Obedience Over Orientation

Save Me, a newly released movie about God and homosexuality, hits upon some of life’s toughest questions as it hits the theatres. Mark, the main character, is a homosexual with sexual and alcohol addictions who winds up at an “ex-gay ministry” called the Genesis House. While Marks finds compassion, hope, sobriety, self-respect and God there, he does not find a “cure” for his same-sex attraction.

No doubt some of the questions raised in this movie are ones that plagued me as a young person when I began dealing with my own “sexual orientation”. My attractions seemed fixed, but my understanding wasn’t.  If my temptations and fantasies were any indication of my seemingly fixed orientation, then I was gay.  While I experienced crushes on girls on an emotional level the almost emotionally cannibalistic attraction I had for guys also fully encompassed me physically and sexually. What’s the problem, right?   Today those feelings are called natural, legitimate, god-given.  And the conflict is blamed on intolerant and antiquated religious views that our culture is daily working to obliterate.  In the 1980’s that wasn’t the case; homosexuality wasn’t polite company.  We were still doing everything in our power as pre-gays and lesbians to appear typical and that meant living in the closet.  That cultural reality coupled with the innate conflict that somewhere at the core of who I was — being gay was wholly and unalterably inconsistent with my very being.  Any fantasy or action was followed by tremendous fear of retaliation from a just God, which was followed by tremendous guilt and confusion.

 I tried to stop the feelings.  I tried not to give into the temptations.  I prayed constantly for healing and to be straight.  I did this for years.  To no avail.  It seemed I was first, last and always, gay.  How could this have happened?  Why me?  How would I reconcile this with my faith and with a just God?  I couldn’t.  How would I change the reality of those feelings and the orientation that I hadn’t asked for?  I wouldn’t.

At 19, I went to a local Exodus International Member Ministry for help in dealing with my unwanted feelings of same sex attraction. Not too long after, I remember going out to dinner with friends from my support group. While out, I ran into a group of my gay friends and one of them said to me, “Are you out with your straight-wanna-be friends tonight?”  I laughed and blushed on the outside, but I was crushed on the inside and wondered, Will this alternative really work? Should it even be tried?  What if I fail and then my old friends want nothing to do with me either?  Was I just gay and sin or not in need of being true to who I was?  Should I just be gay and ask for forgiveness daily for the rest of my life?  Was celibacy the answer — realize I’m gay and have all the fun without all the sex?  Could I call that Diet Homosexuality?

A little misguided at first, I stayed on the “road to recovery” from homosexuality.  I most wanted to be normal and acceptable, I think, but that misrepresentation of the point served to help me stay in the game.  While the pressure of a church culture that was intolerant of people is a reality that I am happy is changing today in lieu of a healthier acceptance of people and understanding that all sin is ugly, not just the ones we don’t struggle with, that pressure and intolerance served to keep me from truly embracing a gay identity. I was never told heterosexuality was the answer, but I sure did believe that it was.  Success for this boy, the youngest of 6 and uncle of 23, was a wife and kids.  However, along the way I came to realize that heterosexuality was not the opposite of homosexuality---holiness is---and that being straight wasn’t THE answer and might never be a reality.  I also learned that heterosexual wasn’t a label or a state of being more than it was God’s creative intent for the appropriate sexual expression of His creation.  It was the only way His creation could reflect His image sexually.

During this time of understanding God’s plan for me, seeking Him for my very survival and trusting Him with my every sexual urge and impulse, I really began thinking how my future, beliefs and sexual sobriety would be impacted if my feelings never changed.  Talk about a dilemma — a crisis of faith and a time of grieving over what might never be.  I might never get to express myself in the way that felt natural.  I might never feel the way I believe I was created to feel.  Moreover, what if I find a member of the opposite sex that I want to feel sexually attracted to and can’t or find a man that I am sexually drawn to and can’t express it?  ARGH!

It was during this season of great angst that the Lord spoke clearest to me.  He knew that I needed some real direction.  Maybe God spoke because of that and maybe He spoke because, like Jacob, I grabbed on and refused to let go until He spoke. Jacob held on for a blessing; I just wanted understanding hoping it would bring relief.  What I came to understand and know during that time, though, has served me well for a decade and a half now. God spoke to me through the question of a friend who asked me, “What do you think God is more interested in, your obedience or your happiness?”  It’s funny to me now, 15 years later that such a question was ever so puzzling to me, but it was.  My immediate thought and answer was that God wants me to be happy. Of course, He wants us to be happy, my friend shared, but God cares most that we are obedient. And as another friend of mine who has also been through a similar journey, Sy Rogers , often says, “Obedience will never hurt you like disobedience always will.”

That night was pivotal for me.  For the first time ever I knew what was necessary.  The question for me was no longer, “What do I do?”, but rather, “How do I do it?”  Not too long after that night a new and increasingly dear friend challenged me on the fact that I had allowed a bout of depression to keep me out of work for three days straight.  Looking for compassion from her I got a firm kick in the seat.  She said, “Get off your butt and go to work tomorrow. You need to start going on what you know and stop living by how you feel.”  That went hand in hand with what my friend had said earlier. Being obedient was what I knew to be right and pursuing happiness first was allowing my feelings to be the motivating/deciding factor in my life.  Wow.  All those years of getting puzzle pieces that didn’t fit together, I was finally getting ones that connected.

This was the beginning of the flood of insight that the Lord began to give me and still gives me today.  It was almost like I’d lived in a desert my whole life, but there was this wall in the middle of the desert that I knew was there, but never seemed to investigate. Come to find out the wall was a damn and the desert a river basin.  Further investigation led to cracks in the damn which led to the flood that restored this river basin to its original intended state.  It’s amazing to think about, but God always wanted me to investigate the wall and to discover that He wasn’t desirous of keeping me in the dark. He wanted me to know Him and to reveal Himself to me.  I won’t ever comprehend it all in this life, but the floodgates were opened and I get more and more of His truth and grace every day.

While I have sought and found some tremendous insights on the Lord related to my struggle with homosexuality that has been but a minute part of what He has imparted.  My struggle with homosexuality was a symptom of my humanity and my brokenness and as He has renewed my mind, transformed my beliefs and perspective that struggle has become something that has greatly diminished and the remainder is the same reminder we all have to go to the Cross every day for the ability to live.

So, you think you have a homosexual orientation?  You think you are living in conflict with that and your faith and beliefs?  Wondering if that orientation will ever be fixed, go away or change to a heterosexual one? 

I can’t guarantee that your ‘feelings/temptations/attractions’ will go away or even subside.  I have lived at varying spectrums of this reality and even go through seasons still that are more difficult than others, but I have found that even amidst struggle a life of obedience is absolutely possible. The spiritually trying seasons are actually the ones that I look forward to these day — like an athlete looks forward to the beginning of training for competition. They are the seasons where you have to work the hardest to get in shape, but when prepared and executed well yields the best results.  It is in these demanding periods of time that the Lord beckons me to come to Him over the counterfeit pleasures that vie for my attentions and affections.  Denying them leads to their death and to living a freer and happier life.

For me, I did experience some shifting in what some might call orientation or attraction.  I got married in 1998 and I love my wife with all that I am.  I am attracted to her in every way and I love every part of our relationship together.  Like any relationship, ours takes work.  We are purposeful about loving one another, communicating with one another and understanding one another.  These things lead to a bond that anyone would be hard pressed to break.  But, as strong as our foundation and life together is, it alone cannot keep me from straying—or her for that matter. Our love is strong, but it is human and imperfect without the Lord at the center.  Loving and marrying my wife didn’t solidify my heterosexuality or put an end to the possibility that I could be tempted.  If anything our relationship has only served to push me to pursue Christ more vigorously. I know the devil would love for our marriage to end and for our kids’ lives to be shattered as a result.  Like my ministry role, my marriage makes me more of a target for the Enemy and for my human enemies.  So, I stay grounded and honest and realistic. I will struggle because I am human and there isn’t any cure for that in this life.