To Those Who Silently Affirm LGBTQ People

Pastors, leaders, & influencers who (silently) affirm LGBTQ people need to come out of the "theological closet."

PREFACE: Recently I was asked about the phenomenon in which some pastors affirm LGBTQ people, but privately and silently. It’s a topic worthy of a thoughtful response. I started by talking about why this question is so personal to me. Then I offered eight reasons why I think some pastors stay silent.

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Dear Silently Affirming Pastor,

(maybe you’re not a pastor but you are a leader or influencer of some kind…)

Greetings in the name of our mutually-agreed-upon Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

As someone who earnestly seeks to follow in the Ways of Jesus, the Christian in me sees and honors the Christian in you. The Christo-centric path of love, mercy, and grace is worth taking, for it is the Way to abundant and flourishing life. Amen.

Of course, is this Way difficult at times? Absolutely—it is narrow, and few find it. But like the one who sold everything they had in order buy the entire field because somewhere out there is hidden the Kingdom of God, you and I both believe in the value of a long obedience in the same direction.

So I begin by telling you that I see you, I honor the space you’re in, and I trust that you are doing the best you can with what you’ve been given and with the context you currently serve in.

Pastoring in general is hard, isn’t it? And then add to that the specifics of this particular topic and sometimes it just feels too much.

But trust me, you can handle more than you can handle. If that sounds weird or you don’t believe me, simply look back at the last five difficult situations you survived. In the midst of them you might’ve thought, “This is it… this one will do me in.” And it didn’t, did it?

No, you are strong. In the best kind of way. I’m proud of you.

Now, I realize you may not know me (indeed over 99.99875% of humanity does not*). Therefore, similar to how Paul would sometimes sprinkle biographical information in his letters as a way of trying to establish credibility with his readers, allow me to take three sentences to introduce myself.

1. As a pastor for over 20 years, I spent my first decade in the conservative, Baptist, evangelical world of my upbringing and education until I shifted toward a more open, inclusive, and progressive expression of Christianity for the past 13 years.

2. In 2016 I wrote a book titled, UnClobber: Rethinking Our Misuse of the Bible on Homosexuality, which, in addition to addressing the six clobber passages, chronicles my story of getting fired from an evangelical megachurch in 2011 when they found out my theology shifted to be LGBTQ affirming.

3. I spend a good amount of time these days traveling, speaking, and writing about inclusion in the church; affirming theology; and helping churches and pastors move in the direction of being fully open and affirming.

So hey, hi there.

My name is Colby Martin, and I’d like to talk to you about something.

The reason for this letter is because my sense is, all things considered, you don’t totally love the position you’re in.

Not “generally speaking,” as in, I’m not suggesting you don’t love being a pastor—you probably do (most days that is… Mondays excepted 😝). No, I’m specifically naming that you don’t love feeling split insofar as it relates to your personal, private convictions (that LGBTQ people are fully loved by God just as they are) and your public position as a leader at your non-affirming church.

My hunch is, in a perfect world, you’d love for those two realities to align. I explored that theme a lot, actually, in UnClobber—the pursuit of integration/alignment—because it’s something that’s defined the most crucial turning points of my life.

You see, like you I also existed for a period of time dis-integrated between my internal convictions and my external reality. While my theology on Inclusion shifted back in 2010, I stayed silent with it for about another year or so—all the while continuing to pastor at an evangelical church just outside Phoenix, AZ.

For what it’s worth, in my own way I relate to your situation.

Which is to say, I don’t write this letter as an outsider casting stones of naive judgment. I write it as someone who, well to be frank, could’ve benefited from reading this nearly 15 years ago. Obviously there’s differences between your story and mine, but I hope you won’t let those detract from the equally obvious points of similarity.

• I know what it feels like to have a belief in your heart and mind, yet not feel free to say it out loud.

• I know what it feels like to wonder (assume? probably correctly…) if you are the only one on your church staff who thinks as you do.

• I know the dance you do of finding little ways to eek out your values and beliefs as and when you can, smuggling your inclusive views into sentiments such as, “God’s love is for all people.” In your mind you know what you mean by those words, even if you also know that your church hears them in a far less threatening and more limited way.

• I know the fear you have that someone might find you out and it might cost you your job.

• I also know the fear of, Will I always have to dance this jig of mis-alignment?

The good news/bad news here is that no, you probably won’t dance it forever. At some point (if you don’t get inadvertently outed) you’ll either realize you’ve had enough and you refuse to hide any longer, or, as was the case with me, your subconscious… your soul… your spirit… will insist on breaking free and it will bypass your conscious mind and force the thing to happen.

Sorry friend, it’s true.

Therefore, in the weeks ahead I will offer Ten Reasons to Come out of the Theological Closet in hopes that you don’t get to the point where it happens as an accident or as a crash and burn.

The thing is, you have some agency here. You have options—even if it feels like you don’t.

So I pray you begin taking steps on your own toward integration because more people get more hurt, and more chaos and suffering ensues, when the going-public part happens to us as opposed to by us.

May those with ears to hear, hear.

Sincerely,

-Colby Martin

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Would you do me a favor?

If you:

• attend a non-affirming church;

• used to attend a non-affirming church;

• know of someone who attends a non-affirming church;

• know a pastor/leader at a non-affirming church

Would you consider sharing this post?

Either share it publicly on your social media or just forward it privately to their email.

Because change absolutely happens! And it often happens through relationships when one person is brazen/bold/loving enough to say, “Hey, I think this is something you should consider.”

I’ve noticed that sometimes in life I can take in information that I’ve taken in before (eg, read a book, watch a movie, listen to an argument) and because I’m a different person now than I was when I heard/saw it last time, it lands differently.

It’s possible that the 10 arguments I’ll be sharing in the coming weeks might land differently this time around.

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*How did I arrive at this number? Simple. I attempted to guess approximately how many people have ever come across my name/face/person. Taking my book sales numbers + my social media reach across various platforms + my personal networking, and I’m guessing about 100,000 people have had some experience with “Colby Martin.” Then I divided that number by the world population (just north of 8 billion) and multiplied by 100 to arrive at 0.00125%, aka, the percent of the world that knows or knows of me. Therefore, it’s safe to assume that 99.00875% of the world has no idea who or what I am.