September 16, 2025 • 20 mins
“I now pronounce you husband and husband” were the words spoken at Lex Renick’s wedding. Married as a trans man to a gay man, Lex was transformed through the love of Christ. Both she and her husband went Straight to the Father, living for the Lord with a traveling ministry to the misfit community, spreading a powerful message of love and hope.
See how Lex seeks God’s heart and finds it, as well as the truth of scripture, the love of Jesus, and the freedom in her new identity with Christ.
In this three part story, you'll see the slow but steady transformation of Lex and how God honors those who earnestly seek Him. And you'll never see the lost the same way again!
Part 1
Hear the heartbreak that unfolded in Lex’s young life and how that propelled her to feeling “trapped in the wrong body,” how she eagerly attempted to find truth in God’s word, and how her father lovingly refused hormone therapy for a young, confused girl.
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Episode Transcript
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Announcement (00:02):
Welcome to One80, transforming testimonies from
next door to across the globe.
Be amazed at how God works tobring people to himself.
Share today's One80 with afriend.
It might be the best news theyhear today.
Lex Renick (00:17):
After that moment I've always felt like I was a
boy trapped in a woman's body.
I know that that probablysounds absolutely outrageous.
Margaret Ereneta (00:30):
I now pronounce you.
Husband and husband were thewords spoken at Lex's wedding.
We're not going to get intothose labels too much here, but
suffice it to say Lex Renick andher husband went straight to
the father.
Now they are serving the Lordwith their miraculous growing
family.
Romans 12 being lived out Sucha beautiful three-part story
(00:55):
You're going to need a Kleenexbox and a hymnal.
Trust me on this one.
Welcome to Lex's One80, part 1.
Lex Renick (01:06):
Well, my name is Lex Renick.
If you were to ask me as achild how my childhood was like,
I would probably tell you thaton the outside we had the white
picket fence.
My family was both mom and dadwere in ministry.
I was at church all the timebut little did people know.
It was like we had demonslurking around our home.
When the church doors closedand the home front door closed,
(01:29):
there was a lot of hiddenaddiction.
There was addiction to alcohol,which led to adultery, which
led to a pill addiction, and allthese things I was exposed to
growing up in this Christianhousehold.
So from a very young age I beganto get angry at God, even as a
young child, because I thought,Lord, if you're this loving God,
(01:49):
why would you allow the peoplethat you've gifted, you know, a
baby with me to come into mylife and cause such harm?
And so that caused a lot ofconfusion.
So my view of God from a veryyoung age was almost like
halfway in, halfway out, and Isay it that way because I would
be at church five days a week.
I would see my parents go afterthe Lord and then behind closed
(02:12):
doors at home.
It was like they were differentpeople.
And so my view of God was like,okay, god, so we experience the
good of who you are at church,but then we experience, like,
the bad, of who you are at home.
And so at a young age, my viewof God was very angry.
I was very angry, I was veryupset at him for letting me be
born into a family where Iexperienced abuse.
(02:33):
I was angry at him because ifhe's this, all powerful, all
loving God, then why would Ihave gone through all the
horrible things that I wentthrough as a kid?
And we find that same narrativein almost every person's belief
system If they've had hurt orpain and they no longer believe
in Jesus or haven't at all,unfortunately.
Um, when the adultery happened,you know there's a separation
(02:56):
that happened and the enemy waslike this is the perfect time to
come into this young girl'slife, little Lex, and rip away
her innocence.
And so, as my spiritualcovering, my father was removed
from the marriage and we onlysaw him once every now and again
.
That is when, unfortunately, Iexperienced one of my first
sexual traumas, and that was thefirst of many, and that
(03:19):
happened between the ages offive and six years old, and it's
like the devil knew that thisis the perfect time.
She's so incredibly vulnerable.
There's no man here to protecther spiritually, there's no
father here to protect herphysically, and it's almost like
abusers know children that havebeen abused, because this
became the narrative of mychildhood, unfortunately, and I
(03:42):
had so much confusion come infrom that From a very young age.
After that moment, I've alwaysfelt like I was a boy trapped in
a woman's body.
I know that that probablysounds absolutely outrageous,
but even before the wordtransgender was ever taught to
me, it was like I felt like Iwas a boy stuck in this body and
(04:05):
I just wanted to unzip myselfand walk out.
And this uncomfortability wasspiritual.
It was demonic, because if theenemy can get a child or an
adult confused about theiridentity, the enemy can try and
rip that person out of the willof God that God has for their
life.
And I really feel like thedevil knew the plan that God had
(04:27):
for my life and that's exactlywhy there was torment, attacks,
abuse, confusion and all thethings that flooded in from a
very young age.
So as I began to get older andgo through puberty, I remember
when Google came out, one of thefirst things that I've ever
Googled was I feel like I'm aboy trapped in a woman's body.
(04:47):
And the word transgender cameup Again.
This is before it was really,you know, publicized and all
over the media or in TV shows.
This is before it was reallypushed on and promoted to young
children.
And I just remember Googlingthat and finally not feeling
insane, finally not feeling likeI was the only one in the world
(05:08):
that was struggling with thisor that felt this way.
And the word transgender cameup.
The word LGBTQ community cameup.
Hormones, getting surgery,seeing all this from such a very
young age, like I don't thinkour parents realized the power
and access that we had to theinternet.
So finding this informationthere was comfort.
(05:32):
The world was going to sell methis cure, this magical cure
that was going to make this bodydysphoria go away.
And so dysphoria in thetransgender community is
basically a word that describeslike this inner uncomfortability
, like you almost want to likelook in the mirror and scratch
your eyes out because you're sobound in bondage and so
uncomfortable it makes you justwant to scream.
(05:54):
I can't explain it other than Iknow that it was spiritual
because I lived it.
I will look in the mirror, 12,13 years old, when I finally
first got my period and mybreasts started growing, and I
would look in the mirror and cryas I had a razor cutting my
chest, mutilating my body, bloodjust going down my chest
(06:14):
because I was so thatuncomfortable with myself and so
I just began to believe thelies that this world was selling
me.
The world was saying oh, godmade you that way.
Oh, it's okay, god's fine withthat.
I began to get confused with myChristian faith, not only
(06:35):
because the spiritual leaders inmy life were not leading
spiritually, they had addictions, like I previously mentioned,
but I also struggled with thatword, homosexuality.
And I remember being so young,13 years old, had Bibles all
over my room and I'm justlooking at so many different
scriptures.
I'm looking at Leviticus, I'mlooking at Romans, chapter one
(06:57):
and two, and I'm just praying tothe Lord because I'm like God.
If you made me this way, whywould you make me feel so
uncomfortable?
Lord?
If you made me this way, thenwhy would I need all these
surgeries and all these things?
God, are you really okay withhow I'm identifying?
And I was trying so hard to givemyself permission to live this
(07:18):
out and it's so weird, evendiscussing the old life then in
my BC days to the now, becausesince I've been made new in
Christ, it's like I've taken offthe rose colored glasses and I
can see why I did the decisions,the bad decisions and choices
that I had, why I had thatdysphoria and that
(07:40):
uncomfortability due to thesexual trauma.
And instead of the worldselling me this cure of surgery
and taking hormones, I honestlyneeded therapy.
I honestly needed a loving bodyof believers to say hey, I'm
not saying that what you'regoing through and your same-sex
attraction or gender identity isokay, but I'm saying that I
love you enough that I want towalk with you back to Jesus.
(08:00):
I needed a body of believers tolove me, to not be ashamed of
me, because Christ wasn'tashamed of me, and to walk me on
the road of salvation.
That is what I needed.
Margaret Ereneta (08:11):
Stay with us till the end, it gets really
good and Lex will help us talkto people who are like she used
to be and what to say and how tolove them.
Lex Renick (08:20):
And so this world is selling people struggling with
you know, previous sexualtraumas and confusion, this
knockoff version of Jesus.
But I found, through mytestimony that there's only
freedom in the arms of ourSavior Jesus Christ, testimony
that there's only freedom in thearms of our Savior Jesus Christ
.
And so again, as I began to getolder and older, I started
(08:41):
begging my dad to let me get onhormone blockers, to let me
start taking testosterone, andI'm very glad that he told me no
, he's like, this is notsomething that I want to be a
part of.
This is not a decision that Iwant to say is okay.
I think that this is definitelya decision that you need to
make when you're an adult andyou're a minor right now.
So therefore, the answer is no.
(09:03):
I could not thank my fatherenough because I probably would
have had way more damage to mybody if I started hormones you
know, pre-puberty or just when Istarted puberty and through the
division of my family andseparation, just to have some
insight.
It's always difficult to talkabout the hardest things that
(09:25):
I've experienced in my childhood, but I know that there's
importance.
The Lord convicts my heart tosay, every time I share my
testimony, some of the hardestthings that I've heard, because
we have to see where we oncewere, to see where God came
through and where we are now.
And so one of the things thatwas spoken over me as a child my
mom struggling with an alcoholaddiction, struggling with
mixing it with pills I'm notsaying that this was my mom that
(09:48):
said it in a sober mindset.
I believe that this was demonicthat my mom spoke over me
because of the alcohol she wasdrinking they call it spirits
for a reason and I remember mymom looking at me and this is
when I started to openly comeout as being transgender.
I lived my life as a transgenderman for 14 years.
Seven years of that was as aminor and then becoming an adult
(10:11):
, and then the seven on werebecoming an adult and getting
surgery and getting ontestosterone, et cetera.
And so I remember coming out tomy mom at 13, letting her know
everything that I was feelingand what I was going through and
what I was identifying as.
And I'll never forget my momdrunk, drinking her glass of
wine, putting it down, givingthis really like solemn, creepy
(10:32):
kind of giggle, and she justlooked at me me and said if I
would have known that you weregoing to be my daughter, I would
have aborted you.
And it's never easy for me toever mention that because, going
forward, that was some of thehardest echoing that I would
hear on repeat.
It's like the devil took thatclip of hearing the woman that
(10:52):
grew me in her womb, the womanthat was supposed to protect me,
replaying over and over andover again.
And then the next thing thatshe would say no one's going to
love you, you're just a freak.
And so I started believing thatlie.
No one's going to love mebecause I'm a freak, because I'm
different and I'm out of theordinary.
She would have aborted mebecause I'm a part of this
community.
What it was.
Very heartbreaking, in fact.
(11:14):
I started putting two and twotogether, thinking, well, if my
mom's saying that she'sChristian, then this is how all
Christians think.
And you know it just createdthis like narrative that
Christians are these mean,horrible people.
And you know that they're justgoing to bang me in the head
with the Bible, and the enemyknew that.
It was like resentment overanger.
Now I'm mad at God again and itwas just horrible.
And that led me down a horriblehidden pornography addiction.
(11:37):
I started having this hiddenporn addiction that no one knew
about and I struggled.
It was like changing my brainchemistry.
It was changing the way that Iviewed myself and the people
around me.
It became this addiction that Ifelt like I could not break
away from.
And when I became an adult and Istarted the hormones and I
started getting the top surgeryand doing all these things, I
(11:59):
had to take a testosterone shotwith the needle about this big.
Every Wednesday I would injectmyself with synthetic
testosterone.
And did I feel good when I goton these hormones?
Yeah, my voice changed.
I grew an Adam's apple, myshoulders broadened.
It was everything that made mefeel matched the identity that I
(12:19):
was honestly very confused andfully convinced that I was, and
there was a sense of falsefreedom.
But we know that that doesn'tlast forever, because only
fullness of freedom comes withChrist.
And so, as I'm taking thesehormones and again struggling
with this porn addiction, I'mtrying to seek the Lord, I'm
trying to seek answers, andevery church that I was running
(12:41):
to, I wasn't flaunting mysexuality or my gender identity.
At this point, I'm living astealth lifestyle, which means
that no one knew that I wastransgender.
Everyone just knew me as Austin, as I identified, uh, male.
And I just remember gettingrejection after rejection after
rejection, and I was just hungryfor Jesus Again.
(13:04):
I didn't need anyone to affirmme, I didn't need anyone to tell
me hey, it's okay.
I didn't necessarily have afamily, I didn't necessarily
have positive believers in mylife that could speak truth and
love, and I knew that I neededthe Lord and I knew that I
needed community and it was likethe Lord was drawing me to the
church.
(13:24):
But every time I went there wassome type of rejection that I
faced, and after every rejectionit was like more pain, more
lies of the enemy came on, morerepeats of the horrible things
that people have said over me.
That led me to drinking alcohollike crazy.
That led me to hanging out withthe wrong crowd, that's for
sure.
That led to me getting intocoke and, you know, doing drugs
(13:45):
and just not making the rightdecisions.
Ultimately, it got to the pointwhere I kept having this
insecurity that my mom was right, that no one was ever actually
going to be attracted to me, andso I began to realize that
people fetishized trans peopleand it was a terrible addiction.
But I was the story of thewoman at the well.
(14:06):
I started prostituting myselfjust to validate that that lie
that my mom spoke of me wasn'ttrue and it's horrible to say,
but it was almost like anaddiction.
I would go run to this sin,literally exchange my body for
money and feel horrible and sodisgusting on the inside after
because of that sin and thenfeel like I needed to do it
(14:26):
again just to wash away that.
It was this horrible, terriblecoping mechanism of just saying,
aha, look, look, you were wrong.
People think I'm attractivePeople like me.
And then my therapist broughtit to my attention that I was
never, actually ever enjoyingthese sexual encounters.
My therapist brought to myattention at a young age that I
was actually putting myself inthe position that I was as a
(14:49):
child and I was trying toreclaim my consent, reclaim my
ability to say yes, butultimately I was self-harming
myself with sleeping with otherpeople and not even wanting to
to try and heal.
And so it just tells you thatyou could run to the world for
healing.
You can run and do what theworld says to heal, but the only
one who can heal is Christ.
(15:11):
Truly, and on my journey ofwalking with the Lord and I kind
of fast forwarded here.
We have to talk about thecoming to Jesus moment and I
feel like I had a few of thosein my testimony.
I remember being 17, tellingpeople in high school that I
believed in science.
I know nothing about science, Ijust knew that atheist people
(15:33):
would say that and then mostpeople would shut up because no
one wants to argue with science.
And there was this girl namedKylie in my drama class at my
high school in Marietta,california, and she is just
awesome.
We still talk to this day and Idon't think she realized the
impact of her evangelizing to me.
Consistently.
She always said hey, lex, wellat the time, hey, austin, after
(15:54):
school today, me and a bunch offriends were walking down to a
church we would love for you tocome to youth and I remember
just telling her over and overno, I believe in science.
No, I believe in science, thankyou anyway.
She would always say like hey,can I pray for you?
She was always loving, alwayskind.
I would be like that misfitsitting in a corner and I was
totally emo let's just be realLike the swoopy hair, the colors
(16:15):
, the pins in the pants.
I was just out of the ordinaryand I got severely bullied, but
she didn't not care.
She would always sit with me,she would always encourage me,
speak a word over me, invite meto church and finally, after at
this point in my life, I wasalready self-harming myself.
At this point, at 17, I alreadyattempted suicide twice.
I there's this, how do you saythis?
(16:38):
There was this like when sheinvited me.
This time it wasn't like I hada choice, it was out of
desperation to feel the love ofChrist, like I knew that I was
missing something, and I wasdesperate, desiring to live but
listening to all these liesabout how I shouldn't be alive
and how I should just killmyself Cause I'm going to go to
hell anyways, all these thingsthat were spoken over me.
(16:59):
And finally she asked me and Isaid, okay, I'll go.
And we walked after thatWednesday after school.
We got there about a mile awayand I remember when we walked
into the sanctuary, this wasn'ta Pentecostal church, this was
just like a regular, you knownon-denominational church.
We walk in and these teenagersstart taking their shoes off,
(17:19):
and that was a little weird forme because at this point I
haven't been to church since,like I don't know, fifth grade
and I'm like Kylie, why are theytaking their shoes off?
And she said, well, what do youdo when you get home?
And I said I take my shoes off.
And it was so prophetic to menow that I could see, because
she's like, well, what do you dowhen you get home?
You take your shoes off.
Well, welcome home.
And that welcome home had likean anointing on it.
(17:41):
It's like God does know ourhearts.
He knows when he's chasingafter us.
He knows when he's pursuing us,what we like, what we don't
like.
Then the worship band goes on.
Again I said I was in my emodays there.
This was a worship band thatwas playing like metal,
christian music.
Never knew it was a thing.
I was like, wow, god is prettycool.
(18:02):
Never heard of any of that.
And then all of a sudden, afterthey're getting a little
hardcore, it's softened down andthese kids were going after God
.
And at this point in mytestimony I've tried everything.
I tried sleeping around,drinking drugs.
I've tried filling the void, Itried even witchcraft at this
point in the tarot cards andseeking out psychics and mediums
(18:23):
and just trying to take a holdof my life with the new age.
And nothing was filling.
And I remember seeing thesekids with their arms lifted high
, with tears streaming downtheir face, like on their face
with the Lord, and it was real,like it was so real and I could
see it and I didn't know whatthey had, but I knew that I
needed it, I knew that I longedfor it and I remember looking at
(18:45):
Kylie saying how do I do that?
Like, how do I re-give my lifeto Christ?
How do I worship?
How do I trust God?
And I remember her looking atme and just saying okay, well,
close your eyes.
And so I closed my eyes, Irededicated my life back to the
Lord and she told me that when Iwould worship, to keep my eyes
(19:10):
closed, to not think about whatanyone else was going to think,
that if I felt like God wasleading me to lift my hands, to
lift my hands, if I felt likeGod was stirring something in my
spirit, to be honest with myemotion, to talk to him like he
was my father because he is myfather and my whole life started
to change from that point on.
At that point on, I continued toattend church Again.
Like I said previously, Iexperienced rejection and even
(19:35):
at that church.
I remember I would go to youngadult night and then I'd go to
Monday night worship and theyhad a young adult pastor and I
had a lot of moments withpastors that have done the wrong
thing and said the wrong thingout of either ignorance or
hatred, I'm not sure, but at thetime I remember being so
vulnerable with this youthpastor and all of a sudden he
(19:56):
pulled me aside and everyoneloved me at young adult night,
like I was friends with everyone.
It was the first time that Ididn't feel like a loner in my
life.
I was on fire for Jesus.
I was in my word.
Were there things that I stillneeded to lay down?
Absolutely?
But there was other areas thatGod was working on in my heart
and removing.
Do I believe that God wanted meto lay it all down at the feet
(20:17):
of Jesus?
Absolutely, but I know thatwith this walk with Jesus, it
was almost like the Lord waslike do you trust me with this
now?
Margaret Ereneta (20:25):
Join us next week.
There's so much that happens.
Hear how Lex just earnestlyseeks the Lord and finds him and
finds the love of her life Aman woohoo, and so very many
miracles that happened.
Both of them are just totallytransformed.
It's such an encouraging story.
Welcome to One80, transforming testimonies from
next door to across the globe.
Be amazed at how God works tobring people to himself.
Share today's One80 with afriend.
It might be the best news theyhear today.
Lex Renick (00:17):
After that moment I've always felt like I was a
boy trapped in a woman's body.
I know that that probablysounds absolutely outrageous.
Margaret Ereneta (00:30):
I now pronounce you.
Husband and husband were thewords spoken at Lex's wedding.
We're not going to get intothose labels too much here, but
suffice it to say Lex Renick andher husband went straight to
the father.
Now they are serving the Lordwith their miraculous growing
family.
Romans 12 being lived out Sucha beautiful three-part story
(00:55):
You're going to need a Kleenexbox and a hymnal.
Trust me on this one.
Welcome to Lex's One80, part 1.
Lex Renick (01:06):
Well, my name is Lex Renick.
If you were to ask me as achild how my childhood was like,
I would probably tell you thaton the outside we had the white
picket fence.
My family was both mom and dadwere in ministry.
I was at church all the timebut little did people know.
It was like we had demonslurking around our home.
When the church doors closedand the home front door closed,
(01:29):
there was a lot of hiddenaddiction.
There was addiction to alcohol,which led to adultery, which
led to a pill addiction, and allthese things I was exposed to
growing up in this Christianhousehold.
So from a very young age I beganto get angry at God, even as a
young child, because I thought,Lord, if you're this loving God,
(01:49):
why would you allow the peoplethat you've gifted, you know, a
baby with me to come into mylife and cause such harm?
And so that caused a lot ofconfusion.
So my view of God from a veryyoung age was almost like
halfway in, halfway out, and Isay it that way because I would
be at church five days a week.
I would see my parents go afterthe Lord and then behind closed
(02:12):
doors at home.
It was like they were differentpeople.
And so my view of God was like,okay, god, so we experience the
good of who you are at church,but then we experience, like,
the bad, of who you are at home.
And so at a young age, my viewof God was very angry.
I was very angry, I was veryupset at him for letting me be
born into a family where Iexperienced abuse.
(02:33):
I was angry at him because ifhe's this, all powerful, all
loving God, then why would Ihave gone through all the
horrible things that I wentthrough as a kid?
And we find that same narrativein almost every person's belief
system If they've had hurt orpain and they no longer believe
in Jesus or haven't at all,unfortunately.
Um, when the adultery happened,you know there's a separation
(02:56):
that happened and the enemy waslike this is the perfect time to
come into this young girl'slife, little Lex, and rip away
her innocence.
And so, as my spiritualcovering, my father was removed
from the marriage and we onlysaw him once every now and again
.
That is when, unfortunately, Iexperienced one of my first
sexual traumas, and that was thefirst of many, and that
(03:19):
happened between the ages offive and six years old, and it's
like the devil knew that thisis the perfect time.
She's so incredibly vulnerable.
There's no man here to protecther spiritually, there's no
father here to protect herphysically, and it's almost like
abusers know children that havebeen abused, because this
became the narrative of mychildhood, unfortunately, and I
(03:42):
had so much confusion come infrom that From a very young age.
After that moment, I've alwaysfelt like I was a boy trapped in
a woman's body.
I know that that probablysounds absolutely outrageous,
but even before the wordtransgender was ever taught to
me, it was like I felt like Iwas a boy stuck in this body and
(04:05):
I just wanted to unzip myselfand walk out.
And this uncomfortability wasspiritual.
It was demonic, because if theenemy can get a child or an
adult confused about theiridentity, the enemy can try and
rip that person out of the willof God that God has for their
life.
And I really feel like thedevil knew the plan that God had
(04:27):
for my life and that's exactlywhy there was torment, attacks,
abuse, confusion and all thethings that flooded in from a
very young age.
So as I began to get older andgo through puberty, I remember
when Google came out, one of thefirst things that I've ever
Googled was I feel like I'm aboy trapped in a woman's body.
(04:47):
And the word transgender cameup Again.
This is before it was really,you know, publicized and all
over the media or in TV shows.
This is before it was reallypushed on and promoted to young
children.
And I just remember Googlingthat and finally not feeling
insane, finally not feeling likeI was the only one in the world
(05:08):
that was struggling with thisor that felt this way.
And the word transgender cameup.
The word LGBTQ community cameup.
Hormones, getting surgery,seeing all this from such a very
young age, like I don't thinkour parents realized the power
and access that we had to theinternet.
So finding this informationthere was comfort.
(05:32):
The world was going to sell methis cure, this magical cure
that was going to make this bodydysphoria go away.
And so dysphoria in thetransgender community is
basically a word that describeslike this inner uncomfortability
, like you almost want to likelook in the mirror and scratch
your eyes out because you're sobound in bondage and so
uncomfortable it makes you justwant to scream.
(05:54):
I can't explain it other than Iknow that it was spiritual
because I lived it.
I will look in the mirror, 12,13 years old, when I finally
first got my period and mybreasts started growing, and I
would look in the mirror and cryas I had a razor cutting my
chest, mutilating my body, bloodjust going down my chest
(06:14):
because I was so thatuncomfortable with myself and so
I just began to believe thelies that this world was selling
me.
The world was saying oh, godmade you that way.
Oh, it's okay, god's fine withthat.
I began to get confused with myChristian faith, not only
(06:35):
because the spiritual leaders inmy life were not leading
spiritually, they had addictions, like I previously mentioned,
but I also struggled with thatword, homosexuality.
And I remember being so young,13 years old, had Bibles all
over my room and I'm justlooking at so many different
scriptures.
I'm looking at Leviticus, I'mlooking at Romans, chapter one
(06:57):
and two, and I'm just praying tothe Lord because I'm like God.
If you made me this way, whywould you make me feel so
uncomfortable?
Lord?
If you made me this way, thenwhy would I need all these
surgeries and all these things?
God, are you really okay withhow I'm identifying?
And I was trying so hard to givemyself permission to live this
(07:18):
out and it's so weird, evendiscussing the old life then in
my BC days to the now, becausesince I've been made new in
Christ, it's like I've taken offthe rose colored glasses and I
can see why I did the decisions,the bad decisions and choices
that I had, why I had thatdysphoria and that
(07:40):
uncomfortability due to thesexual trauma.
And instead of the worldselling me this cure of surgery
and taking hormones, I honestlyneeded therapy.
I honestly needed a loving bodyof believers to say hey, I'm
not saying that what you'regoing through and your same-sex
attraction or gender identity isokay, but I'm saying that I
love you enough that I want towalk with you back to Jesus.
(08:00):
I needed a body of believers tolove me, to not be ashamed of
me, because Christ wasn'tashamed of me, and to walk me on
the road of salvation.
That is what I needed.
Margaret Ereneta (08:11):
Stay with us till the end, it gets really
good and Lex will help us talkto people who are like she used
to be and what to say and how tolove them.
Lex Renick (08:20):
And so this world is selling people struggling with
you know, previous sexualtraumas and confusion, this
knockoff version of Jesus.
But I found, through mytestimony that there's only
freedom in the arms of ourSavior Jesus Christ, testimony
that there's only freedom in thearms of our Savior Jesus Christ
.
And so again, as I began to getolder and older, I started
(08:41):
begging my dad to let me get onhormone blockers, to let me
start taking testosterone, andI'm very glad that he told me no
, he's like, this is notsomething that I want to be a
part of.
This is not a decision that Iwant to say is okay.
I think that this is definitelya decision that you need to
make when you're an adult andyou're a minor right now.
So therefore, the answer is no.
(09:03):
I could not thank my fatherenough because I probably would
have had way more damage to mybody if I started hormones you
know, pre-puberty or just when Istarted puberty and through the
division of my family andseparation, just to have some
insight.
It's always difficult to talkabout the hardest things that
(09:25):
I've experienced in my childhood, but I know that there's
importance.
The Lord convicts my heart tosay, every time I share my
testimony, some of the hardestthings that I've heard, because
we have to see where we oncewere, to see where God came
through and where we are now.
And so one of the things thatwas spoken over me as a child my
mom struggling with an alcoholaddiction, struggling with
mixing it with pills I'm notsaying that this was my mom that
(09:48):
said it in a sober mindset.
I believe that this was demonicthat my mom spoke over me
because of the alcohol she wasdrinking they call it spirits
for a reason and I remember mymom looking at me and this is
when I started to openly comeout as being transgender.
I lived my life as a transgenderman for 14 years.
Seven years of that was as aminor and then becoming an adult
(10:11):
, and then the seven on werebecoming an adult and getting
surgery and getting ontestosterone, et cetera.
And so I remember coming out tomy mom at 13, letting her know
everything that I was feelingand what I was going through and
what I was identifying as.
And I'll never forget my momdrunk, drinking her glass of
wine, putting it down, givingthis really like solemn, creepy
(10:32):
kind of giggle, and she justlooked at me me and said if I
would have known that you weregoing to be my daughter, I would
have aborted you.
And it's never easy for me toever mention that because, going
forward, that was some of thehardest echoing that I would
hear on repeat.
It's like the devil took thatclip of hearing the woman that
(10:52):
grew me in her womb, the womanthat was supposed to protect me,
replaying over and over andover again.
And then the next thing thatshe would say no one's going to
love you, you're just a freak.
And so I started believing thatlie.
No one's going to love mebecause I'm a freak, because I'm
different and I'm out of theordinary.
She would have aborted mebecause I'm a part of this
community.
What it was.
Very heartbreaking, in fact.
(11:14):
I started putting two and twotogether, thinking, well, if my
mom's saying that she'sChristian, then this is how all
Christians think.
And you know it just createdthis like narrative that
Christians are these mean,horrible people.
And you know that they're justgoing to bang me in the head
with the Bible, and the enemyknew that.
It was like resentment overanger.
Now I'm mad at God again and itwas just horrible.
And that led me down a horriblehidden pornography addiction.
(11:37):
I started having this hiddenporn addiction that no one knew
about and I struggled.
It was like changing my brainchemistry.
It was changing the way that Iviewed myself and the people
around me.
It became this addiction that Ifelt like I could not break
away from.
And when I became an adult and Istarted the hormones and I
started getting the top surgeryand doing all these things, I
(11:59):
had to take a testosterone shotwith the needle about this big.
Every Wednesday I would injectmyself with synthetic
testosterone.
And did I feel good when I goton these hormones?
Yeah, my voice changed.
I grew an Adam's apple, myshoulders broadened.
It was everything that made mefeel matched the identity that I
(12:19):
was honestly very confused andfully convinced that I was, and
there was a sense of falsefreedom.
But we know that that doesn'tlast forever, because only
fullness of freedom comes withChrist.
And so, as I'm taking thesehormones and again struggling
with this porn addiction, I'mtrying to seek the Lord, I'm
trying to seek answers, andevery church that I was running
(12:41):
to, I wasn't flaunting mysexuality or my gender identity.
At this point, I'm living astealth lifestyle, which means
that no one knew that I wastransgender.
Everyone just knew me as Austin, as I identified, uh, male.
And I just remember gettingrejection after rejection after
rejection, and I was just hungryfor Jesus Again.
(13:04):
I didn't need anyone to affirmme, I didn't need anyone to tell
me hey, it's okay.
I didn't necessarily have afamily, I didn't necessarily
have positive believers in mylife that could speak truth and
love, and I knew that I neededthe Lord and I knew that I
needed community and it was likethe Lord was drawing me to the
church.
(13:24):
But every time I went there wassome type of rejection that I
faced, and after every rejectionit was like more pain, more
lies of the enemy came on, morerepeats of the horrible things
that people have said over me.
That led me to drinking alcohollike crazy.
That led me to hanging out withthe wrong crowd, that's for
sure.
That led to me getting intocoke and, you know, doing drugs
(13:45):
and just not making the rightdecisions.
Ultimately, it got to the pointwhere I kept having this
insecurity that my mom was right, that no one was ever actually
going to be attracted to me, andso I began to realize that
people fetishized trans peopleand it was a terrible addiction.
But I was the story of thewoman at the well.
(14:06):
I started prostituting myselfjust to validate that that lie
that my mom spoke of me wasn'ttrue and it's horrible to say,
but it was almost like anaddiction.
I would go run to this sin,literally exchange my body for
money and feel horrible and sodisgusting on the inside after
because of that sin and thenfeel like I needed to do it
(14:26):
again just to wash away that.
It was this horrible, terriblecoping mechanism of just saying,
aha, look, look, you were wrong.
People think I'm attractivePeople like me.
And then my therapist broughtit to my attention that I was
never, actually ever enjoyingthese sexual encounters.
My therapist brought to myattention at a young age that I
was actually putting myself inthe position that I was as a
(14:49):
child and I was trying toreclaim my consent, reclaim my
ability to say yes, butultimately I was self-harming
myself with sleeping with otherpeople and not even wanting to
to try and heal.
And so it just tells you thatyou could run to the world for
healing.
You can run and do what theworld says to heal, but the only
one who can heal is Christ.
(15:11):
Truly, and on my journey ofwalking with the Lord and I kind
of fast forwarded here.
We have to talk about thecoming to Jesus moment and I
feel like I had a few of thosein my testimony.
I remember being 17, tellingpeople in high school that I
believed in science.
I know nothing about science, Ijust knew that atheist people
(15:33):
would say that and then mostpeople would shut up because no
one wants to argue with science.
And there was this girl namedKylie in my drama class at my
high school in Marietta,california, and she is just
awesome.
We still talk to this day and Idon't think she realized the
impact of her evangelizing to me.
Consistently.
She always said hey, lex, wellat the time, hey, austin, after
(15:54):
school today, me and a bunch offriends were walking down to a
church we would love for you tocome to youth and I remember
just telling her over and overno, I believe in science.
No, I believe in science, thankyou anyway.
She would always say like hey,can I pray for you?
She was always loving, alwayskind.
I would be like that misfitsitting in a corner and I was
totally emo let's just be realLike the swoopy hair, the colors
(16:15):
, the pins in the pants.
I was just out of the ordinaryand I got severely bullied, but
she didn't not care.
She would always sit with me,she would always encourage me,
speak a word over me, invite meto church and finally, after at
this point in my life, I wasalready self-harming myself.
At this point, at 17, I alreadyattempted suicide twice.
I there's this, how do you saythis?
(16:38):
There was this like when sheinvited me.
This time it wasn't like I hada choice, it was out of
desperation to feel the love ofChrist, like I knew that I was
missing something, and I wasdesperate, desiring to live but
listening to all these liesabout how I shouldn't be alive
and how I should just killmyself Cause I'm going to go to
hell anyways, all these thingsthat were spoken over me.
(16:59):
And finally she asked me and Isaid, okay, I'll go.
And we walked after thatWednesday after school.
We got there about a mile awayand I remember when we walked
into the sanctuary, this wasn'ta Pentecostal church, this was
just like a regular, you knownon-denominational church.
We walk in and these teenagersstart taking their shoes off,
(17:19):
and that was a little weird forme because at this point I
haven't been to church since,like I don't know, fifth grade
and I'm like Kylie, why are theytaking their shoes off?
And she said, well, what do youdo when you get home?
And I said I take my shoes off.
And it was so prophetic to menow that I could see, because
she's like, well, what do you dowhen you get home?
You take your shoes off.
Well, welcome home.
And that welcome home had likean anointing on it.
(17:41):
It's like God does know ourhearts.
He knows when he's chasingafter us.
He knows when he's pursuing us,what we like, what we don't
like.
Then the worship band goes on.
Again I said I was in my emodays there.
This was a worship band thatwas playing like metal,
christian music.
Never knew it was a thing.
I was like, wow, god is prettycool.
(18:02):
Never heard of any of that.
And then all of a sudden, afterthey're getting a little
hardcore, it's softened down andthese kids were going after God
.
And at this point in mytestimony I've tried everything.
I tried sleeping around,drinking drugs.
I've tried filling the void, Itried even witchcraft at this
point in the tarot cards andseeking out psychics and mediums
(18:23):
and just trying to take a holdof my life with the new age.
And nothing was filling.
And I remember seeing thesekids with their arms lifted high
, with tears streaming downtheir face, like on their face
with the Lord, and it was real,like it was so real and I could
see it and I didn't know whatthey had, but I knew that I
needed it, I knew that I longedfor it and I remember looking at
(18:45):
Kylie saying how do I do that?
Like, how do I re-give my lifeto Christ?
How do I worship?
How do I trust God?
And I remember her looking atme and just saying okay, well,
close your eyes.
And so I closed my eyes, Irededicated my life back to the
Lord and she told me that when Iwould worship, to keep my eyes
(19:10):
closed, to not think about whatanyone else was going to think,
that if I felt like God wasleading me to lift my hands, to
lift my hands, if I felt likeGod was stirring something in my
spirit, to be honest with myemotion, to talk to him like he
was my father because he is myfather and my whole life started
to change from that point on.
At that point on, I continued toattend church Again.
Like I said previously, Iexperienced rejection and even
(19:35):
at that church.
I remember I would go to youngadult night and then I'd go to
Monday night worship and theyhad a young adult pastor and I
had a lot of moments withpastors that have done the wrong
thing and said the wrong thingout of either ignorance or
hatred, I'm not sure, but at thetime I remember being so
vulnerable with this youthpastor and all of a sudden he
(19:56):
pulled me aside and everyoneloved me at young adult night,
like I was friends with everyone.
It was the first time that Ididn't feel like a loner in my
life.
I was on fire for Jesus.
I was in my word.
Were there things that I stillneeded to lay down?
Absolutely?
But there was other areas thatGod was working on in my heart
and removing.
Do I believe that God wanted meto lay it all down at the feet
(20:17):
of Jesus?
Absolutely, but I know thatwith this walk with Jesus, it
was almost like the Lord waslike do you trust me with this
now?
Margaret Ereneta (20:25):
Join us next week.
There's so much that happens.
Hear how Lex just earnestlyseeks the Lord and finds him and
finds the love of her life Aman woohoo, and so very many
miracles that happened.
Both of them are just totallytransformed.
It's such an encouraging story.
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