|
It seems like all
my life I was looking for what would make me feel complete, or at least
normal enough to fit in. When I didn’t find it at home or with friends, I
kept looking elsewhere. I thank God I finally looked in His Word.
From the time my
parents divorced when I was two until I moved out for college, I lived with
my mother and my sister. My dad’s past substance abuse and psychological
state kept him emotionally and physically distant from my small family of
three. I grew up in church learning about God the Father who wanted to be my
personal father, too. Though it brought some comfort, trying to love this
invisible God was often like trying to love my absent dad. I still craved a
physical person who would wrap his arms around me and call me “loved one.”
The first male I
distinctly remember wrapping his arms around me was a boy in Mexico. I was
six and he was about two years older. As a relative of my host family, he
was around for a week. He started holding my hand and kissing me, gradually
getting more sexually aggressive. When I tried to make him stop, he gave me
a choice between my sister and me. Afraid to tell an adult, I chose to
protect my sister and take whatever he did to me. This brought confusion,
shame, and a fear of sexual interaction.
Due to competitions
with my sister and difficulty relating with my peers, I developed incorrect
theories of my creation. My favorite was that I was supposed to have been a
boy. I had read Psalm 139 and pictured God putting me together in my
mother’s womb as if I was play dough. When He got to the boy parts, His hand
slipped, and I was born before He had a chance to finish me. Around age
nine, I told a couple of my friends on the playground that I wished I was a
guy and would love to become one if I could. The next thing I knew, they
were calling me gay and chanting for everyone to hear, “Kendra wants a sex
change! Kendra wants a sex change!”
After this, I
generally preferred to hang out with girls who liked the outdoors or the
boys in my neighborhood. We climbed trees and exchanged punches to the
stomach while my sister played with toy horses and swapped clothing with her
girlfriends. When I outgrew my guy friends, I settled for being a bookworm
who withdrew into her own fantasy world. Eventually, that problem faded as a
new one emerged. I developed intense emotional longings for women. Combined
with past sexual fantasies, I began to seriously question my sexual
orientation. However, since I still also liked guys and believed homosexual
behavior was a sin, I buried my questions with the fear that I could never
bury them deeply enough.
My questions
resurfaced in high school when a guy I was attracted to shared his
homosexual thoughts with me. The next year he started a gay club on campus.
I was president of the Christian club. Though I publicly stated at the time,
“Hate the sin, love the sinner,” I still felt drawn to my friend’s club and
feared my own physical reactions. Again, I pushed my thoughts away.
When I moved from
California to attend college in Oregon, I had unlimited access to the
Internet for the first time. By sheer curiosity, I began viewing
pornographic sites, both heterosexual and homosexual. Motivated by fear of
breaking the rules, I confessed to my campus pastor after two months of
viewing these sites. I was caught off guard by only one of his questions:
“Have any of the sites you’ve visited been of a homosexual nature?”
Unwilling to face my own questions, I told him no.
Shortly after that, a
friend of mine showed me a very sensual video involving two women. As she
told me of her past homosexual involvement, I could no longer ignore the
fact that I wanted a similar encounter of my own. After a brief hiatus, I
was back online, seeking out women in lesbian and bisexual chat rooms,
hooked on brief encounters that left me ashamed in the morning.
My sophomore year, I dated a man that I
genuinely cared for, but when things went wrong in our relationship, I
turned to fantasizing about a female friend. Some time after my boyfriend
and I broke up, my feelings for this friend developed further. I wanted to
be with her forever, physically and emotionally. Though I couldn’t reconcile
my faith with me feelings, I tried to think of a way to make it work.
God wouldn’t let me rest. I shared with my
friend how I felt. Wisely, she told me not to go down that path. I toyed
with my options, knowing I was at a fork in the road. Gathering prayer
support from my sister and a couple of close friends, I chose to talk to my
senior pastor. As a first-time pastor, he wasn’t sure what to do. He removed
me from youth ministry with my best interest in mind. The only practical
help he gave me was the name “Exodus” and a hope that he could get resources
from another pastor. Next thing I knew, he and his wife were moving to Los
Angeles.
I worked that summer
at a Christian camp. I immediately told the female director my struggle, in
fear that I would be “found out” and fired. Instead, I received some
mentoring while still being able to minister. I was encouraged not to let
self-rejection usurp the truth of Romans 8:1, that there is no condemnation
for those who are in Christ Jesus. The director’s unconditional love and
tough challenges from Scripture added greatly to the small measure of hope
God had planted in my life.
|
