LIBERATION

This is an article I wrote for an online publication a decade ago.

Liberation
by Gennee

When I came out as a crossdresser, I was liberated from what society says I’m supposed to be. I felt that I was completed as a transgender person.

There’s another liberation that I experienced many years earlier. When I confessed my sin to God, I asked Jesus to come into my heart. It was liberated from the control of sin and eternal damnation. During Jesus’ earthly ministry, He set people free from disease, blindness, despair, shame, fear of the future and religious dogma.

One of my concerns, when I came out, was how being transgender would affect my standing with Christ. He answered me one November day in an empty church when He embraced me as His child who happens to be transgender. It was part of his plan for my life.

Liberation is more than being set free from physical circumstances that are unpleasant. Jesus came to liberate our spirits too. We may be free, away from the things that bring distress and pain but are bound by shame, anger or bitterness. The inner turmoil from years of abuse may still paralyze us from living the life God has for us. I am reminded that it took nearly a century after independence for America to be free from the threat of attack from Britain.

Liberation means we no longer need to be victims. As transgender and gender-variant people, this can be a tall order. Long suppressed and demeaned by medical and religious institutions, we are rising up and declaring that we are God’s creation, too. We believe that God loves us as we are.

Transgender author Vanessa Sheridan states that ‘liberation is an essential, perhaps the essential element of the gospel of Jesus Christ for human beings and certainly for differently gendered human beings. It’s the whole purpose of the gospel- to free us from sin’s shackles.’ Sheridan states further that ‘Seeking personal spiritual liberation through the good news of Jesus Christ will help us to accept our responsibilities and benefits as gender-variant individuals, allowing us to more fully celebrate our transgender orientation and identity as the true blessings from God that they are.’

We need not be ashamed of who we are. Christ has liberated us from the shackles of sin, shame, and despair. We have been liberated from society demands that we conform to something that we’re not.