I First Thought it Was a Curse, But Now…
I’m sure many who are (non-transgender) Christians reading this may think this is just some justification of my “condition”, but I urge you to read on…
I spent decades trying to deal with what I could only call a curse. How else do you describe being born with the body of one sex and have the internal identity (soul) of the other. Having lived it, I would call it a curse. Finally around 30 years old I realized I had to get it fixed or kill myself. And even after having surgery, I continued to think that my life was just more complicated that it needed to be having the history that I did. I didn’t know why God made me the way He did, but I KNEW that this WAS how He made. The reason? I always felt I would have to wait until I could ask him face-to-face in Heaven. Then about a year ago He gave me my reason, my purpose. I’m not alone. I’m not the only Christian who happens to be transgender that want nothing more than to love God, worship Him and serve Him. But in many churches it’s just not all that easy if you’re transgender.
And that’s when God gave me my purpose. My reason. My why. There are SO MANY Christians like myself who are transgender and hiding in the shadows. They love God, they love the Lord Jesus who saved them but they can’t tell others, perhaps even their own family or best friends that they are transgender, whether they haven’t transitioned yet or maybe they already have. It’s a scary things on both sides of transition. For me, telling friends who knew me only as male that I wanted to live as a woman was too much for many of them. Yet telling friends more recently that the woman they now know wasn’t born female and grew up a boy can be equally difficult for them to comprehend.
Here is what I DO know, if you’re a child of God, He LOVES you. You have a home with Him. God doesn’t judge you whether you’re transgender or not. Only people do that. They’ll figure it out one day, but in the meantime, you can help your Christian brothers and sisters who are transgender. Don’t let them give up on our Father because people can be jerks. “Father, forgive them for they know now what they do” has never been more appropriate. So don’t HATE. They don’t hate, they just don’t understand. It will come… in time. Maybe in our lifetime, maybe not. That’s up to God, not us.
If you’ve been hurt by a church in the past, don’t let that define your relationship with God in the future. I’ve been really hurt, to the point of massive depression. Don’t confuse a church, or even Christians with God and our Lord Jesus. I never doubted God but Christians, I doubted them a LOT, for a very long time. But I think that was to get to a particular place, that place being right now to give you this message.
God’s love is all around you waiting to be received and welcomed. If you’re a Christian and wishing you could have a church to call home, then now is the time to stop wishing (God is not a genie) and start praying. Don’t pray for a church that will celebrate you and welcome you BECAUSE you’re transgender, but because you’re a Christian. The rest we work out. YOU become a tool for the Lord to help teach other Christians that being transgender is not carrying a nuclear bomb for the church. For me, it’s one heart at a time, even at my own church. THIS is my ministry, THIS is my purpose, THIS is my why. It just might be yours as well. Pray about it. I was scared to death and crying when praying to the Lord about this when He gave me peace about my purpose. I pray you’ll find you’re peace and purpose in your journey, because I BELIEVE He didn’t create you just to ask why. Seek your why!
Being transgender is a GIFT from God to me. At first I thought it was a curse. And then I learned to live with it. But it’s my why, it’s my reason, it’s my purpose – to glorify Him and to reach out to others who are transgender seeking the Lord and to touch the lives of Christians to be open to their transgender brothers and sisters.
If you’re transgender but not a Christian, don’t let your perception of Christ’s Church keep you away from seeking the Lord. God is God, and God is good. There is much within His Church that needs to get away from tradition and back to what He did in fact communicate to us. It’s a journey you’ll never regret if you choose to pursue it, He loves you. God wants to have a relationship with you, He’s not just some tree you pray to or smoke you hope is hearing you. He created the worlds. He created Earth. He created YOU. He LOVES you, if you don’t know how to pray to God, start with “hi”, then just talk to Him. He doesn’t speak in “thee’s” and “thou’s”, He speaks the language you do – fluently. You talk, He listens. Give Him a chance. A chance to change your life and give you a reason, a purpose that you’ve always been wanting.
The last paragraph pretty much sums up life.
Not just for transgender, but for everybody.
Allison
Thank you Allison. Yes, it does.
I did find a church home that felt like “home,” in the Episcopal church, after 40+ years as a Southern Baptist.
Kate, I’m so glad you’ve found a home. I grew up Baptist as well, so I get it. I’m praying our Lord will continue to bless you on your journey in life and your journey with Him.
Thank you, not sure I’m ready to come back to any church…recovered and abused Roman Catholic…not even sure there is a god, but the message of love and neighbor has always resonated as part of the human condition, and especially with me.
Lovely thoughts.
I am happy for you that you have found a way to practice your faith, but the Catholic Church has ruined religion for me. That and I know that I am as welcome as a turd in a swimming pool in 99% of the churches. Its even worse when churches put up hateful signs against transgender people like one church did on I-78 in Bethel, Pa.
Hi Elena, don’t let “religion” via any church get in the way of accepting God’s love for you. People can be, well….people and hateful people of all sorts are everywhere. There IS a church out there full of people ready to welcome and love you. And yes, it might take a while to find it – but it will be worth the effort. I pray you’ll find a community where you feel safe and accepted.
There is Christian community where we are welcomed Elena. I have been part of and served in several congregations where my spouse and I have been embraced though we are a same sex couple and I am a trans woman. AND this though I have been excommunicated three times by other congregations who did so when I disclosed my transgender status… …Even conservative groups are starting to come-around (I have seen it a number of times among people I know personally – I myself had to work through this with God’s Spirit when I fully realized I am one of… Read more »
Yes, I have come to believe it is a gift, and I too follow Jesus as a woman of transgender experience, still married to the woman I wed 28 years ago. God made no mistake in me: I am the woman I was destined to be, His daughter, Jesus’ sister. For God’s purposes which I am coming to understand, my path into womanhood has been longer and more difficult than for most of my sisters… …My relationship with Christ is more than close and secure enough that if God did not want me to be a woman, I would not… Read more »
Thanks for this piece it resonates so much with my experience. It’s such a release when you embrace that how we are made is how we were meant to be made and that is just beautiful fearfully wonderfully made.
I’m glad it resonated with you Roe. We ARE fearfully and wonderfully made. We were made in God’s image, not in what man imagines we should be.
I was thrown out of a church on the basis of “wearing the wrong clothes”. I am now in a church that fully accepts me and has allowed me to share the ministry. I have a much more real relationship with my Lord now that I have given up the hypocrisy of living as a man. I also believe I am here for a special purpose and have something to offer that most believers don’t have.
I too believe you may have something special to offer. I think it’s the outcasts in society who truly appreciate and love our Lord for his grace and mercy toward us. Blessings.
Three weeks ago I thought I would have to choose between my faith and who I was. You’ve given me hope that I might not be a lost cause after all. Thank you so much, and God bless you.