In Prayer, We Are Fully Seen and Fully Known

Author - Umn ministry

October 14, 2021

How intimacy with God fuels Meg Baatz’s ministry among same-sex-attracted and LGBT peers.

Meg Baatz was first drawn toward God as a preteen. “I was really insecure and just full of shame and guilt, and searching for meaning,” she says, but she knew “Jesus was there just loving me exactly as I was.”

Years later, while serving as a Bible study leader in a campus ministry, Baatz says her “faith and sexuality journey collided” as she became more conscious of feelings of attraction to other women.

For Baatz, prayer has been key in her personal discipleship as she holds to biblical convictions on sexuality while identifying with and ministering in the LGBT community. Baatz’s continual sense of God’s faithful, loving presence has characterized her ministry via Posture Shift (which equips church leaders to reach and care for LGBT individuals) and Kaleidoscope (a ministry focused on helping sexual minorities explore faith in Jesus).

What role has prayer played in your life as you’ve navigated discipleship and your sexuality?

Sometimes we can have a very narrow view of prayer—that it’s sitting alone in your room with a Bible open, which is great. But when you read in the Scriptures to “pray without ceasing,” I think of prayer more as this place where I’m aware of the presence of God around me, and I’m also ready to engage in relationship with God. It’s in that place where I feel most seen and known and upheld as a person.

It’s really only in prayer that I’m seen in full by these infinite eyes that are not fooled by any kind of filters or lens or opinions of me that might obscure the whole truth about myself. It’s in this nearness that it’s impossible for me to hide, or to deceive God into thinking that I’m ...