Falling down and getting up

If you have never heard of Alexander Whyte, let me introduce him to you. He was Moderator of the Free Church of Scotland in the latter years of the nineteenth century, and he is one of my heroes.I’ve been a Christian for a very long time, and I’ve constantly struggled with same-sex attraction. I’m in my seventies now and I reflect in this article on how I’ve survived, both spiritually and emotionally. The reason that Alexander Whyte is a hero of mine is the following comment he made on how we survive as Christians who struggle with same-sex attraction and who want to be obedient to God’s Word: “The perseverance of the saints is characterised by ever new beginnings.” Or, as a friend of mine expressed it, with less finesse but much greater clarity: “Falling down and getting up, falling down and getting up, falling down and getting up, all the way to heaven.”

To put it simply, that’s my story.It’s all about grace. In fact, the whole of the Christian faith is about grace, but grace is something we find very difficult to understand. It’s taken me a lifetime to begin to come to terms with it, because it doesn’t seem to make sense. 

Years ago, I was working in Brighton, and my struggle with same-sex attraction was intense. Temptation was all around me, because gay pornography was freely available. Martin Hallett (whose faith and inspiration founded True Freedom Trust) happened to be in the Brighton area, and I needed someone to talk to, because I had messed up badly. So, I met him in his caravan, and he listened as I poured out my tale of woe. When I was done, we prayed that my repentance might be sincere, because I found it difficult to accept that I was forgiven. Gently he said, “Charles, don’t you understand, this is just New Testament Christianity?” By that, he meant that this is how every Christian, gay, straight, bi-sexual etc. person lives every day of their lives. We live only by grace. Grace saves us, and we persevere by grace.

I have to admit that, for me, biblical truths are sometimes more memorably expressed in the hymns we sing than in the text we read. A couple of Joseph Addison’s verses from the 17th century describe my experience best:

“When in the slippery paths of youth
With heedless steps I ran,
Thine arm, unseen, conveyed me safe
And led me up to man.
Through many dangers, toils and deaths
Thou gently cleared my way;
And through the pleasing snares of vice
More to be feared than they.”

The older I get, the more conscious I am of God’s guiding, protecting hand. While I smart with shame when I remember how many times and how grievously I’ve been wilfully disobedient, that’s nothing to my amazement at the way, time after time, I’ve been saved from utter disaster. Two things stand out for me as crucial to understand.

• Firstly, the almost unbelievable scope of God’s grace. 
• Secondly, the measureless extent of His willingness to forgive. 

Another little verse sums it up. (This one’s a bit more up-to-date!):

“The arc of sky above our heads is infinite and free
There is no end to outer space that human eye can see,
But wider, deeper even yet, more infinite than space,
The constant overflowing of God’s abounding grace.”

I know it’s a contradiction in terms. Nothing can be more infinite than infinity. But so is the life of a believer whose deepest longing is to live in obedience to their Creator, yet struggles as we do. Part of our nature which casts a shadow over our relationship with Him.

No worse than anyone else

One trap our spiritual enemy is fond of setting for Christians who struggle with same-sex attraction is to convince us that our sexuality marks us out as worse sinners than anyone else. That is the opposite of the truth. We are no worse than anyone else. We haven’t chosen the attraction to members of our own sex. Our choice lies in what we do with that attraction. Do we let the Holy Spirit use it to teach us the reality of grace, or do we allow Satan to deny us grace?

What defines us as human beings?

One of the great mistakes of our age is to define yourself by your sexuality. The prevailing culture insists that our sexuality makes us who we are. Nonsense! What makes me who I am is the fact that the Son of God loved me and gave Himself for me. My faith in His atoning sacrifice makes me an adopted child of my Creator. In other words, what defines me, what makes me who I am, is my relationship with God. From first to last, that is something in which God takes the initiative. I belong to Him by adoption and grace, and nothing can change that.

That assurance is the most important thing that has enabled me to survive my struggle with same-sex attraction, which is not over even now, in my seventies! When I was dead in transgressions and sins, my Creator reached out to me in sovereign grace. I was in peril of His judgement but, through the touch of His Spirit, He caused me to respond in repentance and faith. He gave me new life, and through the Spirit, He fashions and matures it so that, increasingly, Christ’s risen life becomes the stimulus of my own.

Dealing with failure 

My relationship with Him is the bedrock of everything I am, and Satan knows that. That is why he makes it the constant target of his assault on my soul. He never tires of trying to undermine and, if possible, destroy my relationship with God. Through constant temptation and failure, he tries to produce a sickeningly repeated experience of defeat and shame which is familiar to all Christians.

The good news of the Gospel is that genuine repentance guarantees total forgiveness every time. I stress “genuine repentance” because repentance doesn’t mean merely saying “sorry” to God. Instead, it requires a change of direction. It involves not just that we recognise and confess our sin but that we determine to turn away from and reject it altogether. However, as we all know from experience, that is easier said than done.

Submission leads to victory

In 2 Corinthians 12, Paul speaks about struggling to be free of an unwanted aspect of his life, his “thorn in the flesh”. Christians who struggle with same-sex attraction know just how he felt. As a young Christian, I prayed for the strength to resist temptation or, even better, for it to go away altogether. I felt ashamed that I seemed to want something of which God disapproved. What did that say about me? How could God love me if I wanted what He found offensive? I couldn’t be more wrong! We are all sinners and that means all of us, no matter what our sexuality, are in rebellion against God. The wonderful truth of the Gospel is that God proves His love for us in that “…while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8)

So, what do I do with this part of me that just won’t go away? I thank God for it! I treasure it! It’s the one aspect of my life that, more than anything else, makes me admit my weakness and need, and the more I admit my weakness, the closer I am to my Saviour. The closer I am to Him, the more I depend on Him. The more I depend on Him and submit to His Lordship of and in my life, the greater spiritual victory I achieve.

Our spiritual enemy is always on the watch to discourage us, but we must remember that, as my friend put it:   “Falling down and getting up, falling down and getting up, falling down and getting up, all the way to heaven.”

If you find this hard to accept, believe what the Bible makes clear: “My dear children, I am writing this to you so that you will not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate who pleads our case before the Father. He is Jesus Christ, the one who is truly righteous. He himself is the sacrifice that atones for our sins…” - 1 John 2:1-2a. God is always ready to forgive, if we give Him the chance and sincerely ask to be forgiven. I know it’s difficult to accept, because it contradicts our idea of justice, but so does the Gospel itself! God’s ways often don’t make sense to us, but these verses couldn’t make it clearer: “My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,” declares the Lord. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.” - Isaiah 55:6,7

A verse in one of Paul Gerhardt’s hymns sums it up best:                                                                                               

“Still let Thy love point out my way. 
How wondrous things Thy love hast wrought!
Still lead me, lest I go astray. 
Direct my mind, inspire my thought,
And if I fall, soon may I hear Thy voice 
And know that love is near.”

Yes, love is near – love is always near!

This article was originally published in the summer 2022 edition of the TFT magazine, Ascend. Click the button below to download your copy.