Gathering All Safely In — A Conversation with Liz and Jordon Sharp

In this conversation, Dr. Jordon and Liz Sharp from St. George, Utah, shared their remarkable and inspiring story of moving from trauma, confusion, and loss to miracles, enlightenment, and strength as an LDS/LGBTQ family. Several years ago—even before they had thought much about this themselves—a tragic event with some family friends resulted in Liz and Jordon receiving strong promptings that God has a deep and abiding love for LGBTQ individuals and wants them to thrive. Jordon (Vice President of Marketing & Communication at Utah Tech University) and Liz (a registered nurse) eloquently described the mistakes made, lessons learned, opportunities found, and how their family bonds expanded far beyond their expectations after their son Sam came out at the age of 14.

Liz and Jordon's family story is near and dear to our hearts at Faith Matters. So often, we don’t have answers to know how we all belong in the family of God; we only have our conviction that we do belong and a willingness to figure it out along the way. Our conversation with Liz and Jordon gets deep into their personal story, including their ongoing spiritual learning and efforts to build conversations about the LGBTQ experience in the Church. We found them to be incredible examples of how to plow into uncharted territory with humility and a simple trust in one fact — that we are all beloved children of God.

[pauladircks]

God's wants us to learn both sides of this situation. So we have stop to blame things, people, principles, doctrine, policies ect. And practice Love because this we can do, the rest is in God's wisdom. It is so great to see parents and children that are in this situation or any others situation Love and respect one another not matter what. In the beginning and end everything is about learn to love . This life is a time to prepare to meet God. Love is the ultimate law.

[TheLindaBoyer]

Thank you so much for sharing your story.

[marjoriesueneuenswander]

I agree with much of what you have said. However, single people have also had to set aside desires of the heart.
Also, in my teens my home was a happy place but I didn’t necessarily feel like I wanted/needed to share with my parents the anxieties/challenges I sometimes had.

[dotmother]

Thank you so much for sharing your experiences and your understandings. This has really helped me a lot!!!

[amandahansen]

This is such an important and beautiful interview. Thank you so much for sharing.