One-on-One with Jackie Hill Perry | Pastor Chad Fisher | It's NOT That Complicated

[Applause] our guest today is of an author a poet a bible teacher uh a hip-hop artist hers is an incredible story she is the author of the book gay girl good god the story of who i was and who god has always been she's also most recently finished a video-based bible study series on the book of jude contending for the faith in today's culture she's also a part of a 12-week collaborative effort video based bible study for parents and for teenagers called christian sexuality discovering the truth about jesus sex and gender we have a lot to cover today so would you do me a favor put your hands together give a big rock city welcome to jackie hill perry uh jackie first off thank you for being here you are just incredible you're an incredible gift to the church you have an incredible story it's an honor to sit with you i believe that you have an ability to unpack the scripture in a way that it just makes sense i want to start with your story matter of fact one of the first things that you say in your book is you said i was attracted to women before i knew how to spell my name now considering a recent gallup poll that just released this finding that one in six gen z adults identifies as lgbt there are a lot of people certainly leaning in today so some with skepticism maybe concern maybe even a little bit of fear others perhaps looking for affirmation or for a new perspective and many even within our church who identify as lgbt or have a family member or friend who does so with that in mind take us back to those early years what was your childhood like what was that time in your life when you you said i was attracted to women before i knew how to spell my name what was going on with little jackie hill perry confusion yeah i mean i think i noticed uh same-sex desires either kindergarten first grade or second grade prior to knowing how to because when your first name was jacqueline that's a little difficult to figure out how to spell you know that's a lot of letters it's too many syllables and so um i just noticed that the same way in which um boys liked girls i liked girls too but i didn't know where it came from i didn't know its origin its source i didn't even have a label for it because i tell people this is early 90s and so there isn't kind of this media effort towards giving me some title to identify myself by um i think if that were the case i might have had an identity that god did not want me to embody far too early creating i think a stronghold that would have been harder to break but that's another conversation but i do think that um i just didn't know what was happening until i went to church and when i went to church i heard you know them talk about the term homosexuality and they did you know the typical leviticus 18 romans 1 first corinthians 6 et cetera and my issue wasn't with uh the consequence that was ascribed to uh same-sex practice it was the way in which it was communicated from the pulpit and the mob mentality of the people in the pews once it was because it felt to me as if oh christians don't like people like that therefore christians don't like people like me therefore i won't talk to christians about what i deal with um and so i do think that the the way it was communicated kept me from the possibility of confession um you want me to keep going well let me ask you this so i do want you to keep going did your same-sex attraction in that like first grade phase of life you're six seven years old even before maybe you you heard uh homosexuality talked about in the church did did that attraction at a young age did it feel normal to you did it feel right wrong what was going on inside your young mind your young heart i think when you're a child you don't know what normal is you're driven by impulse and so i i think i i didn't know but i did i do think that the conscience uh reminded me or tried to teach me if it was morally right or not because every time i would do something with a little girl we hid and it's like why are you hiding why do you know to hide why don't you think this is acceptable why won't you communicate that you like her in the same way other little girls tell their you know their mama's hey i like latroy trey or whatever and so to that's the joke because we all knew a little trade track growing up i didn't i knew john johns i don't know where trey trey came from in my spirit it's all good we're gonna we're gonna unpack that thought though um the conscious speaks in in a minute tell us about your family your mom your dad were you raised in a christian home did you did you go to church together always what was your relationship like with your family yeah so my mother uh has been consistent always my father was there sometimes he yeah he he saw me when he wanted to which meant you know sometimes he would be in my life for six months and disappear for two years be in my life for a week and disappear for another year it was just a really inconsistent kind of thing my mother however you know single parent worked her butt off crazy work ethic um you know the type of mama that tell you to do something don't explain why you know wash the dishes why i got to do them right now because i said so it's like well i gotta do it right now at 5 p.m um why not six and so there was those kinds of interactions with her if i grew up in a christian home no uh my my mother wasn't a believer my exposure to the christian faith was through my aunt merle who i talk about often publicly because my aunt merle is the most saved woman i have ever met in my entire life she's like that save saved family member save thrice saved save saved like holy holy holy that she's safe safe safe um come on like to the point i've never seen her kneecaps like she wears dresses okay every day that's she wears dresses on monday tuesday wednesday even at 7 00 pm she still got a dress it's bedtime and you you dressed up now i have heard you uh describe your relationship with your aunt you you've said of that relationship your save saved aunt that it created an unwanted conflict for you and yet you've described conflict as a mercy how so well when you're around a righteous person your sin becomes obvious wow and so i think to be around her i saw that there was a distinct difference between the way she lived and the way i lived the way she moved and the way i moved the way she loved and the way i loved and even though you know the conscience is really loud and you want it to shut up sometimes it's a mercy because any time conviction is present that's god allowing you to see the truth about yourself and so it's it's it's like man ah i'm a liar ah i'm arrogant we can run from it and we do in our sin but really what is happening is that the spirit of god is trying to illuminate you to reality and um i think as as as sinners reality is what we hate most so that's good now one of the first verses a lot of people will hear or learn is it's john 3 16 for god so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whosoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life that that verse uh has special meaning to you um unpack that for us just a moment yeah so that was the verse that came to my mind when i was converted uh i was in my room i was 19 and uh prior to this time obviously you know having same-sex desires uh when i'm a kid and then growing up with this you know concept that this is not what god wants this is not what god likes i don't want to go to hell and it's crazy because i really thought that my same-sex desires were the one thing that would send me to hell and not my sinfulness in general um and so i'm walking around the world just scared of dying because i don't want to go to hell but it got to a point when i was in high school where i was like you know what it's it's becoming harder for me to uh behave like a heterosexual it would just be easier for me to be myself and so i decided to you know do what i wanted to do which was to be the lesbian that i thought myself to be um and so you know i got in a relationship with a girl in that time is when i uh became what in the black lesbian community is called a stud stud is the woman who kind of projects a hyper masculine self so you know wearing boxers sacking my pants my voice is already deep so i didn't have to change that um [Laughter] wearing um wearing sports bras to flatten my chest you know um which if i can go here i think a lot of that was a natural consequence of people telling me that i behaved like a boy um i think people made it seem as if my kind of womanhood was not woman at all so naturally i thought i shouldn't be what i am um yeah and so i think i think the church needs help with help with creating a better more biblical and accurate framework of what womanhood and manhood is so that people so that people are okay with themselves right and so fast forward 19 in my room doing something irrelevant like watching making the band and the band was never made which is interesting and i felt god speak to me yeah and when you're not used to god speaking to you you don't know what to do with that but i did a process of elimination because what came to my my heart was she will be the death of you and i'm like i wouldn't tell myself that because she life for me so i don't i don't i don't think i told myself that i don't think the devil gonna convict me of no sin and so this must be the lord and so i sat up and i started to have a conversation with god for the first time uh and in the conversation i told god i don't i don't want to be straight though because i thought that conversion was the same thing as heterosexuality because when people presented the gospel to me it was presented as if to come to jesus is to be straight instead of come to jesus to be holy come on um and so that was my initial pushback because i'm like god you're calling me to be something i don't feel that i am and i really sense that god was saying i'll work all that out just come to me yeah you're my you are my priority not your sexuality not all these other things it's you as an individual as a person as an image bearer and so come on she can preach she can freeze am i am i you can freeze i feel like i'm traveling down your notes so i'm just going to preach you're just walking through i'm traveling down i might know it i told god that but the crazy thing is is that when god was revealing himself to me and this is nothing but the spirit's work second corinthians 4 talks about how the enemy is blind in the minds of unbelievers so they cannot see the light of the glory of god in the face of jesus christ but he who said let there be light has shone in our hearts to give this light and so me seeing god as he is is the holy spirit's work in me um and so i'm starting to see the truth which is that my my main and primary issue is not homosexuality the fundamental sin to which i needed to repent of was unbelief at the bottom of all of my sins was that i did not treat god as god that i made created things more worthy which is romans 1 of my affections of my love of my time of my mind of my joy of my money i treated people as if it was possible for them to make me whole which is crazy um and so in that i saw man you don't want just my sexuality you want my entire self which makes repentance impulsive because now you see that god doesn't want to fix an aspect of you he wants to hold you um and so i told god i said god i don't i don't really know what none of this means i don't know how to do what you're calling me to do but i know enough about you to believe that you'll help me and my mind went to john 3 16 which is the only passage i knew it was and on the bottom of february 21 bastard you can't miss it where it says for god so loved the world that whoever believes in him whoever whoever anybody anybody anybody believes in him shall not perish die but have eternal everlasting life and i knew that that verse was talking about me and so by the power of the holy spirit i simply believed it that's awesome genesis 3 yeah come on that's good genesis 3 the creation story adam and eve are in the garden they're enjoying the perfection of all their favorite god has made there's no sin right most people are familiar with this story there's an apple there's a snake eve takes a bite adam joins in they're banished from the garden a lot of people don't know what to make of this particular passage you explain it better than maybe anybody and you see yourself in that story how so man because we all here we're all in adam um the interesting thing is that i think sometimes we forget to start these kinds of stories with god uh because genesis 1 1 doesn't start with the problem it starts with a person in the beginning god created the heavens and the earth which is which is which is really fascinating because it's like why is the bible why is the first thing it wants to introduce us to about god is that he's a creator and i think it's because if god is creator then everything that comes after him is automatically subject to him so when we move into genesis 3 um where or genesis 2 where god genesis went into where god commands the man hey you know do whatever you want eat everywhere you know you naked be unashamed and naked just just do your thing and because doing their thing was according to the will of god at the time and he tells them yeah do everything except don't eat from the fruit of this tree then you know obviously he communicates that to his wife otherwise how else would she have known the commandment uh and so in genesis 3 then the serpent who was really rude because he doesn't introduce himself he don't ask her his name he don't say how's the day going you know [Applause] you need any leaves the bandit because you know walking around with just no brawl that just had to be something and so you can edit that out it's just a lot sin or not that's a lot and so he says did god really say yeah which is the root of all of our doubt is to question the word of god and by questioning the word of god ultimately you end up questioning the person of god because if you question the person of god now the question becomes is god a liar and is satan telling the truth uh so she starts to see this tree which is where i see myself and all of us is that she looks at this tree that god told them the day you eat of it you shall surely not possibly not maybe not might you shall surely die but she looks at the tree that god said would kill her and sees nothing but good things about it ain't that something that that that your affections can rule your reasoning to the point that you think there is life in a dead thing yeah and so she looks at the tree and she's ah it's good for food ah that's a delight to the eyes oh that's desire to make one wise she has an affection for a created thing that changes her affections and takes her faith off of the person she was made for and puts it on to the thing god made for himself and that is all of us we are all born idolaters worshiping created things and expecting them to be god for us and so when i look at genesis 3 i see jackie because that was jackie's problem and that's the entire world that's so good that's so good you you've mentioned romans 1 several times romans 1 beginning with verse 21 is actually our theme verse for this series for although they knew god they would not worship him as god or give thanks they thought of foolish ideas of what god was like as a result their minds became dark and confused claiming to be wise they instead became utter fools they exchanged the truth about god for a lie and worshiped and served created things rather than the creator because of this god gave them over to shameful lust furthermore since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of god he gave them over to a depraved mind to do what ought not be done now there are a lot of sins that are listed out in this passage so men who have abandoned natural relations with women women who've abandoned natural relations with men those who are wicked evil greedy depraved envious murderous those who cause strife on social media come on somebody um those who deal in deceit those who stir up malice gossip slander people who hate god those who are arrogant boastful proud disobedient to their parents i think we can all find ourselves somewhere on this list for although they know god's righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death they not only continue to do these very things but they also approve of those who practice them i i know this is a passage that uh you've taught a lot on can you just unpack those words for us for a moment you want me to unpack paul uh well paul's whole goal here is to help people see that them and god got beef that all of us are under sin that all of us have uh you know exchange created thing created things for the creature um and that out of this flows a depravity that expresses itself in particular sinful behaviors um the scary part about this whole passage to me is that a part or an aspect of the wrath of god is the freedom of thinking that your sin is okay verse uh 21 for although they knew god they did not honor him as god or give thanks but they became futile in their thinking and their foolish ears were dark and claiming to be wise they became fools and therefore god gave them up in the lust of their hearts so many times we think wrath is just hell but wrath is god letting you go to do whatever you want and so what we see in the world is wrath it's the presence of god's wrath on earth that people are doing whatever they think they want to do but the good news is is that romans 1 is not the whole book yeah that at some point we get to chapter six but i'm gonna let you preach that well that's interesting yeah thank you that's interesting um because it seems like people don't get upset with sin we get upset with god and so i wanna um ask you this reconciling the commands of god with the character of god is sometimes difficult especially when it seems as though god doesn't always have our best interest in mind so i'm going to give you an example for instance to deny yourself which is what christ tells us to do right that doesn't seem to have my best interest in mind you've struggled with this you talk about uh in those early years when you were younger you said the devil made more sense to me than god what did you mean by that because when you ain't seeing your best interest is seeing it like what you want what you delight in what you go after what you spend your time with is everything that is unrighteous and untrue and unreal and i think even sometimes having these conversations i can hear people in their heads you know people that are very uh religious and moral and pious who say ah that's not me it's like no your your religious superiority complex is also unrighteousness too right and so but in essence i think i write about this in my next book i think part of the tension with trusting god is that we don't believe he's holy um god as holy means that god is transcendent meaning he's unique he's different he exists completely different than we do uh meaning he's he's incomparable he doesn't compare to anybody but it also means that he is morally pure so he is without spot he is without wrinkle he is without blemish i think some of the the the difficulty when god's commands pop up is that we don't trust the person giving them we treat god as if he's possible or as if it's possible for him to sin against us so when you say oh i don't feel like god has my best interest in mind it's like do you know who you're talking about yeah you're talking about a being that can do no wrong you're talking about a being that literally cannot sin against you can you imagine a being that can do nothing but good towards you that is who we're talking about when we say obey him we're not talking about the devil but i feel like sometimes we speak of god as if he has a satanic character and that is not the case he is good and he is true and he is righteous and he is faithful and he is honorable everything in the ten commandments is god himself everything we expect of our neighbors is god himself we want people to be nice we want people to be good we want people want people to bump us on the shoulder when they walk down the hall that's god the ideal person is god himself that's so good and so that's that's that's where the trust begins is do you know who it is that's speaking to you yeah and you you said in your book that so many of god's commands are not normative for us no we're born in sin and shaped in iniquity we want to do what we want to do so when god tells me hey uh you know then take up your cross and die daily die what do i want to do that for so let me ask you about that because galatians 5. crazyness right it does in galatians 5 it says this so i say live by the spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature for the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the spirit hello the spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature then it goes on in verse 19 and it says the acts of the sinful nature are obvious i have two questions for you about that the first is are they really obvious are the acts of the sinful nature really obvious because it seems to me that even those who genuinely desire to follow jesus in our culture are having a hard time knowing what the line is between what is moral and what is immoral my my second question is this sounds like anything but an easy life right this sounds like a constant battle a never-ending struggle so why would anybody willingly sign up for this so to the first point in galatians 4 where it says that the works of the flesh are evident well if the bible says it's evident then it's true that's one two i think we have to ask the question evident to who paul is writing to a church so he is writing to christians so he is writing to people who know jesus therefore he are writing writing to people who are clear-sighted in their assessment of sinfulness and so i do think it's evident when you are walking with god and you are walking according to his word you can discern a lie from afar but if you are living a lie and addicted to them and in love with them just as romans 1 says that their foolish hearts became darkened meaning when your heart is darkened you cannot perceive the truth as truth and that is such a that's the difficulty in the contention that we have as christians is that we're trying to tell blind people to see yeah and that's why they need the spirit so that when the spirit feels now the works of the flesh are evident because you have sight uh the second question is is it worth it in essence is what you're saying being a christian is difficult and jesus said that you know hard is the way to life and few will find it it is really really hard but it is also very very joyful because in sin my life was hard too but i had no hope come on that's you know i was struggling so it doesn't mean it doesn't mean that there weren't some some some experiences of happiness in sin but it does mean that they ran out really quick because i was going to broken cisterns when i had a god who was living water you know i needed a blunt i needed a drink i needed some porn i needed to masturbate i i needed a relationship i i had to always go to something because everything always ran out but in christ now i have somewhere to go someone to be with someone to talk to where i am filled with joy even in the midst of my troubles but it doesn't end there with with the unbeliever even if they got little minor uh you know convenient unlasting satisfactions to take hold of in this life after their breath is after their breath leaves then what with us there is difficulty then there's a crown yeah that's the difference is that i have a real hope on the other side of this world so that's good let's go back to your story just a bit what was your view of men growing up you mentioned your relationship with your father you've you've called him the the i love you sometimes father or the sometimes father what impact did your relationship with your father and with other men have on your development spiritually socially psychologically and even sexually i don't know um i still need therapy to figure that out i think overall when you have fatherlessness then i was sexually abused when i was uh maybe five or six and then i really do think that media kind of shaped me in some way and pornography because i think when i started watching pornography when i was seven wow and when you imagine a seven-year-old ingesting that kind of objectification it really does do something to your mind and how you see yourself and how you see men and so i think overall i just didn't trust them it really was that simple i think i thought that men were not capable of authentic love that all that all they really wanted was a woman's body and to use her and do whatever it was um to her but i think through therapy and my husband and just a reorienting of how i see men through the scriptures my mind is being renewed not fully renewed but it's being renewed when you've experienced that kind of trauma sexual abuse or even the trauma of a father who you know is in and out of your life those are scars that run deep so you're learning to deal with those and then pornography addiction you're consuming that you're dealing with these emotional deep emotional wounds physical wounds psychological wounds you enter junior high high school which are some of the most formative years of your life what um what did that time what did that season look like for you as you're developing as you're yeah as you're developing into a lot of a woman a lot of weed i smoked a lot of weed i was so grateful when my lips stopped turning black y'all probably don't understand that y'all don't get it there's a lot of light-skinned saints in here so um you know what i i almost smoked marijuana one time oh you sound like i almost did almost almost the reefer almost uh i had a praying mom and dad and in true story i'm at a party i'm at a party and somebody went to hand me the reefer the reefer right and and this kid out of nowhere who wasn't a believer nope nobody was a believer in this this this room but this kid out of nowhere just slaps the hand of the person about to hand me the weed and said hey don't give that to him he's a christian he doesn't do that sort of thing and totally blew my chance to try it i was very angry but maybe i was saved from something too i mean praying parents the power of a praying for i just sure that the power of a prayer parent will work miracles true truly miracles i think one of my struggles in in school was that like what dominated my life was honestly when you even though i wasn't raised in a christian home my murl was so uh what's the word y'all better be a thesaurus that she just her life and taking me to church all the time really did something to my conscience that i could not shake and so i felt like so much of my teen years was me trying to run away from what i knew god was calling me to do you know and it sold so much of so much even of my weed addiction was me trying to find a counterfeit piece to offset the conviction in my mind you know and so i think that's really what it was i'm so grateful that eventually god did not let me run far because it did get to a point where i called my cousin keisha and i said hey god keeps talking to me and i'm i'm not a fan like i just i wanna i want him to leave me alone i legitimately wanted god to stop convicting me of sin really what i wanted was god to make me a reprobate i did not want to be reminded of the distance but god was so merciful in his pursuit and so what kesha said she was like i'm not worried about you i know that god loves you enough where he's gonna have you because he wants you i didn't know what that meant it sounded too spiritual it sounded scary it sounded spooky but she was telling the truth which is that like you can't outrun the call of god i'm gonna ask you about your cousin in a moment because that was that was a defining moment for you there was a conversation that you had with her but it runs deeper than the conversation there was also a moment uh your girlfriend and you were out you encounter a man a violent man and this particular encounter became a a significant turning point or at least a marker in your life that you had to keep going back to it stirred some questions in your heart tell us about that moment and how that became one of the turning points people never asked me about that part of the book i thought that part of the your story was was so fascinating yeah i don't have the words right on my tongue for that one um so basically what happened i was with my girlfriend at um this hotel that we were staying at and uh this dude walked in the hotel and i guess he was mad at one of the workers and he was just like one of the big bulky lebron james looking uh men and so with a big neck and stuff and so and he was just so angry and so i got scared and uh i i got scared but at the same time it was it was weird and this is gonna sound crazy is i was aware of my femininity in that moment because my girlfriend was looking at me to keep her safe and i'm we laughing but the spirit of god used it like she's looking to me to be masculine enough masculine enough to protect her and i'm looking at her like we need to protect each other but in that moment i felt like what the lord was doing was showing me you're a woman you're a woman you you got these pants on you know you walking all hard like like you like you got something between your legs but you're a woman yeah and that's what i made you to be wow and so well he used he used that moment what's interesting um as i've heard you share your story and in your book is just absolutely incredible just the the the way that you're able to unpack scripture throughout your story it's so good but you you said that this that you were never fully at peace when you were living as a lesbian now i've had many conversations with people within the lgbt community who would share that same uh feeling right i've never fully been at peace i've had many conversations with those within the lgbt community who would say the exact opposite i've i've never felt more at peace i've never felt more at peace with who i am or with who i'm with we also see this same dichotomy in the church right so there's there are some churches that will uh fly a rainbow flag on the steeple and in our are very much we openly embrace alternative lifestyles and then there are other churches that feel like it's their sole purpose in life to bash the gay community and then you know they're people like us we're somewhere in the middle of how how can we the church best navigate the challenges of our difference and love a community that has been often hurt by and marginalized by the church while at the same time not compromise our deeply held biblical convictions around god's instruction and design for christian sexuality wow i know that's a lot i know that's a lot man that was thick i liked it um in jude he says this uh verse 20 but you beloved building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the holy spirit keep yourselves in the love of god waiting for the mercy of our lord jesus christ that leads to eternal life this is the answer to your question and have mercy on those who doubt save others by snatching them out of the fire to others show mercy with fear hating even the garments stained by the flesh one of the things i love about this verse is that jude is not giving you one blanket method for evangelism he's giving you different methods that are dependent upon your knowledge of the person and your wisdom in the application of what they need um but he says have mercy on those who doubt mercy is compassion and so there are some people within the lgbtq community that legitimately love jesus they they love him and they serve him and they walk with him but there is some doubt there is some wrestle to those people you have mercy you have compassion you say you know i get what it means to wrestle i got my own wrestles i got my own struggles that i'm really fighting through uh but there's another person who jude is speaking to he says save others by snatching them out of the fire that is the person where you know okay this has moved past doubt this is you your fingertips is right by the flames and so there's a different urgency yeah there's a different directness that i communicate to this person because i don't want them to go so far that they end up in hell themselves then there's the other person who uh to others show mercy with fear hating even the garment stained by the flesh but in essence what he's saying is in your compassion towards these individuals hate the sin that they function in because we are in a culture and in a world and in a context where our compassion is leading to complicity which is not compassionate at all and that's happening that's happening because we're not showing compassion with fear we're just showing compassion and so our compassion has no anchor it has no root it has a it has no wisdom with it right and so i get it like it is hard to walk alongside people and see them happy and see them with their wives or their girlfriends or their husbands and be the kind of person to say well maybe you should repent of that that's hard the the call to repentance is never easy and if it feels easy to you you probably lack compassion but it the thing is i have to care more about your soul even more than i care about our relationship and so many people are dishonest and lack courage simply because they are scared of people not liking them they are scared of the relationship being ruined but god forbid i want to maintain and preserve this relationship while at the same time i never give you the the the words to have a relationship with the father because if they do come to the father guess what's going to happen now we're going to be reconciled yeah and so i think that has to be the aim i'm sorry i just know that that's so helpful that's so helpful you know and i love how you went straight to the word you didn't give me your opinion you went straight to the word and you unpacked that for us that is so helpful first corinthians chapter six you mentioned that um it says do you not know that wrongdoers will will not inherit the kingdom of god do not be deceived neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers lots of lists in the bible right we'll inherit the kingdom of god there's a key here it says and that is what some of you were hello but you were washed you were sanctified you were justified in the name of the lord jesus christ and by the spirit of our god you you say something so powerful in your book you said the same bible that condemned me held within it the promise that could save me unpack that thought for us [Music] god changes people um because in first corinthians 6 9 through 11 people tend to spend more time on that than they do the end what i mean by that is they spend a lot of time on hey don't you know you know those who practice homosexuality won't inherit the kingdom of god and they do hold dissertations and lectures about sin and wrath and judgment which are good and right and necessary but then they leave off verse 11 which says and such were some of you i think that is so encouraging to know that paul is writing a letter to christians who at one point were not going to inherit the kingdom of god but now he's encouraging them by saying but that's not who you are anymore and so i think the i don't even remember your original question uh i think the hope ultimately is that when jesus calls you to himself he's he's promising to restore who he intended you to be yeah that does not mean that you will not struggle that does not mean that you won't be tempted that does not mean that you won't have to wrestle with some things but what it does mean is that you will have a new nature that is in opposition to everything that you used to love more than him before and so that my sinuses messed up that is that is the hope that we all need is that man even though you might be in sin even though you might be an idolater even though you might be an unrighteous person you don't have to remain that way yeah that the same god who created the heavens and the earth is the same god that will create in you a new heart so good so back to that defining conversation that you had with your cousin keisha it wasn't just a conversation that really helped to shift your focus in your heart there was something different about your cousin kesha what what made her different from all of the other christians in your life at that time she cared about me as a person you know like i could i could call her and and she's my cousin but she's about 15 years older than me and so these are i'm having conversations with her while i'm 17 and she's in her 30s you know and so i i think when i would call her i was aware of how she treated me because she would ask me how i was doing she would ask me about my day she i could tell that my sexuality was not at the forefront of her dealings with me um and so that's why she was the first person i called when i started to wrestle with god because i felt safe i don't think safety should be confined to you know compromise or not ever speaking the truth i knew she would tell me the truth but i think i knew that i was being told the truth by a person that cared about me first um because i i do think that at times christians well-meaning christians there there is this uh pressure to fix the person instead of loving the image bearer and i think those two methods really will shift how you engage that's good she cared about you holistically your whole person and not just your sexuality can i add this to them yeah i think what what at the the root of that though is when i told her that i was gay she gave me to god because she told god god did i not pray for her enough that she's my umbrella's daughter for context did i not pray for her enough did i not love her enough did i not teach the the bible enough she was blaming my sin on her dealings with me which i think is everybody especially parents is that you don't think you did enough but what god told her is i love her more than i i love her more than you do and what that did was is that she realized that she had to trust god with me so then when i came around she didn't have this pressure that the spirit was not putting on her and now she talked to me she rested in the fact that god was sovereign even over my conversion so what was the tipping point for you ultimately when you decided to give your life to jesus the god was better he's better he's better i can't explain it like he if he is the creator of all things including the creator of me and my affections and my desire then there is no one competing with him no one and and that's the tricky thing about sin is that sin really wants us to believe that everything that god has made is better than the god who made it and so that's ultimately what it was is that through the holy spirit i was able to finally see the truth about god which is that he's the good one yeah he's the better you said you you made a spirit decision in that moment you also say this that in your book you said in my becoming holy as he is i would not ultimately be miraculously made into a woman that didn't like women i would be made into a woman that loved god more than anything to the person who's struggling right now to trust god whatever their sexual identity or label how would you help somebody cross the line of faith regardless their hang up with god um is god good should i trust him is jesus worth it for me how would you help somebody cross that line of faith i mean when you consider the reason jesus came it's it's hard not to think that god is worthy because as we mentioned in the beginning adam and eve sinned and their sin was uh passed down into our lineage and so we inherited it and so so even our questions about if god is worth it is a byproduct of eve sin um because i do think that righteous people just know the answer is yes but with that i think we have all these idols we have all these sins we have all these struggles we have all these things that are really working very hard to take our attention off of the fact that god deserves us and so then god knows that what we deserve in light of our refusal to obey is wrath and judgment because a holy god must be a just god and so instead of us having to pay this penalty ourselves in hell as we should have god sends his son who is god in the flesh to live a righteous and unblemished and pure and god-oriented life in ways that we wish we could and he does it for us he does it for people who did not even ask for jesus to come on their behalf and then the son goes to the cross and on the cross all of our sins and all of our idolatry and all of our porn addiction and all of our lusts and all of our uh religious arrogance and all of our apathy all of our racism all of that is put on jesus and the wrath that was assigned to us is assigned to the sun where the sun then absorbs the wrath of god so those who come in partnership or in fellowship and relationship with the son do not get wrath they get freedom come on they get righteous but not only that jesus dies and goes to the grave and he doesn't stay there but he raises from the dead because how can death have power over god it's impossible but not only that he comes back and then he promises somebody he he does not say hey come to me and you're just going to be all by yourself he does not say come to me and all these commands i gave you you just got to obey him in the flesh he says i'm going to send you a helper come on i'm going to send the holy spirit who will be with you and so is god worthy yeah he sent his son so that we could recognize that and live it that that's the only evidence i could provide is the gospel that's so good and i just want to take a moment right now you're watching some of you in person some of you from afar you know again hundreds of prisons joining us right now maybe you're behind bars and you're hearing this i think what's important to understand is going back to that genesis story what does adam and eve do when they realize that they've sinned they run and they hide from god as if god can't handle our sin we've we've talked about a lot today and i'm sure there are some things that you might be wrestling with but here's something that i would encourage you to consider god knows everything about you he knows all the sin you've ever committed and all the sin you will ever commit and still he says i love you still he's ready to forgive you still he wants you to be filled with his holy spirit still he wants you to have peace here now and the hope of heaven to come i mean think about that he's not a surprised by your sin or my sin and so the last thing god wants from us is when we become aware of our sin is to run from him what he wants us to do is to run to him and if we could have the picture of god that jackie has so uh incredibly painted for us as a loving grace-filled merciful god when we run to him he's not waiting to to condemn us he wants to set us free and so i'm going to ask you to just do this close your eyes and bow your head wherever you are i'm going to ask you to pray with me right now i know that there are many many people who are about to pray this prayer maybe for the first time you're going to say lord i i want to be forgiven i need to be forgiven i'm i'm ready to be saved from my sin just pray this prayer with me would you say jesus here i am and i'm putting my faith and trust in you it might be small faith right now but i'm giving you all of it and i'm trusting you with my life i know you already see my sin but i'm confessing it anyways i'm confessing my sin to you and i'm asking you to forgive me cleanse me from the inside out would you fill me with your holy spirit that jackie just described would you fill me with peace and life and hope would you reveal to me the purpose and the plan that you have for me so that day by day we can walk this out together thank you for dying on a cross for me for being raised from death to life for me i owe you everything in jesus name everybody said amen come on who's glad you came to church today anybody glad you came to church today jackie i've got just a few more questions for you you good for a few more i feel like we there there there was a question a few cards back i didn't get to ask you i do want to um you said in your book that we are reaping the fruits our culture our churches our families are reaping the fruits of not teaching what the bible says about gender how can we as parents mentors pastors teachers do a better job of teaching the bible uh what the teaching what the bible has to say about gender sexuality particularly in a culture where so many people would say you know what i don't care about a book that was written thousands of years ago that that has no relevance to my life today how when the word of god is so quickly disregarded how can we teach his word and use his word in a way that would be more effective in reaching others man i mean i think part of the the the problem with uh the way the word has been taught is because we have people that don't actually read it don't actually study it uh don't actually spend time in it or obey it even and so i i think that automatically makes jesus's command to go therefore make disciples of all nations teaching them what i have commanded you a little harder or more messy because you're teaching what you don't even understand and so with that i guess the encouragement is to read your bible like really read your bible because if we have the gender conversation for example people have been like so i'm a girl who you know i'm not a fan of dresses i i've been messing with them a little bit lately because i turned 30 and some change um but i don't i don't wear i don't wear purses too often i don't do the the feminine things but you have people within christian circles who will say you're not acting like a girl where did they get that from the bible it's not there and so that's my point is that if you read titus 2 or if you read proverbs 31 or if you read genesis 1 and 2 if you take all of the passages that kind of show us womanhood don't read your culture into the passage let the passage affect your culture and so that is what's happening is that it's a lot of isa jesus going on in the world so that i think that's that's the help is that we just need to get in our bibles because unbelievers are they they know the bible more than we do half the time because they want to refute it come on so we're not so true it's all over tick tock jackie it's all over yeah jackie you've been married now to your husband preston for seven years two beautiful children eating in autumn they're all got their kids there are a lot of you have three i do come on three what's the what's your sage is it's sage and she's five months okay sage come on that's right three kids there there are a lot of people who've walked in your shoes or who are walking in your shoes now that can't even begin to imagine being married to somebody of the opposite sex or even being in a relationship with somebody of the opposite sex what was that transition like for you from being attracted to and in relationships with women to now being married to a man for seven years and having a family was that easy for you did it come natural for you has it been a process you see my face i'm seeing it right now thing i've ever done in my life hardest thing i've ever done because being with preston wasn't even just about you know affection or attraction it's also about being with someone who forces all this trauma out of me that i have to deal with singleness allowed me to kind of you know not mess with it it's just like oh i'm triggered but i get to go home and watch netflix uh now i'm triggered and you're the one triggering me and you sleep in my bed so i i have to wrestle through things so that we can have peace and unity um but initially when um i met preston i met him when i was 20. so i became a christian at 19 met him at 20 at an event um in la where i was doing a poem poem about my testimony about being an ex-lesbian he was doing a poem about how he used to sleep with everything that breathed and so like you know he was a male he just was he was out here and then and then i was doing me so we just became good good friends because obviously we we was ratchet uh before jesus and so when i did started to develop some type of attraction to him i didn't understand it because it was foreign to me and it was new and it was weird and i thought it was probably the devil trying to tempt me you know like he's trying to distract me from my purpose and so i gave it to the lord and eventually he ended up pursuing me but i think one of the things that i try to help people see is god has not given me a general attraction or affection for all men he's given me a specific affection for the man he's called me to be with and to mirror his gospel through or with and so i i never want people to take my story in one co-opted to burden people with gifts that god is not calling them to take a hold of what i mean is i've heard where people say oh look at jackie she used to be gay now she's married now she has kids you can do the same you don't know if that's what god got for them you know like that we need to begin to get back to celebrating singleness and the possibilities of glory that come along with it that's good and so yeah because we make so oftentimes marriage as the end-all but christ is the end-all as if it is as if marriage is salvation right or evidence of conversion and it's not bearing the fruits of the spirit fruit of the spirit is and the thing is i don't ever want to offer up marriage as the aim of life as if marriage itself is eternal because it's not the marriage between the church and the lamb is that is the marriage that will last all of us will technically be single in heaven and so celebrate your single brother and actually learn from them about what you're going to be experiencing one day that's so good so so yeah marriage is a kind of glory but it is not the highest glory and so my my marriage to preston god uses it and i'm thankful for it and it sanctifies me but it is ultimately the specific way that god wants me to image his gospel ephesians 5. so how has and is motherhood changing you how's what's motherhood been like for you it's probably where i'm wearing dresses now i don't know when you get epidurals you just gotta wear a dress necks i don't know um it's it softened me for sure because initially i wanted a boy because i i thought boys would be easy you know it's just like oh i'm rough and tough we could be rough and tough together but then he gave me three girls and so i think i don't know it's always really hard to put it into words but i think i think having daughters has helped me to develop a contentment with my womanness that i did not have before having them and i i can't even flesh that out because i'm processing it that's good you recently collaborated on a project called christian sexuality we were talking about this a bit ago a 12-week video-based bible study created for teenagers and parents and youth leaders we're taking our entire staff through it it is absolutely incredible would you give us a quick 30 000 foot view of what that is specifically why would somebody here today watching online or in person why we might want to or need to go through a 12-week bible-based study on sexuality well i think it's a part of the great commission to to equip yourself to understand what jesus has taught so that as you go throughout the world you can make disciples of all nations teaching them what you're learning um so that's one i think too sexuality is a huge hot topic in our culture and rightly so we are sexual beings uh and so there is a element and i think a a it's a weird way to say this but i do think there is some goodness that comes out of the provocative nature of sexuality because now we get to teach about it and learn about the right way the righteous way and the good gift that sexuality actually is it's a good thing created by god um and so man i think knowing how to uh walk through scripture and understand sexuality in in the the righteous moral ethic that god has displayed for us in this scripture actually helps us to embody and enjoy it and love it too and display to the world healthy sexuality even in our own relationships that's good any last encouragement for those watching or listening today uh i don't know uh if i had to think if i had to pull something out the sky i would i would challenge everyone to study god and what i mean is when you read the bible pay attention to the way it describes god when you when you read the psalmist pay attention to the words they use when speaking about god when when you when you think read things like genesis for example when adam and eve hid from god it says that god was walking in the cool of the day you would think how does that teach me about god because god isn't running god isn't stumping he is walking toward fresh sinners as if he's coming in peace how does that affect you well now when i sin i know that god is not antagonistic towards me in christ he still wants me to come as a father does too do you get what i'm saying and so that's my encouragement is study god and your life will have to change that's so good well jackie thank you so much for sitting down with us today truly you are you are truly a gift to the church and um just such a prophetic voice and a gift to the kingdom of god and we're so grateful that you've you've given us your time today and just been such an encouragement to us so um hey church one more time give it up for jackie hill [Applause] perry [Applause] [Music] me

Channel: Rock City Church

Views: 165,319

Keywords:

Id: 8SEdxjF-UaU

Length: 63min 40sec (3820 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 22 2021