Door of Hope Testimony:

It is amazing just to think of how much God loves me and how much he has done to reach me.

From the age of about five I can remember struggling with homosexual tendencies. My first experience was with another five year old. To this day I do not know what caused me to participate in such an act. An older sister of mine caught me in this act and told my step-father who severely beat me. Neither my mother nor step-father talked to me about what I had done. As I got older my sister began to tell other kids what I had done and I spent the rest of my life trying to deny that it ever happened. It got to a point where I began to question myself, if people thought that I was gay then I must have been. However, having been raised in a Christian home with various family members who were my foster parents, I learned that God loved me and that homosexuality was a sin. However, I did not understand why I felt the way I did about other boys nor did I know what to do about it because my church denomination only offered damnation but no hope for change. I could not believe that God would allow this to happen but offer no hope for change.

Through out my childhood I continued to struggle with these feelings never fully acting out on them until I moved-out on my own at 18. It was then that I began to experiment with cruising gay pick-up sites. Each time I found my self sleeping with another man I would go home and cry while taking a shower trying to wash of the shame and disgust of my sin. All through out college I found myself going up and down with this struggle. I desperately wanted to change because I loved God, but continued to fall flat on my face. By the time I turned 21 I began to talk with my pastor at that time and I shared with him my struggle. He was helpful but lacked effective resources.

At the age of 24 I met my wife. When my wife and I met it was love at first sight. God had given her the ability to love me knowing everything about me. Before we started to date I told her everything. She told me that she was ok with it as long as I was willing to change and prefer her and God over this sin. A year before our wedding I fell again. I immediately called her and told her in tears. She was hurt but forgave me and agreed to marry me. After this I thought that I was totally free from this sin. However, there were doors that I had left open such as soft porn through fitness magazines. By the time our son was born I had fed myself with so much soft and hardcore porn that I found myself acting out again. Only this time I never really told my wife what was happening. For four years I allowed her to believe that I was only struggling with porn.

After we had left another church that we had been at for five years where I received bad counsel from a pastor who was struggling with homosexuality unbeknownst to me, we started to attend a church that had a ministry for those who wanted to come out of the life style. Immediately I could feel the leading of the Holy Spirit telling me to sign up. I met with the pastor over the class and shared with him where I was at. All was going well until I allowed myself to get too close to someone in the class and I found myself acting out with him. Because this person wanted to start a friendship with his wife and my wife as couples even though we had fallen, I realized that I had been deceiving myself and that if I did not come completely clean with my wife regarding this sin and past sins, my marriage and life would be destroyed because I could see how this relationship or others could have developed if I continued to be deceitful. Over much dread I confessed to my pastor and wife what had happened. It hurt my wife to the core. We are currently in counseling with our pastor. We still have more work but God has shown himself to be faithful. He is mending our marriage and changing my heart. God has shown me how my acts were not only sin against him but against my wife as well. My heart has been broken and is being put back together. I am trusting God to keep me and I am learning to trust him one day at a time. When I look back on the night I told my wife everything I know that God had angels standing guard in our home encouraging us to hold on. We have chosen to trust God and he has proven that he can handle anything.

It was in the midst of all of this that a friend referred me to Setting Captives Free. I found the individual and very direct lessons powerful in helping me to deal with the root issues in my struggle with homosexuality. I am thankful to God that there are people who have received the power of God to change their lives. It has given me hope beyond measures. It is the desire of both my wife and I to one day share with others the awesome power of God to mend and change lives.