Small group discipleship, investment by others leads to drastic life change

Danny Moseley (left) meets with his D-Group on Friday mornings at Chick-fil-A. Once a ‘growing believer,’ Moseley’s pastor Bill Wilks now calls him a ‘multiplying believer.’
Photo courtesy of Bill Wilks

Small group discipleship, investment by others leads to drastic life change

By Grace Thornton
The Alabama Baptist

When Danny Moseley was 16, he was introduced to pornography, and one thing led to another.

“It took hold of me and led me down a very, very dark alley,” he said. “For a very long time, I was a practicing homosexual.”

Porn had been “the gateway to everything that went wrong,” Danny said. “I had a hard time coping with things as a young person, and even though I had very loving parents, I didn’t talk to them. I didn’t confide in them my personal stuff that was going on with me.”

So one step at a time, he walked into darker and darker corners of the world, he said.

After high school, he moved out of his parents’ house and eventually moved out of Alabama to places where he felt it was more acceptable to live a gay lifestyle. He spent his money on porn, to the point where he couldn’t pay rent and got evicted several times from the apartments where he lived.

A destructive path

“There were points in my life where I didn’t know where I was going to live or where I was going to get my food,” he said. “I never did live on the streets, but I did things to allow me a place to live, things I’m not very proud of and that hurt me in the long run.”

But all during the 30 years Danny “lived a gay lifestyle,” he couldn’t shake the feeling that he wasn’t made for that, he said. “Deep down inside me, something in my gut just turned. It was telling me that it was wrong, that I didn’t want this life anymore.”

Even so, all through those years, he couldn’t figure out how to forge a new path. A few times when Danny visited churches, he was kicked out, he said. He remembers sitting in the parking lot of a church late one night sobbing because he didn’t know what to do.

“The guilt and shame were way too thick for me to go back to church,” he said.

So Danny kept on living his life. He tried to make things better and worked on his nursing degree. One day along the way, his mother asked him to take her to visit NorthPark Baptist Church, Trussville, and he said yes.

Lightbulb moment

“I couldn’t say no to Mother,” Danny said.

Not too long after, his father died and NorthPark’s pastor, Bill Wilks, helped with the funeral. That’s where Bill and Danny first met. Then years later, when Danny’s mother died, he found his way to Bill’s office.

Bill said he remembers thinking that Danny seemed like “a broken individual” that day.

“He told me, ‘I don’t know what I’m going to do,’ and I said, ‘Danny, you need the Lord,’” Bill said. “He said, ‘Well, you know the lifestyle I’m living,’ and I said, ‘Danny, you can choose not to live that lifestyle anymore. It’s not important what we’re tempted to do — it’s important what we do.’”

At that point, it was like a lightbulb came on, Bill said.

“I think Danny was thinking in order to follow Christ, he would have to change the way he felt,” he said. “I explained to him it’s not about how you feel, it’s about what you do. That kind of liberated him.”

That day, Danny decided he wanted to choose Christ. Bill prayed with him and introduced him to his D-Life group, part of a small-group reproducing discipleship model started by Bill.

For the next five years, Danny was there every week for that small group’s 6 a.m. meeting at Cracker Barrel. It took eight months of walking through the New Testament alongside those other men for Danny to get up the courage to share his story with them — he feared rejection or worse, he said.

“After I shared, they stood up, and I got scared — I thought either they’re going to leave or beat me up or blame Brother Bill for bringing me into the group,” Danny said. “But they came over and laid their hands on me right there in Cracker Barrel and prayed.”

After experiencing their love and support, Danny got up the courage to go forward for prayer at church the following Sunday — and his D-Life group went forward with him.

“It proved to me that I am loved, that God loves the sinner even though He hates the sin,” he said. “Because of that, I gained more strength.”

It’s still a daily struggle against temptation, Danny said. “It’s still a battle. You don’t get over an addiction in 24 hours.”

He also battles major health issues as a result of his past choices — nearly 30 years ago, he contracted HIV. He’s fought to try to get rid of the remaining existing copies of magazines he posed for in the past.

He also faces persecution from the gay community at times, he said.

Sharing freedom

But Danny also talks with people wanting the same freedom he’s found. He’s currently discipling several men who are choosing to follow Christ instead of pursuing the lifestyle they once had, Danny said.

Along the way, as he’s been discipled, he’s also led two D-Life groups of his own. One met at Bojangles, and not too long after it started, he led a worker there to Christ and went back after hours to disciple her. He also led a group in the clinic where he goes once a week for kidney dialysis.

“We were able to pray for other patients and talk to the doctors,” Danny said. “Everyone else in that group has now passed away, but we were a light in that dark, gloomy place.”

Bill said Danny is the “most resilient person” he knows.

Discipling others

“He’s HIV positive, has diabetes and has lost both of his legs and some of his fingers,” Wilks said. “But he’s never missed D-Life. He went from a growing believer to now being a multiplying believer, and he’s discipling people through Zoom in other cities. I tell him all the time, ‘God’s preserving you because He’s using you.’”

Danny said he gets up every day with the strength God gives him.

“This temptation, this pain, it’s a thorn in my side, but God says His grace is sufficient for me. I’m supposed to be an example to glorify God, and I try to do that all the time,” he said.

And as for the men who discipled him and led him to Christ, Danny said, “I would be dead or in a homeless shelter if it wasn’t for my D-Life group. It gave me the accountability to read the Bible, and it gave me guidance. Now I want everyone to know they can have that same kind of hope.”

For more information about D-Life, contact Bill at 205-602-2888 or bill@livethedlife.com or visit livethedlife.com.