In Not Of: Sexuality

Pastor Randy Phillips is clear from the start: this message is not preached through a political lens. It is preached through a biblical one. People will disagree. That is allowed. You do not have to believe to belong. Keep showing up.

He begins with Valerie Klein, a LifeFamily counselor and redeemed child of God. She names her story without flinching—childhood trauma, three abortions, tubal pregnancies, addiction, and recovery. What would have changed everything when she was young, she says, is a church that offered another choice: someone to walk with her, counsel her, and tell her she was accepted and loved. Her word now is simple. Don’t do this alone. The enemy isolates. God redeems. Free counsel is available at care.life.family.

Then Randy tells the story that became LifeFamily’s posture. Early on, an Austin radio station serving the LGBTQ community invited him on air. Dozens of conservative pastors had declined. He said yes. He asked God to baptize him in grace, answered hard questions, and prayed in the name of Jesus. The atmosphere in the room changed. The station manager came to church that Sunday with about thirty friends. Many came to the altar. When one later asked Randy to officiate a wedding, he said he would not officiate—but he would eat the cake.

That decision still stands: live in the tension between conviction and compassion. Extremes are cleaner. The middle is messy. It is also where people actually meet Jesus.

From the Book of Daniel he draws a picture of life in a culture that wants to rename you. Daniel was 17 when he was taken from home, given a new name, steeped in a foreign worldview, and pressed to surrender every distinctive tied to God. Three kinds of people show up in that story: people of the culture, people of God who stay distinctive inside it, and people of God who live like the culture. Randy’s question is pastoral, not theoretical. Which one are you?

His biblical claim is straightforward. Sex is recognized at birth, not assigned. God created mankind male and female—Genesis 1:27—and stamped Imago Dei on every soul. Identity built only on feelings becomes idolatry. “You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body” (1 Corinthians 6:20). Feelings are fluid. The body God made is not a costume.

He distinguishes two words that often divide churches: egalitarian (equal in value before God) and complementarian (different gifts that complete each other). Women and men are equal in worth. Jesus lifted women in a culture that suppressed them. Celebrate the difference. Don’t flatten it.

Culture says psychology is sexual identity—conform the body to the mind. Scripture says the opposite: let the mind be renewed to the body God made. Gender dysphoria is real inner conflict. Randy asks parents not to overreact to every overheard phrase, and not to ignore the pressure either. Call children up to how God made them. Keep them close to the family of faith. A permanent medical “fix” for a psychological struggle has left many people wishing they had heard a stronger, loving voice sooner. Come anyway. Be loved here.

He names four ways Christians try to respond:

Daniel did not disappear, and he did not start a fight over the king’s food. He pulled his supervisor aside and asked if another way was possible. Respect opened a door that rage never would.

Randy closes with his dad, Kenneth Phillips, sitting down beside Leslie Cochran—one of Austin’s most recognizable street figures—and inviting him to church. Leslie came. The presence of God filled the room. Kenneth knelt and prayed with him. About a month later Leslie was murdered in a homeless camp. Randy does not pretend to settle every question about that life. He knows what he saw: a Jesus-lover, convictions intact, kneeling with a broken person.

That, he says, is the way. Live Jesus out in front of them. If you are respectful, and if you will stay close enough for God to work through you, you will reach people in a way picketing, screaming, and hollering never could.

Key Scriptures: Daniel 1; Genesis 1:27; Genesis 3; Psalm 139; 1 Corinthians 6:20.