Lone Stars: a story of family, secrets and being true to yourself

Lone Stars by Justin Deabler is the story of family in an ever changing America. Julian Warner wrestles with a question his husband, Philip, poses to him after they adopt a baby boy, Pablo. What will he tell their son about the people he came from? As he comforts his son late at night, Julian thinks about his family. The story transports readers to 1960s Texas to Lacy Adams, a young girl who discovers her mother isn’t telling her the truth about her family, and to Aaron Warner, a young man who dreams of college football and life away from his blue collar family. The story follows Lacy, Aaron and Julian as they live through the events of the 1980s, 90s and the new millennium as American struggles to answer the questions of immigration, sexuality, and the rapidly changing world. Will Julian find the answers he’s looking for? 

In his debut novel, Justin Deabler weaves a story of family, secrets and the freedom you find in being yourself. From the 1960s and Eisenhower’s immigration border raids, to the 1970s, Lacy and Aaron’s letter correspondence during the Vietnam War to their crumbling marriage and Julian coming to terms with his sexuality and finding love, it is a story of the changing world around us. It is a story about being true to ourselves. Not just in terms of sexuality but as immigrants, women empowerment and discovering that family is more than just the people you come from. Family can be the one you build for yourself. It is a story about life’s struggles as we search for a better life than the one we left behind. It takes a hard look at the events of the last thirty years with brutal honesty and hope. I recommend Lone Stars. 

Lone Stars is available in hardcover and eBook.

A Bigger Table: an attempt to bring all Christians to the same table

A Bigger Table: Building Messy, Authentic and Hopeful Spiritual Community by John Pavlovitz is one man’s journey to Christianity and envisions a table where everyone is welcome. He focuses on homosexuality and the LGBT community. He opens with the feelings of the morning after the election of Donald Trump and sees the already deep divides among the American people becoming “cavernous.” He discusses his belief that the only sin in the world is exclusion. We need to love each other and leave us that way as that’s how we were made. He doesn’t really offer any ideas to bring all Christians to the table, only that we need to gather together. It seems to be a lot of talk without much thought to the action needed.

I really wanted to like A Bigger Table and gladly accepted an invitation to read it. However, I was turned off by his self-righteousness and self-congratulatory tones. I feel as a pastor, he questions the authority of the Bible and what it says about homosexuality. You cannot hand pick which verse to believe and follow and which ones to ignore. While I admit that these verses have been used as the basis for horrible and horrific treatment of the LGBT community and it is wrong. However, to ignore the clear language of the verses is equally wrong especially in the New Testament. I am highly disappointed in this book. I can see Mr. Pavlovitz’s goal to open the conversation and I can appreciate this goal. However, I feel he further pushes others away instead of trying to pull everyone in together at the same table. I do not recommend A Bigger Table.

A Bigger Table

is available in paperback and eBook

My Christian view on homosexuality and homosexual marriage

                I write this opinion with great trepidation because I know once it’s out there, I can’t take it back. That being said, I can’t keep it to myself any longer. This thought has been rolling in my head for a while now and I've been trying to figure out how to write it down. Many of you know that I am a Christian. I have been since I was 17 years old and with each passing day my faith in my Lord Jesus Christ grows stronger. He has shown me that He is in control and provides my family with our needs. Lately, I've been reading that the Christians have no right to claim that homosexuality is a sin that the New Testament does not talk about homosexuality.  The Bible speaks very clearly about homosexuality. It is wrong. I don’t understand why the uproar about Phil Robertson of Duck Dynasty when he was asked a very specific question about sin and he quoted the Bible. Why does the world ask these questions of a Christian knowing full well what their response will be and then call them intolerant? A similar incident happened to Kirk Cameron on the Piers Morgan show.

I will address three arguments that I have read that Christians are wrong about homosexuality and the Bible. First, the Bible does not condemn homosexuality. This is false. There are quite a number of verses that speak against sexual immorality. Due to the sheer number of verses which deal with sexual immorality in general, I am referencing the verses which speak of homosexuality specifically.

• ·         Romans 1:25-27 “They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator – who is forever praised. Amen. Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their woman exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.”
• ·         Leviticus 18:22 “Do not have sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman; that is detestable.”
• ·         1 Corinthians 6:9-10 “Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers not men who have sex with men nor thieves nor the greedy nor the drunkard nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.”
• ·         1 Corinthians 7:2 “But since sexual immorality is occurring, each man should have sexual relations with his own wife, and each woman with her own husband.”

These verses are very clear DO Not. Sex is to be between a man and a woman within the bond of marriages. That is how God created us and any other way is a sin.

                Second, I've read that a few gay advocates that cited that Jesus never spoke against homosexuality and in turn homosexual marriage. But he did. Matthew 19:3-6 sets the scene between Jesus and the Pharisees, who are trying to test Jesus. The Pharisees ask “It is lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any and every reason?” (verse 3). Jesus then replied, “Haven’t you read that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’ and  said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate” (verses 4-6).  Therefore, marriage is between a man and a woman.

Third, Christians are using the Bible to justify hatred against homosexuals. Unfortunately, this one is true. It pains me to see that Christians are using God’s words to justify their own hatred and it’s been used in the wrong way for centuries. The Bible does not give Christians license to discriminate or vilify anyone. There are countless verses in which God is telling us to love our neighbors and the Christians are not to judge one another:

·         Hebrews 13:1 “Keep on loving one another as brothers and sisters”

·         James 4:12 “There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the one who is able to save and destroy. But you –who are you to judge your neighbor?”

·         John 8:7 “When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, ‘Let any of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’”

·         Matthew 7:12 “So, in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.”

·         Galatians 5:14 “For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”

·         Matthew 7:1-5 “Do not judge others, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye?”

Sin is sin, regardless of type. God hates it all and as a sinner, I must worry about my own soul and my righteousness with God. I am commanded to follow Him and teach His teachings to my children and the world. Being Christian doesn't make me perfect, far from it. However, I will not support something in which the Bible clearly speaks against. I don’t understand how Christians will say murder is wrong because it says so in the Bible but will say that homosexuality is natural when the Bible clearly speaks that it is not. Believers do not have the option to pick and choose the verses we chose to believe. I know some who would call themselves Christian who quote the nice verses and yet ignore the hard time, gut wrenching, take your breath away verses. I must follow the commands given to me by God. God has clearly forbidden homosexuality. We all have to answer for the decisions we've made in this life. I still think homosexuality is wrong but that doesn't give me the right to condemn homosexuals. I have known several gay people in my life. Some were classmates, co-workers and even second mothers. Even though I do not agree with their lifestyle, I do not wish harm to come to them in any way. I am commanded to treat them as I would want to be treated. So, I will treat them with respect and dignity.