BLAKE MICHAEL
“I relate to God and people as a true man, with strength and boldness. God, in fact, has taken this quiet, gay boy and made him as bold as a lion!”
From as early as age 10, I remember feeling a strong desire to know the boys who sat with me at the lunch table. I wanted to know each of them as more than a friend. As I grew older these desires grew stronger. By the time I entered junior high I had started watching porn, masturbating, and exploring these feelings. I wanted to see what was “out there,” so I started using gay dating apps to find someone who would please me in the way that my body demanded and my heart so desperately craved. Unfulfilled by the hook-up culture, I soon realized I wanted more than sex. I wanted a relationship… to hold someone and to be held by him too. This “want” soon became a reality when, at 16, I began dating another man. Before long, I fell in love, and he became the focus of my life. In my mind, my plans were set: I would graduate early, we would move into a house together, get married, and build a family. But even though the relationship made me happy, there was no peace in my life, nor was there any freedom. I lacked a sense of purpose, and despite this man’s affections, I was consumed with a hunger for something more. This desperation often left me depressed, anxious, and suicidal. But everything changed one strange morning when God, thankfully, ruined my plans.
My boyfriend and I had been dating for a few months, and we had just spent the weekend together. Driving home, I was pulled over for speeding (84 mph in a 70 mph zone). As the officer walked away from my car, I heard a strange yet familiar voice: “Blake, what are you doing?” Not raised in a Christian home, I’d only heard bits and pieces of the Gospel. But in that moment, I realized that all of the stories, movies, books, and sermons that had trickled down to me through the culture were more than fairytales and words. As God’s presence filled the car and surrounded me, I had an instant awareness that I was living in sin. What’s more, if I didn’t repent, this sin would cost me my life! “He isn’t worth your life,” the familiar voice whispered.
There and then I understood that total surrender to God would mean leaving behind this man who I loved with all my heart. As I sat on the side of this quiet road, I knew without doubt that I had to change. The experience was so profound, in fact, that I broke up with my boyfriend that very morning. Though it may sound hard to believe, I immediately began pursuing holiness and preaching the Gospel. Within two weeks, a local pastor who’d heard my story reached out and offered to mentor me. With his help, I received counseling and other helpful resources like Holy Sexuality by Christopher Yuan and Gay Girl, Good God by Jackie Hill Perry. As an intern at his church, I began to grow as a son and a preacher. Three years later, and I am still free. I have found healing from my past and wholeness in the present. And I have so much hope for the future. Though I still sometimes struggle with same-sex attraction, these feelings no longer control me. I am living out my God-given masculinity through leadership, preaching, leading, and equipping others. I relate to God and people as a true man, with strength and boldness. God, in fact, has taken this quiet, gay boy and made him as bold as a lion!