Chris McCurley: good morning everyone. so glad to be here. Thank you for inviting me to be here this weekend with all of you. Of course, we've been discussing a lot of really controversial things both yesterday and even today in this lesson we're going to be having together. by way of introductions, just let me just explain. My name is Guy Hammond. I'm as as was mentioned by Chris, come from Canada. Don't hold that against me. and I lead an international ministry called Strength in Weakness Ministries. its purpose, I started the ministry about twenty years ago. Its purpose is to offer help and support to Christians who live with unwanted attractions to the same gender. And we run support groups in three different languages and are helping several thousand Christian men and women all over the world who live with this reality. And we also run support groups to help Christian parents who have a gay child. So that's what my ministry is. And I spend the majority of my time traveling around the world speaking and writing books and talking about this to churches, Christian colleges, Christian universities, and whatnot. So that's why I'm here and and that's what we are doing. Of course, you know, whenever I talk publicly on this issue, it's always controversial. The two comments you see on the screen there, the challenge with that is that they come from the same lesson. I don't know how you're gonna feel about some of the things that I say today. some of you may disagree with my stance. it's impossible for me to get out of here in a crowd this size. with everybody agreeing with everything that I'm gonna say. That's okay. The important thing is that we have the conversation. I really appreciate the faith and courage of your senior leadership here to say, hey, let's talk about this. Let's talk about LGBTQ and how it relates to us in matters of faith. I'm a big believer in the idea that if a church wants to be relevant in its community, it has to be willing to talk about what everybody else is talking about. And if you don't want to be relevant, if you want to be irrelevant, then you stay quiet on issues like this. So I appreciate the faith and courage that it's been for you to host me this week. And not every church would do so. And I just pray that it's in some way been a blessing to you. The the reason why this whole issue is so important to me is because I lived a gay life for many years. I started participating in homosexuality, believe it or not, around the tender age of 12, 13 years old. I don't know where that desire came from. I I never chose my attractions. In fact, I've never met anybody who's been able to choose what they're attracted to. There are hundreds of contributing influences that determine what a human being is attracted to. It's a very complex thing. Now, we are all 100% responsible. For what we do with our attractions, that we're responsible for. But for the capability itself, I don't know, where does this stuff come from? How much of it is nature? How much of it is nurture? Not sure. But anyway, around the age of twelve, thirteen years old, I started recognizing that hey, I'm experiencing something that my friends aren't. It was very confusing for me. I grew up going to a church. The only message I heard at church was that. People like me who are attracted to the same gender are wicked and evil and going to hell. That was the message. So church did not seem to be a very safe place for me to get perspective. I knew I couldn't tell anybody in my church. I wanted to tell my father and talk to him about it, but my dad made it really clear how he felt about gay people. Today we would use language like homophobic to describe who my father was. He was my dad was actually a very kind, loving man, but did not have much patience. for people who were a part of the gay community. So home wasn't safe. And I spent a lot of nights as a kid crying myself to sleep, unsure of what it was that I had done to get this capability that I did not want, I did not ask for, and yet somehow, you know, here here I was and by the time I got into my late teens, I thought there's no place for me in the church. I couldn't reconcile this thing that I was experiencing with my faith. It's not that I didn't believe in God, I just didn't think that God believed in me. And so in my late teens I moved to Toronto, Canada's largest city. Of course, there has a large LGBTQ community. And there just lived a very reckless, promiscuous gay life. Had multiple partners, I had a boyfriend. By the time you know, I was around twenty-four years old, I knew my life was in trouble. My life was a train wreck. I knew I needed help. I didn't know where to go for that, but in God's perfect timing, he sent somebody who invited me to church. It was a Church of Christ in Toronto. I was at first very skeptical. I was like, Church, all those people are homophobic and bigoted. I don't want to go to church. But this guy kept inviting me and finally I was like, Okay, I'll go to your church. And I loved it. I thought, well, this is not like the church I grew up in. Maybe there's something different here. And so just out of curiosity, I kept going. Every Sunday I'd go to church and I'd learn about Jesus and got to know these Christians. And every Sunday, I did that for two years. Every Sunday, go to church. After about two years, I was like, you know, guy, you gotta make a decision. Either Jesus is gonna be Lord or you are gonna be Lord. But you you gotta pick one here. Of course, I was pretty impressed with Jesus. And had recognized that I had made such a mess of things, I wanted to give everything over to Jesus. So I did. I studied the scriptures in earnest and certainly came to the conclusion that homosexuality was not compatible with the Christian faith, and that that would need to be something I repent of. And so I decided to to do that. And I was baptized on August fifteenth, nineteen eighty seven, so I recognized that's what was that, thirty-nine years ago. And I can tell you that I have not. I have not participated in any kind of homosexual activity since becoming a Christian almost four decades ago. So I really did that leave that life behind forever. But, you know, I don't know why God works the way he does. If I was God, I would do things very differently. But the reality is, in spite of forty years of faithful Christian living and saying no to same-gender attractions, the reality is I'm still. homosexually attracted. Hasn't even shifted. I I'm just as attracted to men today as the day I became a Christian forty years ago. And for a a period of years in my Christian life that caused me a lot of grief, and I really tried to figure out how to become attracted to women as if somehow that would be the ultimate measure of my success. After a while I began to realize, guy, this is more impoverishing your faith more than anything else. And there's no scripture that says you have to be heterosexually attracted to follow Jesus. I thought, okay, well I'm gonna stop worrying about it. If God wants this to be something that changes in me, then great, I'll take it. But You know, maybe that'll never happen. I I'm just gonna do the best I can to honor God with my life. And so the mantra of our ministry is for the Christian, the opposite of homosexuality is not heterosexuality. For the Christian, the opposite of homosexuality is holiness. That we just do the best we can to honor God with our lives, live holy lives. Of course, we won't do any of this perfectly, but we will do it faithfully. One day God will say, Well done, good and faithful servant, not perfect servant, but faithful servant. And so that's how I'm trying to live my life. And I don't know if it'll ever change. I I kinda reason it like this. I even even if I did, I don't know, wake up one morning and all of a sudden I was attracted to women, I don't know what difference it would make to my life. Like, let's say I had woken up this morning in Dixon, Tennessee, and all of a sudden I was like, wow, something's different. I'm all of a sudden attracted to women. I don't know, like, what difference would it make to me? Jesus is my Lord. He's the one I've decided to follow. It's been an honor to do so, and whatever I'm attracted to, who cares? Jesus is still gonna be my Lord. So besides, if if I'm attracted to men, well, I'm not allowed to do anything I want, think anything I want. I have to submit my sexuality to Christ and live a holy life. Well, if I'm attracted to women, I'm not allowed to think anything I want, do anything I want. I have to strive to live a holy life and honor Christ. So if I'm attracted to men, I have to live a holy life. If I'm attracted to women, I have to live a holy life. So what do I care what I'm attracted to? I'm just gonna try to live a holy life. Now one thing that I I never thought would happen when I was becoming a Christian is that I would ever get married to a woman. I didn't know how that was gonna be possible. But after a couple of years of being in the church, I met this wonderful Christian woman. Her name was Kathy. She just became my best friend, and it got to the point where I couldn't imagine living my life without her. So of course I sat Kathy down and told her about my past and my current struggles and who I was and you know, asked the girl to marry me. And she said yes. And Kathy and I got married and feel so grateful for God giving me a wife. And Kathy and I were married for 28 amazing years. This is a picture of me and my family, me and Kathy in 2006 with our four children. And you know, I love showing that picture because there's no way that a man who is living a reckless, promiscuous gay life with multiple gay partners with no boundaries and no restraint should get to have this. I'm just so appreciative and grateful to God for giving me a family. Of course, life fits us all. And in 2017 Kathy was diagnosed with stage four brain cancer. And this is a picture of me and my family in 2018. That picture was taken about four months before Kathy died. Of course I miss her incredibly but Kathy was a very pragmatic woman. And so just before she died, she called me into the hospital room and she said, Honey, please promise me you'll get married again. I was like, I have to find another wife. Wasn't it a miracle enough? That I found one wife, now my wife now I gotta find another wife. I thought, this is not gonna happen. I you know, who wants to live with this? So when I went back to the hospital the next day, Kathy had written out a list of pre approved names. Of women in the church, you know, that she thought I could marry, widowers and, you know, people who'd never married and we kinda laughed and joked about it. She died a about a week later. a few months later, though, I started feeling lonely. And I thought, if I want to be my best self, I'm better with someone else. I I need somebody to call me higher, and I'm my best self when I'm with someone. And so I thought I would like to get married again. I thought, where how am I gonna do this? I gotta find a wife. I thought, yeah, there's that list. So I got out that list and I said, okay, there were four names on it. And I thought, well, I'll just start at the top and work my way down. Hopefully, one of them is gonna say yes. The very first name on the list was a lovely Christian woman. that I had been friends with for many years. Her name was Laura. Laura and her husband Scott had been friends of ours for decades. But the same year that Kathy died, just earlier, Laura's husband died. Scott died. So Laura was now a widow. And so Kathy was saying, listen, Scott just died. Laura's now available. I thought Laura, she's just a great friend, like I can't imagine marrying her, but anyway. Laura and I got together and we talked. I told her about the list. Told her she was my wife's number one pick. I'm the man with the lines, boy. And Laura says yes and Laura and I have now been married. we just celebrated our sixth wedding anniversary. And I consider myself to be somewhat of a walking, living, breathing miracle. I'm not even attracted to women, and I've now had two wives. So I'm very grateful to God for what He's done and very, very appreciative for that. And I love Laura and Kathy so much. You know, what does the Bible teach on the issues that we're discussing today? Well, this is all controversial stuff. And again, I don't know if we'll agree on everything together here today, but I would like to think that we're all gonna at least agree with this. That every person needs to be treated with dignity, kindness, love and respect. Regardless of what people are attracted to, regardless of how they decide to live their lives, regardless of what they think of Jesus and the Bible, the church, every person needs to be treated with dignity, kindness, love and respect. I would like to think that that we are all going to really strive to follow. You know. The Bible doesn't talk about homosexuality a lot. We've got five main scriptures, two written by Moses in Leviticus, and then three by the Apostle Paul in the New Testament. And each time homosexuality is talked about in a negative light as something that is outside the confines of what God intended for human sexuality. It's solid enough for me that it is put me into a place in my life where. I have now spent forty years consistently denying these feelings and emotions and these desires that feel so natural to me, so normal to me, in order to be obedient to what scripture teaches. I have to tell you, the Bible stance on sexual ethics and pr in particular homosexuality has been a real inconvenience to me. but, you know, I am just of a deep conviction that God's word has to go above my feelings, my emotions and everything else. And so it's been an honor to do this and Yeah, I probably the hardest thing I've ever done. it's been a lot of people want to know how is it that you're married to women but you've got you know, you're h homosexually attracted, how does that work? Listen, there's so much more to a loving, committed Christian marriage than physical attraction. Physical attraction is an important component, but it's not the first thing. The world, Netflix, the entertainment industry, whatever, all tell us that attraction is the number one most important thing in any relationship. That's garbage. that's the reason why why we also live in a world with about a fifty percent divorce rate. There's so much more to love and companionship and caring for one another and being safe with one another and protecting each other and so much more than just physical attraction. And I've just a lot refuse to allow the fact that I'm homosexually aff attracted to be a defining part of our life. And we have a wonderful physical relationship, emotional, spiritual relationship, and I would be lying if I told you it's always easy. But, you know, through kindness, through conversation, through being there for each other and trusting each other and feeling safe with each other, we make it work. And so that is how I live my life. I wanted to talk this morning about just some strategies on how we can share our faith with LGBTQ people, even using my own story as an example. I think one of the challenges we're faced with in our role today is that we stereotype each other. a lot of people in the LGBTQ community think that all Christians are homophobic, mean spirited, and bigoted. Well, that's not true. There are, of course, some Christians who fit that stereotype perfectly, but that that that's not the case for all of us. Likewise, a lot of Christians have wrongly stereotyped people in the LGBTQ community. Some of us think they're all activists, they all want to fight and argue, they're all unreasonable. And none of them have any interest in Jesus. Well, there are some people in the LGBTQ community who fit that stereotype perfectly, but not most of them. Most people are just regular people. LGBTQ people are regular folks. They have mums and dads and brothers and sisters and jobs to go to, and they want to cut their grass and be left alone and contribute to their community. That's most LGBTQ commun people in the LGBTQ community. So this is not something we need to be afraid of. We need to lean in. Now when it comes to sharing our faith and talking to people about Jesus in the Bible, especially from that community, we think we only have two choices. Option number one is this repent or perish. Well, that is an option. And it's actually a true statement if you don't repent, you will perish. I just don't know if strategically that's the best way to talk about Jesus in the Bible and repentance. Then we think, well, I don't want to slam the pulpit and yell at people, so I guess there's no other option. I guess I'll just be quiet. But there is a third option. And it's this it's hospitality. Hospitality wins the day. You see, it gives people time, room, and space to learn about Jesus and ask questions. This is how I became a Christian. In the story that I just told you, I went to church every Sunday for two years while people were hospitable with me. The Christians had me over for dinner, they took me out to movies, we hung out, they became friends. They knew I was living a gay life, but they still welcomed me into their home and All the while I was still living my gay life, but on church at church I was go going and learning about Jesus and these people were kind to me. You see, it gave me time, room and space to figure things out, to ask questions. I think this is the key forward in being able to represent Jesus And giving people the time and opportunity they need to figure things out. You know, there's a difference between acceptance and approval. A lot of times we think, well, I don't want to just, you know, start reaching out to my gay friends and doesn't that just look like that I'm approving of how people are living their lives? No. There's a difference between acceptance and approval. One of the great things about Jesus is he had this unbelievable ability to accept people even though he didn't approve of how they were living their lives. There is a difference between acceptance and approval. And so when we live like this, what we're saying is listen, you are a welcome guest here. We want you to come to Walnut Street, Church of Christ, to learn about Jesus. And we are going to give you the time, the room, and the space to figure things out. And we're not going to sit in judgment here on you. We're not going to make assumptions about your life. We're going to walk alongside you. Another challenge I find in churches is this. It's easy for us to put arbitrary timelines on people on how fast we think they should change, on how fast we think they should repent. But sometimes the Holy Spirit just moves at a different pace than we would like him to. My again, my story. It took me two years before I was finally ready. Okay, I'm ready to leave my gay life, leave my boyfriend. And become a Christian. But it took two years to get there. Thank goodness the Christians in that church were willing to be patient with me and give me that time, room, and space to figure it out. If they had expected that of me, you know, in the first three or four months of showing up to church, if they had like, listen, you know, you better break up with that boyfriend or you're not welcome here at the church anymore and you gotta stop living this gay life, I wouldn't have been ready in three or four months. It took me two years. And so we can't put arbitrary timelines on people on how fast we think they should repent. Sometimes the Holy Spirit just moves at a different pace than we would like him to. So my question and challenge as the churches is this: Can you be secure enough in your own faith to allow this to be a place where people who are different than you, who think different than you, that look different than you, then vote that different than you, who live lives that you don't agree with, can you be secure enough in your own faith to allow this to be a place? Where these people who are different than you can come and learn about Jesus. And are you willing to be hospitable while you do it? You know what one of the things I love about the church is that we're very hospitable. We have people into our homes and we make meals and we have barbecues and We have people over, but what I have found is that most Christians only do that with the people who agree with them. If you look like me, think like me, talk like me, go to church like me, come on over. We'd love to have you over. But if you look different than me, dress different than me, use names and pronouns that are different than mine, and I disagree with your lifestyle, and you have no interest in Jesus, yeah, we're not that interested in having those people over for a barbecue. How on earth are we going to win a lost and dying world for Jesus? How on earth will you ever be able to help people like who I was, Guy Hammonds of the world, if we're not willing to be kind, loving and hospitable and have into our homes and into our lives people who are different than us? We have to be willing to do that. I I want to share with you a strategy. I call it the 92nd handoff. This is there's many strategies. I've written about them in the books that I've written. And but this is just one, it's quick and easy. If there's somebody in your world, somebody at work, somebody you go to school with, maybe it's somebody in your family, and you've always thought, you know, I I want to invite that person to church. I want to talk to that person about Jesus. but it's gonna be awkward, I don't know what to say. I don't want to put my foot in my mouth. I don't want to insult anybody. and so time and time again the spirit has been prodding you, but you've been ignoring that, putting out the spirit's fire and thinking, no, I'm not going to say anything. If I say this at work, if I say this at school, if I say this to my uncle, so no, I'm not saying anything. If you've been in that spot, then this little strategy, I hope, will help you. I call it the ninety second handoff. And this is something you can do in about ninety seconds to a minute. For the case of this example, let's say it's an uncle of yours. Let's call him Uncle Bob. Uncle Bob is gay, he's got a gay partner, they're married, and you love Uncle Bob. You've been thinking for a long time, I wanna wanna talk to Uncle Bob about my convictions of Jesus in the Bible and see if I can start a conversation. I just don't know what to do here. Here's what you do. When the opportunity arises, maybe it's a family reunion, and you see Uncle Bob and you you pull Uncle Bob aside privately, say, Uncle Bob, can we talk just to you and I? You say, Hey, Uncle Bob, listen. You're a tremendous uncle. You've been a wonderful friend for so many years. I so value and appreciate our friendship. But listen, Uncle Bob, I I I want to talk to you about something. I don't want it to come out weird. Forgive me in advance if it does. I just want to talk about something. Is that okay? Can can I and Uncle Bob would say, Sure, go ahead, guy. What you want to say? Well, listen, Uncle Bob. Did you know I I'm a Christian man, I take my faith very seriously. I belong to the Walnut Street Church of Christ. But you know, Christianity for me is how I live day to day, hour by hour, minute by minute, not just church on Sunday. And I I take my faith very seriously, and it's done so much for me. And I would love to talk to you about this. But I don't want you to feel pressured. I don't want you to feel like, you know, I'm just giving you a hard time here. I if if you're not interested, that's fine, but I just wanted to let you know that I'd love to have a conversation with you about this. So because I don't want to pressure you, I just want you to know that this is an open invitation for the rest of my life. If the day ever comes you would like to have a conversation about Jesus in the Bible, and you want to have a conversation about how much God loves you, I want to have that conversation. But I'll leave that ball in your court. I'll never even bring it up again. If the day ever comes you or your husband would like to talk about how much God loves you and what the Bible says, and I can't promise it'll always be an easy conversation, but if if you're willing to, I want to. But the ball is in your court. Is that okay? Now Uncle Bob might say one of two things. He might say, First of all, guy, you're a great nephew. Thank you so much. Appreciate the invitation for that. yeah, me and my husband are not interested. thank you, but no, w I'm not interested in Jesus the Bible and I don't want to have that conversation. You'll be like, No problem. As I said, I just wanted to offer it. And it's an open invitation for the rest of my life. Or Uncle Bob might say, Wow, guy, that is so thoughtful. well maybe, I don't know, maybe me and my husband should sit down with you and find out about what you think and show us some stuff for the Bible. I'm open to that. Now, if Uncle Bob says that you better be ready. You can't be like, my gosh, I didn't think he was gonna say yes. Now what do I do? You know, look up my n bo look up my name on Google, find a few of my books, read those, you know There's a movie that was made about my life not too long ago called Finding Guy. Watch the movie, it's on YouTube. Like prepare yourself, get ready, get ready to have the conversation. But what you're doing is you you've done a few things by having that conversation. Number one, congratulations! You said something. You don't have to feel bad anymore that you're not speaking to Uncle Bob. You did it. Number two, what you're doing is you're you're relinquishing this now to the power of the Holy Spirit. And you're leaving this for him, for the Holy Spirit to work and maneuver his way through Uncle Bob's life. To bring him hopefully someday to a point where he's willing to have this conversation. And then finally, what you've done is you've put the ball into Uncle Bob's court. Like it's his life. He shouldn't be the one worried about it. What are you so worried about it for? It's his life. Like he should be thinking about this. So you will have accomplished a few things by doing that. That little strategy can work at work. You're sitting beside somebody at work, you know, and and you you y this person at the next desk, they're gay. You've always wanted to talk to them, you didn't know what to say, you don't want it to be weird. So you pull them aside into a private conversation. You say, Hey, listen, we've worked together for a lot of years. I really appreciate that. You're a great employee, great friend. And can I talk to you about something? I hope it's not weird. If it comes out weird, I apologize in advance. But can I just talk to you about something just between you and I? Sure, go ahead. Hey, listen, if the day ever comes you want to have a conversation about how much God loves you, and about the Bible. I'm a Christian person, I take this very seriously, I'd love to have that talk, but the ball is in your court, I'll never even bring it up again. let me know if you ever want to have that conversation. you can do that quick and easy on almost any topic. It doesn't even have to be LGBTQ, it can be on anything, but it it it allows you in a very quick and easy way to be able to begin hopefully a conversation with somebody. What is our message to the LGBTQ people in Tennessee? What what what what what is our message to these people? Well, number one, our message is this God loves you. That's our message to LGBTQ people. God is love. And God loves all LGBTQ people as He does everyone. That's our first message. The second message to LGBTQ people is this you're free to live however you want. God is a gentleman, He doesn't force anybody to follow Him. We're not robots. If you don't want to follow Jesus, it's your life, then go live an LGBTQ life. Like it's your life. But know this: while you are free to live however you want, you are not free to choose your own consequences. And there are consequences for everything we do in life. And so we recognize: yeah, I want you to learn about Jesus because there's severe consequences for the choices that you're going to make. So, number one. God loves you. Number two, live however you want, but you can't choose your own consequences. Our third message is this the Bible transcends the shifting currents of opinion. The Bible transcends the current opinion of of TikTok, social media, your friends, your neighbors, the people you hang out with, and your feelings and emotions. Everything's all up and down and changes constantly, but the Bible is the one thing you can plant your life on. And it doesn't change. So the Bible is worthy, you can trust it. And then finally, the cost of following Jesus is high, but the cost of not following Jesus is higher. The cost for me of following Jesus has been high. But the cost of not following Jesus, that is higher. That's our message to LGBTQ people in Tennessee. I'm gonna close with this. that's a picture of me of course and in the middle is my son, Wyatt. Wyatt's like I don't know how old he is. I have four kids. I who whatever. I think he's twenty eight or something like that. But beside Wyatt is one of my best friends, his name is Clyde. Clyde is a gay man, and Clyde is heavily involved in the LGBTQ community where I live in Canada. Clyde and I have nothing in common. We disagree on politics, we disagree on obviously sexual ethics, he's an atheist, I'm a Christian. I refuse to embrace homosexuality, he embraces it fully, he's been with the same partner now for thirty years. We disagree on everything. How did this friendship happen? Well, when my wife was dying, my wife went into a hospice facility for the last month and a half, and you know, the Christians were getting together and making us meals every night so that the Hammonds had something to eat at dinner time. And Clyde was like, Well, I want to help too. Clyde's a chef. And so Clyde started bringing meals over to the hospice facility every Friday night. And he would make enough food for the doctors and the nurses and all the patients and all the Christians knew if you want to go to the hospice to say goodbye to Kathy Hammond before she dies, go on Friday night, because the food is best on Friday night. Clyde was so kind and so generous. Did I care that he was gay? Did I care that he was married to another man? Did I listen, all I knew is that this man loved me and my family and served us. And you know, since then our relationship has just continued to grow, and he's now one of my dearest and best friends. I told you a minute ago that a movie was made about my life. It's called Finding Guide. We use churches as movie theaters for a period of years, but it's just on YouTube now. You can just go to YouTube and watch it. But when the movie was being made, the the the guys who made the movie, it was a Christian production company in Texas, they were like, We want to promote the movie, and they heard about this relationship between Clyde and I. And so they said, Can we come up to Canada and interview you and Clyde? because this is so unique. And I said, Sure. So this Texas this company from Texas came up to Canada and they sat us down and they interviewed us. And so in closing, I'm just gonna show you about two minutes of the interview. of Clyde and I and want to warn you before you watch it, Clyde is a wonderful man, but he is a heathen. I don't know how else to say it. He he he kept swearing throughout the filming. We had to say, Cut please stop swearing, Clyde, we're showing this in churches. You can't swear, you know, in the movie and so anyway, cut Clyde some slack here, but it'll help you understand why I think hospitality is the key forward in helping people. And Clyde, who has lived an active gay lifestyle and has been with his partner now for twenty six years. Okay, so I'm gonna I'm just gonna throw out this statement, okay? Yeah. A Christian and a gay man fundamentally should not be friends. Says who? A gay man and a Christian can't be friends, that's ridiculous. I mean look at this. Nobody 'cause we'll throw punch You'll throw punch Yeah, I will. my gosh. I probably won't throw punch them. Are we gonna be that shallow? Are we gonna be you know, yeah, we're gonna be sh that shallow as a human being that we're gonna allow this whether somebody's gay or not or a Christian or not to dictate whether we can be friends. That's ridiculous. Well, for me the friendship outweighs any of the nature. Like I can understand why. Christians may have an outlook on gay people. I don't want to go see a bunch of out on a gay pride parade. That's not what it's about. So it's a no wonder they get upset. It upsets me as a gay male. A lot of Christians assume that everyone who's gay is an activist. Yeah. And you know, that they they want to fight and argue and be on a float in a parade. But the truth is most gay people are just regular folks. They They want to I'm at home. I'm a homemaker. I work. I'm a human being. We are all human beings. Yes, you may not agree with my lifestyle. What really happened that made a spawned was that my wife Kathy became very ill. And Clyde heard about this, and out of the goodness of his heart, this guy started making meals and driving them out to this hospice facility to feed my family and I as we sat around my wife's deathbed and he just so endeared him. Himself to me and my family. And I would try to remind people that, you know, Christians that this is what Jesus was known for. being friends of and getting along with people with whom he disagreed. And so this is living, breathing proof that we can disagree but still accept each other and be kind to each other. We can agree to disagree. Yeah, that's right, and we're gonna get along. Yeah. So Clyde, you've seen the movie Finding Guy, and you're familiar with Guy's teachings and his stance on things. who do you think should watch? this movie? I think Christians, gay, straight, trans, anybody should watch this movie. It as a gay male it was really an eye-opener for me. I learned things. I guess what I'm trying to say is I'm not a religious person, but to see my friend have that much faith in his God to want to live that lifestyle is very powerful. I'm not there yet. Maybe one day I will be there. Right now I love my life. 26 years, same partner. But it it could change. I even cried at the end of this movie. I won't give it away. But it was very powerful at the ending. So I keep working on pr on Clyde. My goal is I wanna I wanna love Clyde like crazy and pray for Cro Clyde like crazy. Wanna be hospitable with him and pray that the Holy Spirit will work the move in his heart. Brothers and sisters, that is the key forward in this hospitality, time, room, and space. Pray like crazy, love like crazy. Thank you for having me here this weekend. I'm very appreciative. Amen.