We must all decide how far our collective moral consciousness will allow the social justice movement to go in its exploitation of our boundaries. I suggest that we have allowed it to go quite far enough. The sexualization of children has no place in schools or in our society. It is simply one boundary that should not be exploited.

Allyn Walker, a former professor at Old Dominion University who identifies as non-binary, resigned last month following criticism stemming from Walker’s views on pedophilia. Walker argued that pedophiles should be destigmatized by identifying them as “minor-attracted persons” (“MAPs”) rather than the pejorative term “pedophile,” because attraction to children is a sexual orientation and not immoral.
The pretense is that pedophiles are more likely to seek treatment if their sexual proclivities are destigmatized. Instead of relying on empirical evidence to determine the reasons for those proclivities or strategies that will keep children safe, Walker relies on queer theoretical tools to argue that pedophiles are wrongly oppressed by society’s power structures as a group of the most “hated folk devils of our time.”
What Is Queer Theory?
Walker is a queer sociologist and criminologist who uses the lens of queer theory to explain human society and crime. Like other critical theories, queer theory seeks a collective critical consciousness that will identify and dismantle identity power structures and dynamics.
Queer theory seeks to unite oppressed groups that fall outside the privileged normative language categories of sex (male or female) and sexuality (straight, gay, bisexual) into a single, oppressed banner of queer. To do this, it relies on the postmodern knowledge principle, which rejects objective knowledge and favors “knowledges” that arise from the lived experiences of individuals of certain identity groups.
Queer Theory’s Application to Pedophilia
Walker uses theoretical tools to problematize the treatment of pedophilia as a sexual perversion to achieve her agenda. She uses the power of language to advocate for the new acronym “MAP” and blurs boundaries of sexuality. The focus is on the collective oppression of pedophiles.
Using a “deconstructionist” perspective, Walker argues that pedophilia is a “social construct.” She boldly concludes that sexual attraction to minors is not morally offensive and claims that the vilification of pedophilia is more about control of sexual minorities than it is about the health or safety of children.
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At the very core of God’s design of humans is his intention for us to order, shape, exercise dominion over ourselves and our surroundings. In a world where reaching nearly every worthwhile goal requires careful thought and planning, why would we assume that accomplishing God’s mission for our lives would be any different? The starting point for overcoming a disordered life is becoming convinced that God’s design for every human is that our inner private world govern our outer world of activity.

Today, we begin a new series entitled, Don’t Waste Your Life: Rule It for Jesus. Paul taught that God perfectly designed Christ-followers for their specific mission, which he called, good works. In Ephesians 2:10, after he clarified HOW we are saved, i.e. by faith, he then explained WHAT WE ARE SAVED FOR. He continues, For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. Not only does God have a specific mission for you in 2023, which Paul summarizes as good works, but that mission is so important that God specifically designed you for it—to have your specific place and responsibilities in your family, your natural gifts and vocational calling, your specific spiritual gifts with which to contribute to the Body of Christ, and your specific relationships with the lost. God designed both YOU and THE SPECIFIC OPPORTUNITIES YOU WILL HAVE IN 2023 to impact your world for Christ. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to get to the end of 2023 and look back at all the opportunities that God gave me that I missed. I don’t want to waste my life. This episode looks at how to overcome a disordered life, so that I can stay focused on Christ’s mission for me—and so bring him honor in 2023.
For most of us, our lives in 2022 are well described by Kevin DeYoung, in his book, Crazy Busy.
You’ve got car repairs. Then your heater goes out. The kids need to see a doctor. You haven’t done your taxes yet. Your check book isn’t balanced. You’re behind on your thank you notes. You promised your mother you’d come over and fix the faucet. You’re behind on wedding planning. Your boards are coming up. You have more applications to send out. Your dissertation is due. Your refrigerator is empty. Your lawn needs mowing. Your curtains don’t look right. Your washing machine keeps rattling. This is life for most of us.
It is ironic that our society’s historic level of fabulous wealth, which has provided so many labor-saving devices and conveniences, has left us so out-of-control busy. But technological growth doesn’t just lead to convenient, labor and time-saving devices; it also leads to endless opportunities. Today, in one week, a human can encounter more information via the Internet and his cell phone than most humans have encountered in their lifetime. The endless opportunities of our technology combine with a particular component of human nature to make our lives crazy-busy: NO ONE WANTS TO MISS OUT ON OPPORTUNITIES. Who wants to be out of the loop on the latest Facebook post that has gone viral? Who wanted to miss out on the latest conversation about the World Cup? Who wants to miss the latest text from friends, or Facetime call from loved ones? Who wants to miss the latest podcast that could hep him be better at his profession? The result of this resistance to missing out is that when we finally do have a little free time at the end of the day, we are too exhausted to use it productively. Life is often like being on a raft rushing down a raging river with no rudder. We just bounce off whatever is in front of us and move on. But if we choose to live life that way in 2023, it will cost US and OUR FAMILIES. Here is a glimpse of some of the costs of a disordered life.
The Cost of a Crazy Busy Disordered Life
A. The crazy busy life can mask the erosion of our soul. Busyness, itself, robs the soul of joy. When our lives are frantic and frenzied without space for soul renewal, we are more prone to surrender to the enemies of our soul, anxiety, resentment, impatience, irritability, discontent. Busyness keeps us so distracted that we don’t realize the toll it is taking on our inner, spiritual life. But God never intended us to be able to cope with life apart from renewing our INNER STRENGTH. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me…. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. Gordon MacDonald, in his book, Ordering Your Private World, observes:
Our public worlds are filled with a seeming infinity of demands upon our time, our loyalties, our money, and our energies.  And because these public worlds of ours are so visible, so real, we have to struggle to ignore all their seductions and demands.  They scream for our attention and action. The result is that our private world is often cheated, neglected because it does not shout quite so loudly.  It can be effectively ignored for large periods of time before it gives way to a sinkhole-like cave-in.
B. The second danger of being CRAZY BUSY is that less important matters take center-stage and shove the most important matters to the periphery. The GOOD THINGS around us gobble up our most precious possession, time, cheating us out of the BEST THING—accomplishing the mission for which our LORD created us, because we don’t default to thinking about our mission. Praying about and planning how best to: 1) love my wife, 2) shepherd my kids, 3) reduce my spending so I can give more to kingdom advancement, 4) build a relationship with my next door neighbor, 5) winsomely express the biblical worldview on current topics at work—these important tasks that are essential to accomplishing Christ’s mission for me don’t have to be done today, or even this week. These activities can usually wait. But often the most visible but less important tasks call for immediate response–endless demands pressure every waking hour. No matter where we are, our phone pings with the latest email, text, or social media notification) THE APPEAL OF THESE DEMANDS SEEMS IRRESISTIBLE, AND THEY DEVOUR OUR ENERGY. But in the light of eternity their momentary prominence fades. With a sense of loss, we recall the important tasks that have been shunted aside. We realize that we’ve become slaves to the demands of the visible, audible world. 
Perhaps the greatest tragedy of living a disordered life is that our wives and children suffer. The outer, visible world can so consume men with good things, that they don’t invest in praying for their wives’ and children’s spiritual battles. Tremendous power is made available through a good man’s earnest prayer (James 5:16). In Exodus 17, so long as Moses’ arms were lifted up in prayer for those under his care, the Israelite warriors prevailed over the Amalekites. But when his prayer arms were lowered, the Amalekites prevailed. When combined with NT teaching, there is no doubt that this text is a physical picture of spiritual reality. Our family members down in the valley fighting the Evil One will win spiritual victories if we pray for them that they will lose if we do not! Even wonderful visible things can devour our time, pushing aside the most vital things.
C. The third danger of the CRAZY BUSY life is investing our life in what doesn’t really matter. Socrates famous statement, “The unexamined life is not worth living” is true. Someone has said, “If we are going to hear, ‘Well done good and faithful servant’ from the Master, we need to well do.” If we want to hear the Lord’s commendation for accomplishing the mission he gave us, we need to stay focused on that mission, as Jesus did his mission.
On the night before he died, Jesus made an astonishing claim. He said to his Father, “I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do” (Jn 17:4). We wonder how Jesus could have talked about a completed mission.
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Written by Forrest L. Marion |
Friday, November 26, 2021
Keep in mind that by this time the Jerusalem church probably numbered between fourteen and eighteen thousand. As the church grew, new men were needed to continue doing what the elders had been handling, that is, if the elders were to continue to focus on the Word and prayer. The deacons took up three duties that formerly had been done by the elders: the administration of the church, the resources of the church, and the mercy ministry of the church. The reason deacons are to be ordained is because they perform roles the elders formerly did. One very practical tip Reeder gave to elders and sessions was this: try not to redo the work of the diaconate.

On a beautiful, crisp Saturday in October, Southeast Alabama Presbytery (SEAL) deacons held a half-day conference focused on deacons and their biblical role in the church. Hosted at Eastwood PCA in Montgomery – strategically, on a “bye” week for Auburn football – about 40 men attended, mostly deacons from several Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) churches plus several teaching elders (TE) and ruling elders (RE). The conference organizer, Montgomery attorney and Eastwood deacon Samuel McLure opened the event by remarking that, as far as anyone knew, this was the first-ever SEAL presbytery gathering to focus on deacons and their role.
Mr. McLure provided handouts of an 1859 article in The Southern Presbyterian Review by the Rev. James B. Ramsay that addressed “The Deaconship.” One of Ramsay’s excellent thoughts was, “A man cannot be a Christian without seeking to assist, comfort and elevate, all that are Christ’s, to the extent of their wants and his ability.” The Apostle Paul gave considerable attention to the taking up of collections and their proper distribution to the poor of the churches he ministered to, Ramsay pointed out. The Virginia pastor argued that the deacon “as a distinct officer” is to have charge of that important, “distinct function of the church.”[1]
Following the welcome and introduction, TE Jere Scott Bradshaw of Covenant PCA (Auburn, Ala.), preached a sermon from Acts 6-7 on the life and ministry of Stephen, one of the seven men full-of-the-Spirit and wisdom chosen to serve the Jerusalem church as a deacon, thereby enabling the elders to focus on prayer and the ministry of the Word. Pastor Bradshaw had three main teaching points: the character of the deacon, the confidence of the deacon, and the incompetence of the deacon.
The writer of Acts, the apostle Luke, relates that Stephen’s character was marked by grace and power, wisdom and evidence of the Spirit, and tenacity in the message of grace in Jesus Christ. Stephen’s confidence was reflected in his message, “one of the greatest speeches in the history of the world,” as Bradshaw said. Stephen emphasized to his audience that God was not confined to Israel. But the problem his audience faced was not one of the distribution of bread or of church resources; rather, it was the defilement of sin. His audience needed a new creation, a new birth, a new LORD, a new witness. Stephen courageously pointed them toward Jesus Christ, the one who fulfills all that the scriptures had led God’s covenant people to anticipate. Yet Stephen was unable to bring about their change of heart. Pastor Bradshaw observed that, like the elder, the deacon is utterly incapable of bringing about change in another’s heart; only the True Deacon, Jesus Christ, is competent to change the heart. Connecting with the biblical account of Stephen’s death, Bradshaw reminded the men that it was this True Deacon who changed the murderous Saul into the Apostle Paul.
Pastor Bradshaw continued, “Dear brother, you will be utterly incompetent in your service as a deacon.” Your service often will go unnoticed; it will receive unmerited criticism; it will be ineffective in bringing about lasting change in people. “And, beloved, this is the joy of being an officer in the church” (both elder and deacon). Because we, as mere men, are unable to produce transformation – neither in ourselves nor others – we must look to Jesus Christ. Deacons must live for the approval of only one voice . . . the Glorious God, who says, “Well done, good and faithful servant. . . .” Jere Scott Bradshaw closed with these words to deacons: “May you rest and work in the power of the Holy Spirit as you manifest the gospel of grace in acts of mercy.” “Then,” added Bradshaw, “you will truly be serving ‘with much advantage.’”
Bradshaw’s closing remarks played into the title and theme of the conference, taken from the PCA’s Book of Church Order, section 9-6: “The deacons may, with much advantage, hold conference from time to time for the discussion of the interests committed to them” (emphasis added).
Following the sermon, the group watched a recorded interview that Sam McLure had conducted with Pastor Harry Reeder of Briarwood PCA (Birmingham, Ala.), specifically for this conference. Pastor Reeder encouraged the men to be concerned with “church health” rather than “church growth.” Normally, a healthy church will also grow numerically. In some churches, however, he noted, the pastor is doing the work of the elders, the elders are doing the work of the deacons, and the deacons are “just doing some work.” Focusing on Acts 6, he suggested the partiality of the elders toward the Hebrew widows at the expense of Gentile widows was “functional but not spiritual” partiality, or prejudice. The earliest elders at Jerusalem were ethnic Jews and so, by virtue of prior relationships and traditional networking in today’s parlance, they easily were aware of the needs of the Jewish widows in their midst to a degree that could not be duplicated among the Gentiles. Keep in mind that by this time the Jerusalem church probably numbered between fourteen and eighteen thousand. As the church grew, new men were needed to continue doing what the elders had been handling, that is, if the elders were to continue to focus on the Word and prayer. The deacons took up three duties that formerly had been done by the elders: the administration of the church, the resources of the church, and the mercy ministry of the church. The reason deacons are to be ordained is because they perform roles the elders formerly did. One very practical tip Reeder gave to elders and sessions was this: try not to redo the work of the diaconate. Enough said.
Following Harry Reeder’s talk and a short break, Eastwood’s diaconate chairman, Brian DeHuff, spoke on the duties of the deacon. “The work of a deacon is sacrificial,” he observed, and if they don’t do their job then the elders will have to pick up the slack. In the imagery with which Alabamians so easily relate, the deacons are “the offensive line for elders” in the church. Deacon DeHuff went on to discuss several duties of deacons today, including collecting and distributing the resources of the church, promoting the members’ giving and stewardship, the care of widows and orphans, maintaining the buildings and grounds as well as the church’s financial and budget records, and preparing the sanctuary for worship. He encouraged deacons to look for opportunities to secure other men in the church with gifts or qualifications in certain areas to assist in ministry. Men with carpentry or other home skills might assist in repairs for a widow. A CPA might help with financial counseling of a member in debt, and so on. An insightful observation he gave the men was this: God looks at giving in terms of how much we keep back. The poor widow in the gospels who kept nothing back was the one who gave the most from Christ’s perspective. “Our wealth is meant to be shared with those who have need,” DeHuff said, and, “One of the cures for greed is generosity.” The best deacons are “do-ers” and “pray-ers.”
Following Brian DeHuff’s talk, the men enjoyed a lunch and fellowship time before wrapping up, and were done by one-thirty in the afternoon. The 5-hour conference was instructive, encouraging, insightful, practical, and cheerful. We recommend other churches and presbyteries consider doing a deacons’ conference of their own. To that end, we note the conference website, WithMuchAdvantage.com, created to encourage deacons to zealously and faithfully own their domain.
Forrest Marion is a ruling elder in Eastwood Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Montgomery, Ala.
[1] James B. Ramsay, “The Deaconship,” The Southern Presbyterian Review, vol. 12, no. 1 (Apr. 1859): 1-24.