It was something that had kept me restless for years.  I’d struggled with the inadequacies, the contradictions, the blatant sin.  I couldn’t talk to anyone about it, and worse, because of it, I felt that I couldn’t talk to anyone.  If you knew me, you’d have probably thought that I was the next best thing to a perfect Christian – no struggles, no serious sins – a nice, boring christian.

Except that I’m gay.  Not that anybody ever knew, though some wondered.  No way in heaven or hell was I telling.  And actually doing something about it?  Dream on.  Except for what I could dream from online.

I was so wrapped up in the dilemma of how do I even talk about such a thing – as a good little christian, don’t forget – and how much I was obsessed with not being able to talk about it.  How does a bible study leader talk to his peers about not lusting after women because its only men in my dreams?  Much less how to bring it up to the people that I’m supposed to be helping lead to God?  I was silent.  On many issues.  My coleader once told me that she got so frustrated with me so often because I never talked about anything really deep.  She was my best friend but for years felt that I was almost untouchable because I never seemed to struggle over anything.

Years of shame, misery, denial, hoping to be straight (at on point I’d have been very content with at least being bi), and not talking.  Now, don’t get the idea that I didn’t want anybody to find out, or that I was worried aobut tarnishing my pretty little image.  I was weirdly more freaked about how people would see me as a christian.  As I understood the Bible was kinda explicit in the bits it said about homosexuality: not for good little christians.  But I was constantly trying to figure out who I could tell, how I could bring it up, how would they react.  Every Sunday for 2 years I met with accountability partners.  Every Sunday I listened to them, because I felt that I couldn’t be honest.  I never spoke much in those small groups of 3 guys, never let the steam off my chest, or shared what I was really going through.  Looking back, maybe I was afraid of being hurt. Of losing the few friends I had.  Of not being accepted.  Of disappointing my parents.  Of admitting that I could never meet up to what God wanted to make me.

Then it slipped.  Last Monday.  Well, it was halfway planned, but I didn’t think I’d go through with it.  I was meeting with a staff worker for InterVarsity to talk about a bunch of stuff and how I might have to leave the fellowship, a sort of personal business talk.  And I told her.  I prefaced it with explanations of how I was worried that she may not want me to be in any bit of a leadership position anymore because…  I’m gay.  From our conversation, it was clear that we were about to leave and be done before I told her.  I was shocked that I actually told her, I wasn’t nervous or edgy and was speaking at ease.  Sarah took it without a hitch.  She wasn’t shocked, mad, or anything.  I had been expecting anything but the honest compassion and concern that she showed me.  Don’t know why, but I wasn’t prepared for it.  For the first time in years, I had tears going down my cheeks, because of the unconditional love being shown me.  In the middle of a Starbucks on campus.  And I didn’t care that I was surrounded by people who might know me.  Because Sarah rocked me.  Our conversation will be the subject of another post, and the circumstances that led up to it, and what came from it too.  But I walked away changed.  I was elated, disappointed, and different when I walked away.  It was way more than just a slip, it was a turning point.

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