When a Wilde Man Weeps
Just visualize this true story as you read it aloud: A famous man lives a double life. While married with two children, he falls in love with a younger man and enters into a sexual relationship with him. The famous man lavishes the younger man with every whim of the young man’s heart, and the famous man later describes their intense union as the fruit of that love “which cannot speak its name.” Irate and unmanageable, the young man’s...
Read MoreThe Right Response: Christian teens embrace peer struggling with homosexuality
She shared her place on stage with a gleaming spotlight and flinched when a close-up of her face on a giant, tri-fold screen invaded her space even more. She cleared her throat, then shifted from her left foot to her right. She fumbled her words, then took the plunge–like a polliwog swimmer on her first attempt at diving. How do you tell a bunch of girls that you like GIRLS? “I’ve struggled with something for a long time,” she said, “but I just...
Read MoreWhen You Don’t Get a Do-Over
Ever been afraid of telling it like it is? Afraid of telling the truth because the would-be recipient was older, more experienced, or somehow more important than you were? After all, the old are supposed to lead the young, right? I know the feeling well, but one day God squeezed it out of me in a way that left his fingerprints all over me. My grandfather, Theodore Roosevelt Williams, a once robust man with a hearty, contagious laugh, lay stretched out in comatose silence in his hospital bed,...
Read MoreA Call to Biblical Manhood: Whose job is it to keep your pants up?
SOMEONE, help me with this–please! Just how responsible are women for maintaining the sexual purity of men? If you’ve ever been part of an institution that requires its girls or women to present themselves as if they’ve shopped at the mercantile and spruced up at the apothecary, you know what I mean. Is it true that men have no control over their bodies once their eyes are engaged in the art of seeing? Insecurity I do not condone padded...
Read MoreRelationships in The Wild: BUT-Kickers seminar, week 6
On Sunday we finished our BUT-Kickers seminar with one last look at “Relationships in the Wild.” And after six weeks of hanging out in the Book of Judges I was ashamed to admit I was still outraged over the heinous, unbridled acts of depravity found in its pages. Done with That I wanted to say I was over it–that with story after story about marred relationships between husbands and wives, between men and their sex slaves, between men and women, between men and men,...
Read MoreRelationships in The Wild: BUT-Kickers seminar, week 5
This week we discussed “Relationships in The Wild,” the only fitting name I could think of to describe the resolute craziness of events in Judges, chapter 19. Nothing new under the sun In this horror story, every type of relationship dynamic is explored, all in the context of anarchy–when Israel has no king, no judge, and no recognition of God as their leader. Culture and impulse rule, and the resulting savagery is enough to make our jaws drop, even now in the...
Read MoreWhen It’s Not Your Fault but You Pay the Price: But-Kickers seminar, week 1
Today we started a six-week But-Kickers seminar with a look at what happens when your life is shaken up by something you had nothing to do with. Perhaps you were not even present when the pivotal event occurred, yet you find yourself knee-deep in tragedy with no way out. Feel free to join us here if you can’t make the seminars in person. Our discussion starts with the story of a soldier and judge named Jephthah, and his daughter. You can meet them in Judges,...
Read MoreWhy Marriage is not for Virgins
Just recently on a clip from The Taste, a reality show based on a cooking competition, I heard Chef/Author Anthony Bourdain say that a dish served to him tasted like it had been prepared by someone who had never had sex. I applauded him for what he said. To sample food prepared by someone who has never gone beyond salt and pepper–who has never explored how the co-mingling of sweet and savory or how the overlapping of textures can light up a diner’s palate would...
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Sherry Boykin, the founder of Faith and Tales, LLC, is a storyteller and a chronic believer in the power of faith narratives to change lives. She loves to use biblical and personal accounts to help women move beyond their obstacles, glean fresh perspectives on life, and to live differently as a result. Her experiences in urban and suburban ministries, Peruvian Amazon jungle missions, long-term singleness, marriage & family, and men’s dorm-living shape her life and provide a colorful backdrop from which to share the Word of God.
Sherry is the author of BUT-KICKERS: GROWING YOUR FAITH BIGGER THAN YOUR BUT, and she has been featured in TIME, THE NEW YORK TIMES, and BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS.
