The Truth about Intimacy (and Gender)

Intimacy Brings Wholeness

One thing God cannot do is lie.

He will not repeat the lies others have spoken over you.

He will not allow a lie you’ve spoken over yourself to be called truth.

He will not allow a label to be your limit. In his presence, every label falls away, even the ones you’ve written on yourself.

He calls you by name, not the names you’ve been called.

He calls you by the name the Spirit sees when it hovers.

He’s been face-to-face with your deepest longings and darkest fears.

He sees the unformed places.

He sees the disappointed hope.

He sees the misty clouds of confusion.

He sees the heaving tumult of humanity in crisis.

He hears the cries of the frightened and the lonely.

He feels the pain of the shunned and the isolated.

He sees the snare of sin and shame.

He sees the many waters that threaten to overwhelm.

He sees through the fathoms of darkness that grayed the color of your world with swaths of shadow.

He sees all of this and speaks light.

Others may call you girl. He calls you daughter.

Others may call you a failure. He calls you daughter.

You may call yourself heterosexual, transgender, asexual, lesbian, or any other of a vast assortment of labels. He calls you his own.

Daughter is higher and reaches deeper than gender.

Daughter is more intimate than your sexual orientation.

Daughter is who you are to your Creator.

God doesn’t address us as girls and boys.

He calls us daughters and sons.

There are intimate places in each of us that can be touched only by him. There are places within us that were created to respond to God’s Spirit. We call out for his touch each time we breathe the name of Jesus.

Intimacy is part of our deep and desperate human desire to simply belong.

We long to belong . . . because we were created to belong.

We crave intimacy . . . because we were created for intimacy.

We need to love and be loved . . . because we were created for love.

And we were created by love.

The truth is we tend to oversimplify some things and complicate others. When it comes to gender, we do both. I live in a woman’s body, but ultimately I am a spirit. We are all spiritual beings having a rather rough human experience. This earth is not our home, so it shouldn’t surprise us that at times our bodies feel awkward, limiting, and constrictive. They will never feel otherwise until our mortal, corruptible frames put on their immortal bodies. We are seeds awaiting release. Then and only then will we discover who and what we really are.

We are all broken. Belonging to other broken people will not fix our brokenness any more than having sex will fulfill our longing for intimacy. If it did, prostitutes and sex addicts would be the most fulfilled people on the planet. (I think we all agree that’s not the case.) But there is One to whom we belong, One who can heal our brokenness and fulfill our need for intimacy. It is the Spirit of God who hovers and makes us once again whole.

Remember the verse in Daniel 2, where the stone untouched by human hands becomes the mountain? This concept is echoed in the book of Isaiah:

There’s a day coming when the mountain of God’s House will be The Mountain—solid, towering over all mountains. All nations will river toward it, people from all over set out for it. They’ll say, “Come, let’s climb God’s Mountain, go to the House of the God of Jacob. He’ll show us the way he works so we can live the way we’re made.” Zion’s the source of the revelation. God’s Message comes from Jerusalem. (Daniel 2:2-3 Message)

God will show us the way he works so we can live the way we’re made. We were made for immovable, invincible intimacy that will not be dissuaded by our deepest longings or put off by our most primal fears. If we ask, he will show us the light of his goodness. Pause, ponder, and allow his light to quicken you.

Lisa Bevere is a New York Times bestselling author and internationally known speaker. Her previous books, which include "Fight Like a Girl", "Lioness Arising", "Girls with Swords", and "Without Rival", are in the hands of millions worldwide. Lisa and her husband John are the founders of Messenger International, an organization committed to developing uncompromising followers of Christ who transform their world. Bevere has spent more than two decades empowering women of all ages to find their identity and purpose. Her latest book, "Adamant: Finding Truth in a Universe of Opinions", released nationwide on April 17, 2018. You can get a copy of "Adamant" here.

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