When I was asked to give this testimony, and told that the theme was about accountability, I was instantly a bit nervous. As I was trying to work out what to say for this, I kept finding myself trying to avoid one particular aspect of my story. But I really felt God put it on my heart to write about. So, just to rip the bandage off right away, this testimony is about my struggle with pornography. I have been in recovery from a porn addiction for the last 4 years or so.

Accepting the need for accountability is a humbling step. None of us likes to think that we lack self-control. And we’d rather not have to talk about our private struggles with other people. When we read about the  misdemeanours of certain politicians, and even some church leaders, we long for them to be held to account.

True Freedom Trust is right to prioritise fellowship and community as ways for members to ensure that their faith walk keeps to the straight and narrow. There is no surprise here, since finding and keeping community are fundamentally scriptural (1 Cor. 1: 10; Heb. 10: 25; 1 John 1: 7, and many others). As we have seen in some of the other articles in this edition of Ascend, a key function of fellowship and community is accountability. As Christians, we need each other’s help identifying the course corrections urged by the Holy Spirit.

The “Being Human” team within the Evangelical Alliance has recently published their “Relationships Matter” course. It is aimed at encouraging Christians to explore and chat about the subject of sexuality within the culture we live in. Yes, a course inviting discussions about sex among Christians in an open and honest way! A subject that for many of us, perhaps, is quite personal and sometimes complex. Few of us will have heard it discussed deeply enough in our churches.

I was privileged enough to be born to Christian parents. They both are brilliant parents and brought me up in the faith. My father would read the Bible to me and my brothers every night, right until the end of primary school. I owe a large amount of my Bible knowledge to him and my mother. This knowledge has been really helpful as I have learned to deal with same-sex attractions (SSA), so I am incredibly thankful to my father for that.

In preparation for this article, I asked a number of members of TFT some questions about their mental health. I chose people who experience both same-sex attractions and had at least one mental health diagnosis. My questions explore how their mental health condition interacted with their same-sex feelings. Each person picked from my questions which ones they wanted to answer. My intention was particularly to share experiences with others, so that others who have similar blends of sexual temptations with mental health struggles might benefit from the experience and wisdom of others.