Older Brother Voices
I am continuing this series of posts where I share some of my journey as a follower of Jesus, coming out as a gay man and reflecting on the story of David and Goliath in 1 Samuel 17. If you are just tuning in, you might want to check out Part 1 and Part 2 of the Armor series. This is Part 3 where I talk about the voices that kept me in my ill-fitting armor. I timed this post at 10 minutes. Thanks for reading friends!
There is one way to read the stories contained in Scripture - where we celebrate the good guys and point fingers at the bad guys. The good guys are always right even when they are wrong, and the bad guys are wrong even when they make points worth considering. It's a decent way to get to basic principles that are introduced in the Text. And it works out fine if you don't think too hard about what is being said and done. Unfortunately, I am a heavy thinker - the kid in Sunday School class that secretly questioned the biblical heroes and empathized with the doubters. I won't go any further with that tangent cuz y'all know I LOVE talking about doubt!
There is another way to read Scripture that disrupts the simpler good guy versus bad guy comparison. This approach invites us to look at the characters as real people with an uncomfortable mix of good intentions and not so good impact. It allows us to envision women and men who, often with great reluctance, stumble into the story of God and find themselves standing only because of God's grace and action. Questions are both well-meaning and lacking some faith. Actions are both faithful and a bit reckless. And when we are honest, we see that the good guys aren't innately good and the bad guys are worth redeeming. One of the reasons I follow Jesus is because He constantly calls out the 'good guys' for their selfish ambition and affirms the 'bad guys' who have reasons to ask their questions. This is a part of David's story; and it is a part of mine as well.
When David’s oldest brother Eliab heard him talking to the soldiers, he got very mad at David. “Why did you come down here?” he said. “Who is watching those few sheep for you in the wilderness? I know how arrogant you are and your devious plan: you came down just to see the battle!” - 1 Samuel 17:28 CEB
In the good guy vs bad guy reading, David's older brother is angry, stubborn and lacking spiritual vision that would give him eyes to see that God was up to something in his little brother. If we go further, we could pin Eliab with motivations of jealousy, superiority and a resistance to change. In this reading, Eliab is not given the benefit of the doubt. This older brother is the bad guy so he needs to be canceled from the story. And maybe this is the best reading of this older brother voice since, as far as I can tell, we never hear of him again in Scripture.
But there is another way of listening to this older brother voice. One where we recognize nuances and tensions that make it more difficult to simply cancel him from the narrative. If I understand the story correctly, Eliab has trained for battle and probably devoted years to preparing for his role as a soldier. He possibly sacrificed a great deal to play the 'older brother' role; bought into the fighting tradition and felt it his duty to wear and live into the armor regardless of how it fit. Eliab possibly sees David as a disrupter; an overly ambitious kid who doesn't grasp the weight of all that has led to this battle with the Philistines. And further, he has probably experienced David's arrogance first hand and has come to expect that his motivations are not simply for the honor of God and Israel. I can imagine that Eliab stands speechless as he watches his little brother, armor-less and free of limitations, slay the giant that he and other soldiers cowered from just moments before. And maybe Eliab cancels himself out of God's story because he cannot get over the fact that God passed him over - with all his training, tradition and good intention - for the passion and inexperience of his younger brother. In this reading, Eliab's voice is in opposition to the voice that leads David to battle without armor; and we don't have to ignore that. But I don't want to cancel him out either.
In my twenties, I was deeply inspired by the older brother voices in my life. Some of these voices I saw almost daily. Others were met only in their books and newsletters, listened to at conferences or watched on DVDs. Whether near or far, I respected these people. I wanted their affirmation and blessing as I discovered my place in God's story and family. I wanted these people to be proud of me as I stepped out in faith and offered myself in service to God's Church. I wanted them to invite me into leadership and let me practice the gifts I believed God gave me.
And y'all - these older brother voices loved me. They fed me, encouraged me, mentored me and allowed me space to grow into the man I am today. And the tension I felt was would they continue to pour so much into me if they knew I was attracted to men? If I could not figure out a way to change or ignore my sexuality, would they banish me as unfit to join them on the battlefield? This was my fear - not the rejection of Jesus, but the rejection of the older brother voices. These were real fears because I saw it happen - sometimes by accident and other times with frightening intention. I did not want to lose my place in the story. I did not want to be kicked out of the family of God. I wanted to be on the frontlines of what God was doing in the world. So I threw myself into church work. I figured that if I could fill my life with as much Jesus-stuff as possible, there would not be any room for my gayness to show up. I endeavored to become the job, to have no identity outside of the church and no ambition that would lead me to away from other like-minded Christians. And I hoped that if I could somehow find a way to marry a woman, I could live my entire life with my true sexuality being a minor detail that would never be mentioned or seen.
This was the armor I wore. It did not fit. In fact, I acquired wounds that I am still healing from as a result of those years. I accepted false narratives about my life, gifts and future because I was essentially living someone else's life. When the 'real Derrick' would show up (and oh he did), I would punish myself for letting my humanity leak out from under the armor. The real Derrick was attracted to men and if anyone saw him, or thought he was sticking around, I would lose everything. So I kept the armor on. And it was the older brother voices in my life that, though well-meaning and doing their best, encouraged me to keep the armor on.
Now before we go canceling the older brother voices, I need to remind you that these people LOVED me and still do. They cheered for me and still do. And even in the midst of coming out publicly, many of them are trying to find a way to stand by me and hold in tension their traditional understanding of sexuality and marriage. I never told most of these people about the 'real Derrick' underneath the armor; so I never gave them a chance to love the real me. And to those I told, most of them lovingly leaned on the tradition as they understood it. Not all of the older brother voices get a pass, but most of them were doing their best to love me for better or for worse. I know there is a culture that cannot empathize with these older brother voices. Many of these older brothers have caused a great deal of pain and suffering with their learned tradition, rigid training and inability to see that God might be doing something new. The harm that has been caused needs to be named and stopped; even as we recognize the nuances of the sexuality debate. There will be older brother voices who will never accept that when the armor doesn't fit, you have to take it off. But not all older brother voices sound alike; and I am finding that if I give these folks I love and respect, and who love and cheer for me, a little space to see what God is doing in the lives of queer Christians, they very well could become the allies we've always wanted. Some will not want to stay in the story of armor-less and limitation-free warriors; but some are ready for the new chapter and don't want to be counted out too early.
That said, my older brother voices need to be reminded that they do not control the voice of Jesus in the lives of their younger siblings. As much I love the older brothers in my life, I will always follow Jesus' leading even when it means I have to say no to theirs. I have deep respect for the training and tradition that has given the family of God such a great foundation. And yet, it seems there is a new thing that God is doing and I am excited to be a part of it. I am grateful for the mentoring, encouragement and at times, wise correction from those who have cheered for me in my twenties and thirties. But I am no longer that 20 year-old naive kid who was nothing more than selfish ambition and immature passion. I have fought lions and bears that you know nothing about; I have experienced the affirmation of God in ways that I cannot ignore. And as I have allowed the truth of who I am in Jesus as a gay man to free me from the armor that did not fit, I have found that I always had a role in God's story, a place in Jesus' family, and a seat at the table of the Redeemed. I can't make my older brothers stay in the story I am in; and at some point, I have to set my sights on the giant in front of me and leave those who oppose the voice of Jesus in my life to stand and watch. At the end of the day, we must all do the things that we believe Jesus is asking us to do and trust that God will be glorified in the story told by our courage and faith.
In May 2020, I came out as a gay man who follows Jesus. I talked about my journey using the story of David and Goliath and the image of armor that doesn't fit. Take Off the Armor is currently a 9-part series, starting with the first set of posts where I went public with my sexuality, talked about my adolescent depression, acknowledged the "older brother" voices, confessed to my own silence and hiding, and pointed to much more interesting things about me. I followed up a few months later with three posts outlining the things I did to prepare to come out: I got a therapist, I found my people, deepened my trust in Jesus. My last update was a posted in May 2021. Thanks for reading, friends!