Reflections on 25 years of Healing - Alan Medinger's Story

[David Virtue]

Reflections on 25 Years of Healing
Alan Medinger’s Story

(Medinger is the President of Regeneration, a ministry to the healing of 
homosexuals.)

Perverse and foolish oft I strayed,
But yet in love He sought me;
And on His shoulder gently laid,
And home rejoicing brought me.

    These words from an old hymn based on Psalm 23 express perfectly what 
happened to me 25 years ago when I encountered the Lord and He brought me out 
of homosexuality.
    My journey into homosexuality followed a pattern that we see over and 
over again in ministry. I was an unplanned child, born to parents who would 
have preferred a girl. My older brother was more athletic and generally fit 
the “all boy” model far better than I, and somehow, he became Dads and I 
became Moms. 
    My parents were good kind conscientious people. They did all they could 
to raise their sons to become successful, well adjusted men, but one 
circumstance tended to shape all of our destinies. My father was subject to 
depression so severe that that he was under psychiatric care for many years, 
and on a few occasions had to be hospitalized. He could barely cope with 
life, much less be the husband and father that we needed him to be. In his 
bad times he drank heavily, and he and my mother fought verbally quite often.
    My mothers life was difficult, and to a limited degree I became her 
comfort and confidant. I certainly identified with her more than with my 
father.
No parent makes a child homosexual. We have learned that a child's early home 
environment may provide “the set-up,” but other significant factors always 
come into play in steering someone toward homosexuality.
    For me, a couple of those factors were decisions that I made quite early 
in life. I have a vivid memory of lying in bed one night as a young boy, 
listening to my parents fight, and saying to myself quite smugly, “They can 
never hurt me; no one will ever hurt me.” I believe that I made a decision 
that night to never be emotionally vulnerable. As a consequence of that 
decision, until my conversion years later, I would never truly be free to 
love anyone. 
    I also retreated into a world of fantasy, sexual and otherwise. It became 
my secure retreat from the pain of life. In a typical fantasy would be a boy 
hero leading men into battle, and then when the fighting was over, the men 
would use me sexually. I both longed for my own manhood and for the manhood 
of other men. 
    At first my longings weren't sexual, they were simply a craving for a 
mans attention. But, of course, eventually, they did turn sexual. A strong 
aggressive neighbor boy who was about a year older than I, when he found out 
I was more than willing to take care of him sexually, was delighted to let me 
do it. Although my fears of being found out limited my activity, I was 
homosexually active with other boys from about age 13 through high school.
    My sexual activities stopped when I went to college. I believe that this 
was because I joined a fraternity and the male relationships established 
there largely satisfied my craving for male contact. Still, my sexual desires 
never changed and my fantasies abated very little. Although I dated some 
girls, there was never any doubt that my overwhelming desire was for a man.
    I was blessed to grow up in a time and culture in which there was no gay 
alternative lifestyle. I knew there were a couple of homosexual bars in 
Baltimore, and I would visit pornographic book stores to glance at the 
magazines in the “male” section, but it never really occurred to me to bail 
out of the only world I knew and let homosexuality determine the course of my 
life. Like so many homosexually oriented men of that time, I would get a job, 
marry, have children and cope as best I could.
    That's exactly what happened. Willa Benson had been my friend from 
elementary school days. We dated through high school, off and on during 
college, and two years after college we were married. I told Willa nothing of 
my homosexual desires. 
    The first years of marriage went well. We had two daughters and I started 
to move up in the business world. We were active in our little neighborhood 
Episcopal Church, and we led a busy social life. But gradually, the pressures 
of career and family started to build and weigh upon me, and at the same 
time, a faulty thyroid gave Willa some emotional problems. My response was to 
retreat into my old means of finding comfort: homosexual fantasy and 
pornography, and, five years into the marriage, sex with other men.
    At first I drove 45 miles to Washington, DC to go to a gay bar to find a 
contact, but as time passed I became more and more reckless until I was 
openly going to gay bars and gay cruising places in Baltimore. A major part 
of my homosexuality was masochistic, and I started answering ads for 
sadomasochistic sex. 
    For 10 years I led the classic double life. Successful in business, 
vice-president and treasurer of a prestigious Baltimore company, a pillar of 
my local church — church treasurer, board member and Sunday school teacher. 
The front was masterfully constructed and maintained. In reality, my life was 
out of control and my marriage had become a sham. I was drinking heavily, and 
turned much of my guilt on Willa. We fought frequently. For the last two 
years of my homosexual activity, I was unable to function sexually in the 
marriage. I never justified what I was doing, but I felt powerless to stop 
it. I saw my life on a downward spiral which eventually would cost me my 
family, my career, maybe even my life.
    Then, two things happened. Willa, searching for help, got herself into a 
prayer group. Unbeknownst to her she had stumbled upon a group of older women 
who were mighty prayer warriors. The leader of the group was Helen Shoemaker, 
author of a half dozen books on prayer and co-founder of The Anglican 
Fellowship of Prayer.
Willa did not tell them the exact nature of our problems, but they started 
praying for me and for our marriage.
    Not long after this, a friend at work had a profound religious 
experience. One night, at his children's Catholic parish school, Jim came 
upon a large prayer meeting being run by the Lamb of God Community, an 
inter-denominational, but mostly Catholic, charismatic group. Jim was 
captivated by what he saw and went in and joined them. He went back the 
following week, and at that meeting he surrendered his life to Christ. 
    As Jim tried to explain to me what had happened, I became certain that he 
had had a true encounter with the Lord. Somehow I knew that I could too, but 
this was the most frightening thing I could think of. I knew that such an 
encounter would involve my homosexuality. Perhaps I would have to confess who 
I really was; perhaps I would have to give it up. As much as I hated it, I 
didn't think I could live without it. It had been my way of coping with life 
for as long as I could remember
    But things were desperate enough that after six or seven weeks of 
agonizing, on Tuesday, November 26, 1974, I went to the meeting with Jim. He 
didn't know my problem, nor did anyone there. At some point during the 
evening, as the 200 or so people were praising God out loud, I said quietly, 
“God, I give up. My life is a total mess. I can’t handle it any more. You 
take over.” And He did. 
    Within a few days, I knew that some profound changes had taken place in 
me. First of all, I fell head over heels in love with Willa and I desired her 
physically. My homosexual fantasies that had almost never left me were gone. 
And most important of all, I knew that Jesus was real, that He loved me, and 
I was starting to love Him. 
    A few weeks later, I told Willa the whole truth about my life. Her years 
of denial came crashing down and in the months ahead she would encounter the 
wounds that my years of rejection, deception, anger and blame-casting had 
caused. Her healing was just beginning and would take a number of years. 
Being able to trust me and receive my love came very slowly. A part of the 
new start in life that we were both given was the birth of our son, Stephen, 
18 months after my conversion.
    It was about four years before I heard of anyone else who had been set 
free from homosexuality, and then I read of Love In Action, a ministry for 
healing homosexuality then in San Rafael, Calif. It would be another year 
before I actually met another “ex-gay” at my first Exodus Conference in 
Seattle.
    Exodus leaders were wary of my testimony at first. They had encountered 
others who claimed to have received sudden miraculous healings from 
homosexuality, only to find out in a year or two that these healings had been 
far from complete. Their caution was justifiable, but not because I had not 
been set free from compulsive behavior and sexual attractions to men. I had. 
Homosexuality is more than just sexual attractions and behavior, and I had 
barely begun to experience healing in other areas.
    One area that had not been touched was my emotional neediness. Although 
it was no longer sexual, I still had a powerful longing for some big strong 
man to take care of me. That little-boy need did fade in the early years 
after my conversion, however, as I entered into a deep personal relationship 
with Jesus. He poured into me the mans love that I had never felt. Today, I 
believe that my need for male friendships are as normal and healthy as 
anyone’s.
    Homosexuality is also a matter of identity, and here again I had miles to 
go. I was 38 years old at the time of my conversion, but in the development 
of my masculinity and sense of manhood, I believe I was about 8 years old. I 
had to start growing up. This process took years, but again it was a mighty 
work of God. Today I am confident in and at total peace with my manhood.*
    Within the past couple of years I have gained another insight into how 
God changed me, one that goes back to the original sexual healing. I always 
saw that healing as a miracle. I don’t anymore. I now see it as three 
miracles.
    First, He broke down my wall of self-protection, and I was suddenly able 
to love. Second, God “desexualized” my unmet needs. For a time, I still 
longed for a man’s love and attention, but that longing was no longer sexual. 
Third the sexual addiction was broken. 
    Although not too many people experience change the way I did, everything 
that happened to me — being set free to love, desexualizing my unmet 
emotional needs, breaking the power of my addiction, having the deep needs of 
my heart met by Jesus, and growing into manhood (or womanhood) — can happen 
to any man or woman overcoming homosexuality. I have seen it happen hundreds 
of times.
    In 1979, five years after the initial healing, I started Regeneration, a 
Christian ministry for men and women overcoming homosexuality. Willa 
progressed in her healing and ministers with me. Our daughters have grown up, 
married and given us six wonderful grandchildren. Steve, our little child of 
the promise, grew to be a strong Christian man, was recently married and is 
teaching school.
    When I look back and consider what might have been, I can barely contain 
my gratitude. What a gracious God we serve. I am reaching the age where it 
will soon be time to let go of some of my ministry leadership 
responsibilities, but I cannot imagine ever wanting to stop helping people 
find the freedom and abundant life that our glorious God has given me.

*My story of Growth Into Manhood will be a part of a book of that title that 
I am writing. It will be published by Harold Shaw Publishers in the spring 
2000.

Regeneration is a non-profit, tax-exempt Christian ministry seeking to bring 
bring God's healing from homosexuality and help the body of Christ in 
reaching out to those caught in homosexuality. For further information write:


REGENERATION
P.O. Box 9830
Baltimore, MD 21284-9830
or call:
(410) 661-0284