by Liz Flaherty | Apr 12, 2017 | Reflections
My husband and I settled in on the couch and began to search for something interesting to watch together as we ate dinner (on TV trays). Yes, we are those people. Andy’s notorious for picking obscure historic films about sports or even conspiracy theory documentaries about Big Foot, all the while acting shocked when I’m not interested. Side note: we had to put the kibosh on watching conspiracy theory documentaries because I began to tell people that the moon landing was staged, but I digress. Nowadays we usually park the remote around outdoor survival or clean comedy. Landing on one of the four thousand programs about surviving in the Alaskan wilderness, I took a bite of my grocery store bought chicken leg, and gave the new program a go. The camera followed a few individuals as they hunted, gathered, and conquered the untamed land. We debated if it was “dinner worthy” entertainment, when a woman began to describe her life in the bush. She was recovering from surgery in a local hotel before heading back onto her remote property. My stomach began to turn and then my heart grew heavy as she described surviving bear attacks and falls on her property, only to lay there hoping she would live. She fought back tears as she explained what it was like to wonder if she was going to die alone before anyone could find you. This woman lives on her own in the Alaskan wilderness. Her closest neighbors are 300 miles away. A mix of emotions washed over her as she told her story of independence and fear of death....
by Liz Flaherty | Feb 17, 2016 | Reflections
I wasn’t a pretty lesbian. Well, I think my girlfriend found me pretty, but nowadays it seems that when you turn on the TV most lesbians are gorgeous and infinitely confident. Jodi Foster, Ellen Page, Gillian Anderson, Ellen Degeneres’ partner with the name that I can’t pronounce…all strong, beautiful women. Nope. Not me, though. I was awkward. Precarious. Insecure. I was proud, but stayed in the background. For those of you who haven’t read my book The God of My Parents, it may be helpful if I give some details about my life. Deep in the mountains of Northern California rests a little town I’ll call Wilsonville. To this day the small wooded community still only houses about twelve-hundred people. My parents left their well-paying jobs in Silicon Valley and relocated there to pastor a church of about five members when I was seven. We contrasted pretty sharply with the culture of this community. As I wrote in my book, “If you were forced to lump all of the residents of Wilsonville into two primary groups you could call them the hippies and the rednecks. Hippies that grew pot, rednecks that cut timber, hippies that protested the cutting of timber, rednecks that smoked pot but hated the hippies, Native Americans that grew pot and cut timber, and the few that simply lived in the middle of it all.” Considering the environment in which I grew up I would probably identify more as a “missionary kid” than a “pastor’s kid,” because I was exposed to so much more culture than perhaps the typical ministry child. Outside of our tiny church...
by Liz Flaherty | Oct 28, 2015 | Reflections
In my last blog, I listed some ways in which people can face pornography (and other sexual wholeness) issues in their church communities. By no means was it an exhaustive list, but I think those are some of the key areas to start with as a family of believers. In this blog, I would like to talk about my own life. For those of you who have not read my book The God of My Parents: The Uncensored Account of My Journey to Find Identity, I talk very openly about my sexuality and how it related to my Christian faith. Today I would like to go over a few aspects of my battle with pornography and how it was costly in my life. I was twelve the first time I saw porn. Nowadays that’s actually a decently old age for a child’s first exposure, whether it’s brought up by intentional searching or by accidental exposure. In my case, it was the latter. A Playboy in my friend’s relative’s home was sitting indiscreetly in the bathroom when I stumbled upon it. After seeing it I looked for more wherever I could find it. A few years later I found it on movie channels like HBO and such, and I never had to search far. Then into adulthood, when I was independent, there were absolutely no hurdles to overcome. It was 24/7 access. Prov 29:18 (AMP) “Where there is no vision [no revelation of God and His word], the people are unrestrained; but happy and blessed is he who keeps the law [of God].” From the beginning I knew this was...
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