My daughter had been injured by an accident — something that had no one to blame or fault. And in that time, I needed to know that it was all going to be all right. I needed to know that it would work out. I needed hope. And I needed to restore my faith in that hope.
I didn't want to lose my best friend to this soon-to-be relationship. I already knew what it felt like to be left alone, tossed away like an old rag doll by a straight relationship, forgotten. I don't know how many times this had happened to me, and I wasn't ready to go through it again. Especially by someone I thought would be my best friend for a long time.
Just imagining myself joining this group on this trip brought up several anxieties: the fear of sharing, sleeping, and showering among so many other guys. I also had masculine insecurities about cleaning up after Hurricane Katrina along with the ability to share my faith. But God is bigger than my anxieties. And as I'd eventually learn, jumping into the unknown with God tends to be the best option.
College held the hope for a fresh start. Home meant the weight of my double-life: the pain of lying about porn and "everything is okay" all the time; the great friendships that never felt deep or authentic enough for my broken self.
We finished the day by taking silhouette pictures with the blazing orange-and-pink sky as our backdrop. My siblings lovingly kissed their spouses and lifted them up in the air as some of the most romantic and precious images I'd ever witnessed. I stayed to watch for a little while, knowing that no one would ask me if I wanted any pictures by myself. That would have been absurd, right? It didn't take long for me to reach the end of what I could handle with my family. So, I ran away.
The vast majority of "Queer Eye" is not even addressing sex; it is addressing prejudice, shame, and loneliness. I have experienced shame, the idea that I am simply unlovable. I even believed for many years that God hated me, that God himself couldn’t even love me.
These men, their stories showed me the courage to love. The courage to love family and friends, whether they understand, accept us, or not. The courage to love and trust God even in the midst of confusion and lies. The courage to love myself.
In this episode of MANLY MONDAY, I process our recently held YOBBERS retreat -- including my favorite element and my least favorite aspect of 47 dudes from all over the world uniting in a single place. What was great about our retreat, and what was just awful about it? I have much to say about our emotional weekend together and life's mountaintop moments at large.
The slog of waking up to my drab mundane life takes a sharp turn for the better, and I am suddenly filled with hope and optimism. The world is not so scary anymore. How on earth did I live without this hope before? I attended this year's YOBBERS retreat, and my mind is spinning over what I just saw and experienced.
Most of my life, I've thought of faith mainly as a decision based on knowing some facts about God. Instead, faith is about coming to Jesus in such a way that the deepest hungers and thirsts of our souls are satisfied in him.