'I Was Living a Lie Until Jesus Delivered Me': Ex-Gays Reflect on Historic Gay Marriage Ruling

WASHINGTON – Three years have passed since the US Supreme Court validated gay marriage as the law of the land in the landmark case Obergefell v. Hodges. 

To mark the three-year anniversary of this case, Americans For Truth About Homosexuality (AFTAH) stood outside the Supreme Court to denounce the decision and demand a repeal. 

But this wasn't only about a judicial conflict. Joining the protest were a group of ex-LGBT people who credited Jesus with pulling them from their former lifestyles. 

"I was enslaved to homosexuality for 30 years until I prayed to Jesus and He told me where my true identity was," one speaker told the crowd. "I was living a lie in who I thought I was until Jesus delivered me!"

Kathleen Crank, Republican pro-family advocate and a candidate for the Maryland House of Delegates, expressed the challenges often felt with advocating biblical truth.

"Exposing the darkness is no fun and can be frustrating and frightening as I have learned." Crank said. "Even though it's frustrating and frightening to keep telling the truth, we have to keep doing it because the right side of history is true." 

One protester responded by shouting, "The crazy conservative side!"

Turning to the shouting protester, Crank responded, "To my friends with the rainbow flags, I say the rainbow belongs to God." 

In addition to judicial and biblical reasoning, speakers also showed concern for where this decision may take the culture. The slippery slope, according to them, has been manifested in the public school system by allowing gender-relative bathrooms. 

This anniversary comes in the wake of the Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission ruling. This case involved baker Jack Phillips refusing to custom design a cake for a same-sex wedding, citing religious convictions as the basis for his decision. 

The six-year judicial battle ended last month when the Supreme Court ruled that the state of Colorado had not given sufficient consideration to Phillips' religious liberty. 

A press release from the AFTAH said, "The Obergefell judicial travesty is right up there with Roe v. Wade and Dred Scott as among the most unconstitutional and misguided Supreme Court decisions in American history."

"Obergefell put a gas pedal to America's already accelerating moral decline and the LGBT-leftist war against religious freedom," the statement continued. "It also makes it easier for schools to indoctrinate children in sex-and-gender confusion in the name of 'equality.' Americans who care about truth, virtue, and liberty must never accept this court-imposed lie."