My Son Says He's Homosexual

Steve Gallagher answers the tough question of parents who are trying to respond to a son who says he is homosexual.

Mike: Steve, we want to deal today with a question that came in from some parents. I'm assuming they're Christian parents. Their son grew up in the church and he's now saying that he's involved in homosexuality or in fact, he's saying he is a homosexual. How does a parent begin to deal with a situation like this?

Steve: Well, the first thing that comes to my mind Mike is they really need to pray for him - a lot of prayer. My experience has been that parents often lapse into this faithless despair and just kind of throw their hands up in the air and just feel hopeless about it, but that's not true. God answers prayers. He's a God of love and compassion. He loves that boy. He wants to see him repent and be restored - it's his heart. So definitely the first thing that comes to my mind is that they need to really lay out a systematic plan of prayer for him.

Mike: So often you hear these horror stories from the gay community that a parent finds out that their son or daughter is involved in homosexuality and they throw them out on the street. What is a realistic and a godly practical response?

Steve: There are practical sides to that, but I would say even before we get to the practical, that he really needs to feel the love and acceptance of him as a person from his parents. They have to be careful that they don't respond out of anger or frustration and cause this gap to grow bigger and for there to become a wall that becomes insurmountable. The hope is that this thing is going to run its course and eventually he's going to start re-evaluating some of the decisions he's made. And you don't want any obstacles between him and you when he reaches that spot. But like I said there is the practical side of it - we communicate our love to him, but we also must stand firm with our convictions that we do not condone this lifestyle and we cannot embrace it. Some parents do ask their child to leave because they don't want that kind of behavior going on in someone's life who is living under their roof. That's something that each parent must face for themselves.

Mike: I think Steve we should probably make a point here that there is a difference in how you're going to deal with a situation in your home between someone who is under-age and someone who may be an adult.

Steve: Yeah, the assumption here is that this young man is eighteen years old or twenty or something like that. You definitely don't throw out a sixteen-year-old out on the streets. You have to deal with that differently.

Mike: Steve, I know that one of the things that parents really wrestle with is how do they communicate their love to their child who may be headed the wrong direction without affirming the choices that they're making.

Steve: I would sit down with him and say "Son as much as I love you, I love the Lord even more, and I have a responsibility as a believer to stand for the truths that have been expressed in scripture; not only for the Lord's sake but also for your sake. I owe it to you as your father to tell you the truth about what God's word says about homosexuality and the devastating consequences of it. What kind of a parent would I be if I didn't tell you the truth?"

Mike: For a child who's struggling with homosexuality who hears the truth, when God hopefully gets a hold of their heart and they repent of their behavior, woe to the father to whom that son would have to turn back and say "Why didn't you tell me the truth?"