by Anneliese Rider | August 3, 2024

Saved as adults, Juli Slattery’s parents taught their children the gospel early on.

“I’m one of those kids that can’t remember when the first time I gave my life to God was,” says Juli, also noting how Moody Radio was a constant staple in her Ohio childhood home.

Juli earned a BA and MA in Psychology and an MS and doctorate in Clinical Psychology. While in college, she met her husband, Michael. They were both attending a singles’ retreat in Florida. For their first date, they ate dinner in the hotel restaurant—and the rest is history.

After getting years of experience in both counseling and media settings, in 2012 Juli founded Authentic Intimacy, a ministry devoted to reclaiming God’s design for sexuality. In 2020, Juli launched Sexual Discipleship, a platform designed to help Christian leaders navigate sexual issues and questions with gospel-centered truth.

Juli has written 12 books, several with Moody Publishers, and hosts the weekly podcast, Java with Juli. She has served on the Moody board of trustees for 10 years and has spoken at Moody for a Founder’s Week breakout session and a pastors’ conference.

Juli has a heart for others, a deeply kind spirit, and a passion to help hurting people heal and grow—all of which you’ll hear in this Q&A.

What’s your perfect Saturday?

My perfect Saturday usually involves my husband. We do a date morning—we go to the gym and we swim laps, and then we go out for a big breakfast. Then we just enjoy being outside, resting, spending time with the Lord, and spending time with family or friends.

Why did you start Authentic Intimacy?

It began with a personal call to go deeper with the Lord. I met Linda Dillow, who is the co-founder of Authentic Intimacy, and she started to disciple me and teach me what it is to really know God through personal worship.

Through that season, God really burdened my heart for sexual brokenness and led me to start Authentic Intimacy.

How have you overcome the possible awkwardness of running a ministry that talks so much about sex?

By doing it. The more you talk about sex, the more comfortable you become in it. You quickly begin to realize that almost all women have questions about sex, and almost all women have brokenness related to sexuality, and they're just looking for a safe place. It's a joy to be able to create that safe space.

I think people feel awkward talking about sex because they think they're the only one who might be struggling. But when you open up the conversation, you realize that everybody's struggling, and it takes away the awkwardness.

What has been one of the biggest challenges you’ve had to overcome as a wife, mother, and founder of Authentic Intimacy?

I think it's going to sound weird, but the biggest challenge I’ve had to overcome is a challenge of self. Self is the source of fear, of feeling inadequate and insecure. Self is the source of relying on my own wisdom, instead of seeking God's wisdom. Self is what causes me to be puffed up with pride and not be compassionate and sensitive toward other people.

If I can surrender self and really just trust the Lord and do the things that He asks me to do and trust and abide in Him, all of those challenges and obstacles don't matter anymore.

What topic has your interest right now?

The topic of Christian unity in the church is something I’m very passionate about right now. What is it? And what does it look like to love each other well when we disagree?

Sexuality is such a personal topic for people. How do you create an environment in your community that inspires openness?

I really believe that God does a lot of that work for us. This is spiritual work. Sexual work is always going to be spiritual work because it's so integrated into who we are, our humanity, the goodness of God.

Some of the intentional things that we do:

• Lead with the fact that we all have sexual brokenness.
• Talk calmly about the topic and not feel like I have to trip over myself and apologize for bringing these things up.
• Share the biblical foundation of everything that we teach because sometimes we can be very guarded and afraid that a teacher, especially on this topic, is going to take us to wrong places.
• Create spaces for people to share. Usually if I do an event, I will have an hour of anonymous Q&A. When you hear other people's questions and you hear the level of struggle and brokenness that is in every room, you don't feel so isolated in your own struggle.

Discussing sexuality (of any kind) is often taboo in many church settings. How can a member of a church move the church body toward wholesome honesty, healing, and growth?

A lot of it starts with prayer, but a lot of it also starts with what we do in our own hearts.

I really feel like God wants to bring revival in this area, and what paves the way for corporate revival is personal revival. I've seen this happen in churches, for example, when somebody is willing to confess their sexual addiction and get the help they need, and their marriage goes through the hard work of restoration.

Now they're providing the opportunity to bring out something that most people feel like needs to be hidden. That can happen with any form of sexual struggle. It can be a woman or a man who's struggling with pornography or same-sex attraction. Or it can be a parent who's struggling with a kid who's transgender.

These things are staying secret, but it only takes a few people who have the courage to step into this space and say, “Hey, I need help.”

You mentioned that it takes other steps besides prayer.

And then you need resources. These are sensitive topics, theologically and emotionally, and biblical resources that create the space and give you the language to talk about things are key.

You also have to have a structure of, “How do we bring God into this conversation? How do we have boundaries and know what we can share and what we can't share? And how do we have the resources of knowing where to go if we open up something that's really painful?”

What do you wish people understood about their own sexuality?

The number one thing I wish people understood is how much God cares about this area of their life and how much they are keeping God out of this area of their life.

Sexuality, for a lot of reasons, tends to be a part of our humanity that we keep separate from our relationship with God.

We don't know how to pray about it. We don't know how to seek help from the church. We don't know how the Bible integrates into our sexual struggles. We don't experience the power of God in our sexuality because we try to manage it on our own.

But God is not ashamed of our sexual struggles. He is not confused by them. He's the author of our sexuality, and He's the Redeemer.

You’ve written quite a few books—is there one you’d like to mention specifically that would relate to ReNew conference attendees?

I think it really depends on the attendee. A lot of my books are about either sexuality or marriage, so I think it really depends on where you are in your journey.

These two are Moody Publishers titles: God, Sex, and Your Marriage, and Sex and the Single Girl.

What do you hope ReNew attendees will take away from the conference?

Paul prayed in Ephesians 1 that God would open the eyes of our hearts so that we would know Him better. If I have one goal, it's, “Lord, would You open the eyes of our hearts and give us a spirit of wisdom and revelation so that we can know You better?”