Dear Bruce,
I have heard through media outlets about the "transformation" that you have gone through over the past year and would like to say just a few things to you about it. I do want to clarify that these things are not said with hate or malice, but rather through a heart that breaks and yearns to see peace and forgiveness found within your and your family's life. I do not "hate" you or despise you for what you have done, but rather hurt and yearn to see healing in your heart. Healing that would mend any wound that you may have.
I do not assume to know how you think or feel, since I have never met you. However, I do understand a yearning that cannot be satisfied. A yearning that causes a man to have the drive and energy to obtain a gold medal in a decathlon can only be described as tremendous and committed. However, I do not believe that such a drive came only from a desire to accomplish a great feat, but rather through a desire to fill an empty space in your life. An attempt to give your life meaning and purpose that it so desperately lacked.
When this failed to fill the void in your life, just as athletic success has failed to do so for so many others, you again began to search for something to fill the void and emptiness that you felt. I believe that this is where you turned towards having a family. You claim now that you have been living a lie and hiding this desire to transform yourself for many years, and yet you married, had a couple of kids and seemed to be enjoying living in the lime light. However, there was nothing in all of it, not the money, the fame, the success that could even come close to filling the hole that you felt existed in your life. So, now you turn to what you feel is the next step in attempting to achieve the happiness that has for so long eluded you.
I have some good and some bad news for you. First, the bad news. You are under the wrath of God for your sins. Not only have you turned and disgraced the body that God created you in, but you have also claimed to know more than the almighty creator as to what is the best way to live your life. "Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body. Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body." (1 Corinthians 6:18-20 ESV) I would like to clarify with this verse that unless you repent of your sins, and turn from your wickedness, you will not stand amongst those who, as this verse says, have been bought with a price. That term is reserved for those who have fallen on their knees seeking forgiveness with a broken and contrite spirit. "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them." (Genesis 1:27 ESV) God clearly has created you to be a male and nothing you do to your body can change that fact.
The bad news does not stop there. Not only is what you have done to your body sin, but also every other thing that you have ever done against the command and decree of a Holy and Just God is also sin. Unless you turn from that sin, you will perish in hell for eternity. "For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Romans 6:23 ESV) So many people think that when they die, that they will finally be free from God and those who talk about him. However, this is not true. When we die there are two places that we can go. The first is to hell, where we can suffer the full wrath of a just God being poured out upon us for the rest of eternity. The second is to heaven. Heaven however, is reserved for those whom God has called unto Himself and chosen for redemption through Christ Jesus. This redemption can only be gained through repentance and the work of the Holy Spirit upon your life.
Here is the good news. No matter what you have done, if you seek God's face through repentance, you will find forgiveness. "I love those who love me, and those who seek me diligently find me." (Proverbs 8:17 ESV) "Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you, declares the LORD, and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I have driven you, declares the LORD, and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile." (Jeremiah 29:12-14 ESV) "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by it the people of old received their commendation. By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible. By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts. And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks. By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death, and he was not found, because God had taken him. Now before he was taken he was commended as having pleased God. And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him." (Hebrews 11:1-6 ESV)
I know that there must be deep pain between you and your family right now. Your children have lost the person who is their father. Instead of being the leader of your home and guiding them you have chosen to abandon them and forsake all of your duties that you have as a father. I plead with you to look the Father for guidance and forgiveness in this matter. He never leaves His children and cares for all of His creation. "Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe. All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.”' (John 6:35-40 ESV)
The last thing that I would like to say to you is this. There is forgiveness at the cross where Jesus died. Many people before and many people after you will experience the grace and peace that only forgiveness through Jesus Christ can bring. I encourage you to delve into the Holy Scriptures and to seek out those who will provide you with sound counsel and advice in these matters. However, first and foremost seek the Scripture for answers. All things in this life must first comply with God's decree for how things out to be done and if something is contrary to that decree, then it is sin. No matter how many people "accept" you as you are in this moment, I cannot do the same. Rather I plead with you in love and a broken heart in concern for your soul and not your feelings. For if I do not stand and proclaim what God tells us is true, am I not myself sending you to hell? This I cannot do, therefore I proclaim that you are a sinner and that you need to repent of your sinful lifestyle and actions.
