1977-1996: Listening, Truth, and Love

After high school, I attended Bethany Nazarene College. I told myself I was there for an education, but part of me was also determined to prove that I could choose my own direction. Chapel every morning reminded me of the call I was avoiding. Eventually, I stopped attending, failed the semester, and left after a year.

Instead of returning home, I moved to Dallas. I attended community college and worked part-time at Sears until a ruptured appendix and emergency surgery changed my plans. My father came to see me in the hospital and encouraged me to return to Virginia.

Back home, I enrolled in community college and worked as an orderly at Fairfax Hospital. I was assigned to the oncology floor. It was difficult work. I would become attached to patients and then learn that they were gone.

I later joined the local telephone company as an operator. I advanced quickly, and in 1980 I was selected to transfer to AT&T. My dreams of fame and fortune gave way to something more immediate: earning a living and building a future.

I knew I was gay. I also knew, with equal certainty, that I wanted to be a father. I once told my mother, "I want to be a father, but I don't want a wife." At the time, I couldn't imagine how those two truths could belong in the same life.

In 1982, I met the woman I would marry. We began as friends, and I told her the truth about myself before we married. On December 11, 1982, we stood before our families in a beautiful Christmas wedding. I believed friendship, honesty, and determination were enough to build a life together.

Josh was born on October 25, 1983. Jordan arrived exactly two years later, on October 25, 1985.

Whatever uncertainty I carried about marriage, I never questioned fatherhood. I had known since I was young that I was meant to be a father. Loving and caring for my sons gave my life a purpose I could understand.

The marriage became increasingly difficult. We moved often and kept trying to find a place where life might work better. I stayed because I loved my sons and couldn't imagine leaving them.

By 1990, the life I had worked so hard to hold together was coming apart.

In August 1990, my marriage ended. We were living in Big Stone Gap, Virginia, and I had spent the previous six months as a househusband and the boys' primary caregiver. When their mother told me she was leaving, I knew Josh and Jordan were coming with me.

They were four and six. I packed what I could, explained what was happening as gently as possible, and took them to my parents' home.

Returning to my childhood home as an unemployed single father was humbling. I had no clear plan and very little money. I was trying to care for two confused little boys while struggling with depression, anger, and my own sense of failure. At times, I wondered whether God was punishing me for refusing the call I had heard as a teenager.

My parents opened their home to us. One condition of returning was that the boys and I would go to church. I joined the choir, and they became involved in children's activities. What began as a condition slowly became a way back.

In October 1990, I was hired as a technical writer on a Veterans Administration contract. I felt completely out of place at first, but I learned quickly and began advancing. Work gave me something solid beneath my feet again.

Then, on March 31, 1991, I heard God's voice.

I was sitting near the back of the church when He said, "You no longer smoke."

I had quit many times before, only to start again when life became difficult. This time, the craving left. I stopped that day.

I accepted that one sentence, but I was still avoiding the larger call. I concentrated on working, raising my sons, and rebuilding our life. From the outside, we were finding our way. Inside, I was still carrying anger, depression, and truths I didn't know how to face.

In February 1992, after an argument with my father pushed me to the breaking point, I went for a walk at Lake Accotink.

God was waiting for me there.

On a warm Sunday afternoon in February 1992, I reached the end of myself.

The boys and I had gone to church that morning. After we returned home, I argued with my father. I no longer remember what the argument was about. I remember how I felt.

I was broke and depressed. I was angry at the life I had created and ashamed that my sons and I were still living with my parents. I cleaned the dishes and left for my usual Sunday walk on the path near Lake Accotink.

That walk was normally my one chance to breathe. The path was strangely empty that afternoon. As I walked, my quiet complaints became spoken accusations. Before long, I was shouting.

I blamed my circumstances. I blamed my family. Most of all, I blamed God.

I demanded to know why I had to live that way. Why couldn't I earn enough to move out of my parents' house? How was I supposed to have a personal life while raising two boys under their watchful eyes?

Nothing came back.

I paced beneath an opening in the trees, looked toward the sky, and finally screamed, "If You are really there, why won't You answer me?"

The path seemed to go silent. Even the insects stopped. My body became rigid as I watched the clouds moving slowly from left to right.

Then my mouth opened, and a voice that was clearly not mine said:

"And what would you have Me say?"

I had no answer.

All the anger and certainty drained out of me. I had demanded that God speak, but I had never considered what I wanted Him to say. For several moments, I stood there in complete stillness.

When the sounds around me returned, something inside me had changed. I felt who I was for the first time. God had met me in my anger and waited for me to become quiet enough to hear Him.

When I returned home, I began writing poetry and short stories. I started a novel. Beneath it all, I knew I was supposed to write a book called God Speaks. I believed I had been given one year to complete it.

But I still didn't begin.

The old pattern returned. Excitement became resistance, and I once again tried to avoid what God was asking of me.

A year later, while I was sitting in the church choir loft, the words came anyway.

Just over a year after the conversation on the path, I was sitting in the church choir loft as the pastor began his sermon. Words started rising within me and came as quickly as I could write them.

I wrote them on the church bulletin. I had never written a poem before. I didn't understand where the words were leading, but I knew I was being given something I couldn't afford to lose.

ALL I HAVE

Looking 'round for hidden truths
my eyes, they could not see,
The splendor of God's deepest love
suspended deep in me.

I couldn't find the lasting truth
which ached within my soul.
My fears and guilt from prior years
had kept me from the fold.

I hadn't always felt like this
God spoke to me one day.
His message floated to my ear
I turned and ran away.

The changes were too many,
my weaknesses too great.
"My life isn’t so awfully bad,"
those bitter words I ate.

While looking for my destiny
I saw more than I should,
It wasn't 'til I hit the dark
that His light produced my good.

The light of God encircled me
as He held me with His hand.
I listened very carefully
as He told me of His plan.

His gentle talk and tender words
helped guide me to the light,
The clarity He led me to
just made the message bright.

For oft I'd felt so coarse, so lost,
so justly filled with fear.
He told me of one basic truth
which made the changes clear.

His plans were quite illogical
for I hadn't had a clue.
That I would use my pen to write
His thoughts for you to view.

He honed my art and let me see
that I had had it all along.
For God had only given me
His only path from wrong.

His plans are made from miracles
on which we may not see.
A hidden purpose given us
to you, and yes, to me.

But all I have is all He needs,
to keep His plan intact.
His purpose and His promise,
His part of our own pact.

But in the greater scheme of things
I'll let Him take the lead.
For God will tell me where I err,
and where to plant the seed.

Kyle Sutton — March 1993

Behold the seed.

At the time, I believed I had written a poem. Looking back, I see a foretelling of the life ahead. The words told me that God had already placed within me what He intended to use and that my pen would become part of the work.

I would spend years discovering what those words meant.

For years, I treated being gay as a truth that could be managed if I kept it separated from the rest of my life. I could be a father. I could be a Christian. I could be a good son. I didn't know how to let myself be all of those things openly.

In October 1996, I attended the AIDS Quilt weekend in Washington with friends and my sons, Josh and Jordan. My friend Jill had come to see the panel honoring her son, Ken.

I watched her walk toward the quilt she had made for him. Every photograph, stitch, and letter held the story of a life and the love of a mother who refused to let her son disappear.

Later, we joined the candlelight vigil from the Capitol to the Lincoln Memorial. As we walked, Jordan looked at me and asked, "Daddy, if I died of AIDS, would you make a quilt for me?"

His question stayed with me. I began to wonder whether I was going to wait for death or loss to force me to tell the truth about my own life.

That night, I asked God for a sign. After a long walk the following day, I felt something pulling at my heart. Life was too short to keep postponing what needed to be said.

On October 18, 1996, I wrote a letter to my parents.

I told them what years of hiding had done to me. I had prayed for God to change me and waited for the answer I wanted. Instead, God gave me the answer I needed. He needed me as I was.

I wrote:

"I am gay. I have always been gay, and will always be. I can't change, nor will I try anymore."

The letter also told them about the spiritual sensitivity I had carried since childhood. I was beginning to understand that my awareness of other people wasn't something shameful. It was part of how I experienced God and recognized where I might be able to help.

Near the end of the letter, I wrote the words that still describe what coming out truly meant:

"I have not changed. You just know more about me than you knew before."

The letter didn't make me gay. It ended the pretense that my faith, my family, and the truth of who I was had to remain in separate rooms.

I sent it without knowing exactly what would happen next. I only knew that hiding had become more painful than telling the truth.

The following spring, I met Mike.

READ MY COMING OUT LETTER