Homosexuals Anonymous Fellowship Services

The Room

Step 2

“We came to believe the love of God. who forgave us and accepted us in spite of all that we are and have done.”

“In that place between wakefulness and dreams, I found myself in the room. There were no distinguishing features except for the one wall covered with small index card files. They were like the ones in libraries that list titles by author or subject in alphabetical order. But these files, which stretched from floor to ceiling and seemingly endlessly in either direction, had very different headings. As I drew near the wall of files, the first to catch my attention was one that read ‘Girls I have liked.’ I opened it and began flipping through the cards. I quickly shut it, shocked to realize that I recognized the names written on each one. And then, without being told, I knew exactly where I was. “This lifeless room with its small files was a crude catalog system for my life. Here were written the actions of my every moment, big and small, in a detail my memory couldn’t match. A sense of wonder and curiosity, coupled with horror, stirred within me as I began randomly opening files and exploring their content. Some brought joy and sweet memories; others a sense of shame and regret so intense that I would look over my shoulder to see if anyone was watching.

“A file named ‘Friends’ was next to one marked ‘Friends I have betrayed.’ The titles ranged from the mundane to the outright weird: ‘Books I Have Read,’ ‘Lies I Have Told,’ ‘Comfort I have Given,’ ‘Jokes I Have Laughed at.’ Some were almost hilarious in their exactness: ‘Things I’ve Yelled at My Brothers.’ Others I couldn’t laugh at: ‘Things I Have Done in My Anger,’ ‘Things I have Muttered Under My Breath at My Parents.’ I never ceased to be surprised by the contents.“Often there were many more cards than I expected. Sometimes fewer than I hoped. I was overwhelmed by the sheer volume of the life I had lived. Could it be possible that I had the time in my years to fill each of these thousands or even millions of cards? But each card confirmed this truth. Each was written in my own handwriting. Each signed with my signature.

Points to Ponder

“We live in the post-Christian world which is under the judgment of God. I believe today that we must speak as Jeremiah did. Some people think that just because the United States of America is the United States of America, because Britain is Britain, they will not come under the judgment of God. This is not so. I believe that we of Northern Europe since the Reformation have had such light a few others have ever possessed. We have stamped upon that light in our culture. Our cinemas, our novels, our art museums, our schools scream out as they stamp upon that light. And worst of all, modern theology screams out as it stamps upon that light. Do you think God will not judge our countries simply because they are our countries. Do you think that the holy God will not judge?” [Francis A. Schaeffer, The Great Evangelical Disaster, (Westchester, IL: Crossway Books, 1984), p. 90]

"The science of chemistry teaches us that a single grain of iodine will impart color to seven thousand times its weight of water. So one sin may affect the whole life, one false brick may cause the fall of the whole building." [J. Harris in D. L. Moody, One Thousand and One Thoughts from My Library, (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, n.d.), p. 128]

"You miss 100 percent of the shots you never take." [Wayne Gretzky in EveryDay Quotations edited by Jack Maguire, (Garden City, NY: Doubleday Direct, Inc., 1998), p. 138]

"Anger in the face of injury is a mechanism for survival, no less than the clotting of our blood.... And like all created things, it is good." [Garret Keizer, The Enigma of Anger: Essays on a Sometimes Deadly Sin, (San Francisco: Josey-Bass, 2002), p. 240]

"There are persons who cannot make friends. Who are they? Those who cannot be friends." [Hazlitt, "On Disagreeable People", 1827 quoted in The Oxford Book of Friendship edited by D. J. Enright and David Rawlinson, (Oxford University Press, 1991), p. 295]