After I confessed my struggle with same-sex desires to a couple of my friends, I acknowledged that I could not fight this battle alone. If I was going to be victorious, I needed someone to come alongside me and help me. My two friends were very loving and gracious as I unburdened myself to them.

Enjoying God and experiencing satisfaction in Christ are exciting elements of the Christian life. In addition to enjoyment and satisfaction though, Paul makes this assertion in 1 Timothy 6:6: “But godliness with contentment is great gain”. It is easy to panic and find ourselves without any peace of mind. How can we possibly be content?

When asked to write this article I was forced to the realisation that I am a 30-year-old male choosing celibacy. That is probably relatively unusual. The teacher in me couldn’t resist loosely dividing this into three areas: what does it mean to be celibate, what can help us achieve that goal and why bother?