because compassion is what gives us clarity by the grace of God. Let's pray. Father, we thank You so much, God, for the space, for these beautiful people I call my brothers and sisters and, God, I ask that You would help us all to journey that, God, in the same way Jeff shared about just holding on tenaciously to his mom that, Father, we wouldn't give up on people. No matter how difficult, we would seek to love and as a result we would become living billboards of the glory of Christ. We would show the world what Christ looks like not by our theology, but by our love. And so, God, grant us grace in Your son's name. Amen. [applause]
