But most of his meetings have been private. He has talked with small groups of pastors in Phoenix and Nashville and shared his story over coffee or lunch, often one on one, in places like Atlanta; Chicago; Orlando, Fla.; Portland, Ore.; and Greenville, S.C.

He also visited the campus of Focus on the Family in February, at the invitation of Mr. Stanton, and talked with more than 20 staff members about the psychic and spiritual damage inflicted on young gay Christians by ministries like Focus. The organization kept the encounter quiet until now because it did not want to be perceived as wavering in its stance.

Mr. Vines, 25, is hardly the first or the most scholarly evangelical to make these arguments, but when his book, “God and the Gay Christian,” was published last year, it received a lot of attention and proved to be both calling card and lightning rod.

He wrote it after he dropped out of Harvard; went home to Wichita, Kan.; came out to his parents; and studied Scripture and biblical exegesis on homosexuality. The book prompted a nearly instant rebuttal from the Rev. R. Albert Mohler Jr., president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky.

“If we accept his argument,” Mr. Mohler wrote, “we cannot do that without counting the cost, and that cost includes the loss of all confidence in the Bible.”

The encounter at Biola was arranged by the Rev. Caleb Kaltenbach, lead pastor at Discovery Church in Simi Valley, who is part of a younger generation of evangelical leaders and pastors pushing the church to de-escalate the fight over homosexuality. “Not everything has to be a culture war,” he said.