Conversations around mental health are often quiet or misunderstood in spiritual settings. This workshop will consider how faith and mental health intersect, and why addressing both is vital for a healthy church community.

Hartland Fall Convocation 2025: Engage Clarity Mode

<p>Conversations around mental health are often quiet or misunderstood in spiritual settings. This workshop will consider how faith and mental health intersect, and why addressing both is vital for a healthy church community.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Hartland Institute of Health and Education

Michael Carducci

Attacked On Purpose: Why Your Sexuality & Identity are Targeted First

Father in heaven, thank you Lord for this morning and this opportunity to get together and to not only to hear about some of the things that are going on in the world, why sexuality is under attack and why it's on purpose, but also Lord, I pray that you would help to inspire us with your Holy Spirit and help us to resolve some of the issues that are going on not only in our world, but in our homes and in our churches.

So I just ask Lord for your leading and guiding and we thank you for your Holy Spirit.

All right, so I wanna start off with workshop number 2, Attacked on Purpose.

Why your sexuality and identity are targeted first.

And so what we're gonna discuss a little bit is we're gonna talk about what's going on in the world.

Well, I don't know if you know, but I was an aerobics instructor and a hairdresser for over 20 years in the gay culture.

And so I tell people, you know, that's my history, and so I really prefer to get in touch with people, so this is really exciting to me.

What I wanna start off with is Genesis 1, verses 27 and 28.

It says, in the image of God, created he them, male and female.

And from this very simple Bible verse that Genesis starts off with, we find that God was very intentional and that the image of God was not only placed in Adam but also in Eve.

And I believe that this was done intentionally because the image of God was what God wanted to reproduce in the exclusive relationship between 1 man and 1 woman.

So in Genesis chapter 1 and verses 27 and 28, actually the image of God is really what's under attack with the LGBT issue, as well as sexuality and identity.

It's not just limited to the LGBTQ issue.

But what I wanna talk about is the fact that especially when Satan saw how God was creating Adam and Eve and this exclusive relationship, because the relationship, the sexual relationship, the bond of 1 man and 1 woman together represents the fullest image of God.

And so God is a creator, would you agree?

Okay, so As a creator, isn't that amazing that God has given this precious gift to 1 man and to 1 woman collectively together in a committed relationship to be a life giver also, to be a creator.

And so when we think about the process, even the angels cannot create life.

And we know that the angels were created higher than the humans.

So think about it for just a moment from Satan's perspective.

You know, you have God up here and then you have the angels here and then you have the humans here and the kids always remind me and then the animals underneath it.

So if you think about it for a minute, if God is up here and Satan is an angel, can angels create life?

And so imagine from Satan's perspective, how angry he was when God bypassed the angels and gave man the ability to create life.

Okay, so we can understand that Satan is going to attack any way he can the image of God because does he love or hate Jesus?

So anything that represents Jesus, the image of God, he's going to seek to destroy.

And so I use this very simple example to help illustrate what happens.

Because again, every male was created to be a father, every female was created to be a mother.

And so the devil is going to try to kill, steal, or to destroy this very precious gift that God has given to every man and to every woman.

So use this example, so when you put 2 female connectors together on an electrical cord, what do you get?

All right, so when you put 2 male pieces together on an electrical cord, what do you get?

So it takes a male and a female extension to put together.

But you know it's not just limited to the LGBTQ issue.

The devil is going to use anything that he can and nothing destroys the image of God more than sexual sin period.

Alright, so that includes masturbation, that includes pornography, it also includes fornication.

Anything that steps outside of the boundaries of what God created, sex between 1 man and 1 woman in a committed relationship, destroys the image of God.

Raise your hand if you hadn't heard that principle before.

So what I wanna talk about a little bit is that this also includes not only polyamory, but abortion, abortion destroys a precious life that God has created between that man and that woman.

Did you know that even divorce destroys the image of God?

Because God is a faithful lover, he has no other lovers, and he never leaves us nor forsakes us, as it says in John, right?

And so again, it's important to know that God has placed this fence around sexuality.

And I talked to the young people about that and you know when you think about this fence like why is it?

Why does God put this fence around sexuality?

Is it because he's God and he can tell us what to do?

You know is there a purpose in what he describes as right sexuality or is he just trying to cage us in and make us suffer, right?

Especially with young people, that's what's on their mind a lot.

And unfortunately, in our universities and institutions, many young men and women think that they can be sexually active if they're kind of connected to an individual or even engaged.

It's like, well, we're going to get married.

And so unfortunately in our Christian institutions, it is not considered sex to engage in oral or anal sex before marriage.

Now according to the secular world, it doesn't matter, it's a free for all, they'll just do anything that they can.

And what I've experienced when I've been speaking at our universities and our colleges is that many young people have compromised sexually.

And if they haven't compromised sexually, some of them have this distorted idea of what purity is.

And so for them, that they can engage in sexual acts even by themselves and still call themselves a virgin.

As a matter of fact, 1 young man confessed to me that he was actually using toys.

And that he said, well, I'm still a virgin, and I looked at this young man, and I said, what kind of a Christian woman would want to invest in a young man that might be inexperienced with other people, but is using different items to arouse himself sexually?

I go, you're not pure in the sense of what God wants every man and woman to be pure in.

And this is what we're finding in our world today.

In Isaiah chapter 14 and 12 and 15, we know that Lucifer, Satan, said, I will make myself like the most high.

And so imagine, again, you know, how upset he was when God bypasses, you know, the angels and gives a gift of procreation to man.

It says in John chapter 10 and verse 10, it says, the thief comes not but for to steal, to kill, and to destroy, but Jesus says, I am come that they may have life and that they may have it more abundantly.

So again, we know that the enemy is going to try to steal something away, but God wants you to experience intimacy on a full-blown level.

And 1 of the things that I share when I'm talking especially to young people is that sex was designed to give you the ultimate expression.

And unfortunately what has happened in the world that I lived in for the 20 years that I lived as a homosexual is that I had allowed the enemy to steal something precious away from me.

And that now sexuality has been distorted by the enemy, and you can imagine at a rapid rate, not only in our world, but now also in our church and in our schools today.

Every man and every woman has this precious gift to create life.

And I use the illustration, imagine when a mother looks into her baby's face and she says, wow, he's got my eyes.

And a father looks into his baby's face and he says, wow, she's got my nose.

God has given us this beautiful gift to be able to know what it's like to create life.

Raise your hand if you're a parent, right?

So that we have been given this gift to know what it is like to be a creator.

And unfortunately, from my perspective, I'm an old man and people remind me of that all the time.

As a matter of fact, I had to sign up for Medicare.

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Attacked On Purpose: Why Your Sexuality & Identity are Targeted First

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