For this Father’s day, I have a message for some of the guys out there who identify as gay.

If you are living as a gay man and once had a hope of being married to a woman and having kids and living the best life but you had to give it up when you came out as gay, I want you to know there is still hope in Jesus Christ! Please stick with me through the rest of this article.

I was there once, like you are, living as a gay man. I too also had believed there was no chance of being married to a woman and having kids so. Once I believed it was never going to happen it became much easier to come out as gay and so I sought love in men. I wasn’t fulfilled to the dreams I once had, but I at least had someone to do life with. Or so I thought.

By God’s grace I was convicted that I was not living in God’s will for me, yet I didn’t know what to do to find His will, to do what was pleasing to God. I felt a conviction the whole time I was in a gay relationship. Can you relate? There’s that tickle of truth shoved way down to your toes, a very soft voice in your ear reminding you God wants you to repent. The prick of truth knowing the messy, often hurtful, humiliating act of sodomy is not the best for you?

That’s where I was. I clung to my boyfriend because I wanted to know and love SOMEONE. I wanted to be known and loved by SOMEONE. I had a great capacity for intimacy and wanted to engage it. The desire for intimacy burned inside. Does this feel similar?

I willingly exchanged the hope of intimacy with a woman, something that seemed as unlikely as the dead rising from the grave, for what I felt was a consolation, a last ditch effort to find love, I turned to men. I found men, unlike women, wanted me and showed interest in me. And since so many people said I was gay, I decided that was who I was to be.

But God showed himself to be true, and faithful, and loving. He brought me to a place where He gave me hope once again, that maybe, just maybe, God didn’t want me to live as a gay man and He had something else for me. With the faith of a mustard seed, I prayed that God would reveal his will to me, that if I was not supposed to live as a gay man, that He would make it happen that my boyfriend would break up with me. You see, there wasn’t ANY chance I wanted to break off an intimate relationship. I put out this fleece to see if God would answer. He did. The next day after that prayer my boyfriend broke up with me! I had also prayed that if God didn’t want me to live as gay, that He would make it possible for me to marry the most unlikely diamond of a woman, Rhoda, who knew I was gay and dating a guy I had once dated!

I found out that God was able to forgive a humble man who has a broken and contrite heart before Him. He worked to restore what was stolen from me. I ended up getting married to Rhoda, even when I was still gay identified, on the belief that God was true and would work out the specifics. And by grace, through faith in Jesus Christ, I found God is a miracle worker! He raised what was dead in my life and brought me to life again.

Now I’m transformed by the power of Jesus Christ. I’m no longer desiring men for sodomy as a means of intimacy. God has given me intimacy with Him, my Father, through reconciliation power of Jesus Christ as my Lord and savior. I have intimacy with my wife unlike I could have ever experienced or hoped for in a gay relationship. I also have the intimacy with brothers in the faith who are able to connect deeply in brotherhood – something I all the time had the capacity for but didn’t have the knowledge of what Christ brings between men for strong relationships.

Please let me pray with you and share with you the power of Jesus to bring abundant life to you, a hope for a future that you had dreamed of long ago. It may seem impossible, but with God, all things are possible. He brought me out of the gay life and into His life 17 years ago. It began with humility, an act of repentance, and a prayer of faith, a confession of trust. And He is so gentle, faithful, and true to respond in love. A great God who isn’t going to give us a rock when we ask for bread. But life abundantly, in this and the next. A joy that goes beyond understanding, a peace that gives us rest, and a hope for a tomorrow.

Being a father has been the most wonderful gift I could have asked for from the Lord. He is a miracle worker. He completes the work He starts in us. He does wash us clean, he DOES give us a new heart and a new mind. He DOES transform and change us into the men God wills for us to be. Fruitful and life abundant in Him!

On this Father’s day, please exhange the sorrow you feel for the dream lost for a hope that doesn’t disappoint, and put your trust in Jesus. Lets pray together and seek Jesus who restores what satan tries to steal and destroy. Let’s pray for the faith, hope, and freedom to seek Jesus and your desire for a family. Jesus is a great counselor and friend, and He is so good. Be blessed in Jesus today. May God bring you peace and fulfil your hope for fatherhood.

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Daren Mehl is the Associate Director with Agape First Ministries, a self funded missionary to the lost who identify as LGBTQ. His heart is to continue to give testimony of Jesus and His wonderful working grace to bring life where there was no hope, to bring us from death to life. Jesus is better than the sweetest honey, better than the purest gold, and a better friend than anyone we can imagine. He gives good things, including the hope of a future, even to giving the gift of a spouse and children to us.
To support Daren’s work, please visit his support page to sign up for his newsletter, his prayer support team, and to help financially. Ministry is his calling and passion and he desires to continue to call the prodigals home and equip the church to reap this great harvest waiting in the LGBTQ community.