Born Gay, Born Again — Identity, Faith, and Freedom

How do two pastors go from believing they were born gay to experiencing transformation in Christ?

In this episode of The Blind Exorcist, I sit down with Pastors Reginald Robinson Jr. and Zaire Willis, authors of Born Gay, Born Again: A Journey of Identity, Faith, and Freedom, to explore how their different life experiences shaped their understanding of identity, sexuality, and faith.

This is not a one-size-fits-all story.

Zaire’s testimony includes childhood sexual abuse, early exposure to pornography, and early experiences that significantly influenced his development and sense of self.

Reginald’s story is different. Raised in a loving, God-fearing home, he experienced early social labeling and misunderstandings about his mannerisms that shaped how others saw him — and how he eventually saw himself.

Together, their stories challenge the assumption that there is a single path into same-sex attraction and open a broader conversation about identity, trauma, and lived experience.

📌 In this episode, you’ll discover:

✅ Why same-sex attraction doesn’t have just one root
✅ How social labels and early experiences shape identity over time
✅ The difference between gender expression and sexual identity
✅ Why many churches feel unprepared for these conversations
✅ What it looks like to wrestle honestly with identity through faith

 If you’ve ever faced confusion about your identity or wrestled with questions from your past, this episode invites you to go deeper — beyond surface-level labels and into the roots that shape who we become.

📖 Get the book here
https://www.amazon.com/Born-Gay-Again-Journey-Identity/dp/1636415830/

🌐 Ministry and support resource: Brand New You (BNY) — 8-week faith-based support program for men
https://bnymen.com/journey

Transcript

Welcome and Why This Conversation Matters

Justin 0:07

Hello, my friend. Welcome back. Thank you for tuning in yet again to the Blind Exorcist Podcast. I'm Justin D. Your host, and we are up to episode 44. And today I have an outstanding episode to present to you. You ready? I sit down with Pastor Reginald Robinson Jr. and Pastor Zahir Willis. These two pastors are ex-homosexuals, and they've come out with a book called Born Gay Born Again. I have a link to purchase the book in the show notes, and I do not get any financial kickback whatsoever. So this isn't some link that gives me commission on referring you guys. I have these guys on this show because I believe in their mission. It's amazing. So I encourage you to grab a copy of this. I mentioned this right up front because everything we discuss in this interview can be applied to any area of sin in your life that you struggle with. But June, as we all know, is Pride Month. And so I wanted to get this out during June from a heart of compassion and understanding so that people can begin to think through what we discuss here during this interview. There's so much here. The value of the content is outstanding. For example, how when a man is born with feminine mannerisms, how society classifies him automatically as gay. And so through childhood and teen years, you're constantly told you're gay, you're gay. But in reality, that's been put on you. You weren't born gay just because you have a feminine presentation. There is a key difference between gender expression, like a feminine presentation, and gender sexuality, a key difference. We get into so many topics that are deep like this. Pastor Reginald and Pastor Zair also have an eight-week intensive program for men. You can sign up for it on their website in the show notes. There's a link to their website. Also in this month of June in Atlanta, Georgia, they are having a conference. You can look on their website. They're having a two-day BNY con. This is what they're calling it. BNY is brand new you conference. So they'll be there sharing, encouraging, inspiring, teaching, instructing. There'll be book signings there if you want to grab their book. This is just cool. This is an amazing resource because the Western Church isn't really prepared to help people struggling with homosexuality. We talk about this during the interview. Now, I've shared enough here. I just want to get into the interview. So as I always say, buckle up, let's go. Zahir, Reginald, welcome to the Blind Exorcist.

Reginald 4:00

Hey, thank you so much for having us.

Justin 4:02

I'm excited. I'm very excited. I'm hoping that this can help bring clarity to a lot of people who struggle with this, whether they're actively involved in a homosexual relationship or are tempted by it all the time.

Zaire 4:18

Yeah, yeah.

Justin 4:19

So, Zaheer, let's start with you. On my podcast, I always start in childhood, the

Zaire — Childhood Trauma and Sexual Abuse

Justin 4:26

traumas and so forth. What was your childhood like? Did you have a mom, dad? Tell me a little bit about the dynamics of your childhood.

Zaire 4:35

Yeah, so I was raised by a single mom. My dad was in my life. I spent a lot of time with my mom at the time, up until around nine years old when I moved with my dad. Growing up as a child, I was with my mom a lot. I would have visits with my dad up until I got a little older. And then I moved with my dad. I would say they were both pretty active growing up, but there was a lot of dysfunction in my childhood. My father was a drug addict. He was addicted to crack cocaine. My mother at the time was an alcoholic. They both are now free of that addiction and no longer struggle there. But it was definitely a part of my childhood and the dysfunction that I had growing up. At the same time, I was molested twice, one at three years old, one at seven years old. I was exposed to pornography at a very young age. And so I say all the time, by the time I was seven and I was molested by the 19-year-old family friend, I was so hypersexualized by that point that I thought it was consensual. I thought it was a transactional type of exchange until I got to therapy when I was 25 years old. And the therapist let me know you were abused. And I didn't understand it like that because again, by the time I was seven years old, I was already very much sexualized and having sexual experiences with neighborhood kids and people that I'd be around my mom's friend's kid and stuff like that. And so it was hard to understand that what felt like what I wanted was abuse. And so from then on, the rest of my childhood, it really was it was like living in two worlds. I say all the time, I'm a church baby through and through. I love church, I love God, I always have. I was the kid who I was involved in almost everything. I was on the choir, I was in the audio ministry, the dance team, you know, all of the things. And also when prophets and pastors would come in, they would always say, You're gonna preach, you're gonna prophesy, you're gonna do these great things in the kingdom. But on the other end, since a very young age, I struggled with homosexuality and same-sex attraction and hypersexuality, and that would mark this double life, this in and out, but would mark my childhood.

Justin 6:54

Zayer, I think you bring out a very important point, which is as a child, when somebody is sexually abused, it feels good to that child, right? Sexuality feels good. So our minds adopt the idea that this is consensual, and it's not. Yeah. And so we are fed this lie that it's consensual, you love it, you like it, and Satan's right there the whole time. And I mention this often on the podcast that demons are transferred through any type of sexual trauma, whether it's molestation, whether it's rape, they are transferred to us and they have appetites. And those demons are gonna push us toward what they're hungry about. I'm very sorry to hear about the trauma you went through. That's terrible. And many people can relate to living a double life going to church. So I think that's very powerful. I appreciate your honesty. I know

Reginald — Labeled Gay Before He Understood It

Justin 7:55

that's resonating with a lot of people. Reginald, let me come over to you. Tell us about your family. What was your childhood like? Did you have a mom, dad, siblings? Tell us a little bit about that. What's that look like for you?

Reginald 8:10

I was born in a little town called Pritchard, Alabama. And I was born to a two-parent household. My mother, till this day, is one of the most beautiful, loving, precious women that I've ever met. God-fearing, a prayer warrior. She worked really hard to provide for us. And she'd do anything for anybody. She was just that kind of woman. My father, he was present as well. He was a guy in the military. And so he was disciplined. He had a great personality, a huge laugh. He was the uncle that made space for me and my cousins to get together to go fishing and do several activities together. He was that guy that called him Uncle Red. I had two older sisters, and we were close. We fought like siblings fought, but we were definitely a close-knit set of siblings. And then I had a grandmother who was very active in my life. She was present, she was always there. I didn't live a life where I had to question whether or not I was loved. I knew that I was love at a young age. The issue was that I was, I started to notice that I was different. I noticed that people would start calling me this word, and I didn't know what the word was, but I knew that this word was not anything that anyone would want to be called. And that word was gay. They would say you're gay. They would say, Why are you walking like that? Why are you talking like that? Why do you hold your hands like that? And I didn't know I was talking like that. I didn't know I was walking like that. I didn't subscribe to it. I didn't ask for it. And so the only way that I knew that this was happening was because people were saying this about me. And it was something that I was fighting to run away from, but I couldn't. I tried to change the way that I sounded, but with answer phone and I would always sound like my sister, I would try to change the way that I walk. But if the teacher would call me up to the front of the class, it would be a nightmare because I knew that everyone would look at the way that I was walking and I couldn't change it. I couldn't fix it. And on another level, while all of this is happening, oh, wait, let me go back. We were a God-fearing family as well. My grandfather was a deacon at the church. We went to church every single Sunday. It wasn't just a Sunday event, it was culture for us. I was at Vacation Bible School, Sunday school. I was that youth that was involved in everything, youth Sunday school superintendent, extremely active. And I loved God and I loved church. I loved to sing, I loved everything about it. I was the one that made sure that everybody got up so that we could get there because I loved it. But while all of this is happening, different people are calling me gay. And then at the same time, other things had begun to happen. At a single-digit age, I had a memory unlocked in my adult years where I recall myself being under the bed performing sexual acts with a female relative. And then some years later, playing around with a male relative, and we are wrestling, and all of a sudden, something is happening. I don't know what it is. I don't know what to call it, but I knew it wasn't right. And it was actually the act of sex. From there, many doors begin to open. There were guys in the neighborhood that were around my age. We play, and then that cute, then at some point, sexual curiosity began to come into play. There were older athletic guys who were there that I would want to play with me. And in order for them to play with me, I would have to do them a favor. And that favor ended up being some type of sexual act. There was an older guy who was about my father's age. All of a sudden, he started to come around, and that relationship turned into something. There was an associate pastor of a church that I was connected to, and that relationship turned sexual. And it just continued to evolve. My grandmother would go to her friend's house. And while she was at the friend's house, they would play cards and they would drink, and they would be in the front, and all of the kids would be in the back. And we couldn't come to the front unless we had an emergency. And so the kids were left in back rooms, doing things that we shouldn't have been doing, touching, filling, playing house, girls with boys and boys with boys, experimenting. This thing was all around me. And so I had a dualism of a life, even as a child, loving God, having a God-fearing family, but being different, being called gay, and on top of that, being exposed to sexual activity. By the time I got in high school, most of the things that I just mentioned had already happened. And so this was pretty much my childhood. It was pretty tough because I really did love God. There was no help. There was no, nobody ministered about it. If it was brought up, it was brought up as an abomination. It was brought up as sin, which I do agree, but there was no discipleship. There was no way out. There were no witnesses. There was no testimonies. And so it just kind of left me to feel isolated and to wonder if this is something that I'm going to have to live with for the rest of my life. This is something that God can truly deliver me from. And that just ushered me into a man living in two worlds, which we now call living on the down low. And so I didn't subscribe to it. I didn't sign up for it. I didn't ask for it. But I found myself living in those two worlds.

Justin 13:48

Yeah, and that's really tough, Reginald, because both of you guys had a heart for the Lord and to be living this double standard and all of this trauma happening and no support. That's what's really tough because if there was the concept of deliverance ministry, you could have had help, the therapy as well. And you had a target on your back. Both of you men did. And so when Satan targets us, it's very strategic and it's planned. It's not random. So he knew by studying your ancestry, studying your family structure, what was going to work to isolate you from God and destroy you. For some, that isolation is drugs, pornography, whatever. It's all about isolating us from God and making us feel shame so we can't really connect with Him and have that flourishing Christian relationship with Jesus Christ that we should have. I tell people after my deliverance sessions, I actually feel like I was born again for the first time. Because it was like I had dark clouds over my head, and here and there they would part, dark clouds meaning the demons, and I would feel the sun hit my head, the Holy Spirit, so to speak, right? And that just happened here and there. But after deliverance and after healing and therapy, those clouds were fully removed, and the sunshine is shining on me all the time. I can feel God's presence. I'm close to him, right? I have intimacy with him. I never had that before. And so,

Society's Mislabeling — Gender Expression vs. Sexuality

Justin 15:46

Reginald, you mentioned about being born and having some feminine attributes. That's very common. And I think it's a misconception for people, especially in our American culture, that you're gay or you're lesbian.

Zaire 16:02

Yeah.

Justin 16:03

My daughter is younger and she has a friend that's masculine. And we were talking about it one day, and she said, Oh, she's a lesbian. Not in a mean way. She just, this is fact, this is the way it is. She's she's a lesbian. Just because she's masculine. And I challenged her on that. And I said, No, that's not the case. Right. What are your thoughts on that, Reginald?

Reginald 16:26

Absolutely. There is a difference between gender expression and sexual orientation. And we have to be careful with that, especially when we're looking at people who are still developing children. And even with adults, but I'm going to say, especially for children, because I'm sure this young lady, she's heard it several times before. People call her gay. I like I like to say that gay was ministered to me. I had heard it so many times. And so because I have the feminine tendencies, everybody is talking about it, and you're calling me gay. And God forbid there be the other layer of sexual exploitation, sometimes it's ministered to an individual. So for me, I feel that I didn't have an opportunity to choose because everybody kept calling me gay. And so I finally just questioned, are they right about it? Is this true? Maybe it's who I am. And then when it came to relationships, no guy really wanted to hang with me because I was feminine. Now, of course, I had friends, I had cousins, I did have people, but just like the average boy, I didn't have average guys just being willing to be around and to hang around. And that all also went into relationships with females. Some of them did not want to date me because of the way that I walked or the way that I talked or because of what everybody else was saying or what everybody else was thinking. So all of these things are really playing a part that if the person like this young lady is not necessarily homosexual, but just has masculine tendencies, the environment cultivates the manifestation of the lifestyle. Some people don't really have just an opportunity to think and choose for themselves because society has already chosen for them. And so we have to be careful when it comes to individuals who may be, the scripture calls it malacos, where they a man might be soft or a woman may be masculine, to not label and assume because in our cohort, we have a mentorship program called Brand New You, where we walk with these guys. And in that mentorship program, we realize that it's a dynamic range of individuals. There's some guys who are like myself that and Pastor Zaire who were oversexualized at a young age, but there's some who may be feminine presenting, but have never had sex. Their main issue is dealing with the fact that they are extremely feminine first, and then other things that are associated with that or sometimes labeled on them. So I think that's an incredible question. And I think we got to be careful at our dinner tables. I think we have to be careful in our private gatherings about what we say. And even if we don't say it in front of the individual, words are powerful. And so we walk in the room, we can feel it. We can feel what you say it. We can feel that we're different from it. You can be smiling and greeting, but there's something about the environment that we create. The body language, too. Yeah, all of that, man. It really says something. So I think it's a powerful question and it's something that we must address.

Justin 19:44

Yeah, and I think culturally, it's how different it would be if people, in your case, Reginald, with more of a feminine presentation, if people wouldn't immediately classify that as gay, you could tap into that in a powerful way, in a productive way in society, whether it's arts, music, like 100%. You know what I mean. So and so this could all been avoided if people would have positively supported you in your presentation of femininity and and tap that in. Yeah, so it's kind of like a parallel to that, it's kind of like me being blind, right? I did not have the supports put in place when I lost my eyesight. I lost my eyesight at 17 from type 1 diabetes. And my parents, they were Christians, and they're just like, Jesus is gonna heal you. So they never put me through cane training, mobility training, braille, no orientation, nothing. I was unprepared for life. Yeah, and so in many ways, you guys were unprepared for life too. But once I went through the training, if they would have plugged me into resources up front, yeah, in my younger years, yeah, this may not have happened to you.

Zaire 21:03

Yeah.

Justin 21:03

Or Zaheer. So, Zaheer, let me come back over to you. So you go through all this in your

Zaire — Spiritual Abuse, College, Drug Addiction, and the Double Life

Justin 21:34

childhood. Your young adult years, like late teens, 18 up through 25, what did that look like for you?

Zaire 21:42

Yeah, my my young adult years were they were spent again living in this double world. I want to back up to 13 or 14 in order to give some context quickly for my 18 to the 20s. By the time I was 13 or 14, I felt like I was finally ready, and not just finally ready because I enjoyed it, but I was I got some courage to be ready to come out of this lifestyle and seek help. And so I asked a my bishop at the time, we had an altar call, and I went up and told him that I was struggling with homosexuality and I wanted to be free. And from that point would ensue years of spiritual abuse. Because of that spiritual abuse, I chose to just run away from the church at this point. So I'm between 13 and 16, I'm feeling like. Like God hates me, I hate me, my pastor hates me, everybody hates me, and I have nowhere to go for help. I I try to, you know, they say to confess your sins. I've tried that, you know, submit under leadership. I've tried that. And at this point, it just feels like nothing is helping. I'm repenting and I'm praying, and there's no help from anyone, or even at this time, it seemed like from the Lord. And so I run away. I get into football. I'm playing football. And so now I'm 18. I go to college. I'm on a football scholarship. And on the outside, things look great. I look like I am succeeding. But the reality of it is, this has been the reality of my life since I was a child. On the outside, things looked good. I was able to perform, but on the inside, I'm still struggling. I'm still dying. I'm still hungering for help and not able to find any. And so between the ages of 18 and 22, I am in college. I am playing football. And again, on the outside, I look good. I look successful. But what many didn't know was that I was now not only struggling with homosexuality and my identity and same-sex attraction and sexual addiction and pornography and masturbation as if that wasn't enough. I am now also battling drug addiction. I was addicted to marijuana for many years of my early adulthood to the point where I would smoke 17 blunts a day just to quiet my mind. I've also tried any drug that doesn't require a needle. I've done LSD, acid, Molly, cocaine, anything that I can get my hands on, pills to try to numb and silence my mind. I believe it's the grace of God that I wasn't able to become addicted to harder drugs because both of my parents are addicts, and that's just in my bloodline. And so I believe it's just the grace of God that He allowed me to try these things, but not become extremely addicted, minus the marijuana. And so that's my early childhood. I'm playing football. I'm in college. At this time, I'm still preaching. I'm still leading worship when I go home during the summers. I'm all of these things, but for my entire life, I've lived this double life. I've learned how to put it on in public while secretly dying in private. And at this time, it felt like that was my only choice. In order to survive living, I had to live this double life because I tried not to. I tried to ask for help. I tried to put light on it, and I couldn't. And so I felt that I was just relegated to the living of this double life. And so it felt like it wasn't a choice that I had. Now, yes, of course, I knew it was wrong and all of the things, but I didn't know what else to do. And so from 18 through to my 20s, that was my life. I got married really young. I got married when I was 22 years old and I stopped there. I don't know, I don't know where else we're going to go, but that's the 16 to 22 range of my life.

Justin 25:26

First of all, thank you for your honesty, man. And there's a lot to unpack here. First of all, the church fails you and you go through spiritual abuse. I think that's something that really stuck out to me. And I think it's very common for people in churches. And a lot of people can't recognize that they're going through spiritual abuse. Absolutely. Which is the rejection of leadership, the harshness, no compassion, and so forth, and rejection from members in the congregation, and this is all types of spiritual abuse. So in your case, Zahir, you are like, I'm out. Yeah. And and and who can blame you, right? This is these are supposed to be the people to help you. Absolutely. And so you have trauma wounds, they're bleeding.

Zaire 26:21

Yeah.

Justin 26:21

And I tell people this all the time on the show, you're gonna self-medicate somehow, all each of us, myself included, right? Before I got cleaned up and came to the Lord, I self-medicated through drugs and liquor and and and and you were doing the same because there's pain there. And not only that, the devil makes you feel trapped. He's having all kinds of fun in your head, right? Because you're supposed to be a Christian and you're drawn to this homosexual lifestyle, and you're living a double life. But here's my question to you listening are you living a double life? Because it doesn't have to be homosexuality. Many Christians, Zahir, live a double life.

Zaire 27:06

Yeah, absolutely.

Justin 27:07

And in my personal opinion, it's because part of the problem is there is no support in our churches, proper support for people really going through trauma. Not that the church has to be therapists, but they have to have that compassion and willingness to walk with someone down the long journey because recovery takes time and there's going to be relapse. Yeah, so they're like either you want free or you don't. That's it. You mess up. Oh, he doesn't want free. We tried to help him, wash our hands of him, and move on, right? It's just life is not that simple.

Zaire 27:52

Yeah.

Justin 27:53

People take a lot of time to walk through healing.

Zaire 27:57

Absolutely.

Justin 27:58

And so thank you for sharing that with us here, man. I appreciate that. And there's just so much there. I know it's touching people, even who may not be homosexual, right? And so a lot of people live in pain because in Western churches we're taught that Christians can't have demons. So obviously, if you are drawn to homosexuality, well, then that's just you, period. Yeah. That's your sinful nature. You love it, you're going after it, that's you. You're a failure. You're doing a terrible job. That's you. Are you even a Christian? This type of crazy talk coming out of these pastors, and it's no. If they understood that Christians could be tormented through demons and understood trauma needing time and healing, I think that would go a long way. What do you think, Reginald?

Reginald 29:08

No, man, I think that's powerful. I love to quote the scripture of the lepers when they come to Jesus and ask to be healed, and Jesus tells them to go and show themselves. And the problem was that they were not healed when they first set out to obey God and to follow the instructions of Jesus. The healing had not manifested yet. But the Bible says as they went, they were healed. And I believe sometimes we have an idolatry for a type of deliverance for ourselves and for others. And if people don't fit the bill of the type of deliverance that we think it should be, then we we count it towards the individual and say that individual just doesn't want to be saved or that individual just doesn't want to live right, not realizing, man, this is a journey. And I believe that iniquity is, I believe it's unraveled through a process of tell I'm sorry to interrupt.

Justin 30:04

Tell us about that, the sin, the sins, iniquity. I heard you talk. Was that you talking about that on the YouTube? I was tell us about that. That's so good.

Reginald 30:12

Yeah, so it's such a powerful revelation from the Holy Spirit. But we like to say it this way: there is sin,

Sin, Iniquity, and How Patterns Are Passed Down

Reginald 30:19

there are sins, and there is iniquity. Sin is the sin nature, it is the slave master, it is what we all inherited due to the fall of Adam and Eve. We are, David gives a glimpse. He says, I was born into sin and shaping an iniquity. And I just believe that because of the fall of man, that God didn't design us this way, he didn't make us this way, but because of the fall, we're born into the sin nature. That sin nature has then sin expressions, which are the offspring of that sin nature. Those expressions vary. Those expressions could be lying, it could be the spirit of gossip, it could be anything, including homosexuality. I often say we didn't get a chance to go to the sin market and choose which sin we wanted. And culturally speaking, for most of us, we definitely would not have chosen the sin that we inherited. And so that sin expression is an offspring of that sin nature. And it is passed down. Sometimes it's the same, but sometimes it's just the fact that sin is in the bloodline that causes the sin to be passed down, which is what we call iniquity. So, for example, Adam's sin was eating of the fruit, but then he had children. Of those children were Cain and Abel, and we see that Cain's sin was murder. And so it wasn't the exact same sin, but we saw that sin nature was there, and those sin expressions were birthed out of that sin nature. And then with the iniquity, this is the deep impression of sin. This is the patterns and the cycles of sin, cycles that we see. So though the sin might not be the same, the cycles may resemble. For example, my father, when I got a little bit older, I heard some of my cousins joking around talking about my father. And I'm listening. And here is where I realized that my father was addicted to crack. I didn't know he was functional for the most part. It was after that I began to see his decline due to his addiction to crack cocaine. Now, my father was addicted to crack, but I've never even really smoked weed, right? I don't, I'm not a drinker. He was an alcoholic as well. I'm not a drinker. I don't smoke. That was not my issue. But homosexuality and sexual perversion, that was definitely my sin expression. Now, iniquities is not just the actual sin, but it's the bend, it's the pattern. So I noticed with my father, his father was not present in his life. His brother left for several years and really wasn't connected to him. And so he dealt with a lot of loneliness. And so to cope with that loneliness, anytime that he would feel this, he would go and try to self-medicate with his sin expression. And so the iniquity is not necessarily the exact same sin, but I do call it sins passed down from your mom and your dad, because these are sins that represent the pattern that drive us into our own sin expressions. And iniquities must be dealt with because Jesus says, many will come to me on that day and say, Did not cast out demons and do all of these wonderful works in your name. And he'll say, Depart from me, you worker of iniquity. And so that must mean that iniquity is very important to God, and it's very important that we unravel iniquity. And again, it is unraveled over time through discipleship, through sanctification, through walking with the Lord, community and accountability. This is how we unravel iniquity. And now to what you said earlier.

Justin 34:07

Oh,

Deliverance as a Journey — Not a One-Time Fix

Justin 34:07

bro, go on with it. Go on. Go on. This is people hear me harping about this all the time. The quick fix. Go ahead.

Reginald 34:15

Yeah. And I do believe that God could do a miraculous work. And I think it's a disservice to us to idolize or to see deliverance in this one way. Because for a person like myself and like many who might be listening today, we went to the altar several times. Nobody went to the altar more than me. Nobody. Any church I've ever went to, they would tell you I got red hair, right? And they'll tell you that red-haired boy was always at the altar. He was always shouting, and I'm believing God for deliverance. I'm crying out, real tears are flowing. My heart is contrite before the Lord. But I would get up and still feel the same pool because the type, because what I believe deliverance was supposed to look like, it didn't look like. We serve a God who is a God of journey. And I think He appreciates journey. It develops a relationship, it develops. And yes, so deliverance is not just a one day, one time at the altar moment. It can happen. We can uh have levels of breakthrough, but this is a lifelong journey and walking with the Lord.

Justin 35:20

Amen, bro. Here's the thing I tell people is that can that quick deliverance style at an altar work for some people? You know, it might get a rid of maybe a porn addiction or fear or something light like that, but it doesn't account for a person's history. Yeah. They don't know, for example, Sally was molested at three by her father.

Reginald 35:47

Right.

Justin 35:47

They don't know Sally was involved in a lesbian relationship. They don't know that she was into witchcraft. So there's none of these knowns. When I do deliverance with people, I actually have an intake questionnaire that I have people fill out with 30 questions so I could really deep dive their life, their trauma. The type of deliverance that I use goes very deep and it's very specialized because I work with an understanding of trauma, if that makes sense. So to your point, there are different styles of deliverance. They all work toward the kingdom of Jesus Christ. They're all good, but there is not just one style of deliverance that works for everybody. So I just wanted to ditto you on that. Go ahead.

Reginald 36:39

Yeah, and I just want to add to it, you know, we're coming up, coming up on Pentecost Sunday. I don't think anybody experienced the power of God in the way that they experienced on that day. But even still, after that, they weren't just made whole through that one encounter. The Bible says that they gather daily, even after encountering the power of the Holy Spirit, I believe probably one of the most potent experiences and expressions of the Holy Spirit in the human encounter, but they still had to devote themselves to the apostles' teaching, to prayer, to break and bread, to fellowship, because I believe that healing comes in community. God commands a blessing in community, deliverance comes in community. It comes with accountability, and it's not just a one-time thing.

Justin 37:27

Amen. Paul writes about this all the time. Put off the old nature, put on the new nature. Paul talks about this all the time about us going through this healing journey. And again, I just go back to how westernized Christianity they want a quick fix.

Zaire 37:47

Yeah.

Justin 37:47

They don't want to, I wouldn't say they don't want to, but they're not trained to spend quality time.

Reginald 37:55

Yeah. And that's discipleship.

Justin 37:57

Exactly. And discipleship a year, two years, yeah, maybe three years, depending on the actual person that you're working with and mentoring. It costs you to be a pastor. Yes. It costs you to be in ministry because you have to take a long road of healing. There are no quick fixes in life.

Zaire 38:19

Yeah.

Justin 38:20

A lot of Christian books are here's the seven steps to overcoming X, whatever X is, right? You just read this book and do these formula and boom, you're free. I wish it was that easy.

Reginald 38:36

Man oh man. Yeah. Man oh man. And again, this is so important because I know if you're anything like me, and I've heard Pastor Zaire share testimony about this, you can deeply love God and still be wrestling with the pool or having areas in your life that you need to be

Relapse, Shame, and What Real Freedom Looks Like

Reginald 38:52

healed from and feel guilty about it, or feel shame, feel condemnation. And there's no condemnation to those who walk in Christ Jesus. And so it's important for us to just remember to continue on the journey.

Justin 39:04

Amen. And I always tell clients that I work with, I'll just pick one example. There's many, but one would be pornography. And I'll tell them, I'll say, look, you're in a healing journey. Yeah. Chances are you're gonna look at porn again.

Zaire 39:17

Yeah.

Justin 39:17

Okay.

Zaire 39:18

Yeah.

Justin 39:18

You've been delivered, we got rid of the demons, but your psychological pathways have been reinforced over and over and over.

Zaire 39:27

Yeah.

Justin 39:27

Your pleasure center, your endorphins, all of this has been reinforced over years. So I tell them there's a big difference between fighting and resisting and praying to Jesus and then yielding to the temptation and repenting. That's one case scenario, right? That's entirely different than someone sitting at work and contemplating and saying inside of themselves, I can't wait to get home, get on my phone, get to this video and watch it four times and just compulsively masturbate. I can't wait. And so God looks at the intention of the heart. And I think that's another black and white negative thing in Western Christianity is that when you're free, you're 100% free. That's it. You're never going to stumble again. And if you do, then you're not a Christian. No, I wish life was that easy. It's not. So I always encourage clients that I work with listen, ma'am, if you mess up, repent, Romans 8, confess your sins, he's faithful and just to forgive you of them and to cleanse you from all unrighteousness. You're not willfully and intentionally wanting to do this.

Reginald 40:42

Absolutely.

Justin 40:43

So when you fall off of the bike, I just I use a bike analogy. I tell him, I say, it's like riding a bike. You're gonna ride great for a while, hit a bump and fall off. You're gonna repent, dust your butt off, get back on the bike, and keep pedaling. I say, whoever makes it to the end is those who get up and repent and get back on the bike. Those who don't make it sit in self-pity and say, I'm not gonna make it. Right? So to your point, I think it's important for people, no matter what healing journey you're on, you're gonna have a little bit of relapse at times. And that doesn't mean you're not a Christian, it means you're human.

Reginald 41:24

Absolutely. Yeah. One of my favorite scriptures says, and having a readiness to revenge all disobedience. How do you revenge your disobedience? It's not shame, it's not guilt, it's not heaviness, but it's when your obedience is fulfilled. In other words, the only way that you can revenge the life that you once live or a relapse is just by getting up and obeying, getting up and doing the work will and the word of the Lord. And so I think this is encouraging. I wish you had a global megaphone to say this because in Christian culture, and even some popular figures don't seem to understand that deliverance is a process and a journey. And I just think it's a disservice to so many believers in the body of Christ who are sincerely seeking God to live right and for holiness.

Justin 42:15

Amen. Amen. Excellent. So here I'm gonna come back over to you. And so you're through your mid-20s, and Reginald, I'm gonna come to you with this question as well. Okay. When did you come to the point where you really came to the crossroads of I need out of this, I'm done. And how did you get freed up from the lifestyle

Zaire — Marriage, Breaking Point, and the Road to Healing

Justin 42:42

of homosexuality?

Zaire 42:44

Yeah, my journey looked a lot about looked a lot like what you guys were just talking about. Tons of relapse and getting up and just trying to figure out what life looked like and how to navigate it without anyone there to disciple me or to talk to me or to give me tips and guidance on how to live this life. And so I think I ended by saying that I got married at 22. And so married my wife. And for the first three years of my marriage, I think things are great. I'm not having any type of sex outside of my marriage. I'm not looking at porn, I'm not masturbating. But there was something happening in my prayer time, in my time with the Lord. And I would spend three, four, and five hours just praying and lamenting and repenting from a life that I wasn't living. And so I wasn't actively engaged in homosexuality. I was actively crucifying my flesh with its desires, as the Bible says, but I spent hours repenting from it, hours repenting from the porn masturbation, and it wasn't a life that I was living. And that would go on for three years. I was tormented by it so much so that my wife would get nervous. I had a whole prayer room and everything, and she would get nervous when I would go in to pray because I would come out depressed. I would come out tormented because I didn't have an understanding of what freedom was. Again, just as you guys were talking about. And I think one of the greatest misconceptions is that freedom means that you'll never be tempted again. And I think the church preaches that homosexual people are people who struggle with same sex attraction, that they're not free if they don't have, if they still have an attraction to a man and you're a man, or attraction to a woman and you're a woman. And we just don't, we don't believe that. We believe that freedom is the ability to Choose and say no to something that you once couldn't say no to, choose a different path that you wouldn't have chosen before. And so because I didn't have this framework, I thought that because I still had an attraction that I was actively laying before the Lord and resisting, that I wasn't free. And this would drive me into repentance. And no, I'm not physically doing it. No, I'm not living this life, but I do notice that I still have an attraction. I still have a temptation. And because of that, I felt that I wasn't free. And I was told it was preached to me that I'm not free because of the attraction. And so that's what really kept me shackled for so long. And so three years into my marriage, I wake up one morning and I believe. And I say, people think I'm crazy when I say it, but I heard the voice of the enemy. He just said, God is never going to free you. You might as well go ahead and masturbate. And it was that day I say, I say in our book, that I just got tired of fighting ghosts. And I said, I said, okay, and I just did it, you know, because you got to think three years and exactly, it's exhausting. And so I'm tired in my mind, I'm tired in my soul, I'm tired emotionally. I didn't know what else to do. And so in my mind, I'm like, is this my life? Do I have to live my entire life depressed and beaten down? And so by this point, and I believe the enemy knew I was at my breaking point. And so when I felt that suggestion, when I heard that voice and it felt like a confirmation, like God's never gonna free me. I'm fighting something that I'll never experience freedom from. And I was convinced in my life that the Lord just wanted to use my gifts because at this time, through these three years in this repentance, I'm still serving. I'm singing and exhorting in ministry, and the glory and the power of God is falling in the room. I'm growing in ministry, but I'm still tormenting. So I was just convinced that the Lord just wanted to use my gifts and use, use it in me for other people to experience healing and freedom, but I myself not be able to experience it. And so at this point, three years into my marriage, I just said, okay, and I just I gave in to the voice and to what I felt was a temptation. And so I looked at porn, I masturbated, and that would lead into again. Now this cycle is coming back up from my childhood, hiding things and trying to live one way publicly and having this secret sin of porn and masturbation in the background. And one thing that we talk about is how sin matures. And so it didn't just stay at that one slip, that one turned into two, and then that two turned into a daily thing, and then it turned into an all-day thing whenever I had free time until again I found myself wanting to experience physically after three years what I saw on a screen. And so I would then find myself stuck in, not stuck, but in the throes of infidelity. And what brought me to the point of, you know, I really have to find help. I have to get out of this. It was seeing how it affected my wife. And it was not an easy process. It was not a one and done type of thing. It was a journey for me of having an understanding of, and I just want to shout my wife out here. She is the most gracious, the most loving, the most understanding person that I've ever had in my life. And I would ask her, why are you still with me? Why haven't you left me? Because I've given you everything that you need to leave. And she told me that I believe what the Lord has shown me about you. I believe what he's shown me more than I believe what you're showing me. And it something just in me said, you know what? If a human created being can love me like this, how much more can the creator love me? And so it put me on a path to heal. I started therapy. I moved halfway across the country for discipleship. I, and it just, again, it's not a one and done. And I think that's just so important to really press. It was not one and done for me. It was journey. It was surrendering day in and day out to the Lord and having a biblical perspective of what freedom is. That just because an attraction may be there, we put attraction synonymous with temptation. Just because a attraction may be there and you may feel tempted by a thing, that does not mean that you have not experienced the freedom of the Lord. And I think getting that one thing in your mind and being able to understand that one concept would free 80% of people. I think, you know, the thing that shackles so, and it's something again, we've had the opportunity to walk with over a hundred men now through our mentorship program. And we see this recurring theme of, you know, I just, you know, I'm not free because I have an attraction. I'm not free. You know, some of them aren't even living in it, but they the the fact that nobody has ever told them, like, hey, you know, you you're okay. Like, as long as you continue to surrender this attraction to the Lord, you know, and you allow him to do the work of sanctification in your heart and your mind and then your imagination, which is a whole another conversation and it's a framework that we lay out, we lay out in the book. As long as you can to continue to surrender this to the Lord, you are actively walking, you know, walking with the Lord. And so, yeah, yeah.

Justin 50:08

This is great. There's so much here. I just want to say that I say on here all the time, one and done is not reality. I'm all about the healing journey. So I tell people when they come for deliverance, you might need two, three, a year later, you might need to come back for another one, three years later, come back for another one. This is not failure because you need deliverance over time.

Reginald 50:37

Man, say that again.

Justin 50:39

So it's a healing journey and it takes time because you gotta understand in your case, Zayer, you had this reinforced in your mind for years. Yeah, so it's not like you got there overnight, you're not gonna get out overnight. Absolutely. I just can't even get my head around how pastors are like come to the altar, repent, you're healed, go on, be free. And absolutely clueless, clueless that it's a journey and it takes a lot of time.

Zaire 51:21

Yeah, and I think the hard thing is one, there I think there's two things at play. I think a lot of pastors and spiritual leaders just don't have they don't have an understanding of people who struggle with homosexuality. And in in our culture for so long, homosexuality has been the capital sin. You know, it's been the chiefest abomination.

Justin 51:43

Which doesn't make sense, by the way.

Zaire 51:45

Because since not at all, especially when you consider that in the Bible, there are 76 other abominations, you know, and and so they but because in culture homosexuality has become the chief abomination, they can't even fathom when you say, I'm still tempted, but I'm I'm walking in my freedom, to them it doesn't click. But for someone who struggles with lust, for someone who struggles with lying, they can be tempted to be lustful, they can be tempted to lie. And as long as they don't go down that path, they have an understanding that they're free, but they don't apply that same level of grace to the person who struggles with homosexuality. There's a scripture in Hebrews that says that by one offering, everyone has been made perfect as long as you are in the process of being sanctified, is Hebrews 10. And that just paints the picture that our salvation in Christ has made us perfect. We are perfect because of Christ as long as we are in the process of being sanctified. It's the process of sanctification that perfects us, that keeps us under the covering of the blood of Christ. And I think it's just important for us to have an understanding of it.

Justin 52:49

Amen. Amen. So true. Reginald, any thoughts on this? This is good.

Reginald 52:54

Oh, yeah, absolutely. I want to go back to the question that you asked him.

Justin 52:59

Yeah, let's go there first. My apologies. How did you become free from a homosexual lifestyle? When I say free, obviously we're talking here like starting your healing journey and getting things going in the right way. How did this happen with you?

Reginald — How Discipleship and Community Brought Freedom

Reginald 53:14

I've always loved God, always had a heart for God, and I've always prayed for freedom and deliverance. I cannot attribute one moment to seeing freedom more so than any other moments. What I can say is there were certain things that happened throughout the timeline where I noticed and recognized new levels of victory and freedom. So I didn't notice it at first, but over time, even now, where I am now, I'm looking, and I'll say it to Zaire from time to time. I can't believe that I'm not enslaved like I was. I'm looking at my life now, and I'm like, this is a miracle that I'm not sleeping with anyone. Yeah, I'm not having inappropriate conversations. I this was something that I've been praying for most of my life.

Zaire 54:05

Yeah.

Reginald 54:05

Took all my life to get to where I am today. And so, but there were certain times where I could look back and see, and from there, I kind of attribute. So, for example, when I met my late pastor, Pastor Andre, he God knew what I needed. He knew I needed somebody to walk with me. And this was the epitome of discipleship before I knew what discipleship was. I was with this man almost in a, it wasn't unhealthy, but I'm saying it jokingly, in an unhealthy way. I was always with or near this man. I stayed with him. I traveled with him. He had an international ministry, and I was just always around. He taught me how to cook, he taught me how to plan events. Every event that I had, he was there. He helped me with my preaching, he helped me with my confidence, he helped me to discover my voice. He took me around the world to do international ministry. I mean, he was just an amazing mentor and pastor in my life that I realized unfortunately many of us may never have the opportunity to have, but God knew that I really needed that. And so he was in my face. He was there. And that relationship began to help to break some things off of me. But yet, you know, I still struggle. I became a minister at the age of 16. And so anything I did from the age of 16 till now, I did under the auspices of a minister doing these things. So, and so there was a lot of guilt. There was a lot of condemnation that came from the fact that I am publicly a worker of ministry, but privately a worker of iniquity. This was something that was just hard for me to get over. In 2014, I heard a message, and in that message, the preacher said that we're designed to reflect what is before us. Now, prior to this, Justin, I, my friends knew when I was in college, I would lay on a cement floor. We had a little chapel at Stillman College. It's really small and it's all brick. And I would lock in that chapel, and I would stay the night in the heart of the winter, the heat of the summer, and lay before God, believing God for deliverance.

Justin 56:16

Desperate.

Reginald 56:17

I yes, I fasted for 40 days and 40 nights. Literally, just water and 100% juice. And I did all the things that I knew to do to find freedom and deliverance. But when I heard this message, we're designed to reflect what is before us. And he talked about when Adam was facing God, he reflected the image of God. But when he allowed Satan and Eve allowed Satan to turn their attention, they began to reflect the fallen nature. And so it was like a light bulb went off. And I realized, wait, when I'm praying, I'm praying with my sin in mind. I'm praying with a sin consciousness. I'm praying weighed down by my sin and by my past. And so I had to, and this is the process of repentance, really. I had to turn my mind to consider what God was saying about me, though my reality didn't reflect his word yet.

Justin 57:13

There you go. There you go.

Reginald 57:15

And went. Yeah, absolutely. And it was at, and if I can give a moment where I begin to see deeper levels of breakthrough, that might be a moment there while say that I begin to see another level of victory because I just was daring enough then to believe what God said about me and not what the word was saying about. Because people, they'll say you're fake, they'll say you're living a double life, they'll say that you're hiding, they'll say all of these things. And it ministers to you if you let it. You know, it'll get in your system. And so now you don't want, I don't want to be a hypocrite, right? So maybe I shouldn't embrace the truth that I am a son of God, or the truth that Christ has set me free, or the truth that I'm saved, not by my own works, but by the finished work of Jesus Christ. My life just doesn't make that make sense. But I turned my mind to believe what the word of God said. And when I did that, I was on the phone with a friend one day. I'll never forget. And I just thought and said to myself, wait, it that sin doesn't have, it doesn't have control over my life like it did. It's not ruling my life. That addiction, the sexual addiction was breaking. And when I look back, I said, wait, I've never gone this long. And so that was one of the moments that really changed my life. After that would be 2020 when Pastor Ezekiel had me to share my testimony in the small group. And that was the first time that I had shared it in a group as such. We all were sharing our testimonies. I went last because out of about 20 men who had powerful testimonies, by the way, nobody had my story. And I just didn't want to subscribe myself to being, you know, the least or the one that people talked about in private groups. I just, I didn't want to expose myself in that way. But thank God for Pastor Ezekiel, who strongly encouraged me to share. I shared my story. It was tough. But after I shared my story, I got off the phone and I had mixed emotions. One was still the question, Lord, why? Why me? Why this? Why do I have to do this? And then the second emotion that I felt was relief. Because I had finally opened up and shared my story. And from there I began to see new realms of freedom and deliverance. Because once you put it out there, it's out there.

Justin 59:35

Absolutely. Amen. This is wonderful. You know, and I think what you're sharing is very important that freedom can come through discipleship, freedom can come through renewing the mind through the word of God. And sometimes, back to the whole Western Christianity idea of quick fixes, sometimes people come to me for deliverance because they want the pain to stop, but they don't want to put in the work. So they want a quick fix. Like I have a magic wand and can touch their head and bam, you're fixed. Yeah. And I think really, and some people I work with, they never read their Bible, they don't attend church. You know, not that we do this out of religion, but they don't want to put any effort.

Reginald 1:00:27

Yeah.

Justin 1:00:27

And so when you're telling me that you're laying at the altar and fasting for 40 days, I mean, this is desperation. And this is what I tell the audience all the time deliverance is for the desperate. Like people who come to me that actually get freed from demons are those who have put in the work previously, like what you're doing and have done, but it hasn't dropped off.

Zaire 1:00:56

Yeah.

Justin 1:00:57

So then they come here and they say, Look, I've tried everything, I think it's demonic, and I think I need a deliverance.

Reginald 1:01:03

Yeah. No, that's good. Because I think deliverance happens, yeah, it happens on several levels. And I used to hate when people said the word discipline. I still don't like it that much. Deliverance is discipline. I'm like, I don't have the power to do it myself, you know. But I think that through the power of the Holy Spirit, when the spirit of God that we were gifted with in salvation is the empowerment to do his will. Yes. But the mind has to catch up with that and believe it. Yes. That now ownership has changed. Sin no longer has power over me. Yeah. So it's kind of like the analogy of the horse, you know, being tied to the lawn chair. You know?

Justin 1:01:47

I've not heard that one. Tell me about that.

Reginald 1:01:49

Oh, it's just, it's a it's really not an analogy as much as it is a photo where you see the stallion horse being tied to a single lawn chair, and that horse does not move because he doesn't realize that he has the power to move, that he can overpower the thing that's he's held by. Wow. And I think when we be, I know when we become believers, sin no longer has that grip over us, but because we don't know it, we don't live like it. And I want to say thank you, Justin, because of all the times that I've shared my testimony, I've never put this together. And you helped me to put it together. So now I can answer the question if there were three things that helped me to see deliverance. One, in myself, it was desperation, but then there was the discipleship, there was the community, and there was the confession. And I think that those three things over time are three pivotal things that help me to get to where I am today.

Justin 1:02:45

Yeah. I think that's amazing. And discipleship is lacking in many Western churches.

Zaire 1:02:51

Absolutely.

Justin 1:02:52

There's plenty of sermons, there's plenty of maybe small groups you can go to during the week or, you know, things like this. But actual discipleship where you're taking time, like an actual program that takes a year or whatever. I'm just throwing this out there, but to disciple people in their Christian faith and to get them to recognize that the power of sin is broken over their life and that they have supreme authority inside of them through the Holy Spirit.

Reginald 1:03:23

Absolutely.

Justin 1:03:24

And it takes a while for people, like you said, to get their head around that.

Zaire 1:03:29

Yeah.

Justin 1:03:30

But once you really understand that the power of sin is broken and the Holy Spirit is there to strengthen us, it puts a whole nother kind of level to the game.

Reginald 1:03:43

Yeah. I think there's coming a restoration in biblical principles and practices, discipleship being the pivotal one. I think we just lost our focus and it became great sermons, great songs, um, great gathering places. And I don't think the heart wasn't right. I just think we lost focus and got distracted. And over time we found ourselves far away from the original mission. And even myself, our church, this year, we just came back to Acts 242. The Lord said, go back to the Acts 242 model where the focus is discipleship. And so I think two things need to happen. I think the church, whether it be homosexuality or any other type of sin, the church has to make discipleship a priority, and the believer has to make discipleship a priority because your 60-minute services on Sunday, it's just not going to cut it. You got to have daily devotion to fellowship, to community, to the breaking of bread in order to see deliverance. And my type of accountability with the people that I work with, especially those who I consider sons in ministry, if you will.

Justin 1:05:06

Amen.

Reginald 1:05:06

You know, that's where freedom lies, right there. Yeah. No, just tell the truth and tell it quickly. You know, if you fall, don't wait two weeks to call me. Right. Right? Like, no, call me now. Let's talk about it. Let's, as a matter of fact, let's grow to the point to where we get to talking about it before. And you begin to notice patterns and triggers. But there has to be a level of vulnerability and honesty for us to get there. And discipleship must be a principal thing.

Justin 1:05:31

Amen. And Paul says in the Bible that those of you who are strong support those who are weak.

Reginald 1:05:39

Absolutely.

Justin 1:05:39

Right? So he was all about and he's writing this to the church, right? So he's saying basically, when somebody falls, you who are strong, support them. Don't ja judge them. Don't criticize them in the church, very unprepared to really truly help people. And everything is just a quick fix, a quick just say this scripture, say this prayer, you know, you'll be fine. And it is again a healing journey. So all of most demonic bondage, there's many reasons for having that, okay? But one thing that's a common thread that I've seen as a deliverance minister is at some point somebody believes a lie from Satan.

The Lies That Keep People Trapped

Zaire 1:06:33

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

Justin 1:06:35

So, Zair, I'm gonna come to you. What was the lie that you believed from Satan?

Zaire 1:06:42

Yeah, I think the principal lie that I believed from the enemy was that the Lord. Did not desire to free me. That he created me, he gifted me, he was using me, but that I just wasn't good enough for him to free me, to care enough about me to lift off the emotional burden and baggage that was on me. And I think throughout my life, not only was that lie spoken to me from the enemy, but it again, it felt reinforced through seeking help and not getting it, through praying all night and all day for freedom and not what I felt like was not receiving it. And so I just began to believe that this is just my life. This is just what I'm going to live like. And I'll probably die living in secrecy. And on the outside, I'll be used. And so that lie was reinforced in my mind and in my heart. And I'm so happy that you brought up the lies and what we and the damage that they do because that's one of the main things that we walk with our guys and the mentorship intentive through. And it's a big topic in the book. We talk about the process of sanctification. And I believe that this process of sanctification is the unraveling of lies. We believe that sanctification happens in the inner man and that our inner man is made up of three different parts. It's our mind, it's our heart, and it's our imagination. And through this process of sanctification, the Lord is renewing our minds. He's purifying our hearts and he's reshaping our imaginations. And I and we say all the time that one of the main reasons our minds have to be renewed is because of the lies that the enemy has placed in our minds, that we begin to believe in our hearts, and that now our imaginations have viewed and pictured over our lives. Yeah. And I saw that process, man, play play out in my life that I just wasn't enough. God didn't love me. He didn't want to free me. And once I believed that, I lived like that. Yeah.

Justin 1:08:50

Understood. Yeah. Excellent points. Excellent. Okay, Reginald, what was the lie that you believed from Satan?

Reginald 1:08:57

Yeah. So when I first met my pastor, mentor, Pastor Andre Reynolds, in one of our first conversations, I said to him, I think God is done with me and I think he wants to kill me. To which Pastor Andre, in his wisdom, he chuckled slightly and said, If God wanted to kill you, you'd be dead. I heard somebody preach about Saul, how God had fired him, but he was still in position for a while. And I just, I'm getting emotional thinking about it.

Justin 1:09:31

That's okay. This is raw and real. That's what the blind actress is, man. We are raw and real on this show.

Reginald 1:09:37

Yeah, literally getting teary-eyed. I I don't think I've ever even said this part, so it's tapping into something else. But it's something that even to this day I have to uproot. That God has fired me. He's so tired of me going back and forth and promising that I'm not going to do it again and going back to it, that he's done with me. And that was one of the greatest lies I had to overcome. I I just want to say I greatly appreciate your ministry because you're saying things that I wish the whole body of Christ could sit in a meeting and listen to. Because when we listen to even some of our popular podcasters in Christendom, the way that they judge and the way that they seem so vicious, it's kind of like they are hungry for blood for one another. To someone who feels like that God is done with them.

Zaire 1:10:36

Yeah.

Reginald 1:10:36

While they're trying to walk out the problem, especially, and here's another thing. Just imagine. 10 years ago, I did, I committed a sin or whatever, or I committed adultery. Over those 10 years, I've been accountable to my accountability. I've prayed, I've repented, I've worked, and then now 10 years later, for whatever reason, information may get out. Then a Christian podcast person takes that information and calls me a false Christian. Do you know what that could do to a person who's already battling with the thought that God has fired them and are, and the only reason why, and so for somebody like me, the only reason why I do what I do, God reminded me at 12 years old, when I was dealing with sin, asking for freedom, he didn't talk to me about my sin in that moment. In that moment, he showed me a vision of myself preaching and doing mighty ministry works. And I didn't believe it. And I said to God, if you make me the man that you're showing me, I vow to be for others who I never had. And so what I do today is a God asking for a return on the vow that I made to him as a child. And so for a lot of people whose hearts are really turned towards the Lord who've come out of sin and have checkered past, yeah, you don't have to help them to feel the weight of their sin and of their past. But it's so unfortunate that the spirit of gossip there's a lack of grace.

Justin 1:12:07

Yes, yes, and a lack of compassion. And I think when it comes to anybody in social media, I share this with the audience all the time. We need to be very careful who we follow, absolutely, and very careful who you let pray over you as deliverance ministers because a lot of these people are not well emotionally, yeah, and so they have trauma that's not been healed, and so they have excellent communication skills, excellent camera presentation, yeah, but they're not well. So it's it's just important, and and I hear what you're saying, Reginald, it's very true. And so you're working through this, you're getting this, and I think it's wonderful that we're talking that this is a work in progress, right? And I think absolutely this root of this lie that God's done with you. Yeah, and this goes back to the messages that were given in our Christian messages and sermons here in the West is this black and white thinking. Absolutely. You you should be over this by now. It's been 10 years. What do you mean you're still having attraction toward a man? Are you sure you're even saved?

Reginald 1:13:19

100%.

Justin 1:13:19

Yeah, you know, this type of foolishness, man, because they don't understand. And Jesus Christ has ministries coming out now, like your guys, mine, others that understand this. So people who are suffering in this craziness, this madness of God doesn't love me because I'm not perfect, and the pastor says I need to be perfect, or I must not love him because I looked up porn again, or I whatever. Yeah, God is dealing with this because he wants people to be well. So let's wrap up here. But before we do, I want to hear from both of you tell us a little bit about the ministry that you guys have in place. I'm gonna link to it in the show notes. So those of you listening, and I encourage

About the Brand New You Ministry

Justin 1:14:09

everybody listening, forward this to any person you know is in a homosexual lifestyle or a lesbian lifestyle so that they can hear this for encouragement, not judgment. So forward this to family members, friends, get it out on social so people can be encouraged, not judged, and feel heard. I think that's important. So tell us about your ministry, guys. Go ahead. We'll start with you, Zair. Go ahead. Tell us a little bit, and then Reginald, you just come in after him and tell us about it.

Zaire 1:14:45

Yeah, so the ministry that we have founded is brand new you. It is a discipleship movement that we've established to journey with men who struggle with same-sex attraction. Our flagship, call it, that we offer is our eight-week mentorship intensive. We take about 25 men at a time and we journey them through an eight-week process. And the main goal is that these men discover their identities in Christ so that they find community and that they have courageous conversations. But we established in 2024 after Apostol Reginald did the first podcast with Ezekiel. We got an overwhelming response, and we knew that we had to do something. It wasn't the plan was never for it to be what it is now. We kind of just workshopped and asked questions of what we needed and what we thought would have helped us in our journey. And around those questions and around those thoughts, we developed a curriculum and we did our first cohort, as we call it, called Beta, and they liked it and wanted to stick around. And so we continued, we continued that process from there. So far, we've done five cohorts. We were launching our sixth one as we speak. We've we've traveled across the country and done Connect Nights where we go into different churches and cities and just have the conversation. We have a conference now that's yearly called BNYCon. We have one coming up this year in Atlanta, June 26th to the 27th. And our heart is to just journey with men to be for them what we needed. But ultimately, it has nothing to do with us. It's not that we're these great heroes or anything like that. We are arrows that that point back to Christ. And the Lord has just blown on the ministry and allowed us to create this space and we're grateful.

Justin 1:16:33

Awesome. Reginald, tell us a little bit about it.

Reginald 1:16:36

Yeah, man. So, you know, when my podcast was released with Pastor Ezekiel, I had over 300 DMs and two to 300 men joined the Band of Brothers WhatsApp within a matter of days. We knew that some space needed to be created. I didn't have the capacity or system to do one-on-ones with individuals. I do them now, but at the at that point, I didn't have any system created because I didn't. Some people go on a podcast and they have books and all kinds of things created. I didn't. I was just contributing to the conversation. And so this was just a response to an outcry for men to have community, like Pastor Zaire said, to have courageous conversation. And we find that many of them have never been in a space where they can share their full story and be seen and be understood. They've never been in the space where the conversation could just be had. And so it's a powerful community. It's self-healing. We thought that it was going to be about the curriculum, but it wasn't. It was about the community, man. Those guys come in and just love one another, support one another, uplift one another. We pray every Wednesday night with them. And it's a powerful prophetic movement that we have. We've seen men not only find levels of freedom, but we we say that God is not just delivering us out of something, but into something, out of darkness, into the marvelous light. And so we're seeing men who are coming into ministry, men who are now having the confidence to just say yes, Lord, and to believe, like I said earlier, what the Lord has said concerning them. And so an army is rising up. We also are creating a space called the Renew, the New Reality Academy, which will be an ongoing discipleship movement that we'll have available here now, real soon. And another wonderful thing is that the wives, man, the wives of the married men that we have the opportunity to walk with have been so loving and so supportive. Even pastors, we have this one guy who his pastor was not sure when he first joined the mentorship group. But after he saw the fruit of it, now anytime we have something, the church or the pastor pays the bill for him to travel and to have hotel and lodging and whatever the registration is because of how powerful it's been for him. We've received several testimonies from wives. And this year at our BNY conference, the wives said, Hey, we're not, y'all not going by yourselves. We're going with y'all. We're gonna have a wonderful time with you. And so now our wives, a shout out to my wife, Prophet Tamra. She's absolutely amazing. I thank God for her. I don't know why she stayed, but I'm so glad she did.

Justin 1:19:12

Keep you in line, that's why.

Reginald 1:19:14

Absolutely. She she said, and I used to hate to hear it, but she used to say, I couldn't leave you because I didn't want you to be out here by yourself. And I'm just so grateful for that. But our wives, for the first time, will be hosting a spouse's gathering during our BNY conference next month. And so Awesome.

Zaire 1:19:35

Yeah. Yeah, in June, then we're joining a session just for When is that? The June 26th to the 27th in Atlanta, Georgia. Yeah.

Justin 1:19:43

And you'll have information about that on the website I'm going to link to.

Zaire 1:19:46

Yes.

Reginald 1:19:47

Absolutely. It's called BNY Con for BNY Conference, BNY Con 26. And the theme this year is Marked by Mercy. And we're excited about it.

Justin 1:19:55

That's awesome. So your book that you guys are releasing or have released July 7th.

Reginald 1:20:03

Yes.

Justin 1:20:03

Absolutely. Born Gay, Born Again. Love it. That is a phenomenal title. And just to let the audience know, pretty much everything we've discussed, there's a lot more in the book than just what we've talked about. So I encourage each of you to grab a copy of it. Where can they purchase a copy of Born Gay Born Again?

Zaire 1:20:28

Yeah, so it is for pre-order basically anywhere that you buy books, mainly Amazon. If they go on Amazon and look up Born Gay Born Again, it's there. Or they can go to our website. It'll link to Amazon, but it may be a little bit easier. It's b nymen.com slash book. And they'll be able to get the information there as well.

Reginald 1:20:48

We're excited about it. And at our conference, we will actually be doing a premiere book signing there at the conference. And so we're excited about that as well.

Justin 1:20:56

That's awesome. Okay. So at the end of every episode, I ask my guests to leave a word of encouragement to the audience. Okay. So I'm going to come to you first, Reginald. I'm trying to ping pong back and forth fairly here.

Reginald 1:21:15

So my apologies. We do this all the time. Okay. We're good.

Words of Encouragement for Those Still in the Struggle

Justin 1:21:20

My apologies if I haven't given each of you enough time, but I for trying here, okay? No.

Zaire 1:21:25

We're in this together. It's all right.

Justin 1:21:26

All right, cool, man. So, Reginald, I want you to speak to men who are listening right now who struggle with homosexuality, who may be practicing homosexuality. I'm going to ask you to share words of encouragement with them as to why they should start a healing journey and even consider deliverance. I'm going to throw that in there just because I'm a deliverance minister. But why should somebody consider getting help for temptation of homosexuality or leaving a lifestyle of homosexuality?

Reginald 1:22:06

Any life that you live outside of the life that Jesus died for is a life lesser lived. I believe that Jesus came to give us life and that life more abundantly. And through our submission to Jesus Christ and his will, we have an opportunity to experience abundant life. I believe that those who are listening, whether fully in the lifestyle or wrestling with the lifestyle, there's something in them that still believes. There's something in them that feels a nudge and a pull. And rightly because it is a nudge and a pull from your maker and creator. God made you in his image and after his likeness. The fall of Adam was unfortunate, caused us to be born into a sin nature. You didn't get the opportunity to choose whether or not you'd be born with a sin nature, neither did you get the opportunity to choose what that sin expression was. I know the church might not have been able to be present for you. I know that people may not have been pleasant to you. And I know that in many cases the affirming movement seems like the most love that you've ever experienced. And I get that. I understand that. But there is a greater love. There is a greater love that we find in Christ Jesus. And I want you to have the opportunity to experience that love in Jesus Christ. Again, He's come to give us life and life more abundantly. Jesus is Lord. Jesus is Lord. His word is our God. His Holy Spirit leads us into that word and into that truth. And I pray that you get an opportunity to experience that truth.

Justin 1:23:42

Yeah. Awesome. Okay. Zair, let's have some encouragement, brother. Why should someone consider leaving a homosexual lifestyle or offering encouragement for people who are tempted by it?

Zaire 1:23:56

Yeah, my encouragement is that why you should seek is because you don't need Jesus or deliverance because you're gay. You need Jesus because we all need him. There is no separate gospel for the homosexual as there is for the heterosexual. We are all dead apart from Christ. And so in your seek for Jesus, in your seek for deliverance, don't idolize your sin expression of homosexuality. Place Jesus on the throne. Put your eyes and keep your eyes on Jesus. He will do and be exactly who he said he is and what he will do and what he would do. And specifically for the person who feels the exhaustion that I felt laying in the bed that morning, I just want to offer encouragement that it does get better, that the Lord can deliver, that he can heal, and that he will deliver and that he will heal. Find community, get involved in a local church, seek out discipleship. And I believe and I know that the Lord is and will do and will be exactly who he said he is and what he would do. Hallelujah.

Justin 1:25:10

Amen. Thank you, gentlemen. Appreciate you coming on.

Zaire 1:25:13

Thank you. Thank you for having us.