Surrender Your Sexuality
While the concept of vulnerability has become more attractive recently, surrender is still anything but sexy.
The image that comes to most people’s minds is the waving of a white flag on the battlefield—defeated, beaten down, a loser. Our Western culture celebrates individuals fighting for their rights, their subjective definition of truth, and their freedom to identify based on feelings. In this postmodern era, we are surrounded by a culture that cheers on people’s ability to create their own reality.
The problem is that this mindset doesn’t bring fulfillment. Our human concepts of freedom and happiness can easily get skewed. While the world is promoting a version of solipsistic self-care, Jesus says that “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35). God isn’t just giving us a commandment; He is sharing with us the truth of our very design. We were deliberately created by our Father to be blessed when we give to others, to be the greatest version of ourselves when we engage with Him like little children, and to find true freedom when we follow Jesus’ leadership rather than our own. Choosing to surrender to Jesus’ ways will change everything.
But it is here—making the decision to surrender—where I most often see people stuck. To give up control of our lives can be legitimately terrifying, particularly if we haven’t yet known God as a good Father. We can be tempted to cling to power, believing that we know better than God does about what we need. Isn’t that just the angle the serpent took when he convinced Eve to take a bite of the forbidden fruit? The enemy constantly tries to tell us that trusting Jesus is dangerous, that we will miss out, that God is just trying to control us, and that we would be better off if left to our own devices. However, human history proves that this is a lie. God tells us to have no other gods before Him (see Exod. 20:3). We are to put nothing ahead of His dominion over our lives.
A Good, Good Father
These are not warm, fuzzy concepts. The Bible says that we are to offer our “bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God” (Romans 12:1). We worship God with our minds, our emotions, and our bodies. These are our offerings—a serious matter. But the great news is that the One we are called to surrender to in this complete way is not of the same caliber as our bosses, our neighbors, or even our earthly parents. We can hand over the reins of our lives with confidence, trusting in God’s goodness and faithfulness. He is the One behind the Good News. He says that His Kingdom is “righteousness and peace and joy” (Romans 14:17). He came up with Heaven and the garden of Eden. He’s the One to whom we are surrendering our lives.
The major barrier to the healing power of vulnerability is shame. Shame lies to us, telling us that we’re not worthy of love because of what we’ve done. It focuses on tearing down our identity until we are repeating the lie, “I am bad,” instead of feeling the genuine conviction that says, “I did something bad.” But here’s the truth: Jesus Christ came to set us free from all shame and condemnation (see Romans 8:1).
Once we give our lives to Jesus, we have a champion of righteousness on our side. The Holy Spirit comforts us, guiding us into the truth that will set us free. He turns us back from the sinful behavior that would destroy us, offering redemption at every turn.
These were new thoughts for me when I was navigating my struggle with my sexual identity during my ministry school years. At least, I’d never really believed these truths before. I began to meet with a man also named “Ken.” For a few years, he met with me regularly to help me. He had lived a gay lifestyle but had gone on his own journey to wholeness and was leading a Living Waters program (the same ministry my friend Liz mentioned in Chapter 2) for people battling sexual and relational problems, which I attended.
Well into my journey, I was meeting with Ken. On that night, he was praying, ministering to me, and leading me to pray along with him. Deeply engaged in this tender moment, I heard him shift gears and say to me, “OK now pray, ‘I give up all of my rights to be gratified by a man sexually ever again.’”
I froze. I understood the words that he was saying, but I realized that I couldn’t pray that. I was baffled. I had spent the last 15 years reading books on transformation, going through five years of weekly professional counseling, and two nine-month programs based on walking out of homosexuality (a story I share in my book The Journey Out). How could I have spent hundreds of hours going after this most important life issue and not be willing to give up my right to be sexually gratified by a man?
Realizing I couldn’t honestly pray those words, I told Ken, “I’m sorry. I need the weekend to think that through.”
Filled with affection for me after a year of working together, Ken just shook his head and laughed, “You’re so messed up, Ken. All right, take your time.”
I knew I had stumbled onto something important. Jesus was the Savior of my life, but He clearly wasn’t yet the Lord of my life. And I knew that was a problem. I needed to actually consider what praying that prayer of surrender would mean. “What if I never had another orgasm? What if my attraction to men never subsided? What if I never had a fulfilling sexual relationship with a woman?” I had to lay these possibilities before me so that I could choose to surrender in my present reality, not choose to surrender only if God was going to come through for me in the way that I imagined.
As the weekend ended, though, I began to turn my focus on who I knew God to be. I realized that He had a pretty good track record of coming through for me in the areas of my life where I had really turned toward Him. Jesus died on the cross for my sins. Some of my choices had resulted in His absolute agony, and yet He still wanted to have a relationship with me. More than that, He loved me extravagantly. That next week, I prayed and soberly made a quality decision about my life. I wholeheartedly gave up all my rights to ever be sexually gratified by a male again. And, with that decision, I stepped into one of my greatest breakthroughs ever.
Without being aware of it, I had been holding on to some control over my sexuality, keeping it like a safety net in my back pocket. When I laid it all down at God’s feet, I made up my mind in a new way. Scripture says that “A double-minded man is unstable in all of his ways” (James 1:8 KJV). Suddenly, I was no longer unstable. I had set my stake in the ground. I had put all of my eggs in God’s basket, and my mind was singularly focused on following Jesus. When temptation came, I didn’t need to decide anything because I already had: Undressing men with my eyes hurt God’s heart, so it wasn’t an option. Porn was completely off limits for me. Orgasm would never involve a male. I sacrificed those guilty pleasures for the joy of being able to rest and say, “All of my fulfillment is found in following Christ alone.”
I gave up all my rights to sexual gratification, and He met me with more than I could have imagined. Bill Johnson says, “Fire falls on sacrifice.” We lay our lives down at His feet, but we soon find out that we cannot out-give God. He is better than we are and more generous than we can imagine. We cannot choose to surrender in order to get something because often His return is different from what we had in mind. But it is always better, and He has eternity to reveal His generosity to us. James tells us, “Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. …Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up” (James 4:7-10).
When we decide to deeply and genuinely surrender our will to God, the enemy—that accuser of the brethren who haunts us with perversion, lust, and pain—runs in terror from us. And the Lord—the intimate creator of our lives—draws close. He lifts us up higher than we could ever lift ourselves. Stop and think about that. Surrendering control of my sexuality completely changed my life.
Surrendering Harmful Behavior
When we choose to surrender our lives to Him, a part of that is surrendering the harmful behaviors that have restricted our ability to experience true intimacy with Him, with other people, and even with our own hearts. This process has to be done with the Holy Spirit because what God asks us to lay down is incredibly personal. Whether He invites us to discontinue certain activities forever or for just a season, He is all-knowing and works to answer our own prayers about our future. We must trust that Father God knows what we need.
The most obvious behavior to leave behind is any kind of sexual sin. Whether these are sexual acts with someone other than an opposite-sex spouse or looking to pornography to get our intimacy needs met, this behavior needs to stop. For those of us who are married, sexual sin can be particularly grievous because of the pain it causes our spouses. This behavior, along with any illegal activity whatsoever, must be addressed immediately. Honest confessions must be made and help—either from a pastor or a counselor—sought after. Doing so is a painful demonstration of surrender, but it is also the beginning of restoration and freedom. Sexual sin damages our ability to receive and give intimacy, and it can even harm our physical bodies, so it cannot remain in our lives. Thankfully, Romans 6 promises us freedom from the domination of sin.
Similarly, pornography acts as a mask to cover the true needs of our hearts. It has become so pervasive in our contemporary society that some Christians may even say that it’s not a big deal, but that is a lie. Porn facilitates lust and, therefore, saddens the heart of God. It is incredibly destructive to the thought patterns in our minds, to our ability to relate to other people, and to our sex lives with our spouses. Extricating ourselves from sexual sin, for some, is a bumpy process. We need to remember that there is grace if we fall into sexual sin as we navigate this journey to wholeness. But we also need to be sober and realize that the enemy is working to destroy our lives with this sin. I tell people, “Treat sexual sin like cancer. Do everything you can to get rid of it. It’s robbing you of the life God has for you.” The trick, though, is how we address it. We must lean in close to the Holy Spirit, look to Him, and follow His lead. He will guide us away from sinful behavior when we are deeply surrendered and walking with Him.
“We must lean in close to the Holy Spirit, look to Him, and follow His lead. He will guide us away from sinful behavior when we are deeply surrendered and walking with Him.”
Today, I can trust myself with a smartphone, but when I was in the midst of this battle I wasn’t able to refrain from sinful behavior while having such easy access to the temptation that a smartphone offers. So God led me to remove the familiar objects of temptation from my life for a season to help me be more successful in my purity walk. And eventually, I grew in my ability to handle different freedoms. God has promised to direct our paths when we trust Him, so He will show us the things we need to lay down. It may be certain movies for one and all movies for another. Some people may need to surrender private time with their computer or even living alone, while other people may need to download a program like Covenant Eyes, which reports all of your computer’s usage to pre-established accountability partners. Here’s the thing: Continuing to stumble over temptations and indulge in sin significantly slows our journey toward freedom. So we need to obey the Lord and surrender whatever He asks us to surrender. He knows which things will cause us to compromise and which ones will not. He is committed to leading us into wholeness, and He knows how to get us there. This is easier to do when we are vulnerable with trusted people about our weaknesses and temptations and inform them of the things we’re committing to surrender.
In this same way, we also want to take an honest look at any sort of addictive behavior, whether it is sexual or otherwise. If there is anything—alcohol, drugs, video games, masturbation, food, TV, or staring at a smartphone—that effectively numbs us from our present reality or masks pain, we can simply ask the Holy Spirit if He is wanting us to lay it down. Addictions are temporary medications, numbing agents that keep us from living fully—and from living fully aware. It may be daunting to let go of what has, in some ways, served as a comfort. We may feel there’s no way we’ll be able to cope without our crutch. But perfection is not the goal. God asks for humble hearts and our willingness to surrender and to follow (see James 4:1-10). He will be faithful to meet us with comfort, counsel, and breakthrough as we walk through this process. He will give us grace to follow His instruction. In scenarios like this, we need to request support, encouragement, and prayer from our trusted friends as well because they also can relay God’s counsel and encouragement, leading us toward victory and freedom.
When the Lord invites us to surrender something to Him, it is for our protection. It is an opportunity for us to lay down our pride and to practice letting Him truly be the Lord over our lives. We can’t expect to receive the promises of God—freedom, peace, righteousness, joy—if we don’t follow Him. Obedience is the shortcut on this journey. It’s that simple. We obey His leading, and then we get to experience the peace and breakthrough that come along with surrendering our lives to His leadership. He gave His life for our freedom, so we ought to position ourselves in such a way as to experience it.
“God asks for humble hearts and our willingness to surrender and to follow. … If we’re living our lives on our own terms most of the day and then hoping that God will show up for us in our moment of struggle, we’ve already lost. The secret is closeness—the kind of relationship with God that is all-consuming, where we never change the subject.”
If we’re living our lives on our own terms most of the day and then hoping that God will show up for us in our moment of struggle, we’ve already lost. The secret is closeness—the kind of relationship with God that is all-consuming, where we never change the subject. My friend Drew Berryessa said, “I began to evaluate how I was living my life in-between moments of overt sin. It was clear that there were habitual behaviors that consistently dulled my heart and sensitivity to the Lord and pulled my heart away from engaging with the Holy Spirit.” (1) But as Drew became more sensitive to honoring the Lord’s presence in the “in-between” moments, focused himself back on the Lord, and proactively replaced negative behaviors with life-giving ones, the negative behaviors faded away. To the world, this kind of freedom from porn and sexual sin seems impossible. But with God and the community of people He has put in your life, all things are possible. “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free” (Galatians 5:1 NIV).
Surrendering Judgment
I’ll bet every person who has battled same-sex attraction can identify with judgment. Many of us have heartbreaking tales of being judged by our peers and even by the adults in our lives who were supposed to protect us. This has a traumatizing effect on the hearts and minds of every individual, especially one who is wrestling at a fundamental level with personal identity. There is absolutely no excuse for the bullying, teasing, rejection, or emotional abuse that so many gay-identifying individuals have suffered. However, sometimes people who have been judged harshly can take on pride and judgment themselves as a protective barrier between their hearts and the people who might cause them pain.
I did this with men. I felt insecure around my own biological sex; I was unable to fit in with the guys. So, as if to preempt the inevitable rejection from other men, I judged both the concepts of sexuality and masculinity as “less than.” But when we make judgments like those, we are essentially kicking God off of the throne, declaring that our ideas about creation, about sexuality, and about the world are superior to His. Such an attitude is disrespectful and naïve. He is the Creator of the universe, and we are His creation. It behooves us to keep that in mind and lay our judgments at His feet.
However safe it feels to hide behind pride and scorn, hiding keeps us from fully submitting to God. Pride stands above others and looks down on their weaknesses, but surrendering to God is a work of humility. A true, deep, meaningful relationship with Him demands that we get on our knees and admit that we don’t know what we’re doing. It compels us to relinquish our rights to hold judgments about others, aligning our minds fully with God. Surrender means that we lay down our personal measuring rods, take Father God’s hand, and let Him lead the way.
Notes:
1. Drew Berryessa in Finding You: An Identity-Based Journey Out of Homosexuality and Into All Things New (2020).
