More on this book
Kindle Notes & Highlights
I learned from Job that sometimes things happen in the world that don’t make much sense to us human beings. I learned from Abraham what it’s like to have your name changed. I learned from the apostle Philip that sometimes you have to say yes to God even when you have no idea what God is doing. And of course I learned from Jesus, who after his resurrection chose to show his body to the disciples—a body that was scarred and transformed, and yet still his own.
The HRC’s report found that 41 percent of trans individuals have attempted suicide, compared to 1.6 percent of the general population of the United States.
This is where transgender Christians have been forced to live: out on the edges. They walk the fine line between acceptance and rejection, between God’s love and the church’s judgment.
“When I think about the sexual minorities or gender minorities who Jesus was speaking about here, yes, I believe they have something to teach society about courage, because they have to overcome so much to just live from day to day.”
“I feel like church has become a place where those requirements either preclude love from happening, or limit how love is shown. What would the church be like if we just accepted people for who and how they were, and loved them there first, before anything else?”
we are not told to suffer for suffering’s sake, or to let ourselves be crushed by injustice because suffering somehow gets us closer to God. Instead, God decides to move in our direction by choosing to experience suffering alongside us. All the while we’re experiencing oppression, God is there, and it’s Jesus who’s seeing himself in our story.
But if we spend all our time focusing on what’s wrong, how do we do what’s right? If we spend all our time trying to use Scripture to defend ourselves, when do we get to see the Bible as a life-giving fount of grace for all people? When do we get to hear God speaking into our lives, if we’re focused on proof-texting our arguments? In short, it’s a good and healthy thing to recognize that the theological crumbs that we once cherished are no longer enough. We need a full, whole-grain loaf of the bread of life.
There are times when I think Christians need to see ourselves more in the ninety-nine sheep who stayed put, and ask ourselves if we may have been part of the reason that the lost sheep got lost in the first place.
