We both are the Lord’s and, as such, should live to the glory of Christ. Once again, notice how Paul makes his emphasis on both groups. The strong and the weak both live under Christ and are responsible to Christ. Regardless then of which category you belong, you are responsible for your own decisions before God as an in-Christ person living under the lordship of Jesus Christ.

To say that we need to demonstrate grace toward those around us seems like a gross understatement. The world around us desperately needs grace extended to them. They need to know about God’s grace, God’s refuge, and God’s love. Further, the church needs it in equal measure. At times, Christians are no more kinder, no more thoughtful, or no more compassionate than many in the world. However, there should be no greater grace extended toward each other than in both the family of God and the biological family unit. These two places should exude the grace of God from each other to each other. Instead, what we sometimes find is judgement, impatience, and insensitivity. Yet if we hope to do this God’s way, we need to manifest outward grace with inward humility; these two provide a great combination of experiencing God’s grace in your life and passing it on to others as well.
Here is where we begin:
As for the one who is weak in faith, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions (Romans 14:1).
Welcome the Weak, but do not Quarrel over Opinions
The idea of welcoming the weak is our key to grace. If you happen to be the strong, then you welcome – or show grace toward – the weak. The Apostle Paul is very clear here. Will the weaker person have the maturity of the strong? No. In absence of the spiritual maturity of the strong, the temptation for the stronger person will be twofold. First, there is potential for the strong to judge the weak. Second, in hope of helping the weaker person, the strong will desire to share opinions with the weak. The Apostle Paul continues.
Here are Two Early Church Examples: Food and Holy Days
The Apostle provides us two different examples. However, upon further examination, we see that although the examples are different, the principles are the same. Notice how they parallel each other.
The Subject of Division: Food (vv. 2-4) and Holy Days (vv. 5-6)
Food: One person believes he may eat anything, while the weak person eats only vegetables.
Holy Days: One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike. 
The Principle: Pay attention to your own heart before God, not the other person’s
Food: Let not the one who eats despise the one who abstains, and let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who eats,…
Holy Days: Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind.
The Motivation: The issue is a matter between the person and God
Food: …for God has welcomed him. Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? It is before his own master[a] that he stands or falls. And he will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make him stand.
Holy Days: The one who observes the day, observes it in honor of the Lord. The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains, abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God.
In today’s culture, there are many more than just the two examples that Paul mentions. Today, one could add various forms of entertainment, tattoos, alcohol, tobacco, music, dress, sports, politics, and more. These principles apply in all of these areas as well.
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Some Christians say you’re not required to use a person’s preferred pronouns, but it’s courteous to do so if you’re asked. It’s simply a matter of being a kind Christian. Whether it’s courteous or kind to comply, however, depends on the nature of what is being asked of you. Complying with a transgender person’s request might seem like a minor change in your behavior, but it’s not. 

All we’re being asked to do is change one word. It’s a simple request. Just use a different pronoun. It might seem like a no-brainer for a believer to comply. Why cause unnecessary tension by refusing a request to be courteous?
Even some Christians encourage the church to practice “pronoun hospitality” and use the preferred pronouns of a person who identifies as transgender. They believe it’s a simple act of kindness that engenders relationship and avoids unnecessary distress in a transgender person’s mental health.
But it’s not that simple. It’s not that we don’t want to be kind or are indifferent about their well-being. Rather, it’s because we care about truth, fidelity to God, and their well-being that many believers abstain from this social ritual. Here are some things to consider.
First, it’s important to distinguish between using preferred pronouns and using preferred names. Here’s why. Names are a matter of convention, something that is a subjective preference. Pronouns, however, are not a matter of convention but are a reference to objective reality (biological sex). That’s why they can’t be chosen.
To say that names are a matter of convention means that names can be chosen because they are not inherent to who a person is. For example, traffic light colors are also a matter of convention. Green means go and red means stop. It’s possible our society could have determined different meanings for traffic light colors—red meaning go and green meaning stop. There’s nothing inherent about green that means go. It was simply a matter of preference (a convention) that green was chosen for go, but it could have been otherwise.
In the same way, names are a matter of convention. My wife and I considered naming our daughter Anya, but we ended up choosing Sarah. Either one would have worked. There’s nothing inherent about the name Sarah that refers to our daughter. Furthermore, our daughter could one day change her name to Shelly if she desired. That’s because names are a matter determined by preference and can be chosen.
For this reason, I can abide by a person’s preferred name. In many cases, I don’t have any other option since they decide what name to share with me. I understand some parents insist on using their child’s given name because of the uniqueness of the relationship. I’m not arguing that preferred names should be used, but that they can be used.
I don’t use a person’s preferred pronouns, however, since pronouns refer to an objective reality—one’s biological sex. Whether you are male or female isn’t a matter determined by preference and, therefore, can’t be chosen.
For example, age is also a biological reality and not chosen. Dutch positivity guru and television personality Emile Ratelband decided to identify as a 49-year-old when he was in his late sixties. No one should be obligated to refer to him as the younger age because age is a biological reality that can’t be changed and is therefore not a matter of preference. In the same way, sex is a biological reality that also can’t be changed and also is not a matter of preference. Using a pronoun that refers to a person’s chosen sexual identity is like using a number to refer to person’s chosen age. Both are illegitimate because neither age nor sex is a matter determined by choice.
Some people, however, claim that language evolves and pronouns can now refer not only to biology but also to “gender identity” (a person’s internal sense of what “gender” they believe themselves to be). Though that might be believed by a segment of society, there is also another large portion of the population that doesn’t accept that shift in language. In fact, they believe words matter and allowing/collaborating with the change in what a pronoun refers to is a problem. They don’t see the attempt to change language to embrace transgender ideology as benign.
Second, when talking to a person, you don’t use their pronouns. You just use their name (“Kaitlyn, can you meet for coffee?”) or “you” (“You did an amazing job”) to refer to them. In other words, declining to go along with a person’s preferred pronouns will not likely upset that person since they’re not usually present when you use their pronouns.
Pronouns are most often used when you’re talking about someone with another person.
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Written by Aaron M. Renn |
Wednesday, June 28, 2023
The reality is that there are plenty of high quality single Christian women, and men, in America. The problems of frustrated singleness are real and shouldn’t be discounted. The technological and cultural problems of America when it comes to marriage are likewise real. But an absolute shortage of high caliber potential marriage partners is not one of those problems.

As I’ve noted many times, the degree of difficulty dial on finding a spouse and staying married has been turned up a lot in America. Falling marriage rates attest to the problems here, ranging from the rise of technology mediated dating, to an imbalance in college degree attainment between men and women, to a politically polarized dating environment.
At the same time, a bad macro environment does not necessarily determine our individual results. In some cases, these trends can even help a subset of people. For example, if more women than men are getting college degrees, then if you are a man with a degree, in theory that could work to your advantage.
However, I hear a lot of complaints from some singles about how this environment makes it all but impossible to get married. For example, one of the tropes of manosphere thinking is that the dating pool for men is poisoned. In their view, the American woman has been ruined as wife material — by feminism, sleeping around with too many men, etc.
One of the more recent incarnations of this view is the rise of the so-called “passport bros,” or men who decide that there are so few good women in the US, that they have to seek out a wife overseas. There are a ton of Youtube videos on this phenomenon, many with hundreds of thousands of view. I think that only a small number of men have actually done this, but the huge amount of debate over it is revealing of a certain attitude.
While few Christians likely spend time consuming this kind of material, I’ve noticed that a lot of single Christian guys also seem to believe it’s hard to find someone to marry, even in cities with tons of Christian singles like NYC.
My church in New York never had more than a few hundred members, and many of them (most?) were married. Yet there were several single women there that I thought seemed to be high quality dating and marriage prospects. Now, I didn’t date any of them. Maybe they had hidden flaws or were not compatible in some way that I don’t know about. Maybe they were prima donnas with ridiculous standards who ended up breaking it off with every guy they ever went out with. Some of them were out of my age range. But if I were single in that church, I would not have been complaining about a lack of quality women to ask out on dates. I have to believe that the same is true of most other churches in town, maybe even to a greater extent, since many of them are larger and with a higher percentage of singles.
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