SPECIAL NOTE: Welcome! I share my story out of a thankful heart for what God has done for me. I also share it because too many people feel judged...they feel that the Gospel is somehow beyond their reach...that the invitation of Christ is exclusively offered to the "in" crowd. Well I've got Good News...the invitation of Jesus Christ is NOT exclusive! His offer of Eternal Life - according to the Bible - is available to ALL of us! Yes, that includes you and me.

My homosexuality emerged when I was just 11 years old. I experienced all the stages you may relate to - denial, escapism, repression, depression and an intense fear of rejection! There were even many moments when I wanted to die.

Finally, at 23 years of age, I experienced the tremendous relief of coming out. And not long after, I experienced the joy of finding love. Life was incredible! I knew then what I still believe today - that homosexuality is NOT a choice. And it's NOT simply a behavior or the technical aspects of homosexual sex. For me and for many of you reading this, it was or is our very identity!

Would you just casually give up your homosexual identity? Me neither! It was my life - my whole life. I was in a committed relationship with a guy I loved very deeply. So you can imagine my surprise when God unexpectedly intervened in my life and led me down a journey of spiritual discovery that ended in me surrendering my homosexual identity, my lover...my entire heart and life...to Jesus.

I invite you to read my story below. I make two promises to you - first, I will not judge you as I share my story. In fact, I will defend your dignity and value as one of God's children to anyone who would judge you! And second, no one ever asked me to change and it's not my business to ask you to change. Homosexuality cannot be changed by man...it can only be surrendered to God. God is the ONLY one who can draw someone to the place of surrender and He is the ONLY one who can transform our lives.

Thanks for listening to my story. Your questions and comments are sincerely welcomed - simply Contact Us.

IF YOU ARE SUICIDAL: While it is common for many of us who experience the threat of rejection to briefly contemplate suicide, for some the prospect of suicide may be a serious consideration. If you feel suicidal, we want to HELP you immediately. First, you should know that you are not alone. Second, you should know that there is help available. Third, you should know that God loves you very much - right where you are! You are His child and He deeply loves you. We want to do everything we can to make sure you understand how valuable your life is - this world needs you...Jesus loves you...and we care deeply for you. Go to our HELP page now. God bless you friend.

CHILDHOOD/TEENAGE YEARS

I was born and raised in a small town in rural Mid-America and had the greatest childhood for which anyone could ask. Our family was very close. We enjoyed boating, hiking, caving and watching football games on Sunday afternoon.

My two brothers and I lived an adventurous life building forts and looking for lost treasures in the wilderness. We threw rocks at trains and mud balls at cars! We regularly had family reunion picnics outdoors with campfires, roasted marshmallows and hotdogs. In my family, there was a lot of love!

Our family was an “Easter and Christmas” kind of church family. We knew “John 3:16” not from what it actually said in the Bible but as a religious symbol behind the goal post in football games. We believed in God but He was a distant God.

I knew from age 11 that I had homosexual desires. Throughout my teens, I guarded this secret tightly. I drank alcohol to escape and repressed my feelings hoping they would go away. They did not go away. These were desperate years. I asked to be baptized thinking that would heal me but the feelings only grew stronger.

COLLEGE

When I entered college, I hoped that I would finally fall in love. Instead, I joined a fraternity and constantly feared rejection if they ever found out about me. Fearing rejection, I left school and moved back home.

On one day not long after I arrived home, I was standing next to my Mom as she did the dishes. Having suffered this great disappointment of leaving school, I was hurting and in a moment of tenderness I felt safe beside my Mom. I was literally about to open my mouth and tell her my biggest secret when she said, "About the worst nightmare a parent could experience is to find out one of their children is gay."

I am convinced that Mom had no idea what I was about to say and she did not mean it in a hurtful way. But the timing of her statement clearly closed the door. It was these two experiences that led me to two conclusions: (i) I am gay – this is no stage; and (ii) No one can know.

POST-COLLEGE

At age 23, I graduated from another university and started my career. Once again, I was hoping that I would finally fall in love. But I soon became fearful that if co-workers knew about me I could lose my job or at least my credibility.

By this time, I had repressed my feelings for 12 years and all the years of denial finally took their toll. I became severely depressed and could not tell - at times - if I was awake or in a dream. Some days, I could not get out testimonytext5.cm2 of bed. I would sometimes drive over the yellow line and wish that a dump truck would take me out.

I finally sought therapy and was soon able to tell my parents. For me, it was the hardest day of my life as I struggled to say the words “Mom and Dad, I am gay.” I cried for hours before I was finally able to say those words to them. For my parents, it was like the death of a son. For me, I felt like a ton of bricks were finally off my back and I felt an amazing sense of hope for the future. Mom and Dad loved me even while they grieved and questioned “why”.

FINDING LOVE

In 1991 at the age of 25, I fell in love. It was an incredible natural high as I finally experienced all that I had dreamed about for so many years. Finally, I felt free and I did not care so much what others thought of me.

I had everything a guy could want – a wonderful lover, a great job, good health and acceptance from my family. But somewhere around the second year of our relationship, I started searching for deeper meaning in life. All these wonderful material and relational blessings were great but there was something deeper that they could not satisfy. Even acceptance from my family and relatives and friends could not calm a growing anxiety in my heart.

SEARCHING

The Religious Right was condemning me to hell while Pro-Gay Theologians were saying that ANY consensual sex was ok. I decided that I could not believe either of them, so I journeyed through the Bible to find out what Jesus had to say about my life. I was disturbed and disappointed to find many verses that described homosexual relationships as sin. The more I read, the more I became convinced that God’s Word was true. I was attending church regularly and getting more and more involved in discovering that God had a purpose for my life.

A SIBERIAN MISSION TRIP

In 1995, I signed up to go on a mission trip to remote Siberia and it changed my life forever. I met people who were SO innocent compared to my Hollywood life. I met people who had paid a price for their faith under Communist rule. I saw a widow who wept as she touched the gate surrounding a condemned cathedral – she did not weep because it was closed – it had been closed for 75 years…she wept for joy that she finally had the freedom to touch the gate as an expression of her faith. I saw orphans grotesquely muscular and yet malnourished from working potato fields. God ended up doing a mission trip on me!

A JOB RELOCATION

When I returned from Siberia, a job transfer took me to New England. Leaving my lover, my family and friends and my belongings behind, I soon was isolated and lonely. It was during these days that God pulled me into His Word and into Prayer. God gently showed me that we all have needs - we have hunger needs, sleep needs, relational needs, sex needs, success needs. And while all of these are important, God showed me we will never get ALL of our needs met. It’s a fact of life – we all know this to be true from our own testimonytext81.cm2 lives. But it was more than that – I saw that the Siberian people’s need for Jesus…and their need for love and food…had to be more critical than my homosexual identity.

Jesus taught me that the Gospel does NOT mean that God is love and therefore we can have ALL of our own needs met – but that through the Gospel Jesus gives us strength, love, peace and comfort when all our needs are NOT met! Jesus says to you and me today – those of us who have tried filling our lives with the things of this world and it has not worked - HE says, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I WILL GIVE YOU REST.” And in an unexplainable and supernatural way, He becomes the One that can meet ALL our needs...

SURRENDER AT THE CROSS

Within months after moving to New England (1995) and after many weeks of resisting God’s call to surrender my life to Him, the day finally came. It was late in the night and I was wrestling with God holding on to my own will. With my spiritual eyes, God showed me Jesus nailed to the Cross and his bleeding head was down against His chest. Jesus lifted His head and the most loving, compassionate gaze peered from his eyes into mine. And God asked, “Do you want my Son?”

I wrestled with God. I said, "Lord, you can have my whole heart but I just can't let go of the one person I love so much...can't I just keep this small part of my life but give you everything else?" God seemed to say testimonytext91.cm2 that maybe my lover and my homosexual identity were not such a small part of my heart. He was right...while I had a very integrated life that was not solely defined by my sexuality, how could the one I love and how I experience love not be a huge part of my life? The fact is...my lover and my life meant the world to me.

Then I thought, "Lord, ok, I'll give you my lover and my identity and invite you more into how I live out my life in this area." I mouthed the words but my heart knew I was not willing to let go and surrender this to Him. After much resistance, I finally collapsed to the floor weeping…I felt all my strength go out of me…and I felt a peace come over me as I said, “Ok Lord, I am Yours.”

MY NEW LIFE

That was over 10 years ago. There was much pain in those days, but also much comfort from my Savior. He guided me to an excellent Church and a wonderfully accepting and loving Care Group. It is my Church where God gave me mentors and brothers and sisters in Christ who listened and comforted me.

Just as one example, I sought out a mentor on an anonymous basis and received a call from an Elder one evening. That night on the phone – he only knew me as “Bill” – he prayed that the Lord would heal me and raise up for me a wife and children from within the Church. I was a little shocked to hear his prayer because I had NO thoughts about marriage – I was hurting from the loss of my lover and yet discovering the joy of knowing Jesus.

MY NEW IDENTITY

It's very interesting to look back now. At the time, I felt so deeply that my identity was much more than "sex". And I still believe that today! My homosexual identity was my source of love...both who I loved and how I loved...it was the reason for my sensitivity to others' needs...it was what drove my compassion for people...it was what made me fight for justice for those who were ostracized and weak. It was, in short, me! Who I am!

And yet many people probably looked at my life and said "he chooses to be gay." There were probably many people that rejected me....that judged me instead of seeing the whole person that I felt I was. And so I saw surrendering my life to Christ through the eyes of uncompassionate religion...I thought it would mean that I would lose my entire identity...not just who I love and how I love...but literally "who I am."

Little did I know the healing that would nourish my soul as I finally let go of my will and stepped freely with my whole heart and mind into whole-life surrender to Christ. On the other side of surrender, I found that I did NOT lose my identity at all! Yes, I lost my lover and I lost my will to continue seeking love and life through homosexuality. And I don't want to minimize that loss - it was very painful many times. I will never minimize that! It was the hardest part of surrendering my entire heart and mind and life to Christ...

But surprisingly, I found that the other personality traits I associated with my homosexual identity were not mine at all...but the very image of God stamped into my heart! He made me this way! Yes, I really was born this way! Compassionate, sensitive to others' needs, concerned about justice for those who are weak. My life purpose, passion and sense of eternal significance emerged as I realized God created me this way to do His will for my life in the few short years we have here on earth.

AND MUCH MORE

I thought that all I would ever have is Jesus. And believe me, Jesus is enough! But God did not stop His work in my life. He transformed a wonderful friendship I had with an awesome Godly woman in my Care testimonytext161.cm2 Group into a beautiful love - my wife and I married in 1999. God has used my wife and children as a wonderful source of healing in my life over and over again.

I am not afraid to say openly that I am not 100% free of same-sex attractions. Yet there is a way in which Christ provides for my wife and I to have a sexually, emotionally and spiritually satisfying marriage even in my imperfect state. While I mention the provision of marriage that God has provided for me, I in no way hold marriage as what it means to be "healed." Knowing Christ in a nourishing personal relationship is what true healing is all about - we will all struggle with temptation until the day we die.

It is no different for a heterosexual man who loves and adores his wife and yet must keep attractions for other women in check. Surrendering such attractions - whether heterosexual or homosexual - at the feet of Jesus brings about peace in my heart...not the old pain of repression. Trust me when I say - and as I shared above - that I fully understand repression and the harm it causes. I don't recommend repression for anyone!

The interesting truth I have discovered is that the old repression that caused me so much pain in my teens and early twenties had to do with the fact that I was hiding my true life from others...and in that hiddenness I feared that I would be rejected or abandoned if people really knew me. In Christ and the love of my wife and the love of equally vulnerable Christians, there is no hiding and there is no fear to be honest about who I am and what I struggle with. You can't know you're loved if you're not known...and you can't receive healing while you're hiding. Today, my life is lived honestly and openly - the good and the bad - with Christ, my wife, my family and my Christian friends. I am no longer hiding. And I no longer feel the pain of repression. I am free in Christ...free indeed.

I lost my life…that is true…the only life I knew. But Jesus saved me and He gave me a new life…a life I could never have known without Him. And together, Jesus has given my wife and I a great purpose - to love each other and to care for our children. And to care for children who don’t have parents. In our spare time, the Lord has taken us all over the world to minister to orphans. There is no greater LOVE than this – that Jesus gave His life for us. And there is no greater JOY than this – to take the love of Christ to the fatherless.

WHAT ABOUT YOU

Maybe someone in your life is homosexual. We would be honored to listen to your concerns and pray for you and your loved one. Or maybe you are homosexual. We would be honored to listen to your concerns and pray for you as well.

There are two promises I make - first, God is faithful to receive you just as you are. Second, we at FOTOS will never ask you to change! Our greatest joy would be for you to personally know the One that can satisfy you completely. We know that as you seek Jesus Christ you will discover that He has already been seeking you! You are His precious child and He has a great purpose for your life!

Maybe you are realizing that the Creator of our entire world REALLY is seeking YOU…with love, with patience, with forgiveness. You sense God knocking at the door of your heart. But you fear letting go. You testimonytext12.cm2 wonder – can I really know this kind of personal God? Can HE really be found? Will He really receive me?

I want to assure you that the next step is a safe one to take. God has a promise just for you in Jeremiah 29:11-14 - “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I WILL BE FOUND BY YOU.”

If you are interested in discovering more, check out The Gospel and God's great love for you. We also welcome you to Contact Us anytime with any questions you may have. We'd love to hear YOUR story!

God bless you friend.

You can reach FOTOS Ministries toll-free at (877) 683-6867