People of the Second Chance (POTSC) is a movement created by author and creative, Mike Foster, which works to overthrow judgement and liberate love. POTSC is filled with a bunch of super artsy, cool and rebellious folks.

Their new campaign is Labels Lie: Don’t Use Them, Don’t Accept Them. Their most recent addition is the picture above. They asked me to write an article to accompany their new poster.

Here is my article.

Question: Do you think you can resonate with someone without taking on their labels?

Much love.

www.themarinfoundation.org 

So when the mail got dropped off at The Marin Foundation’s office today there were 3 huge boxes. The sender was Zondervan. I thought… Here it is! The DVD Curriculums are here! So give me some grace and view the excitement with me of opening the very first copies of our new Love Is an Orientation DVD and Participant Guide.

It officially releases on December 13th.

You can pre-order the DVD and Participant Guide combo pack here.

You can pre-order the DVD by itself here.

You can pre-order additional Participant Guides by themselves here.

I’m popping it in my DVD player right now… Can’t wait to watch it myself as I haven’t seen the final version yet. Awesome!

Much love.

www.themarinfoundation.org 

So exciting! It’s almost release day for our new Love Is an Orientation DVD Curriculum which is set to release on December 13th (for those of you not in North America it will release January 1 through your respective Amazon sites and the Zondervan website).

This new resource will be for any church, university, non-profit, organization, clinic, community center, small group of friends or individuals interested in what it means to not only elevate the conversation between the LGBT community and the conservative world, but also culturally engage each community through our Living in the Tension (LITT) gatherings—as there will be an entire session devoted to building and sustaining your own LITT group. We are so, so pumped about this new resource and pray it has a huge impact in continuing to spread this bridge building movement! The six sessions will include:

1) Love is an Orientation

2) Building Bridges between Conservatives and the LGBT Community

3) Theology of Bridge Builders

4) Answering the Tough Questions

5) Teens and Sexuality

6) Living in the Tension Gatherings

We also interviewed six LGBT people from around the country, coming from all different theological, social, and political perspectives, so you can get to know them and where they’re coming from by hearing their stories from their perspectives.

We filmed in a dozen locations around Boystown and the city of Chicago, and we’re just really proud of how everything is turning out.

You can pre-order from Amazon here (DVD), here (Participant Guides) and here (Combo Pack).

Here are a few pics from our time filming. I’ll be posting many more from all of our different locations and our different interviews soon…

Looking forward for you to all have a chance to engage with it. Please feel free to post this anywhere you want to start spreading the word!

Much love.

www.themarinfoundation.org

A few days ago the BBC World News featured the work of The Marin Foundation in written and audio form! Above is a screenshot I took of the BBC’s home page on their website… And that’s us as the feature story! It’s been crazy since it went live. We have gotten tons of folks reaching out from all over the world. This impact of our story is being felt! It’s such a humbling thing to have happen, and it’s definitely surreal to know that our bridge building message is getting spread across the globe through the most internationally trusted media company in existence. Just unreal.

You can read the full article here

You can listen to the 30 minutes segment the BBC ran on us here (and you have about 30 days to download it to keep it if you want)

Yesterday I got an email from the BBC and they gave me the following, crazy, update about our stories since they went live:

—Our radio segment (which has also been featured throughout America on NPR) is the most listened to segment of any from the BBC World Service

—Our radio segment is the most downloaded segment of any from the BBC World Service

—Our article is the 2nd most shared article of any story on any of the BBC websites

—Our article is the 3rd most read article on any of the BBC websites

I have to thank Christopher Landau so very much. He was the producer of the segment, as well as the writer of the article. Christopher was the one who fought for this story to be done! Even after some higher-ups said no to his initial proposal, he kept at it over almost 1 full year (!!!!) before they finally said yes. And now look what is happening! Brenda and I first met Christopher while I was speaking in London earlier this year. He had read my book when it first released in 2009 and as he said, “kept it in the back of my head to do a story on it for just this time.”

I’m not the most trusting person when it comes to media folks… They never seem to quite tell the truth in how they are going to present or edit something. But Christopher did exactly what he said he was going to do. A stand up man. A balanced journalist. And now a person ever so dear to not only my heart, but the millions his work has reached around the world.

Just absolutely amazing what the Lord is doing with this.

No matter the outcome, faithfulness always wins out.

Much love.

www.themarinfoundation.org

Recently I was asked to write an article for the Journal of Political Theology. This academic journal is the world’s premier journal about the intersection of politics and theology, and members of its editorial board include Cornel West, Miroslav Volf and Walter Brueggeman, among many other well respected and notable commentators and theologians in the world of politics and religion. The article I wrote, that was peer reviewed and published this month, is:

Winner Take All? – A Political and Religious Assessment of the Culture War between the LGBT Community and Conservatives

You can download it for free here. 

I used this amazing opportunity to dive into some new realms of the intersection of theology, social construction and politics. I really look forward to hearing what you all think about it.

Much love.

www.themarinfoundation.org

I’m flying to Dallas today to teach two classes until August 8th at the Salvation Army South Region Territorial Youth Institute. One of the five day classes is on Bridge Building, the other five day class is on How to Study the Bible.

Last year I spent a week with them teaching and it was one of the most transformational things I’ve ever had the privilege to do. The youth that the Salvation Army bring to this event are no joke! From the outside looking in, few of them have hope for a better future. Few of them know any life other than hustling, drugs, gangs, baby-mommas, guns, welfare, systemic poverty, death … you name it. Now not all the youth at this event are in that situation, but my experience was the majority definitely are.

My first conversation that week was with a 17 year old kid. I asked him how his week was before coming to the Institute, and nonchalantly with no discernible expression, like it’s just a normal part of everyday life said:

“Well, at the beginning of last week I was hanging with my cousin at a party and then my brother showed up and shot my cousin in the face while I was standing right next to him. He died in my arms. It was a gang thing, you know. The funeral was yesterday and now I’m here. I’m trying to figure out how to get out of that life.”

What?! What?! Did he just say that to me? I’ve literally never had anyone say something like that to me in real time.

And let me tell you that stories like that were not uncommon. In fact, they were by far and away the norm. The life so many of these kids live is beyond my, or many of your, realms of contemplation. Teaching these kids how to read and study the Bible, and also how to love our LGBT brothers and sisters was an honor. The conversations and questions and friendships I built from that intense week have lasted since, and I am interested to see what this year will bring. I pray it will be exactly what they need to further their own lives, stories and journey. It was an honor to even be around them and let their will to survive transform me! And then, to get to do it again… words don’t describe the feeling. Well, maybe these words: Heavy responsibility.

But throughout that week, and this past week leading up to today, I have been thinking about something that really gets under my skin. Let me set it up this way:

The biggest contingency at the Institute, that I knew of, comes from the g-h-e-t-t-o of Atlanta. It is also where friends of mine live in the middle of raising a few month old child, and also where they work for the Salvation Army. They live across from a prostitution house. Murder and burglaries are normal. In fact, when I went to stay with them this last time they even asked me if I wanted to because their house got robbed a few days earlier and staying with them at such a juncture would probably be dangerous. And those friends of mine… they’re white and stick out like a sore thumb.

Here’s the thought I just couldn’t, and still can’t shake:

Hey Andy Stanley and North Point Church and Brad Lomenick and Catalyst and all you other cool Christians in the mecca of Atlanta – where you all at?

You talk, tweet, blog, hold events, preach, write books and whatever else you do so much about leadership and raising up the next generation… From what I see and read and listen to I guess that just means the next generation of folks you’re talking about are those that look and live like you.

You know when Jesus said ‘what you do for the least of these you do for me.’

I contend that Jesus meant the least of these in your OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, IN YOUR OWN CITY.

Not in Africa. In Atlanta.

You’re always the hero of the story when you go to Africa.

You’re nothing more than the privileged white man when you go to East Point or College Park surrounding Atlanta.

Where would Jesus, if he lived in Atlanta, go? Would he walk to the ghetto down the street and invest his time and energy and intelligence and love there, or would he fly, for thousands of dollars, to a foreign land because across the world they “need more help”. Look in your back yard for those that “need more help”.

Andy and Brad and any other cool Christian in and around Atlanta – you better thank the Lord, Creator of Heaven and Earth, that the Salvation Army is there picking up and loving and teaching and raising up those you don’t want to touch with a million foot pole. And you also better start giving them your money so they can keep doing what they’re doing in theirs and your neighborhoods in Atlanta … you know, doing the things you don’t; or don’t want to do.

If the aforementioned ARE investing their time and energy and love and passion and knowledge in those areas, where is the color at their church/events? Why don’t those living in poverty in the ghetto not showing up to be taught or to live a more faithful life of love and leadership?

Where are those who the day before, got shot in the face by a relative over gang related stuff? Where are they at your church or event?

I can just hear it now:

That’s not our target demographic…

They don’t come to our churches or events and we can’t help everybody…

The Salvation Army is already doing a great job and it’s their expertise and have a handle on it…

Blah blah blah

You know why those kids don’t go to North Point or Catalyst or the like? Because the “leaders” and their “followers” aren’t willing to invest the time and effort and credibility and longevity into these kid’s lives enough that they will actually start to trust them. And PS – Jesus never waited for people to come to Him. He sought people out. The Pharisees waited in their temple courts for those in need to come to them. Who are YOU acting like?

Why don’t you give them all scholarships to attend your conferences or services or events or gathering or whatever? You make enough money to do such a thing. If not, why don’t you hold stuff in THEIR neighborhood and show light where light is meant to be shown!? GO IN PERSON and make sure they get there and attend! No, you won’t make a penny off of them. They might not turn into the next YOU, but the potential impact in their lives and the chance that one more person can gain the tools and advantage to be taken out of the cycle of poverty they live within and truly become the leader you love to talk about will be immeasurable.

And you know what? Maybe they won’t. And that is why, what the Salvation Army is investing in SO reeks of the incarnational life and work and ministry of Jesus. The outcome was secondary to the fidelity of living in relation to, and relationship with.

I don’t care what any of you reading this might think or perceive about the Salvation Army. This Youth Institute, and what my friends do and live in their everyday life is the real freaking deal. I’m humbled to even get to be in the same space as my heroes. I just pray that from today through August 8th I might teach and be fully available, 24/7, to be there in any way I can; that this week, like last year, will be a launching pad for a new set of solid relationships with a group of youth that I can pour myself into for the long haul to be there for whatever they need from me personally.

Much love.
Andrew

I am a Christian, so I know love. I know love because I am loved.

Unconditionally.

I know what love is supposed to look and feel like. I know how I am supposed to love because Jesus invented the come-as-you-are-culture. Therefore if I am a believer in Jesus I must follow in his ways. The Way.

Love.

It’s an odd thing when you think about it: That I must act, feel, support and have my spirit intwined with another in such a way that it provokes a deafening reaction of realness, contentment and security that are sunken deep into the core of the others’ being. That’s what love is.

Tangible.

Measurable.

“Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.”

Love is real and truthful. Love causes tears of joy. It causes a pause that elicits a quivering deep breath of exhaustion and relief with the understanding that the root of the most pain is finally engulfed in the core of the most secure of places.

Jesus.

Love.

That’s our command. It’s our Kingdom Job Description. There are no two ways around it. The Bible tells us that it is the Holy Spirit’s job to convict; God’s job to judge and ours to love. Billy Graham said that in defense of his love for our President after being accused by a Christian magazine that he was capitulating to President Clinton’s agenda after the sex scandal. That sex scandal.

This is what it means to practice in the Way.

That Way.

The challenge of our time is not how correct we can be. How orthodox. How much of a defender of the faith to keep out all potential heretics, haters and hooligans. We must stop being driven by the fear of the future and focus on how to love well in the here and now.

Right now.

A close friend of mine recently said:

I continue to find myself caring less and less about what each respective person professes to believe, and more about how they profess those beliefs in word and deed.

Oh.

My friend…

He’s gay.

“We should love one another.”

I’m not asking you to give up on the evangelicalness of who you are and what you believe. Not theologically or socially or politically. I’m suggesting it’s time to commit ourselves to the radical love that is irrevocably tied to the One we claim as our Savior.

“For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.”

Who is our brother?

Other believers? Those who go to church like us? Look like us? Think like us? Act like us?

If someone from ‘the other’ isn’t a part of what you’re doing you’re not building a bridge toward the Kingdom you’re building an army here on earth.

Anyone can build an army. Takes no faith. No guts. No love.

No Jesus.

On the reality show NY Ink about a New York City tattoo parlor, a man tatted from head to toe described his understanding of love:

You know someone’s commitment is real when they charge in when everyone else is running out.

Who and what are you committed to? Who and what are you charging towards?

Is it to the fidelity and work of Jesus’ love that created the best case scenario for living a faithful and righteous life,

or

Is it to feeling ok that you’re right with none of Jesus’ intimate love for the others whom you believe are wrong…

Much love.

www.themarinfoundation.org 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pofj5_wXG9c&feature=channel_video_title

On June 26th this year, we gathered at the Chicago Pride Parade to apologize for the ways that we as Christians have harmed the LGBT community. While apologizing for what we have done or have failed to do is an important step in the journey towards reconciliation, we are trying to continue to push forward in that journey by encouraging Christians to let their respective apologies motivate them to taking tangible actions to make things better for those in the LGBT community. We will be posting a few videos of individuals relating what they are sorry about and what they are committing to do about it, but we would love to also hear from you if you would like to upload a video on YouTube and let us know by contacting us at info@themarinfoundation.org. You can see our I’m Sorry Campaign home page here.

Much love.

www.themarinfoundation.org

Here is an article I wrote for Youthworker Journal about the future of college ministry. It’s all about the need to shift relational paradigms from the 21st Century back to the 1st Century in order to continue making an impact in the ever-changing world of college campuses.

What do you think about the philosophy change I sketched?

Much love.

www.themarinfoundation.org

[Drat! For whatever reason the video isn't embedding, so just click here to see it]

Too often we all just take our bats and keep beating each other … neither is breaking. ‘Breaking’ isn’t the point. At least it’s not supposed to be. Are we going to keep trying, which will get us no where, or are we going to find a new way?

Much love.

www.themarinfoundation.org

There’s a bold young man named Charles Peters – from Liberty University none the less – that created Heretic Press. It was originally supposed to be a project for one of his classes, but through the wonders of the fluency of college students’ use of the interwebs, it has quickly taken off into so much more than that in its content and extreme popularity!

On the second “official” issue, the work of The Marin Foundation is featured as the cover story. In there Charles asked me to talk about some stuff that I don’t really speak too much about in public. But I thought, whatever, let’s just keep it real and do this thing.

You can find the full issue in PDF here

You can find the overview of Heretic Press with its past issue here

I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did. I sincerely pray that Charles and Heretic Press continue being a much needed voice of those who ride the edge of the American sub-culture of Christianity!

Much love.
www.themarinfoundation.org

Dr. John Corvino wrote an article at 365gay.com about LGBTs being defined by their sexuality instead of a number of other facets that make up a person’s fully identity. John contacted me before he published the article because in it he writes about The Marin Foundation and the infamous Chapter 2 of my book.

He and I have met in person and corresponded before, even hanging out for a few days earlier this year. He knows of my broadening perspective on what I’ve been told by my LGBT friends (and those on this blog too…who I consider friends as well ). With that in mind he asked me to write some thoughts for him and the article regarding that process. Although I wrote too much and he didn’t have room to include all of my thoughts, he asked if I could post them here in full so he could link to them from his article. You can read his article here. And here are my full thoughts in response to his question:

It is sometimes difficult for people in the LGBT community to grasp the truth that what I wrote in that section came directly from what many of my LGBT friends and people I know in Boystown told me over the years. Since I wrote that chapter three years ago my thoughts have changed. I wish I would have added more qualifiers before and after I wrote that section; however, today, the reason my thoughts have changed are also directly related to my LGBT friends and people I know in Boystown and around the country describing their connection between their identity and sexual behavior in a different manner than they did even a few years earlier. As I’ve said many times before, I’m not gay. I’ve never had a same-sex attraction and far be it for me to sit from the outside and comment on matters that I have no personal experience with. What I write and speak about comes from the large LGBT community I have close relationships with – from all shades of the spectrum from the far left to the far right. Regarding LGBT identity, sexuality, thoughts and opinions, I very carefully make sure that when I’m in conservative evangelical circles I am doing or saying nothing more than an honest relaying of thoughts, stories and experiences from people in the LGBT community, and what they think important enough for me to communicate to conservatives about. Let’s be honest, if a gay Christian man in a committed relationship and I stood on the same platform and said the exact same words in the exact same manner with the exact same cadence, who would a conservative evangelical audience listen to? Because they would listen to me doesn’t make the situation or the institution right, it just makes it that I must humbly listen and learn more intently to the LGBT community and be responsible to put forth a message that is accurate and representative of as much of the community as I can communicate. One of my main checks and balances is that my inner circle consists of a number of LGBT people (Christian, non-Christian, partnered and single) who hold me accountable. But just as culture shifts, so do words, concepts, politics, perceptions, experiences and cultural norms. My role as a bridge builder is to try to keep up with the ever-moving and evolving times of the differing worldviews, experiences and filters of each community and the disconnect that follows those variations. Sometimes it proves right, sometimes it proves wrong. But the faithfulness to the fidelity of relationship never changes.

Much love.

www.themarinfoundation.org