HOW I LOST MY VIRGINITY AND KEPT MY FAITH

I hope you won't be quick to judge me as I tell my story. It's weird, I know, but worth sharing.

    I was young, naive, and vulnerable. I aroused love long before its proper time and started a romantic relationship right after high school, at age 17 with a colleague leader in the Teens Church. We both believed in God, had a good understanding of the Christian faith and had just been baptized. We believed in sexual purity as it is the will of God concerning sex for all Christians. But that didn't automatically mean that our relationship was going to be God-honouring. We scaled the boundaries of physical intimacy and did everything except for penetrative sex. Everything. From time to time, we appeased our guilty conscience that “We were not having sex, after all” and again, “We were in love.” It sounded logical to our desires but it was also costly to our faith. So for two years and some months, we kept doing what we had become good at unknowingly; sinning against God and our bodies. In no time, we had to part ways. Our disagreements were becoming unceasing and we could hardly resolve them. 

    The breakup which left a vacuum in my heart made me jump into another guy's arms in some few months’ time, without much thought or repentance. This new guy was not the “churchy type” though he went to church on a good day. Again, we scaled the intimacy boundaries. This time around, things went a little further than I expected. One of the days, in the heat of the moment, I lost my virginity. The thin piece “trophy” I had down there which I could boast of in the midst of my guilt and shame was also gone. That day, I wept like a baby and I couldn't sleep at night. My whole sexual adventure from day one started playing back to me like a horror movie. I learned John Milton's lesson taught in Paradise Lost the hard way; “Innocence once lost, can never be regained. Darkness once gazed upon can never be forgotten.” 

 I felt bound to hang on to this unhealthy relationship because I had given all of myself to him. I just couldn’t walk away because I felt I’d be at a loss if I did. So for three years, this relationship dragged on. I was a walking-dead during those years. I was miserable within and I needed help but I fought an endless war within myself because my guilt and shame wouldn’t let me be, talk more of opening up to another person.

 My continuing secret sex life stood in clear contrast to my weekly church attendance. I felt very dirty and disgusting in my own eyes. I hated myself. I hated what I had become. I hated what I had done.

Though I was unhappy about the life I was living, I felt I had no strength to escape from it. I had tried to quit a couple of times, but the more I tried, the more I failed at it. The whole thing had become like an addiction, so I kept going back, again and again. I was still going to church and praying but I felt very distant from God; I was always physically present in church, but spiritually absent. My mind wandered every time as I would be imagining how disgusting I looked in the sight of God. 

 I started slagging off because I believed I could never leave that dirty life behind me. I gave up on myself, but God never gave up on me. Some Christian brethren around me started noticing my coldness and reached out to me asking if all was well with me. Their encouraging words from the scriptures were always ringing a bell. I gathered my last strength and decided to end the toxic relationship. This time around, I was successful. I bid that life goodbye and for the first time in a long while, I felt relieved, but not entirely.

    In the early days after the breakup, I was always afraid when the thought of going back came to me. I kept praying to God for his grace and strength as the days went by but I was getting even more afraid. But God had a rescue plan for me like he always does for His children. I felt prompted to talk to someone about my problem. I figured that would make a lot of difference so I gathered the courage to share my darkest secret with a lady mentor from my church. She used to be my Sunday School teacher when I was a teen. My heart was pounding as I spoke to her on phone but I was stronger than my fears this time. After hearing my “dirty secret”, she reminded me of a Bible verse she often quoted to us whenever she spoke about the love of God. “But God demonstrated his own love for us in this; while we were still sinners. Christ died for us.” Romans chapter 5 verse 8. For the first time, I truly grasped the reality of God's love for sinners: It was beautiful, so pure and true. I accepted that no matter how far I had drifted, I was never too far from the saving grace of Jesus Christ. She helped me to understand and accept God's love and forgiveness again, and journeyed with me to the place of complete healing and liberty from my past life.

    I realized later on that God had allowed my iniquities to break me to the point where I could do nothing but cry out for his help. Though I wish no Christian goes through this dark path of sin and rebellion, I am amazed at how God has used my vulnerability and brokenness for his glory. What used to be an overbearing yoke has now become a testimony I can use to reach out to others struggling with sin. 

    If you find yourself in the dark as I did, I would urge you to commit yourself to God in prayer continuously and surrender your burden of sin to Jesus. God places people on our path to walk this journey to “Christlikeness” together. Find a friend or a mentor whom you can trust and talk to him/her. You need someone to hold your hand and walk through the healing process with you. Remember the Father's arms are always open to receive you. 

Blessings.

Credit: Grace & Kwame