Dear Colin,
How do you write to someone you don’t know about something you don’t understand? I don’t know, but I’m giving it a try.
First of all, I am frustrated. I am frustrated with homosexuality, the ex-gay movement, and I find the “pro-gay” people largely strident, self-centered, and obnoxious. (Did I leave anyone out? Oh, yes, myself!)
Seriously, I attended Homosexuals Anonymous [H.A.] in the mid '80s, when there was a chapter in [city named]. I was one of two women (usually) in a roomful of men.
My original, primary purpose was to see if there were people who believed in Jesus Christ who were also gay (I am going to be “sloppy” with terms—I’m beginning to feel “a rose is a rose” regarding semantics).
I could read the Bible’s clear message on homosexual behavior. The orientation, the feelings,—I chalked them up to “rebellion” and the maverick in me. Besides, I was young—I had plenty of time to “go straight”.
I stayed in those meeting rooms for approximately two years. At the time I was to leave for a year of life in [state named], I called the female facilitator of the group to say “goodbye”. She told me she was living with her new [female] lover. She had been in the program much longer than I. I can’t say I was devastated or shocked. Saddened, maybe…
…I mention that because I’m at the point of wondering if I’m deluding myself that any of us become truly straight. I know that you, yourself, had a return (of sorts) to the “old ways”.
Why would you return to ex-gay ministry, Colin? Do you believe it works? Do you believe there is more than just hope—but a reality of change for those of us who know in our private moments how we feel?
About three years ago, I called several Exodus ministries around the country, trying to find out more—more information, more insights. I know that H.A., while not in opposition with Exodus, has some differences.
I want to do right, but I don’t want to delude myself. Self-lies are misery to live with. But then, so is blatant sin. A rock and a hard place comes to mind.
H.A. in [city named] has long been defunct. But, it was my “stepping stone” so to speak. In some ways, I consider you to have had a mentor role in my life.
I would like to hear back from you with anything you might wish to share. I know my questions are difficult, but I feel we’ve all asked them.
At any rate, peace and grace in Christ.
A.M.
So much in your letter! So little space! I feel honored that you wrote to me.
If you have read this newsletter’s feature article already, you will understand why I kept going in a ministry of homosexual recovery after repeated failure on my part. Christ has conquered forces outside of me. He’s brought the Kingdom—outside of me. He’s my Righteousness outside of me. It’s mine, whether I feel it or not.
When you know this, you determine your reality by Him, not by what’s going on in you. That enables you never to give up. You defy the norms and the paradigms of the world. Then when you start hanging out with the old longings, your faith, through praise, knows how to center itself again in Him, and reduces the longings. Gradually as you grow, you see more and more those longings were misinterpreted for what they really are. And you open yourself increasingly to your heterosexuality, baby-step at a time.
But it’s the growing process that often makes us feel we’re kidding ourselves, because that’s precisely what it is, “a process”, neither where we were nor where we want to be. So in our “private moments”, as you put it, we may often feel the old yearnings. But the way of Christ is to know that though, in ourselves, we are neither where we were, nor where we want to be, in our new Self in Him, we are already there. So faith then, through praise, gently pulls our heart’s longings to that place.
That, plainly speaking, means that when you are alone, feeling sexual or romantic for a woman, you first of all by faith affirm through thanks to God your sexual self in Christ, then, instead of blocking your sexual feelings by trying to think about the weather, you enter in to your erotic moment, thanking God for who you are as a woman, and sensualizing yourself in the presence of Christ, instead of in lust. Slowly this helps to return your sexuality to innocence.
I believe in recovery from homosexuality. I experience it. But, “truly straight”? What’s that? Not even the “truly straight” are truly straight. Remember we live in a fallen world and recovery is relative. It’s never perfect. There is always the capacity to go back. But recovery is not being on the edge, ready to fall off at the slightest push. Recovery is not being obsessed any more; being able to appreciate same-sex beauty without drooling over it, enjoying same-sex affection without feeling you have to have it all, enjoying someone else’s life without feeling you don’t have one of your own.
But it’s also knowing that if you started thinking in certain ways, and getting resentful, and disconnecting yourself from society, you could go back, because you’re not perfect until Christ comes. You know this and you’re comfortable with it. You live now in His identity—and it rubs off!
I have to tell you that some ex-gay ministries have forsaken the Gospel for psychology, and it just won’t cut it. There can be no true ontology without faith in Christ.
And I’m bothered by ex-gay ministries that will not encourage you to explore your sexual feelings in the Lord’s presence through masturbation. Sexual wholeness doesn’t mean stuffing it, but exploring it until you can return it to innocence.
Get my tape series. They’ll help you further and bless your socks off (stockings?).
—Colin