Door of Hope Testimony: Joel

My thanks to my Setting Captives Free mentor, Michael, and to my accountability partner, Tabb, for helping me revise it truthfully into a God-centered story of victory. Most of all, I thank God for orchestrating the spectacular victory I now enjoy.

By nature, I've always been very intellectual, so in dealing with my lust for guys (and for women, for that matter), I tried to figure out the causes of my homosexual desires. It could have been several things: my father's emotional abuse when I was younger, my own sensitive nature, and half a dozen other "factors." How strange it was for me to learn in the Door of Hope Course that the cause isn't always essential to finding the cure.

Needless to say, for 17 of my 23 years on earth, I was very fond of "self-gratifying." When I was 12, a boy my own age and I discovered we liked the same habits, and we tried to find an opportunity to be alone to gratify each other. Didn't work, but that didn't matter. The little we did do before being caught was a taste of forbidden fruit I never washed out of my mouth. For years afterward, I wanted to recapture the pleasure of the experience. I constantly self-gratified, made erotic art in secret, and fantasized about anyone I found attractive. Then when I got internet access, and I discovered gay porn, a new dark chapter opened in my life.

The mental struggle in my mind was horrible. Born into a sincere, devout Christian family, being saved at 6 years old, and rededicated to Christ at 13, I wrestled with an overwhelming sense of worthlessness because of my losing battle with lust. It got me in trouble several times when I tried to come onto some boys at my Christian school, but by God's grace, I never experienced any public humiliation. Even so, the internal shame consumed me. I felt so painfully false when others would tell me what a good Christ-like kid I was.

I went to two Christian psychologists and a prayer healer. Each time, I would get some solid advice, or a touch of the Holy Spirit's power, yet I never held on to the victory I gained. I was like some of the Kings of Judah in the Old testament: I'd "get rid of the idols in my cities", yet "neglect the sacred shrines in the high places." Always the enemy would draw me back, convincing me I was a lost cause. Needless to say, I wasn't walking in total victory.

All this time, I felt like I had a Jekyll/Hyde complex. I strove to grow in my walk with God, yet I could not get past the strange sweetness of sexual sin. The battle came to a head when I was 21, and my younger cousin, a dear friend and brother to me for 7 years, came on to me. We seduced each other several times over the next two years. What we did together felt good, but it scarred me so deeply there were days I contemplated suicide. I couldn't take the two-faced life anymore. I knew either I had to come clean completely, do whatever it took to have total victory, or else I had to embrace my lust as who I really was, once and for all.

Through all of my life, I felt so terribly alone. I had plenty of acquaintances but no real friends until I graduated from high school. Even so, that horrible loneliness persisted. I knew I wasn't the only one who experienced such temptations and struggles, but I had no one to talk to who had been where I'd been, and God always seemed so awfully far away. It seemed like there was no one in my church who could identify with what I was going through. Many lonely nights I prayed for one.

But at last, in January of 2010, I made a friend at church who could identify with what I was going through. I found the courage to tell him EVERYTHING that had happened to me, and that I had done. He put me in touch with a friend of his who was a pastor. He became a mentor, and my main accountability partner. He helped me enroll in Setting Captives Free. What, ideally, would have been 60 days has dragged into three months, but the lessons have paid off. I took them as an opportunity to learn more about the Jesus Christ who is the Lover of my soul.

I could spend pages talking about the powerful love and wisdom I gained from the Door of Hope lessons. It’s not just an “ex-gay program.” In fact, it’s really a crash course in Christ-centered living, which is THE key to victory in all areas of life! In April, I experienced a major spiritual breakthrough, and now I really am walking in continuous victory over lust. For over two months, I’ve been free from self-gratification, avoided porn, and have been training my mind. All of this has been in God’s power, and it’s all to His credit. Where once I had an online circle of gay friends for companionship, now I have a circle of godly, passionate Christian friends. Where once my walk with God was cold, now it’s burning hot and hotter still each day as I pray, worship, meditate, and serve. I no longer wrestle with the question of “Was I born this way?” What matters is that sin is sin, and God is God. He will do whatever it takes to bring victory to anyone who cries out for it.