Overcoming Despair with Tony Miano

I thought I was never going to be able to, uh, open air preach again. Uh, it wasn't, it was not only my ministry, but it was the way I supported my family as well. And I, I panicked. I went, I mean, it was, I went into a panic and that started me down the road of despair and anxiety, uh, to a level I had never experienced before.

Your Calvinist podcast is filmed before a live studio audience. And welcome back to your Calvinist podcast. My name is Keith Foskey and I am your Calvinist. One of the most difficult things that we have to face in life is times of despair, times of anxiety and times of depression.

And we live in a world that seeks to give all kinds of answers to that. Some of the answers, which are not really biblical. And today I have with me a good friend and an evangelist and a person I have known and loved for a long time.

Tony Miano is going to be with us today, sharing about his new book called Overcoming Despair. But before I bring him on, I just want to remind you of a few things. Number one, this show is a ministry of Sovereign Grace Family Church.

So if you are in the Jacksonville, Florida area, we'd love for you to visit with us and you can learn more about us at sgfcjacks .org. Also, you can support the show by supporting our partners. And we partner with tinybibles .com.

You see these little things on my desk? They're actually full Bibles. It's the smallest printed Bible you can get on the market today. And they provide these at a wonderful cost for people who want to have them either as a family heirloom, as a useful tool, or something that can be hidden just about anywhere if you need to have a Bible that you can take with you.

So find them at tinybibles .com and you can use my first name, Keith, and you will get a percentage off. All right, I want to now bring Tony on and we're going to continue this conversation that we began on the subject of Overcoming Despair.

Tony, thank you for being a part of the show today.

Pastor Keith, thank you for having me.

Absolutely. And just about, I guess, was it six months ago you first sent me your draft of the book to give me an opportunity to read it? Was it about that long?

Yeah, I think it was about then. I think it was somewhere around February is when I started to reach out to a few people to ask them to read the manuscript.

Well, I want to start by saying thank you for giving me the opportunity to read it. And I learned a lot from it, but also was challenged by it. And to be quite honest with you, I was surprised at your story, not in a bad way.

I want to be clear. I was surprised because, and I've shared before some of the struggles that I've had with things like anxiety. I was surprised at the parallels that you shared in the book. And I just want to tell you, as I said in my endorsement for the book, the first half is riveting, the second half is challenging.

I mean, it's just the best way I can say it is I couldn't stop the story. Your story is amazing and so much, I think, going to be a benefit to people who have gone through these things and hopefully will point them to where they can find some real hope.

So for those who don't know you, and I know obviously I've known you for a while. We've seen each other at a few different events and obviously I followed your ministry for a while and you've been on my show before.

But for those who don't know you, can you give us a little bit of your history, your street preaching ministry? I know you were with Ray Comfort for a while and all those things. Just a quick rundown of your history.

Sure.

Well, again, my name's Tony Miano. For those who don't know, I'm a member of Grace Fellowship Church here in Davenport,.

Iowa.

I'm married now for 39 years to the bride of my youth, Maria. Together we have three adult daughters. Our youngest daughter was just married this last Saturday. So Saturday we became empty nesters. We've got three grandchildren at present, Jashani, Caleb and Bethany Rose.

And I serve my church as a full-time evangelist. I've been a full-time evangelist in one context or another for about 20 years. And prior to that, I spent about 20 years in law enforcement in Southern California.

That's amazing. And yeah, I've heard your evangelism interactions. I know you used to carry a GoPro with you. Do you still do that when you go out?

I do from time to time. I don't as much anymore, not for really any particular reason. I've always been very careful not to allow a camera to get in the way of the gospel of a conversation. And I also have to check my own heart as to why I'm videoing the conversation.

Is it truly for the edification of the saints and to get the gospel out to other people? Or is there still some remnant in there of Tony who wants the attention? And so I always have to balance those things.

I praise God for my pastors and my church family to help me keep those things in check. And sometimes I just go out without the camera just so I don't have to think at all about video or anything like that and just make sure I'm giving 100 percent attention to the soul in front of me.

But I still maintain a YouTube channel and I still post videos from time to time. Sometimes I'll just go out with an audio recorder and I'll post an audio, discernment audio or something like that of a conversation.

You know, that's awesome. And I'll put a link to your YouTube page in the description so people can go see it. As I said, I'm always encouraged when I watch you interact with people. You have such a, I want to say a pleasant but still commanding way in which you share the gospel.

And I say commanding, you were a police officer, so there's a certain presence that you have. But also you're so pleasant and loving in your presentation. I've just always been very moved by that. I want to say something, though, and this is way off the topic.

I promise we'll go back to the book in a minute. But but do you remember when we were in Milton together?

I sure do.

Opener, opener preaching.

Yeah, that's where we met.

Yeah. Well, you said something about.

Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

This was it was about Facebook and YouTube. It was about cameras and stuff. Oh, and it causes me to check my heart. I don't even know if you remember saying this, but you were talking, you were you were on the stage with some other guys.

And I don't remember if it was like during a Q &A or something. But you said he said you said, yeah, this morning I got up and and I and I had to check my Facebook. He says, and I forget if you said like I had to chase the likes or like you want to see the likes like you said that.

And then you kind of made the point that that that sometimes can drive us. And it's not good that we're that we're that we're that we like that, that I mean, if you said the word dopamine hit, but something like that, like we like this hit of like this good feeling that we get when we see people like the stuff that we do or we like the videos, that can be a powerful and negative reasoning for people to go out.

If we won't go out and evangelize without the camera, then we probably shouldn't do it with the camera.

Yes. Amen. And that's I still have to keep those things in check in my own life. You know, I'm thankful, Pastor Keith, that, you know, as you described how you see my interaction with people today, I'm very thankful for that.

I had to confess and repent of a number of years ago of being an angry, angry street preacher. And it was really the ministry of my church, my pastors who helped me to see that that while I would always insist that I'm not fighting with people, I'm fighting for the souls of people.

Many years ago, I was probably more looking for the fight with people. And but over the years, the Lord has convicted me of that kind of sinful mindset and I think has tempered me a great deal in my interactions with people.

I think part of that as well, Pastor Keith, is due to the fact that now that I'm living in Iowa and no longer in Southern California, my ministry on the streets has changed a great deal. In Southern California, my primary ministry was open air preaching.

I could go to any street corner anywhere in Los Angeles County and have hundreds of people around me to open air preach. I come to Davenport, Iowa, almost eight years ago, and it's rare to find a crowd of any kind except that maybe a particular event.

So over these last eight years, while I still open air preach, the majority of my conversation these days are one to one conversations with people on street corners.

Do you still go to the coffee shop with your computer with the little sign that says, I'm Tony, sit down and talk to me?

Yeah, I do. In fact, the laptop I'm looking into has that placard on the on the back. And while I'm not drinking as much coffee anymore, when I am out, I like to go other places to write. The white noise helps me concentrate on my writing.

Silence actually is a detriment to my writing. And so I got the idea years ago that, well, if I'm going to spend time in a coffee shop writing, let's see if we can make it evangelistic in some way. And so I have a placard taped to the back to the lid of my laptop that says, hi, my name is Tony.

I'm a Christian. Do you have any spiritual beliefs? Do you have any questions? Have a seat. And over the years, a few people from time to time have, you know, and it's funny, there have been a couple of times where people have walked up and I've looked at them like, I don't know you.

And I forgot that I have the sign on the computer inviting them to come over and sit down and talk to me. But I've been able to have a few really good conversations that way.

That's so fun. Steve Lawson talked about how sometimes when he was preparing sermons, he would go and he called it renting a booth at McDonald's. He says it costs the cost of a cup of coffee. He said you rent a booth at McDonald's for the cost of a cup of coffee and you can sit there and write.

And that noise helped him. So what you just said is seems pretty consistent.

Yeah.

Well, brother, you sent me the book. The book tells your story and I don't want to be the one who tells your story. And my biggest thing is I want people to read your story. But I still want to ask you just a few questions to kind of give people a taste of what the book is about.

Because when I met you back in Milton and even knew about you before then, I did not know that you were struggling with anxiety and that you struggled with depression. And I know we use these words because that's the vernacular of the world.

And I know that in the book you talk a little bit about not adopting the world's language, not giving into the world's definitions. But for the simple, just to get us started, I didn't know you were suffering from these things.

I didn't know you were struggling. To a lot of people, they would have never thought that. And I think that's the danger of having a platform is people think that the man on the platform has no, has no, uh, you know, failures.

He, you know, he's, he's the one and yet you were. So can you kind of tell us when that, when that started and, and like I said, don't tell us everything in the book. I want people to see, but, but, but kind of give us the parts you feel comfortable telling us today.

Sure.

Um, so when you and I met, uh, I'm going to kind of leapfrog a little bit. By the time you and I met, which was probably 2012, 2013, I had already been on antidepressant medication for a couple of years.

So when you saw me, when we first met, I was not having any kind of struggles. So I thought with anxiety or depression, I'll talk a little bit more about that. Um, but the, the struggles with these sins and, and I will always refer to them as sins.

I do not believe, uh, from what I've learned, um, from the word of God, I do not believe that these are illnesses, diseases, or disorders. Um, I believe these are things that we do. These are not things that we have.

And I explained that I explained that in the book, but, uh, it started for me very, very young, uh, probably the age of 13 or 14. Uh, I had my, I had no idea what I was dealing with, but now looking back, I had my first bout at, if we could say with anxiety and depression at about the age of 14, uh, when I received news of the death of a loved one and receiving that.

And I think that was the first time in my life that someone I knew passed away. I'd never experienced that before. And I immediately was gripped with the fear of death. Every, everything, everything around me was going to kill me.

I wasn't going to, I wasn't going to make it till my 18th birthday. Um, I had no thoughts of taking my own life, at least not at that time, but I was afraid of everything. I was afraid to eat. I was, uh, I was afraid of germs.

I was afraid of injury. I was afraid of everything. And this went on for about a couple of months now, uh, by this time, it's just my dad and me and my three younger sisters in the home and my dad had no idea, no clue as to what was going on with his son, who yesterday was a 14 year old, you know, athlete, uh, aspiring to big things in athletics and, and, uh, seemingly having no issues of any kind at all to the next day, who are you and what have you done with my son?

And that went on for a couple of months and it just went away. It just seemed to go away. And I was fine for the next year, year and a half or so. And then out of nowhere, it just came back this, this gripping fear, this, uh, anxiety, um, uh, what the world might describe as obsessive compulsive behaviors, um, came back about my sophomore year of, of high school thereabouts, and again, for like a couple of months, I was, I had no idea who I was, I couldn't sleep, I couldn't eat.

And then it just went away. And then for sure.

Have you heard of the term existential dread?

Um, I've heard both those words, but never put together.

Because, because your experience is so familiar to me. Cause at 19, I, I experienced my first dealing with anxiety and it was over death, it was, it was about the fear of death and it really is what you're saying is so similar, but I've come to learn, they, there's a term, it was like the term for everything, but the idea of fearing your own mortality, the existential dread, and, and, and I've, I've come now that I, now that that terms in my mind, I actually hear people talking about it all the time.

I hear people, you know, doctors and different things using that phrase. And this is what they're talking about. That, that, that, that overwhelming sense of you're going to die and you can't do anything about it.

And, and that's it. And so I just wanted to, I don't know if you'd ever heard that term.

No, no, I hadn't. Uh, and then, so from there, I, I, for the next several, many years, many, many years, there was nothing like that at all in my life now, as my wife, uh, who's sitting off in the dining room could testify, there were still, there were still some things, you know, Tony was careful about what he ate and where he ate and things like that.

And, and we just chalked it up to, you know, the quirkiness of Tony, you know, but, but as far as that kind of gripping fear, that anxiousness, that deep sorrow, none of that I didn't for a 20 year law enforcement career, I didn't experience any of that.

I mean, I was in some of the worst situations you can imagine, uh, dealing with the worst that man could do to his fellow man day in and day out. And, and I, it really, not that it had no effect on me, but I didn't struggle with any kind of anxiety or depression or anything like that, uh, during that time, it, it, it went, uh, I went so long, uh, that I never thought I was going to experience it again, but then in about December of 2009, it came back with a vengeance.

Hmm.

And when it came back, you decided that the, the, was it at that point, you decided that it was the medication that was going to help you. Or you, again, not don't want to tell the story for you, but you, you, at a certain point you decided to go on medication.

Yeah.

So December of 2009, uh, it was actually something happened as an open air preacher, your instrument is your voice. And, uh, something happened during 2009 that I thought my voice was gone for good. I thought I was never going to be able to, uh, open air preach again.

Uh, it wasn't, it was not only my ministry, but it was the way I supported my family as well. Uh, and, uh, and I, I panicked, I went, I mean, it was, uh, I went into a panic and that started me down the road of despair and anxiety, uh, to a level I had never experienced before.

And so for the next five or six months, uh, I tried in a sense, I tried everything. I went through biblical counseling. Um, I communicated with my pastor, communicated with, uh, dear brothers close to me in Christ.

Obviously my family and it got, it got so bad that it was suggested to me, Tony, you might need medication. And that was the last thing I wanted to do for me. That was it with all of the pride and ego and everything else in my mind to go down that route.

I was giving in, I was quitting. I w I wasn't trusting Christ. I had come to faith in Christ in 1988. By the time this happened, I had been a Christian, you know, for, uh, you know, well over 20 years.

Um, and, uh, and so what does this say about my faith? And so it was suggested to me, you need to go see somebody. You need to, I think you need medication. And so I called, I called the psychiatrist's office, talked to a very nice lady.

And I told her about my misgivings. The, um, the, the doctor was supposed to be a Christian. I don't have any reason to doubt that. Uh, and I told her about my misgivings about medication and she said something to me, brother, which I talk about in the book, uh, she said something to me that almost immediately made it okay for me to take the medication.

And what she said to me was, oh, these are just vitamins for the brain.

Yeah.

I remember that from the book.

Yeah.

Yeah. These are just vitamins for the brain. And so I thought about that for a second. I thought, there it is. That's what I needed. That's what I needed to hear. I can work with that. I can go with that.

And I started, um, I started to take the medication and so it was April, May of 2010 when I first started taking medication, uh, after several months, I started to feel like my old self again. And, uh, I had never thought that the medication would be a long-term situation.

And, and so by the end of two, 2010, now, by the end of 2010, I decided, you know what, things are good. I want to get off the medication, worked with my doctor to slowly come off, uh, the antidepressant I was taking.

Uh, but within a month or so the anxiety and the depression came back and, uh, and so I called the doctor in a panic, said, Oh no, it's back again. And he said, well, we'll put you back on the medication, but because you were on it and came off it, we're going to have to start you at a little higher dose than what you were taking before I didn't even care at that point.

And I knew there was something that happened and I, I do want people to read the whole story. I want them to get all of the context of what happened, but there were, there was something specifically that happened as I put, went home, put that pill in my mouth, a pill that wasn't supposed to start working again for two to three weeks, but soon as that pill touched my tongue, I felt relief and I knew I, and I knew I shouldn't have physiologically speaking, I should not have felt any relief putting the pill in my mouth, it was going to take two to three weeks for it to work into my system and start doing whatever that medication.

Does.

And so I, I knew, I knew at that moment I said, wait, there's, there's something else going on here, but I wasn't at that point ready to admit it. And so I resigned myself to the fact that I was going to take, uh, antidepressants the rest of my life.

And, and after a short while, uh, I began to feel better, began to feel great. In fact, and up and up, uh, that would have been beginning of 2011. Now, when I reached, started to take the medication again and from 2011 through March of 2018, life was great.

Life was amazing. I didn't, I didn't have any issues with, uh, with anxiety or depression. I didn't have any kind of travel anxiety. I used to hate to travel. Um, and I used to, I just, just traveling, being away from home.

Yet I was, as an evangelist, I was doing it a hundred days a year. Um, but through that season of 2011 to 2018, I loved to travel. Everything was, everything was fine. Uh, I went on my first trip to Kenya in 2017 with one of the pastors of my church here in Iowa.

And it was a pastor Mike.

It was, it was pastor Nick that I went with of the first trip. And a great trip, wonderful trip. No issues at all. Um, I went to Africa for crying out loud. Didn't have any issues of any kind with travel anxiety or food or anything like that.

It was a wonderful, wonderful trip. And then the following year, um, I find out on a Sunday morning from the pulpit from pastor Mike that me, him, and pastor Nick were heading back to Kenya, um, in, in a few months.

And, and I felt what I would call a twinge in my heart and my mind and I knew what I knew immediately. It's like, Oh, you're anxious about this for some reason. Why are you anxious? And, uh, the anxiety started to build slowly leading up to the trip there in Kenya, the second trip to Kenya.

And, uh, we get to Kenya and the world just falls apart. Um, and, uh, and now I, now I'm petrified. I'm taking the medication. I have been for eight years and now on the medication, I'm experiencing anxiety and depression, and my first thought wasn't to cling to Christ.

My first thought was to call the doctor and ask whether or not I needed more. And, uh, and I confess that to pastor Mike, um, I testify in the book, uh, what that night was like, uh, knocking on his hotel room door and, and describing what was going on, describing to him my desire to take more medication, his encouragement and counsel not to do that.

Um, and then, uh, I got through that night. The next couple of days were, were pretty tough. Uh, and then I decided to call the doctor and asked to take more medication. And with just a phone call, I was able to get exactly what I wanted, uh, which is a big problem with these medications and the way that anxiety and depression is treated by the world.

Um, there was no diagnostic testing of any kind, no blood tests, no, uh, CAT scan, no X-rays, no MRI, nothing, just anecdotal stories about how I felt. And I was given a pill and all I had to do was say, I don't want to take it anymore, and I was helped to get off the medication.

And then all I had to do was say, yeah, I want it again. And I was given the medication. I think I need more. And I was given more. And the, to my pastor's credit, although I hated them at the moment, when I confessed to them that for one night I took more medication, they said to me, Tony, you're Joneson, you're a member, you're acting just like an addict.

That was probably the most offensive thing anyone could say to me, the retired street cop evangelist, that I'm an addict. Um, but I had developed at the very least a psychological dependence on that medication.

And so we would get home from Kenya, uh, and, uh, I was continuing to take the medication, meeting with my pastors, uh, receiving counsel of one kind or another almost daily, but with no pressure, Hey, get off the medication.

But on my own, I decided, look, I, I am too dependent on this. I need to stop taking it. And so it was a call to my doctor. I'm in Iowa. The doctor's in California. One call to the doctor. I think I'm being, I think I'm too dependent on this.

I think it's time to get off. Okay. And he helped me to wean off the medication. And as the, as the last time, uh, back in early 2011, when I tried to come off the medication within, uh, once it was completely out of my system before too long, the anxiety started to come back.

And, uh, and then I wrestled with, I wrestled with going back on the medication. I, I managed to, to pit my doctor against my pastors and my pastors against the doctor, uh, by, you know, sharing with each of them what the other was saying.

And, and I, I went back on the medication for a short time, came back off it. And I started to develop, uh, what's known as a fib atrial fibrillation, irregular heartbeat. And so as I'm talking to the doctor one day, uh, this would have been late, uh, late 2018, I just, as an aside said, Oh, by the way, you know, now I have a fib.

And he said, Oh yeah, I can't put you back on the medication. Uh, that's one of the side effects. That's one of the possible side effects of this medication. And I hadn't, I hadn't up to that point that, that to best I could tell, I, I hadn't experienced any kind of side effects to the medication.

And he said, look, I, I can't put you on something different. Uh, you know, I gotta be able to see you in person. You're going to have to find a doctor there in Iowa. Um, and there was no way I was going to do all of that.

And I didn't want to try another medication. And, and I decided they're sitting in my car talking to him that I'm never going to take this medication again. And it struck me, it struck me how easy it was for me to say, well, because of these other factors, I'm not going to take this.

And it hit me like a ton of bricks at that moment that, you know what? I never needed this to begin with. I never needed this to begin with. And so for the next several months, um, uh, my church family and I, my family worked through, uh, being off the medication and staying off the medication.

And that would have been, uh, early, uh, late 2018, again, early 2019. And, and I haven't taken any medication since now. Um, you know, I, I've been off the medication now for years, but that is not to say that I never experienced anxiety and depression anymore.

In fact, uh, um, I went several years without experiencing any of any kind. And no sooner had I finished writing this book, brother, that it was if the Lord was saying, well, okay, good. You wrote that book.

Let's see how much you believe it. And started wrestling with some anxiety and depression again. And, but this time though, instead of turning to a doctor or medication, I turned to Christ now, look, I've, I've been a Christian for 36 years, uh, and sanctification is an ongoing process.

And some sins, the Lord takes away in an instant and some sins we deal with for some time and it's never a license for sin, it's never an excuse for sin, but I praise God. I praise God that when those moments of anxiousness come, when those moments of sorrow come, the remedy is Christ.

The remedy is in the word of God. The remedy is not in what the world says, uh, is the answer to an illness, disease, or disorder. The remedy is repentance and faith in Christ. That is the remedy for these kinds of sins and any kind of sin.

It is repentance and faith in Christ.

Do you find that your experience parallels at all with what Spurgeon referred to as the dark night of the soul? Have you, did you do any study of that? Have you, have you found any parallels there?

Well, you know, I, I have. I did a lot. I've done a lot of reading in preparation to write the book, did a lot of reading on anxiety and depression in the midst of it, uh, back in 2010, 2011. Uh, interesting brother.

It seemed as, as I was dealing with these sin issues in my life that the Lord saw fit to bring other people into my life who were struggling with it, having no idea that I did, uh, looking, seeking counsel, uh, for reasons unknown to me.

Uh, coming to me, asking for counsel about anxiety and depression. And, uh, one of the benefits of going through biblical counseling is that the goal of biblical counseling is to prepare the counselee to be a counselor.

Uh, the goal is, is so that Christians can counsel Christians. That's, that's one of the main goals of biblical counseling.

And you're talking about like ACBC association of biblical?

Yes.

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

The good guys. I would refer to them.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

And I know sometimes people talk about Christian counseling and different things, but specifically you're saying, yeah.

I'm specifically talking about the, uh, the J Adams, uh, ACBC, uh, ACBC form of, of biblical, uh, biblical counseling beginning and ending with the gospel and, uh, and so having gone through, through that, having read quite a bit, um, you know, when I was in the midst of the anxiety and depression, sometime it was a morbid interest, I think, in what others went through in the past.

Um, but as I've, as I've studied and researched these things, I read about, you know, Martin Lloyd Jones's book, uh, spiritual depression, wonderful, wonderful work, um, read what Spurgeon wrote of himself and what others wrote of Spurgeon, uh, yeah, there were nights as he referred to the dark night of the soul, there were nights where the only prayer I could utter was, I will not deny you today, Lord, I will not deny you today.

Now with Spurgeon, um, some attribute what he experienced to, uh, some of the physical things that he dealt with. Uh, it's believed that he struggled with gout. Uh, ultimately it was, uh, uh, a kidney disease, I believe of some kind that would ultimately take his life.

And certainly these things could have attributed to his mood. Certainly. Um, you and I have been talking, uh, about this a little bit over the last few days and, and certainly, um, you know, the weather, uh, diet, health issues, sleep, lack of sleep.

There's all kinds of environmental physiological, uh, things that can attribute to one's mood, but that being understood, none of that gives us a license to take those circumstances, environmental factors, biological factors, and then justify behaving in such a way, thinking in such a way, feeling in such a way that the Bible clearly says is sin.

Do not be anxious. Do not worry. Do not be fearful. Uh, why is my heart? Why is my soul downcast? You know, I, I, it's beautiful. I think in the Psalms, uh, pastor, how, how David so often he'll begin in a sense, confessing, being downcast, being despairing, uh, being fearful.

And in the midst of the Psalm, we see his repentance happen on the page with him ending with, with praise and thanksgiving and glorifying God. And, and we see in the Psalms in part, a biblical fight against anxiety, anxiety, and depression.

And, and while Spurgeon, uh, was, was open about his despair. He never in a sense gave into it saying, well, this is just who I am. This is what I have. No, he would, he fought against it. As I, every morning I, I host a Bible reading program on YouTube and I, I begin before I read the Bible, I read the morning devotion from Spurgeon's morning and evening devotions.

And so often Spurgeon talks about despair, but never giving into it, never giving license to it, but giving the remedy for it. Worship, praise, thanksgiving, remembering who God is, trusting in his word, believing on Christ, remembering what Christ did.

Uh, and so while Spurgeon did battle, uh, despair at the very least, uh, despair, maybe what we would call depression today, um, Spurgeon fought against it and, and never gave license to it, at least not in anything that I read.

Sure.

And I think that's, that that's very helpful is, um, several things that you've said, uh, one is that this, every, everyone deals with different besetting sins, you didn't say the word besetting sins, but that's what you're referring.

To, right?

The sins that we did, that we struggle with as believers, whether, whatever they are, and I'm not, I'm not, I'm not trying to, uh, discount it, but I'm saying if this, if, if we recognize that it's a sin, but, but it's not as if we are saying that this is a indication that a person is an unbeliever, because you said you've been a believer since 88, but you still struggled with these things as a believer.

Am I saying that correctly? I, again, again, not, not trying to discount it or overlook it. I'm just, I, I, I'm thinking about the person who's listening to this, who's saying, well, I, I've, I'm, I'm, I'm experiencing these thoughts.

Does that make me not a Christian?