The story of the prodigal father

Easter 2025 was an emotional and spiritual time for me. I want to share my resurrection story with you, that sin is defeated and the darkness of guilt and shame can be exposed to His marvellous light! I am praying for all same-sex attracted parents to know God’s light and grace in their lives and to testify that God answers prayers in ways we can never imagine. 

I want to share my story for the purpose of glorifying God, celebrating the power of Jesus overcoming my shame and burdens through the Holy Spirit coming to me and answering my prayers and the prayers of my faithful brothers in the Barnabas Group and my church cell group.  Five years ago, the Lord brought me to a crisis moment of having to face my secret sin and its consequences. I ended up separating from my wife and youngest daughter, whilst four of my seven children stayed with me. The others live abroad.  I confessed to my wife the dark side of my life and sought Christian counselling and support from others. It was three years ago that I found True Freedom Trust and joined a Barnabas Group.

Living with a secret

Whilst I told my wife about my life and the unwanted same-sex attractions, my seven children did not know. Struggling to know how to live without deceit and authentically with my children has been an enormous burden. For several years, I prayed and thought through strategies to bring them into the light, for fear of their finding out unexpectedly and confronting me.  My wife, bless her, never wanted to expose the struggles I faced to my children, and said it was up to me to confess to them what the real reason for my marriage breakdown was.  I needed to tell them about the sin in my life which continued for over 45 years, since the sexual abuse I suffered from another man at age 11 and many beatings from my father when I was very young.

Beauty in hardship

When to share your personal story of sin and unwanted same-sex attractions will be different for us all, and who and how many people need to know will be a personal matter for each of us. When you tell your children, if you ever do, it will also be a very personal decision, needing much prayer, counsel and wisdom. It will be a moment to banish the devil's tactics of shame and fear - so in your heart you can know God will bring you to good outcomes - even though we will walk through the fire in the journey! Remember that diamonds are made under incredible pressure, and when my son said this to me after hearing my confession - that I was a diamond to him, I wept.

Barnabas Group support

I was planning to be at the Good Friday communion service at my church, but the Lord had a different agenda.  Below is a message I have sent to my TFT support groups, as they have been praying about me and my family's struggle at our previous meetings: “I am genuinely thankful to God for giving me and my friends in TFT a way out of the temptations, sin and despair that comes upon us. On Good Friday, sin was taken upon our Lord and He paid the price on our behalf. Thank you Jesus. On Resurrection Sunday we remember the total defeat of sin and that Christ rose from the grave to be glorified.  I want to share with you the Good Friday reality in my life and the light that came upon my family. Recently at our Barnabas Group, we spoke about how the devil no longer has a hold over us.” 

Shame and guilt are broken

The massive burden of guilt and shame the devil held over me and my family was broken on Good Friday evening. From 5:30 pm to 11 pm, I was able to be with four out of my seven children. The Holy Spirit came to meet us! The conversation turned in such a way that I was able to give my true and full testimony, from my sexual abuse at age 11 to 13, and the resulting unwanted same-sex feelings. It broke me. I was very emotional, but thank God this daily burden of fear has been smashed and no longer has a hold over me. I have felt crushed and oppressed literally every day, living in fear of my children finding out my backstory. Unbelievably, my children have all known about my secret for the last 10 to 11 months and have been very burdened to reach out and talk to me. They all agreed to be patient and wait for me to confess my sin to them voluntarily. Good Friday evening was that moment. My 4 sons cried with me and literally each of them prayed over me with their hand on my shoulder. They affirmed their deep love for me and want nothing more than the light of Jesus to shine on our family. One read James 5 v 13, the other Psalm 91, and for several hours we talked - not of the sin and the darkness, but that the heavy chains of condemnation and pain were broken - broken on Good Friday!!”

Powerful prayer 

When I invited my TFT group to come to my home in January for food and fellowship, all my boys knew they were my TFT support group and that they had been praying for a breakthrough. They were so pleased to meet them and understand that the TFT are a strong support network for me.  I had been unaware that my family had been actively praying and talking to their own Christian support counsellors about me, while I was afraid of being exposed and losing my family.

The trigger for my meeting with my sons was my deployment for a month to go abroad soon after Easter to work in the recent earthquake zone to help build an emergency field hospital in Myanmar. My son asked me if I was ready to die as a possibility of going to a country in the midst of a civil war and earthquake. From their initial questions, and really feeling the presence of the Holy Spirit, I began to tell them my story and why my marriage had failed.

Seeking forgiveness 

As a result of our meeting, my wife re-opened a line of communication with me on the following day. That was the first short WhatsApp message exchanged between us since August 2024.  Whilst the journey of forgiveness has started with my adult children, I know my past has had a massively hurtful impact on my wife and caused her so much pain. I lament the suffering I have caused her and pray that in God’s time, He will heal and comfort her sorrows. My motive in sharing is to help anyone out there who has a similar family/truth burden and to say our hope is as it says in Ecclesiastes 3:11 – “God makes everything beautiful in His time”!!!

This article was originally published in the Autumn 2025 edition of the TFT magazine, Ascend. Click the button below to download your copy.