Many people hurt and struggle in life, crushed by pain. Yet they hide it or turn to so many other things. The solution is to become friends with Christ. While a perfect life is not promised as a result, his comfort, strength and peace are well worth the struggles. The Bible makes many mentions of there being hardship in the Christian life. "21 They preached the gospel in that city and won a large number of disciples. Then they returned to Lystra, Iconium and Antioch, 22 strengthening the disciples and encouraging them to remain true to the faith. 'We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God,' they said." (Acts 14: 21-22) (I mention this only for the reason of honesty that no one may be misled into thinking it overly gentle of a life. This prevents falling off.) One misconception Christians often give is that to gain a relationship with Christ you must first change yourself and quit your sin. Though we preach the opposite, we unwittingly teach this in action. Despite the scripture, " You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us (Romans 5:6-8)." We say such naive things as 'lesbians and bi-sexuals that call themselves Christians are not Christian.' While it is true that this is a sin and that to refuse to give it up to God as one grows in understanding and is confronted is rebellion towards God. If this person refuses help and council for a period of time they are to be treated as a non believer. This goes the same for those who wrong another and do not repent of the wrongdoing after numerous stages of confrontation. However, one's sins will be revealed to the heart on God's timing and God works in man at his time. To give your life to Christ means to let your heart be transformed. There will come a point when one desires to give up sexual immorality, though God first took them comforted them and blessed them while they had not yet done so. If one does not come to Christ because they are afraid to give up something, they missed the message. You don't just give it up to earn him. He takes you and changes you until you want it gone, realizing its harm. I myself had many sins I had yet to repent of when first saved and many I still regularly repent of, desiring my freedom. Every sin causes harm, yet God loves and gives strength, mercy and power during such periods. There are no prerequisites to come to God. Sin is harmful but God wants your heart first; then as you grow in relationship with him, your sin gets taken away as your desires change to become more pure. One last note is if a lesbian or any other form of sinner comes to you and repents- no matter how many times in a day- you must forgive them. " 3 So watch yourselves. If your brother or sister sins against you, rebuke them; and if they repent, forgive them. 4 Even if they sin against you seven times in a day and seven times come back to you saying ‘I repent,’ you must forgive them.” " (Luke 17: 3-4)
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