We are bombarded by stories, songs and visions of what fulfilling relationships look like on TV, film, Spotify, social media and in books. We absorb the story they tell us about our sexuality and how it is to be enjoyed. That story shapes our hearts. “Swipe Up” invites us to hear God’s better story, how He offers a superior satisfaction and has a justifiably prior claim upon us. Jason honestly, humbly and personally tells that story through his own journey so that we, to use Ed Shaw’s words, “gaze upon God’s reality and His better love stories”.

There was a time when I lived a gay lifestyle, but that all changed, very gradually, when it became clear that God wanted me to live differently, as a celibate man. Through His grace, God has sustained me in that commitment. Now, looking back, I can see just how the Lord was working in my life...

Ernest Hemingway said, “Man’s destiny in the universe is like a colony of ants on a burning log.” Oh dear! It seems that all 7.7 billion of us on this planet are on a journey to nowhere. It sounds hopeless and really rather depressing, doesn’t it? But God (The most wonderful phrase in the English language!) has said differently in John 3 verse 16 and 17: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world but that the world through Him might be saved.”

New Monasticism is a diverse movement. It seeks to take the positive aspects of the monastic tradition from the past and apply them to life today. The intention is to become more like Jesus. It involves committing ourselves to living with people for a time that we don’t choose - in essence, trying to make a new family from strangers...

We all bring baggage with us when we approach Scripture. It might be personality quirks like introversion and self-reliance, or culturally conditioned philosophical concepts like individualism. These things act as static that we must try and tune out. When we do, we are better placed to hear what Scripture teaches on community...

This a beautiful story, very well told. Becket Cook tells the reader what it was like to be immersed in the gay lifestyle on the US West Coast, and how the world looks from that perspective: “I wanted everyone to be free to be who they were with wild abandon and without shame, completely comfortable in their own skin.”