 to enter His gates, to lift our hands, and bless His tongue. It's time to praise His Holy Spirit. What heaven is already singing, we are going to make tonight. Will you join us in worship and prayer right now? Let's lift up our hands towards heaven and the sanctuary. Would you join me in prayer? Jesus, we say from this house that you are great. King Jesus, worship together tonight. You're walking in the dirt, knows what living in a sorrow song. There's a God who, there's a God who, and don't praise the one. Still speak each and all praise. King Jesus, you're pulling to God forever. There's a God, there's a God who's out forever. I just sense right now there's a nearness and a tenderness of God. But His love is reaching out. The holy moment for some of us where the love of God just hasn't penetrated. You might have served Him for years. It's distant. I feel like it's a great idea, but it hasn't actually sunk in. You haven't actually received the love of the Father and the gift of the love of God. It's free. I feel like His love is reaching out right now to the depths of us, to the innermost places. Fall across this room, just open up your hands. Close your eyes and just to avail yourself to the love of God right now. We're going to let the musicians play. Holy Spirit, we just invite you to minister all across this room, every heart. Minister to every heart. Minister to every mind. The love of God, the love of Jesus, the love of the Father. I thought every hand lifted up all over this room this evening. Jesus, magnificent, glorious, majestic, beautiful Savior. Lord, there's not enough hours, days, months, minutes. There's not enough lifetimes for us to sing and to proclaim the goodness of our God. How you saved us, how you've changed us, how you reached for us. God, what kind of a King leaves heaven to come in the pursuit of His enemies? Our God does. Our King does. Jesus, we stand as the redeemed, those who have been washed, those who have been cleansed, and maybe even some of us this evening that are looking at you, Jesus, with all in wonder for the first time. And our prayer tonight is, Jesus, that you would step into this room and that you would make yourself known. That you would be glorified among your people. And as you make yourself known, Lord, you would speak to us. Lord, that you would bring comfort. You would bring strength. You would open eyes to see, unplug ears to hear. Lord, in that you would somehow draw us closer to you than we were when we walked into this room. Whoever we were when we came into this room, we want to be different people. We want to be closer to you. We want to be more like you. We want to know you more. Jesus, you just have a way of changing us from glory to glory, faith to faith, and from strength to strength. Tonight, here we are, gathered in your name to give you honor, glory, blessing, and praise. And we ask you to do this in your name, Jesus. The name above all names, the glorious name, the resurrected name, the beautiful name, the worthy name of Jesus. Come on, let's praise Him one more time in this place. Jesus, we praise you, Jesus. We praise you, God. We praise you. We praise you. Man, isn't it good to be in the house of the Lord? I love it. I love it when God draws near to us. You know, there's nothing like the presence of the Lord. David said I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of the Lord than to do anything else with my life. I would rather stand at the back door and open the door just so I can get a glimpse of him than to be famous, than to be in front of the most well-known princes and kings of this earth because there's nothing like the presence of the Lord. And you made the right choice. You're here tonight. And on a beautiful Michigan summer night. And listen, the Lord knows the cost of that, right? But it's going to be good tonight. And we're so glad that you're here. Hey, would you do this? Would you right now take 30 seconds and just spin around? Say hi to one another. Greet somebody. If you're looking for a seat, kind of squeeze together. We'll make some room. Good evening, everybody. Welcome to Sunday Night at Radiant. We do these occasionally when we have different prayer focuses and special guests. And tonight we have a special guest with us. Beckett Cook is back with us. And this morning, yeah. Wasn't this morning awesome? This morning was so great. Went home and took one of those mega naps. So today actually feels like Monday. It's like so good morning. I'm on Australian time right now. But it was a great morning. And by the way, Beckett's book, A Change of Affection, we had it in all three of our locations, but we're sold out. We sold every copy we have, but we're going to replenish it. We're going to get more books, have it in the bookstore. Because I really believe that you can debate with people about theology and ideology, but you can't debate somebody's testimony. There's a power in testimony. And the second half of the book of Beckett's book is really, really strong because it has Q&A. It's like frequently asked questions. And to me, that was the gold. And so we want to make sure that it's available for you. You can also go on Amazon, I believe. It's still on Amazon, correct? You can just buy it on Amazon, have it drop, ship to your home or whatever. But we're going to make sure that they're in our resource centers as well in the future just because we want that to be available to you. And tonight we're very excited to have Beckett stick around. And we're going to have a conversation. And so would you guys help me welcome back up to the platform? Come on, Beckett. Thank you guys. Good to be back. Yeah. People are loving it. And by the way, tonight, everybody, I think on the lower thirds of the screen, I might have missed it. Can they put that back up, whatever that was that we had there? If we had it? Oh, there we go. You can scan the QR code. And if you want to ask a question tonight, you can put it on there. Now, here's the only caveat is we've got a lot to discuss. And I'm not sure exactly how much time we're going to have for questions at the end. We'll see. We're going to do our best to answer at least some. So if you have a specific question tonight, go ahead and scan that right now. Or you can go to radio.church slash ask Beckett. And you can type your question in there tonight. And we'll try to get to that. Also, there are a couple of resources we wanted you to be aware of. Can they put that up on the screen? It's where is it? Oh, if you QR, I don't know what it is though. I need to see it. Okay. So I think I think it is Beckett's podcast and YouTube show information. It's called the Beckett cook show. If you scan that, you'll get information about that. Listen, if you guys do listen, how many of you listen to podcasts? Okay. Yeah, a bunch of you. You need to listen to this guy's podcast. It's one of the best thing. And I listened to about 10 of them every month, not just his, but 10 different podcasts that I listened to. This is one of my favorites. The content that he covers, the guests that he has is just excellence. Great resource. Also on, if you QR code that one of the guests he just recently had a friend of his named Christopher Ewan has what did I do? This is why I should be sitting there. So I don't see my wife because she makes funny faces. I think on there, we have a curriculum. I was having a private conversation with your wife. Sorry. Okay. I think, I think on there, I think now there's curriculum for parents on the subject of sexual, human sexuality, gender identity, that kind of stuff. And we've had several parents that have asked for resources and we'll get more to that. So if you scan that, that would be great. Welcome. Thank you. Welcome back at cook to the Lee Cummings show. It's good to be on your show. It's good to be here. Hey, I want to jump right in. And one of the things that we talked about this afternoon that you've covered in your podcast recently was you shared the story about a letter that your mom wrote. And I would love for you to just start there tonight. Yeah. I mean, this was a shock to me. About, I don't know, three months ago, my sister, and I have many sisters in law, but one of my sister in law, sisters in law, she texted me a letter. She took a scan of a letter that she found in a box recently. And it was, and she texted it to me. And it was a letter I brought the receipts right here. It was a letter that my mother wrote to God. She typed a letter. And it's the title of the letter is a prayer for Beckett. Now I have to, to remind you, my mother, when, when she found out that I was gay in 1992, 93, we, you know, she had that moment. She broke down. She cried. And that was the last we talked of it. Now over the next many, many years, she not, not once, because I knew where my parents stood. I knew what their convictions were, right? So not once did my mother say, hey, Beckett, you know, you're still sinning, right? She never, she never brought it up. It was extraordinary. And my father didn't, didn't bring it up either. What I didn't know is that my mother was praying these, these prayers because she knew, my mother knew that she couldn't manipulate me or, you know, convince me in her own flesh, right? She couldn't control my life. I was living in LA. So she knew to go to the throne room of God and the first, and she also knew the first prayer point on this because she knew that this is a spiritual battle, right? She knew that she had to go to the spiritual realm and, and fight this battle. It wasn't about convincing me that it was a sin. She would never have been able to do that. She had to go to the throne and their first, her first prayer point is deal, quote, deal aggressively with the enemy, come against him in the all powerful name of the Lord Jesus Christ with the sword of the spirit, the word of God. And, and then she goes on and when I read this letter, I was just blown away. I started just balling because I was like, I can't believe I didn't know my mother was behind the scenes just praying and praying for me like this. And she even was praying things like, you know, a deep quote. These are some of the prayer points. Be removed in the all powerful name of Jesus Christ, number one, spirit of homosexuality. Number two, the desire for homosexuality. Three, the denial of his heterosexuality. Just interesting. Number four, removal of all the blocks of the truth. And she even prayed, she goes on and on. And she even prayed that, where is it? She says, protect him from AIDS. Now that's so like, I can't believe because here's the thing is, and I'm not going to get too graphic, but like there is no natural explanation why I never got HIV over the many, many years of my life. There's no, in fact, my boyfriend, who I was living with at the time came home in a year, a year into our relationship, he came home and told me that he had just found out he was HIV positive. And I was convinced that I was, I mean, there was no way that I wasn't. And that was back in the day. This was in 1999. That was back in the day when you had to wait a week to get your test results. So for a week, I was just absolutely convinced I had HIV, 100%. There was no way I didn't. And I go to get the test a week later. And I mean, I go the next day to get the test. I had to wait a week. I go to get the results. And even the guy at the clinic was shocked. He was like, you're negative. And I'm telling you, this is because of her prayer. This is like a supernatural thing. Because I always wondered why I never contracted HIV. And it was because of my mother's prayer. So that's what, I mean, that's what's so powerful for parents who are dealing with this, with their kids. Because obviously it's rampant right now. And again, it's like, it's kind of impossible to convince your child at this point that it's wrong or that this is a bad path or you're going down a path of destruction. You need to go straight to the throne room of grace. And even though it seems like, I know, I get it. Like in your flesh, you want to just fix it right away. You want to control it. You want to fix it. But it's got to be, you got to play the long game and go to the Lord. And my mother, she prayed for 20 years. 1992 to 2009. How long is that? I don't know. She prayed that long. And also my other siblings were praying for me. And especially my sister-in-law, Kim, she's in my book. She was praying for me. And she was amazing too, because she was an evangelical Christian. I knew that she believed homosexual behavior was a sin. But every time I went home to Dallas for the holidays, she would call me and say, hey, let's get together for coffee. And I was kind of like, why does she want to hang out with me? I mean, she knows I'm gay. But I was like, OK. And we'd have the best time. And she would talk about God. I would talk about guys. And again, she would never quote scripture to me. But what she did, after I got saved, she told me this. She told me this before I would have been really angry at her. And my mother. If I knew my mother was praying this prayer, I would have been very angry at her. Because I used to bristle very much at the idea of hate the sin, love the sinner. Because I used to think, how can you hate half of me and love half of me? Because it was my full identity. But my sister-in-law prayed this verse over me for 20 years. Acts 26, 18, when Paul is speaking in front of King Agrippa, he's explaining what God has sent him to do to preach to the Gentiles. And he says, to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins in a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me. And in their Bible, like still, she has my name next to it and she has it highlighted like four times. And she just prayed that over me for so many years. And yeah, did that answer your question? I think it's incredible because it illustrates that the battle that we're in for those who are far from Christ, no matter if it's gay or some other besetting sin that's controlling their life, the issue is it's a spiritual battle. And if you try to fight that battle with the weapons of the flesh, arguing or trying to manipulate the situation, sometimes you can drive a serious wedge in there, but the fact that you didn't even know that about your mom, but that your mom was this prayer warrior on her knees, we can never underestimate the power of intercession, never underestimate the power of a praying mother. I know. I mean, that's like Augustine's mother, Monica. She was like, my mother was like Monica. She prayed for saying Augustine for all those years. And yeah, the power of a mother's prayer. We told our kids they never had a chance because Jane prays. It's like she would pray these prayers like Lord, whatever they do, let them get caught. Yes. All the time. That's what Christopher Yuan's mother did, the curriculum you just talked about. His mother, he wrote a book called Out of a Far Country, and he was saved out of homosexuality too. And his mother said, God, you know, do anything it takes. I don't care what it takes. And it took Christopher getting arrested and put in prison for many years for him to come to Christ because he was dealing drugs and stuff, and he got caught. And that was his mother's prayer. Like, I don't care what it takes. Like just do it. Wow. Okay, so you and I were talking earlier and you were talking about how you came out in the 80s. You, both of us, many of us are children of the 80s. In the 80s, it was a much different world. It was a much different scene. Very different. I miss the 80s, right? I miss the 80s. I miss the styles. I miss the fashion. But when you came out in the 80s, even the cultural, the cultural way that this issue of homosexuality today, it's phrased as the LGBTQ conversation was vastly different than it is today. Back then it was undercover. It was on the down low. It was don't ask, don't tell. And today it's out front. I mean, here we are. We're in June, which is, you know, nationally it's called Pride Month. It's out loud. It's involved in every corporate decision. We've seen some of that in the last month with Target and Bud Light and different things like this. The culture wars are engaged with it. The question I want to set you up with, and this will be tough to do succinctly, but how did we go from this issue, being what it was in the 80s, how did we get to the place we are at in this cultural moment on this issue? Because you have some brilliant insight about that. Yeah, I mean, in the 80s, I mean, this is all tongue-in-cheek, but in the 80s being gay was kind of cool and now it's just obnoxious, but... So it was different, different time. But yeah, I mean, we don't live in a vacuum, right? We don't, we are constantly influenced by the culture around us. And I always say you're not, we're either giving into the pressure of the world or the pressure of the word and the conviction of the spirit, as you mentioned earlier. And so, you know, in high school, at my school and the girls' school, I mean, unanimously, everyone believed that homosexuality was wrong, 100%. And those very same people, 30s plus years later, a lot of them are LGBTQ allies or they post rainbow flags, you know, on their social media. And it's like, gee, I wonder what's happened. And so I just wanted to just briefly go through kind of what sparked the gay movement was the... In 1969, the Stonewall Inn, which is a gay bar in New York City where I've been several times, but it's in the East Village, or West Village. And the Stonewall Inn was raided by the police in 1969, like at one o'clock in the morning, on June 28th. That's why Pride Month is in June. It used to just be one day a year. Now it's an entire month. Now it's probably an entire year. But so the Stonewall Inn, in 1970, that was the first gay Pride marches. Those are the first gay Pride marches in Chicago, L.A., San Francisco, and New York. And then, you know, a lot of things happened. There were movies and TV started to feature gay characters. And I remember as a kid, there was a TV show called Soap. It was a primetime comedy show called Soap. And Billy Crystal was one of the stars in the show. And he played the first openly gay character in a sitcom ever. And I remember, see, I actually saw the episode where he came out in that show, and I was just like, whoa, I remember feeling such feelings of kind of like, this is so weird and dangerous and strange. And so that has... And storytelling is the most powerful form of persuasion, especially visual storytelling. So movies and TV are very, very, very powerful. And then Harvey Milk was assassinated in 1978. He was on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and he was a gay activist. And it became a movie called Milk in 2005. And my friend, Dustin Lance Black, wrote the screenplay and won the Oscar for that movie, for writing. But that movie, and Sean Penn started that movie, and it won all the awards, of course, and it was really powerful and persuasive. And then in 1981, the New York Times printed the first story of a rare pneumonia called... And they called it in 41 gay men in New York and California, and they called it grid at the time. Gay-related immune deficiency disorder. But then they changed it to AIDS. And I remember in the 80s, I remember it's funny because I was, you know, I was living that life, and my friends and I were always fascinated by how the gays were blaming Ronald Reagan for it. It's like, you guys are at bathhouses every night. Why are you mad at Ronald Reagan? I mean, we were stunned by that. And then in 1989, after the ball, this book After the Ball came out, these two guys who went to Harvard published a book called After the Ball, about how America will conquer its fear and hatred of gays in the 90s. And I'll just read a couple of quotes from the book. And this was kind of a blueprint of how to normalize homosexuality in America. And all of it came true. It's a very big book. And they say that the purpose in effect of pro-gay propaganda is to promote a climate of increased tolerance for homosexuals, and that, we say, is good. And we realize more upon emotional manipulation than upon logic, since its goal is, in fact, to bring about a change in the public's feelings. Notice feelings. The main thing is to talk about gayness until the issue becomes thoroughly tiresome. And then this is the last quote, but this is key. In any campaign to win over the public, gays must be portrayed as victims in need of protection so that gays will be inclined by reflex to adopt the role of protector. So that's why there's LGBTQ allies. They succeeded in this. And then in the 90s, there were a bunch of sitcoms, like Ellen, the Ellen sitcom, she was the first openly lesbian actress to play an openly lesbian character on TV. That was a very, I remember the episode where she comes out as a lesbian, and we all watched it, all my friends and I, we watched it and we loved it and thought it was amazing. Will and Grace premiered in 1998, completely normalizing homosexuality. And it's like, when you watch Will and Grace, you're like, and I was friends with Sean Hayes, the guy who played Jack. When you watch Will and Grace, you're just like, these guys are hilarious. They're so fun and funny and smart and witty. Like, who could not like them? And of course it's fine. Homosexuality must be fine. And then Sex and the City premiered also in 1998, Normalized Casual Sex, it had gay characters. And really that Sex and the City had a huge powerful effect on young women. Like, still, it's still resonating today. And then 2003, this was a turning point in culture when Queer Eye for the Stray Guy premiered. I remember, I was in Bangkok with, I was on a shoot in Bangkok, with one of the guys on the set with me, was British, and I said, this show is gonna change everything. Because it was the first time, with Sex and the City and with Will and Grace, it was mostly gay guys and women who were watching the shows. But Queer Eye for the Stray Guy was five gay guys who were doing makeovers on clueless straight men, right? And it was the first time where the girl, the boyfriends were watching and husbands were watching and loving the show. And I told my friend, I said, this is gonna be a game changer, because now it's like everyone's gonna love the gays. And they're gonna think it's normal. And then 2005, Brook Back Mountain came out with Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal. And I mean, that movie was so powerful. Ang Lee directed it. It was like exquisitely directed, as I say in my book. It was just, it was stunning. And that movie was a major turning point. And then jump to, I mean, there were a lot of other things, but jump to Obergefell, the decision by the Supreme Court in 2015, legalizing gay marriage in all 50 states. Of course, that had a major impact on the culture. And then Bruce Jenner's on the cover of Vanity Fair in 2015 as well as Caitlyn Jenner. And so, and now, of course, every TV show, every movie has gay themes, gay characters. And so we're in TikTok. We're inundated, obviously, with it now. Target, Bud Light. So, yeah, so, you know, I love, someone posted this meme on TikTok. Or yeah, it was on TikTok. Someone posted this meme. My dear, this is kind of a play on the screw tape letters by C.S. Lewis. My dear Wormwood, disregard everything I wrote in my previous letters. Just get your patient to download TikTok and it'll all work out for us. Your affectionate uncle screw tape. It's true. I mean, social media has become like lighter fluid to this whole issue. You know, in a world prior to 2010 Instagram came on the scene, you know, back in the day when Facebook, when people under 30 were actually on Facebook prior to 2010, but now, you know, then came Instagram and then, you know, after that Snapchat and TikTok, those have become major discipleship portals for an entire generation that has taken what was written after the ball and a lot of the agenda. You might maybe mention about the homosexual, the homosexual agenda, but it's taken that to a whole other level in a generation and it went from being a joke and being kind of a slow roll to becoming like accelerated to where we are today. Yeah, it's funny. I was just saying earlier that my friends and I in the 90s, we used to joke because I think it was George Bush, George W. Bush who popularized the expression homosexual agenda. I forgot who started that phrase, but my gay friends and I used to call each other on Sundays and say, what's on your homosexual agenda today? Turns out though, it's like there was kind of, but see, this is a thing I was telling Pastor Lee this earlier. When I was working in Hollywood and I wrote two TV pilots that sold and both of the TV pilots were gay themed. One was called, I don't even want to say the title of it, but both of them were gay themed and I thought, you know, when you're in the dark, so when all of the content that we imbibe on TV or movies is coming from people who are in the dark, right? So when I was writing those shows, I thought I was doing good. I thought I was doing good for the world and I was going to help America open its eyes to how wonderful homosexuality was and so it's like, yes, there's an agenda, but it's kind of like when you're in it, you don't feel like it's an agenda. You just feel like you're doing the right, you want to be on the right side of history and you want to just, you know, so it's this weird kind of contradiction, but there definitely isn't, like after the ball was an agenda. That book was definitely an agenda. And now, of course, there is a very specific agenda. It's very agenda-driven, not only by Hollywood, but by politicians. So it is genuinely an agenda now. It's not just, you know. Yeah, yeah. It's not just Sunday afternoon. No, no, just hanging out. Okay, so was it 2010 that you, or 2010 that you got saved? 2009. 2009. And your childhood was in Catholicism. Yeah. And then going to Catholic schools, then a long gap, you get saved and you come into the church really with no baggage about the church, maybe some perspectives about the church. How did it, how has it affected you as a man that came out of the gay lifestyle, born again, come into the church and watch the polarizing way that the church in America has responded to this issue? Because I mean, the church, for let's say the last 10, 12 years, this has been a central issue that has divided denominations. Yeah. It's divided families. It's divided churches itself. And it seems like they kind of go in one of three ways. They're either A, becoming affirming, B, becoming side B, and maybe you can explain that, or C, which is holding to a historic Christian orthodox perspective on sex and marriage and human sexuality. How have you, so coming into that now, being a disciple of Jesus, what's your perspective of looking at the church and how polarizing this has been and how the church has responded to it? I know, 2009 isn't that long ago, but it seems like a lifetime ago because of how much acceleration there has been. Because when I got saved in 2009 at my church, it was, I mean, everyone at my church in LA, in Hollywood, we were all, everyone was on the same page with this issue. Everyone believed it was a sin. People were so loving to me, so supportive, so like cheering me on, so excited for my salvation. And now it's funny because not necessarily at my church in particular, but maybe so, I don't know. But now those kind of like the same people, I'm the bad guy now because I'm sticking to orthodoxy. So because I'm not gay affirming now, or I'm not side B or whatever, I'm suddenly the bad guy. And it's like, wait, you guys were celebrating me in 2009 when I got saved, what happened? It's the power of the culture and the power of persuasion. But in terms of side B, I mean I touched on it this morning, but side B theology is also known as re-voice. It's this whole kind of movement within the church where people who come out of that life, I don't like the word lifestyle because it sounds like a Martha Stewart place setting, at the table or whatever. I've never liked the lifestyle of the word. But it's people who come out of that life who believe, who are Christians who believe in the biblical sexual ethic, they believe homosexual behavior is a sin, but they call themselves, this has become more and more prominent in the church. It's creeping into the church, this kind of false theology. It's a false anthropology and it's a false theology. And it's coming in very quickly. And it's Christians who call themselves queer Christians, gay Christians, sexual minorities. They use terms like spiritual friendship, which is basically a sexless marriage. So two ex-gay guys, I don't even like the term ex-gay, but two ex-gay guys who become Christians will make vows to each other to have a lifelong commitment, almost like a marriage without sex, which is bizarre to me. The last thing I need is to have a vow with another, someone who's struggling with the same sin. What I need is male heterosexual friends who can pour into me, which is what happened with me when I got saved. And so that's a new phenomenon. It's been going on for, I don't know, five, seven years. And it's... Sheep and wolves clothing. And it's tricky. It seems loving. It seems kind of like you're being hospitable and missional. It seems loving to do this and to use this kind of humanistic terminology. But you're robbing the... You're not using biblical terminology. You're using humanistic terminology. And it just... It confuses the issue even more. And again, I always say this. I mean, it's just so spiritually unhealthy because you're kind of cordoning off yourself in this kind of special category as an ex-gay Christian who needs special treatment in the church, and you're not allowing the Holy Spirit to sanctify that part of you. And it's just... It's like such a weird place. It's just stewing in your old self. You're stewing in your old man when you should be... You should be mortifying the flesh and pursuing righteousness and sanctification. In the church, I think one of the mistakes that we made in this issue, as well as other issues, is we let culture define the language. So the whole... The thing that makes the LGBTQ conversation very difficult is that we have allowed culture to shape the narrative that says that your identity is shaped primarily by your sexual attraction. And it's not just your behavior. It's actually your identity. It's who you are. And so if you convince somebody that this is your identity, the core of who you are, well, then it's no longer change your behavior or let God transform you and change you into a new identity. It's like, no, this is who I am. And the side B kind of Christianity, even though they would say, well, marriage is supposed to be between a man and a woman, but I'm a, quote, gay Christian or a queer Christian, that's my identity. That's the language that culture is using right now. Creating this... It's Freudian language. There's no such thing as a sexual identity. That's an invention that was spawned by Freud. Because Sigmund Freud in the 19th century, the father of psychoanalysis in Vienna, always beware of psychoanalysis. But Freud was said that sexuality is at the core of what it means to be human. And so that's really, he was the progenitor to sexuality becoming your identity. Because for Freud, sex was everything. Yeah. And so when people, like the side B, and for those of you who don't know why they call it side B, a record always had a side A and a side B. So side A Christianity is like, no, you get saved, you're a new creation, all things are new in Christ. Side B is like, well, I'm a Christian. Oh no, no, no, side A. Side A is not that at all. Side A is not even Christianity. Side A is gay, affirming Christians. Okay, there you go. Side B is what I just talked about. Yeah. So you can be a Christian, but self-define yourself as a gay Christian or a queer Christian or a, you name it, anything else in there. You can even call yourself a trans Christian. Or, I mean, at their recent conference they had in Plano, Texas, there were, I forgot, I mean, there were so many crazy things, but there was like someone came on stage to speak with a trans flag. I mean, it's just, yeah, it's just not, it's not a healthy way to think about the reality of being united to Christ when you're born again, you're united to Christ, and you're in union with Him. And so calling yourself a queer Christian or a gay Christian, it's like you're marrying the sacred and the profane. You know, you're marrying like sin to the name of Christ. It's like, why? No, that doesn't work. So yeah, I don't get it. I don't understand. Oh, that's good. Okay. I want to ask you a couple of practical questions that I think a lot of us are thinking through. Last year we had a guest that came and spoke on this subject and gave some answers that created a little bit more confusion than actual clarity. And so I'd love for you to speak into this because even since he was here, he's a great, great guy and respect much about him. But there was a couple answers that, I walked away and I go, I really need to think through this. And you and I have talked, I've heard you speak to them. One of the issues is obviously the identity issue. Can a person be called a gay Christian? You've answered that. But what about the issue of, there's a conversation about pronouns and pronoun hospitality. Are you familiar with that term? Oh yes. Oh yes, I am. So these are my pronouns. The, thou, and thine. Those are now my pronouns. So yeah, I mean, the pronoun situation, I'll just quote my friend Rosario Butterfield. She recently wrote an article for Reformation 21. And she repented of, because in the past, Rosario, if you don't know her, she was a tenured professor, a lesbian tenured professor at Syracuse University, a super staunch lesbian activist. And then she gets radically saved in 1999, I believe. She's written many books. She's absolutely brilliant. She's been on my show many times. And she wrote this letter repenting of using pronouns. And she says that, she says that the Supreme Court decision in favor of gay marriage, that decided gay marriage, changed everything. It changed the game. So it created this collision course between LGBTQ plus ideology and the Christian faith. And then she talks about the reasons why it's a sin to use pronouns, to use preferred pronouns. Well, first of all, I mean, you're number one, you're breaking the 9th commandment. You're bearing false witness, right? Because you're indulging in a lie. So when you use someone's preferred pronouns, or even if you're a cisgender heterosexual, and you put in your profile on your social media, you put he, him, that's still implying that there's a range of genders, that there's more than two genders. God created human beings binary. He did not create us non-binary. And Rosaria goes on to say that she's like, these are some of the reasons why it's a sin to use preferred pronouns. And she says it's a sin against the 9th commandment. So you're bearing false witness. It's a sin against the 10th commandment when it's a trans pronoun, because that's a sin of coveting. So a trans person is coveting what they don't have, right? And it's a sin against the creation ordinance, because God created us male and female. It's a sin against the image bearing of God. It discourages believers' progressive sanctification and falsifies the gospel. It cheapens redemption and tramples on the blood of Christ. Pronouns fail to love my neighbor as myself. And she tells a story. This is so true, because she tells a story of a woman named Laura Perry Smalls. And Laura Perry Smalls lived as a transgender man for many years. And she had pumped testosterone and engaged in mutilating gender-affirming surgeries for many years. And she was resaved out of that life. She was redeemed. And she recounts this in her book. She talks about how when she got saved, she returned to the church of her youth. And she returned to her conservative Christian parents because the church and her parents had refused to use her preferred pronouns throughout all the years she lived in this false identity of transgenderism. And why did she return to them? Because they refused to lie. Their refusal to lie compelled her trust. So my parents never became gay-affirming with me. And if they had become gay-affirming, I would have lost all respect for them. Because I would have just been like, your convictions are so flimsy. What are you doing? I wouldn't have respected them. But when you're a prodigal and you go back home, like if you're going back home to parents who've lied to you and are affirming, then there's no celebration. There's no fatted calf that's going to be killed for you. There's no celebration. So that's why it's so important as parents to, as Rosaria says all the time, stay connected to your LGBTQ child as much as you can, as much as possible, but never become indoctrinated by the ideology. And that's what she says, that this side-b Christianity elevates being winsome as the end game. And it swaps biblical clarity for postmodern pluralism. And she says that Christians need to learn how to love their enemies, not pretend that their enemies are their friends. She tells a story in her book. She was at this dinner with this pastor. Her neighbor was pouring into her, this pastor and his wife. They were pouring into her. And she was still a lesbian and she was kind of uncomfortable. And they would sing Psalms after dinner. And they sang Psalm 23. And in Psalm 23 it says, I dine in the presence of my enemies. And she thought, oh, this is so cool. I love this song because I'm dining in the presence of my enemies, these Christian people. And then she realized later that, wait a minute, I'm the enemy. But they love me. These people love me, but I'm the enemy. And so she says, Christians need to learn how to love their enemies and not pretend their enemies are their friends. So yeah. So how, obviously when you make that decision, okay, whether it's your children, whether it's a coworker, whether it's people that you come across with and it's becoming more and more prevalent as culture is embracing it more, I'm not going to use, I'm not going to buy into the lie. I'm not going to, I'm going to be kind, but I'm not going to go along with the lie and use preferred pronouns. Immediately you are going to get, you're going to get conflict on multiple different tiers and the closer those relationships are, it's going to become more intense. You're going to have people, families say, okay, we can't come around. I'm not going to come unless you call me by my right name and you use my preferred pronouns, whether that be kids, extended relatives. And I think that's the place. I don't think most people are convinced. Oh, that's who you are. Most people are just trying to secure the relationship. I think one of the things that Christians in this hour have to really grapple with is premeditate, okay, I'm willing to pay that price for the longterm opportunity to see them come to Christ as well as for the guarding of my own soul. So I don't become deceived and I don't become part of the problem. What would you say to people who, okay, I'm going to make that decision. I understand that, but I also know I'm going to face that. How do we prepare for that to be kind to love our enemies, recognize them as, because of the gospel's sake, their enemies? How do we prepare ourselves to do that? I mean, obviously you're still living in West Hollywood. I've got to imagine that you've had some unique encounters. How have you now as a Christian kind of steeled yourself for that, for those kind of conversations? Before I get to that, you reminded me of just kind of standing in this culture and I just, you know, it's like, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. You know, these guys were aliens in Babylon, right? They were in a foreign land and they were commanded to bow down to culture. They were commanded to bow down to the golden statue Nebuchadnezzar built and they refused to do so. And the consequences were dire. They were going to go into a fiery furnace, right? And they were told twice and they said no twice. They refused to compromise God's word by one Iota knowing that they were going to go into a fiery furnace and be burned. And that's as believers, as Christians in this culture, we have to be that strong in our convictions. It doesn't matter. I mean, I want to say this delicately, but it's like if you're in a situation where you're being told to be gay affirming or use put pronouns in your profile or blah, blah, blah. Like, you're compromising. You're compromising God's word and it's like, I know it's not easy. I mean, I know this is not an easy thing to do in this culture. But we, like, we, again, they were willing to go be burned to death, these guys, to not compromise God's word. So the second part is what was the other question? How do you prepare yourself for those moments of confrontation? It's like, because nobody likes confrontation. Very few people like confrontation. So we have a tendency to shy away from that. I'll do whatever you want to do. Just don't yell at me. Just don't call me a bigot. Just don't call me hateful. Just don't cut me off type of thing. So I'll do it. When you make the decision, I'm not going to go along with that. How do you prepare your heart for that? Well, for me, I mean, the cat's out of the bag. So it's not a shock to people when they find out, you know, that I believe homosexual behavior is a sin. And it's just strange because people in Hollywood, in LA, they strangely, they listen to me because I mean, it's like, but this doesn't have to be the way, but because I have street cred, like I live that life for 20 years. So they're like, wow, there's something. This is odd. I've never heard of this. Like what? Tell me more. So they're intrigued by it. But I think in general the way I mean, I used to do this on the set. Before I would go on the set of shoots, I would pull up at, you know, seven in the morning, whatever the call time was. And I would, I would get there early, like 10 to 15 minutes early. And I would pray. And I would say, God, just help me by your spirit today. Lead me to the person or the people on the set today that you want me to talk to and evangelize. And it's crazy. He would do it every time. I would be on the set and I would just like, I would be in a situation where I would tell, I mean, I would tell everyone on the set about Jesus. And I'll tell you this funny story. I was on this one shoot for Ugg boots. And I had worked for Ugg like one time before. And my assistants were Christians. They went to my church. And the agent, the woman from the agency said, she was on the set. And after a couple of days of that first shoot, she was like, and she was Jewish and she's very funny. And she was like, is everyone on this shoot religious? And I was like, well, yeah, we're Christians. My guys and I were Christians. And I told her my story and she was just kind of shocked. And then they kept hiring me. I thought I was, you know, every time I was on a shoot, I thought I was just never going to get hired again. But they would keep hiring me. So on the second Ugg shoot, we were shooting in Malibu and the sun was going down. And that's woman, the agency woman. She was like, oh, we've got to get this shot. The sun's about to go down. Like it would be a sin to not get the shot right now. And she said, oh, Becca, you know all about sin, don't you? And I was like, well, yes, I do. And I said, what are the wages of sin? So when I said yes, I do the entire set, the entire crew turned to me, the models, everyone turned to the photographer turned to me and they were just lined up like straight in front of me. And I said, what are the wages of sin? Death. I said, right now, all of you people are dead in your trespasses. Come on. I'm alive in Christ. Come on. Come on. And they, and I explained the gospel to them. And then the woman from Ugg, the client, the client from Ugg, she's, we're still friends. She, she's just like, after my whole spiel, she was like, I'm going to go get a coffee now. But they just kept hiring me. So the point is prayer, prayer, prayer, prayer. It's so important. God, like if you just pray and God give me favor with these people, give me wisdom. When I speak to them, just help me navigate the situation. He does it. Yeah. Yeah. It reminds me a friend of mine who has been a leader in the Iranian underground church. I mean, imagine that vastly different culture, right? In Iran, where it's illegal to be a Christian convert, Christian convert convert from Islam. And when I talked to them and I asked him, I said, how do you, every single day he goes out and he's, he, you know, he's got ministry that he's going to do. I said, what's the first thing that you do? And he said, I wake up and I pray every morning because I can't afford to make a bad stuff. I need the leadership of the Holy Spirit. And we can look at a mission field and go, oh, in Iran, they need to do that. Guys, we need to do that in America. We need to be people of prayer. We need to be spirit led for these types of situations. Not all of us are going to be on a photo shoot, but we do have workplaces in schools and neighborhoods that we're going to engage with people. What would you say to people about the subject of Christians being invited to gay marriages or gay weddings? Gay weddings. Yeah. I mean, when I first got saved, I, I think about a year after I got saved, I was at dinner with my two agent. My commercial agents from William Morris. And we were at the Bel Air Hotel and it was a man and a woman. And the man was about to get married to another man. And, and so the woman, I can't use the real name. I don't know if we can use the real name. So are we being taped right now? Okay. But anyway, the woman turned to me in the middle of dinner. And she's like, I'll just say Joe. She's like, Becca, you're going to Joe's wedding, right? And I was like, of course I am. I was like, totally put on the spot. And I didn't know she was going to do that to me. I think she did it on purpose, but she's like, you're going to Joe's wedding, right? And I was like, yeah, of course. And at the time I thought, oh, well, this is, you know, I'm showing love and this is going to, I'm showing compassion. And so I go to the wedding. I show up and it's, you know, hundreds of people. And as soon as I see the people coming in, my heart just sinks. And I'm like, oh my gosh, like I'm here celebrating. Everyone here is celebrating this sin. They're not only celebrating sin, but they're here to commit to these two men being committed for a lifetime in sin. They're here to commit to these two men down a path of eternal destruction. That's what's happening here right now. And it was one of the worst nights of my life. I felt horrible at this wedding. And I couldn't, and then it was weird. It was like, I finally left the wedding. And I determined after that, never to attend a gay wedding again. And I realized that was the wrong decision to go to attend the gay wedding. And I believe that today as for Christian, if you're a believer, even if you're a parent, I believe, again, it's like the woman who was trans and went home to her parents who never lied to her. It's like, as a parent, of course, your instinct is to want to go and not, you know, heartbreak that relationship with your child. But again, if you're going to a gay wedding, and even the reception, you're going and you're celebrating, you're celebrating a grievous sin. I mean, in the Old Testament, this sin was a capital crime. Like this is a serious sin, right? And so you're going and you're celebrating sin. And it's just, it's something that as a believer, I don't think we can do. I think, you know, we have to, again, like Shadrachmi, Shachman, Bethany, we have to just as much as it hurts say, listen, I love you. You're my child. I will always love you. You're my best friend. I will always love you. But in good conscience, I cannot attend. I cannot celebrate this because I happen to have a different worldview. I happen to have beliefs that are foundational to my life. And I cannot, and it's like when Luther was at the, was it at the diet of worms? So when he said, you know, and it is neither safe nor wise to go against conscience. And he's like, I can't recant. But I think, yeah, I think for gay weddings, I think it's a, it's a no-go. And, you know, Jesus said, you know, I did not come to bring peace. I came to, I came with the sword to divide and mother against father, father, you know, mother against son, father against son, whatever, I can't think of the verse right now, but he came. And what he meant by that is, is when you become a follower of Christ, it's going to create division in your, even in your own family. It's going to create a strong division. And, but the good news is prodigals come home. And so just keep praying. Amen. Amen. Prodigals come home to fathers and mothers who have prayed and stayed their convictions and not changed because of accommodation. What would you say to parents whose kids are coming home? Most recent statistics kind of shaped by the cultural phenomena that's happening is that Gen Z, somewhere about 30 to 40%, self-identify, even if they're not active, but self-identify as being either LGBTQ plus IA, you know, the whole alphabet. So now we've got this social epidemic, which means you've got an increase of parents, even in the church, whose kids are coming home and saying, this is who I am. What would you say to parents about how to respond to your kids when they come home, whether they be high school or out of school like you and make that announcement? How should they respond? I mean, I think with this new wave of, of these statistics, obviously it's a social contagion. And I, I mean, with this, with this, this is a different animal. I think with this situation, as a parent, I think you should, you know, sit down with your child and say, okay, let's talk about, let's talk this through. And here, by the way, here's some resources on these issues on, you know, here's Irreversible Damage by Abigail Schreier. Like, why don't you read this book about transgenderism and how, how absolutely devastating it is and harmful it is to children. And here's this book by, you know, so-and-so and Christopher Yuan and others. And I think it is, it's okay to sit down and kind of try to reason with your child about like this, this is, you have to understand this is, this is not normal. This is a social phenomenon that's happening right now. And it's, and just, and you know, really challenge your child to think about, why do you think, but this is what, this is, I'll tell you a story. This is what happened to me at a conference. I was speaking at a year ago for standard reason. This, we, we've spoken six different cities and it was to all too young. It was high school in junior high kids. And I was stunned at how many of the kids were non-binary, pansexual, gay, transgender. I was absolutely shocked at these, and these were like Christian kids, right? And so this young, this young girl, teenager, I think she was probably 15, she, after, during, after a Q and A, there was a line of kids and they came up to me, she came up to me and she said, kind of, kind of sort of defiantly, she said, hi, I'm non-binary and pansexual. And I said, why? Why are you that? I said, because when I was in high school, there was no such thing as non-binary. So why are you non-binary? And I challenged her on this. I said, is it for, do you do it for popularity? Do you do it because you want people to think you're more interesting? Do you do it for street cred? Like, why are you pansexual? Like, that's not even a thing. That wasn't a thing when I was in high school. And this one boy was like, this one teenage boy said, I'm asexual. I said, you haven't even got through puberty yet. What do you mean you're asexual? So these kids need to be challenged. And I'm telling you this girl, while I was challenging her, tears started, she started welling up with tears and tears started streaming down her face because she didn't have an answer for me. And it was so cool because later that day, after that session, she left and she was so kind of convicted by it. She went to someone at the conference and they prayed for her and she came to faith in Christ that day. So these kids need to be challenged. It's like, no, you're not non-binary. That's not real. And see what they don't... It's like, if you frame it in a way that... It's like, don't you see you're being duped? Because kids don't want to be duped, right? Don't you see you're being duped by the culture? And by the spiritual realm, by Satan himself, you're being duped. Satan is laughing all the way to the bank because you believe you're non-binary and you're transgender. Satan is thrilled that you think that and it's such a lie. And so that's... I think it's important to do that. Have those conversations and challenge your kids and say, I don't believe you. Explain to me why. You spoke to her just like a dad back then. That's what a dad does. It's like, why? And that's a serious conversation. I think Jane and I have had these conversations with parents and so many parents are intimidated by this issue. It's like, I don't know how to talk to my kids. They're on TikTok and they're teaching them this in school or every Netflix show that they're watching is reinforcing this. And I don't have time. I've got a job and I'm just barely having enough time to take them to sports and now I'm trying to figure out how to have a conversation about this. It's overwhelming. Parents, let me just encourage you prioritize becoming discipled in the word of God and culturally aware because there is nothing more important than you being able to pray, to have conversation with your kids and other people about this issue in our generation. Because if you don't, I promise you, your kids are having this conversation with somebody. They're watching it on some social media platform. And a little side note is I would say, parents, one thing I would never do is I would never give a smartphone to your kids before they are a certain age. And you ask me that age, I think it's 40 because you can find a direct line of correlation between this issue and the release of the iPhone in 2006. And social media platforms in 2008, 2010, the line just skyrockets. And it's because our kids are all being discipled by somebody and it's just not necessarily Jesus. It's somebody on TikTok, it's somebody on Instagram, it's somebody that they're watching in a show or on YouTube. And so mom and dad, you don't have to be Becca Cook experts, but you do have to be able to have this conversation and be able to say why. I mean, ask that question, that's huge. What would you say to, what would you say to all of us as somebody that came out of homosexuality into the light of the kingdom through bold witness in a coffee shop, I love that it was an intelligentsia, which is one of my favorite coffee shops, about how to, how to witness, how to be a friend, how to bring the light to people that are trapped in that darkness that Jesus saved you out of? Well, I mean, it's not really, there's not one particular way to do it, but I mean, there's many different ways. But I, you know, I think it's helpful to develop a trust with a person. You know, it depends on the situation. If you just have two hours on a plane, that's different from if you have a lot of time with a friend or some acquaintance, and you can develop a friendship and trust and build that trust with them and pour into them. But I was, I mean, I'm forever grateful to those kids at the coffee shop who told me the truth. They just flat out told me the truth, and I'll forever be grateful to them because they didn't, again, they didn't try to, you know, dodge the question or kind of make it just vague and ambiguous. They told me just straight, like, it's homosexual behavior is a sin. That's what we believe in our church. And I remember, I didn't mention this, but I, when I went to the, that church service that first time, before I walked into the service, I remember putting the, it was like in my imagination, I put the idea of homosexuality as my identity. I put it in a white box. I don't know why white. I just, I remember putting it in a white box and just putting it on the shelf. And I was like, I'm just going to go into the service and with an open mind. And that was so helpful to me for those guys at the coffee shop to tell me that because it prepared, it was, it gave me the chance to do that. It prepared me to be able to do that. But there's so many different ways. I mean, and again, I think the most important thing is to, you know, in terms of witnessing to people in that community is to pray, is to pray, you know, for God to open the door for that and to soften the heart of the person you're going to speak to and just, yeah, I'm trying to think of a good example of that. But yeah, I'll try to think of it. It sounds like from your story, God was already working on you. And so here they are, you know, God orchestrates those events, right? And they were willing to be their part. They had no idea that God had already been moving on you at a fashion thing in Paris. But they were able to add their part by being just truthful and authentic about who they were and what they believed and being bold and inviting you. That's pretty bold. I mean, to just, after a conversation like that, say, come to church. Yeah. Yeah. And you'd be surprised. I mean, people are so burdened. And so in postmodern, we live in a postmodern world, and postmodernism is a heavy burden. Jesus' yoke is light and easy, right? But postmodernism is a heavy burden because you never, when I was living in that world, I didn't know what was right or wrong, what was up or down. I just, and it was just like, you never knew what everything was subjective. There was no objective truth. So I would go into these situations and think, oh, well, is this right or wrong? Well, gee, I don't know. I mean, I guess I'll just go with it. And that heaviness, that burden of postmodernism is so strong that people are hungry for the truth. So many people who live in that world are hungry for the truth. So I think if you just, you know, open the conversation and say, hey, I have the truth, and the truth will set you free. And it's here to think. I don't know if you remember the parable of Plato's Cave. So Plato, Socrates wrote this parable of Plato. So Plato's Cave is this parable of these people that are in this cave and their chain basically in this cave. And their entire reality is what they can see in front of them on a wall. And there's a fire behind them. So all they can see on the wall are shadows of themselves, right? So that's their entire reality. And they believe that it's what reality is. One of the persons is able to escape the cave and come out into the real world and see the sunlight. And he's like, and that's what we are as Christians. We're people in the sunlight who actually we can see reality. We know the truth. We've been, God removed the scales from our eyes. We can see. We were blind now we can see, right? And so we have to go to those people who are stuck in Plato's Cave and say, hey, you think this is reality, but it's not. It's a shadow come out into the sunlight. I promise you it's better than this shadow. You're in a dungeon and you're, it's like, you're, yeah. So Plato's Cave. That's a great illustration actually. It's, it's really good. Good answer. Okay. Next few moments, I want to ask you a couple of questions that people have texted in. This one we knew was coming. Do you still struggle with same-sex attraction even now that you've left your lifestyle or, you know, homosexuality? How did you, how did you fight that while still loving Jesus? I don't know. Pastor Lee, do you still struggle with indwelling sin? I'm perfect. Clearly. Clearly. So yeah, people ask you that all the time. And I, I don't even, I mean, I, I'll answer it, but I don't like to even say this because it's just kind of, it's like saying this thing over myself all the time. But so I was telling you earlier that the day before I got saved, sexuality dominated my thought life. It dominated my friends' thought life. We talked about sex all the time. Like we were, it was a constant refrain and we would, we would talk about, you know, who did you meet? Did you have, did you meet someone last night or, you know, blah, blah? It was always about sex. And I mean, sometimes we would talk about art in the theater too, but we were talking about sex a lot. But then the day I got saved, that, so let's say like my, that reality was at 100%, right? Sexuality dominating my thought life. The day I got saved, it like plummeted to like 10, 5% by God's grace. It just plummeted. And so now I'm, you know, technically not attracted to women or a woman. So I'm happy until, you know, I don't know what God has in store or whatever, but I'm happy to be single, celibate for the rest of my life. Like it's, I actually am thrilled to be single. I mean, I was in so many relationships and they were so ex, I still have PTSD from them. So I'm happy to be single and like Paul, like Jesus was single. You know, I'm happy to be single and celibate for the rest of my life. And unless God, you know, and God created the universe, he can change anything. He can change my desires. Obviously, he could do that in a snap. But until that day happens, I'm happy to. And like all of us, any sexual temptation that comes our way, we're called to mortify that. We're called to crucify that again and lay it on the cross, right? Yeah. Yeah. That's great. Rosario always says, like every day we are to drive a fresh nail into our sin. So, yeah. That's pretty brutal. Question from Alex said, what would you say to junior high and senior high students that are in the room that are facing this issue? I mean, it's really the issue of their generation. Yeah. I mean, if you're faced, do you mean like they're struggling with this issue? Maybe, yeah, maybe. Yeah. I mean, first of all, if you're struggling with this issue and you're in this room, my heart goes out to you. I know that it's a struggle. The struggle is real. I know it's hard. And I would say, you know, please find someone you trust, a pastor, a youth pastor, someone you trust in the church and talk to them about this issue, talk to them about your struggle. Because we're to bear one another's burdens with the body of Christ. And it's so great to have people be able to support you and pray for you and to disciple you and walk with you through this. Because it's a long slog, you know? Especially if you're that young and you feel like, we're not promised tomorrow, but when you're that young, you feel like you have 80 years stretched out before you and you're like looking into kind of this abyss and you think it's like, I'm gonna be stuck like this forever. But I would talk to someone you trust in the church, especially a pastor or a youth pastor and get a lot of support, get a lot of prayer. But if you're struggling in terms of, you know, being pressured as a kid to conform to the world. I mean, I don't know. This is like unprecedented. So it's, that is, I can't imagine being your age now. I can't imagine being at your age in this culture now. Because it's like, it's so overwhelming. It's so ubiquitous. It's just everywhere all the time, 24-7, dry queen, story hour, everything happening. So I would say it's funny because I just like being in here tonight and today actually worshiping in here. The worship is, by the way, the worship band is amazing here. Can I get a name into that? I mean, I was like so just blessed by it and just revived by it, revitalized. But it just feels like, you know, I just think of, I was thinking of this earlier. It just feels so safe in here, you know, especially as a kid and you're going through this with all this pressure in the world to be in here and to be with believers and to see what the truth is and to be around it and to, this is a good play, a safe haven for you to come and kind of get, again, to get Ruth and revitalize in your faith and to get reaffirmed in what the truth is so you can, you're able to go back out into your high school, your junior high school and stand firm without compromising and you might, you know, you might get rejected by your friends and you might become unpopular or whatever but, you know, Jesus was pretty rejected and he was kind of crucified. So like, if you want to be Christ-like, that's not a bad model to follow. So, yeah, it's hard, I'm not saying it's easy but stay in the church and get, you know, fed. Well, what I wanted to say is we were talking earlier and you said, sometimes I have these moments where I'm on stage looking out at churches and thinking to myself, I never thought I would be standing in an evangelical church sharing on a Sunday morning and I said it was, I wonder what the apostle Paul felt like, you know, many times where he finds himself in a similar situation. I used to hate Gentiles, I used to try to kill Christians, I was an expert in all these things and now here he is eating with Gentiles, rebuking Peter and he's an apostle to the Gentiles, he's building churches and he had those moments and we're just glad that you came and had one of those moments with us. Thank you, yeah. Thank you, guys. Yeah. Yeah, come on, let's do it. Oh, are we standing? Oh my gosh. You guys are so sweet. I have to say, first of all, this church, it's been such a blessing to me to be here this weekend because I just felt the Holy Spirit so strongly here and also I just want to say that there but for the grace of God, go I. So we see all this LGBTQ madness, but again, it's like I was part of that community and praise God, people were praying for me for all those years. My sisters were fasting for me every Monday and yeah, no pressure, but my sisters were fasting. But yeah, again, it's like, it's only by the grace of God that I'm here today and that I'm able to speak to you about this issue and it's still shocking to me. I still have just like, God, how did this happen? There's hundreds, I live in West Hollywood, I live in the heart of darkness, there's hundreds of thousands of gays in my neighborhood and as God was like, hmm, Beckett, I'm going to grab you out of that and pull you into my kingdom and now I'm going to send you out and just try to help the church understand this issue. And it's just like amazing to me. Yeah, amazing. And it's hopeful and I do want to reiterate what you say. Guys, this is why we believe in prayer. This is why we call our church to fasting. This is why we believe in the work of the Holy Spirit because there's just some things that only God can do and to see what God has done in his life. Really, if you're saved here today, it may not seem like to you, but you're a miracle too. Your life is a miracle. Salvation is not like I got enlightened. Salvation is God reaching down, snatching us out of our sin and bringing us into his kingdom and that's the only way that that's going to happen in other people's lives, gay, straight, or anything else. It's God breaking through, but our prayer and our fasting impacts that. It's like winning the lottery. Tim Keller actually, when he was doing a sermon, he said, he mentioned, he was like, do you get, do you understand that? That if you're saved, it's like you won the lot and he pulled back and stopped himself. But yeah, it's like a mirror. It's a supernatural moment in time. It's supernatural. It's a miracle. It's a total miracle. So praise God. Well, we want to, before you leave and before we're done tonight. Oh yeah, pray for me. We want to pray for you. Yeah, do that. I need prayer. Jamie, you want to come on up here? I do. Let me just say, I do, I, I need prayer for, I'll just give you a specific thing because I feel the last couple of years since I started my show, I have felt such a heavy burden, like a heavy, I feel, I've been feeling really oppressed. It's like a spiritual thing. I feel the weight of it. And so please pray for that. Because I, it feels, because every time I put out an episode, each, because my episodes are not, they're not like world friendly, you know, they're very controversial. And so every time I put an episode, I just feel this, this weight of like, ah, like everyone's going to hate me and this is stressful. And it's affecting a lot of my stuff, my sleep, it's affecting things. But anyway, please pray for, for that, for protection and for the enemy to leave me alone. Jamie, you want to come on up here? Just get away from me. Okay. Everybody extend your hands towards Beckett. Father, in the name of Jesus, we stand in awe of you at what you've done in this man's life, son of God. And Father, I just feel your, your joy over him. That you're looking at him with joy in your eyes like a father, just pride in his eyes. As you see this man, the son, who you have snatched as a coal from the fire. And you've put your spirit in and you've marked him out. And you've changed and transformed his life, but Lord, you've also set him apart to be a sign and a wonder and to be a voice. And so Father, right now, I just pray your affirmation over him. I just pray that I just hear the Lord just like saying, yes, Beckett, yes, Beckett, I love you. And Father, I'm asking for you to just wrap your fatherly arms around him and that there is no enemy and there is no weapon that is gonna be formed against him that is stronger than your fatherly embrace. He is not alone. You promised I will never leave you and I will never forsake you, says the Lord. And Lord, I pray that he would feel that embrace every moment of his life. The way he felt it that first day, the way he felt it when the waterfall of your glory hit him came crashing upon him. Lord, I pray that his praise and that his testimony will break the heavy yoke. And right now in the name of Jesus, this thing that has been oppressing him, this false yoke, this burden, this assignment to weigh him down right now, we as his brothers and sisters in Christ, we say in the name of Jesus, be broken right now. Oppression be removed and let there be a new freedom of your Holy Spirit. Lord, a new freedom of your Holy Spirit that comes upon him, a new mantle. A new mantle, a double portion of what he's experienced already. Lord, of your nearness and of your presence. Lord, I pray your word says that the fullness, there's joy in the presence of the Lord. The fullness of joy in the presence of the Lord. God, I'm praying that in his sleep hours, God, I'm praying in his rest hours and in his routine, there is gonna be a tangible increase of your nearness and of your presence and of your anointing. Holy Spirit, that you're gonna Ephesians one him. You're gonna open the eyes of his understanding with wisdom and knowledge and understanding about the hope of his calling and the inheritance that he has in the saints and the power of the Holy Spirit at work in him. And right now we rebuke every demonic assignment of hell against him. And we say the Lord rebuke you. This is a chosen vessel, Father. Would you put a hedge of fire around him? I'm praying for his sleep, God. I'm praying that it would improve. Lord, that he would get deep sleep. I'm praying that anxiety would not be his friend, but there is a peace and a joy and a freedom and a looseness that comes because he's in you. Lord, as he studies the scripture, it's gonna come to life in him. He's gonna grow deeper in his intimacy with the Holy Spirit. Greater power, greater unction, greater clarity, greater creativity. And Lord, we pray that you will go before him. You will clear the path, open the doors that no man can close. Close the doors that no man can open. Father, that you'll make his steps ordered of you. And Lord, let him be a voice of encouragement to the body of Christ in this hour. God, I'm praying for favor with publishers and media outlets. Lord, he gave the first life that he had in the flesh to media and to the arts. And I'm praying, Lord, for an open door back into that community somehow, some way and even with publishers to write and to communicate that you'll take this message and put it on miracle growth steroids and expand it far and wide, God. We bless him and we pray for him in Jesus' name. Amen, amen. Come on, can we just thank Beckett for coming? All right, everybody. Thank you, you're dismissed. We'll see you in the prayer room tomorrow. Next weekend, God bless you.