'The Holy Spirit Overwhelmed Me': How a Gay Hollywood Designer Found Redemption & Freedom in Christ

Swimming in Drew Barrymore's pool. Vacationing at Diane Keaton's getaway home. Going to the Grammy Awards or rocking Paris Fashion Week. This was the lifestyle of Becket Cook, and he absolutely loved it until the day he suddenly didn't. 

Cook writes about that profound moment in his life in his new book titled A Change of Affection: A Gay Man's Incredible Story of Redemption. 

Cook, a successful set designer in the fashion world, was mingling with Hollywood's elite. He was also openly gay. Despite everything he had, it still wasn't enough. 

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"So I was attending fashion week and I went to all of the shows and a bunch of the parties," he recalled. "And I was at a party one night and I just looked over the crowd and I thought, 'I can't do this anymore. This isn't going to cut it anymore.'"

In his book, Cook shares how God turned his identity upside down and brought him the kind of peace and freedom that he never knew was possible. 

During an interview on The 700 Club Friday, the former LA set designer shared how he was molested by a friend's father when he was 10-years-old. He explained that he told one friend about the attack, but no one else. 

"I didn't tell my parents because I knew my father would have had him killed," he said. "My father was a really powerful attorney in Texas and so I was like, 'I really don't want my father to go to prison over this.'" 

"I didn't want people to know," Cook said. "It was a very shameful experience and I didn't want it to get out." 

When asked if that experience affected his sexuality years later, the author responded, "For many, many years, living as a gay man, I never really thought it affected me. I just kind of denied that it affected me because I didn't want my sexual identity as a gay man to be tied to such a scary, weird, gross night."

"But after I became a Christian, I realized that night had a huge impact on my sexuality, and kind of where I ended up going," Cook continued. 

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He also shared that he came out as gay to all of his friends and family after he was out of college. 

"My parents were actually very lovely about it," Cook recalled. "I was the youngest of eight kids, so by the time they got to me they were like, 'Oh, you're gay? OK, cool,'" he said with a laugh. "My parents were Christians and they believed it was a sin. But they were very sweet and very loving about it."

Cook said while living in Los Angeles, he was in serious relationships with five different men. But he felt dead inside.

"I was at Paris Fashion Week in March of 2009. I used to go to fashion weeks in New York and Paris," he noted. "I was at this after-party. It was very glamorous. Everyone from the fashion world was there. I think Kanye (West) was there."

"So that night in Paris, I was looking out over the crowd and thought, 'This is not it. This is not the meaning of life. What am I going to do with the rest of my life?'" he asked himself. 

Then one day, he was having coffee at his favorite coffee shop and saw people with Bibles. 

"My best friend and I ended up getting into a conversation with them and they invited me to their church the following Sunday in Hollywood," Cook recollected. "And I asked them, 'What does your church believe about homosexuality?' And they said, 'Well, we believe it's a sin.'"

So Cook went to church that following Sunday and recalled that everything the pastor was saying from Romans chapter 7 was going through his mind and heart and that he was literally on the edge of his seat during the whole sermon.  

"Then after the sermon, this guy on the side of the church prayed for me. I came back to my seat and I was processing the sermon, the worship music, and everything," he said. "Then all of the sudden, the Holy Spirit overwhelmed me. And God was like, 'I'm God. Jesus is my Son. Heaven's real. Hell's real. The Bible's true. You are now adopted into my Kingdom. Welcome!'"

Cook said he immediately started crying.

"It was like a curtain had parted and I could see the truth for the first time in my life," he explained. "I knew the meaning of life for the first time in my life." 

Cook also said he knew in that moment who he was. Being gay was not who he was. 

"It was over," he said. "I was done with it." 

READ the rest of Becket Cook's story in: A Change of Affection: A Gay Man's Incredible Story of Redemption.