Of course, believers’ humble practice of God-honoring heterosexual marriage, though it may be costly, will also bear witness to the joy men and women have in biblical marriage. And in spite of stubborn resistance from opponents in contemporary culture, God’s powerful love and mercy is irresistible, as is his creative wisdom–in making us male and female—in his image. This we must seek to share in love with those who adopt androgynous sexual expressions. We must continue to express the love of Jesus, who was crushed on the cross for our redemption and for anyone who will receive it.

In a perceptive article on the recent history of Evangelicalism in America (which I recommend),[1] Aaron Renn, a writer for First Things, confirms something I have been thinking for some time: politics has become religious. It is thus difficult to speak out about traditional moral behavior without being “cancelled” or charged with being a Christian nationalist—by people who doubtless plan on making America a pagan nation! In other words, contemporary progressivism and biblical faith now occupy many areas of common ground. How has this come about? Renn describes three recent distinct phases of secular culture as it relates to Evangelicalism and biblical Christianity, moving from general acceptance to general opposition. They are, in Renn’s terminology:
A Positive World (Pre-1994) 
In this stage, as Renn puts it, “society at large retains a mostly positive view of Christianity. …Publicly being a Christian is a status-enhancer. Christian moral norms are the basic moral norms of society and violating them can bring negative consequences.”
I cannot resist my oft-repeated phrase: “When I came to America in 1964 I thought I had died and gone to heaven.” As a European, I was surprised that a Christian student movement like Campus Crusade for Christ would try to attract students to the Christian gospel by drawing attention to the much-admired BMOC (Big Man on Campus), who happened to be a Christian. Renn shows that “this period is the last period of generalized Christendom where most in Western culture shared the same moral norms and where Christians could concentrate on sharing the Gospel.”
A Neutral World (1994–2014) 
The next stage takes a neutral stance toward Christianity. “Christianity no longer has privileged status but is not disfavored. Christian moral norms retain some residual effect.”
I note that this period immediately follows the appearance in 1990 of a book by Marshall Kirk and Hunter Madsen, After the Ball: How America Will Conquer Its Fear and Hatred of Gays in the 90’s. This book is presented as a “compelling and compassionate work that never fails to stimulate. After the Ball is required reading for straights interested in understanding a minority that comprises 10% of the population and for gays who are learning that the revolution is far from over.”[2] The authors encouraged gays “to come out of the closet, and they outlined a code of gay ethics calling for mature love relationships and greater moderation in sex.” The book was a massive success, creating general ambiguity in the way people began to think about both homosexuality and Christianity.
A Negative World (2014–Present)
According to Renn, “Society has come to have a negative view of Christianity. …Christian morality is expressly repudiated and seen as a threat to the public good and to the new public moral order.”
Biblical Christianity is now in this third antagonistic phase. Renn sees cultural antagonism in the conflict between progressivism’s re-definition of “the public good and the new public moral order” and that of the biblical moral order. Incisively, Renn dates the transition from the neutral to the negative phase in the year 2014, just before the Supreme Court’s Obergefell decision, which, he notes, “institutionalized Christianity’s new low status.” He does not explain why the new status is low. By granting to homosexuality constitutional status and by recognizing same-sex marriage as a “civil right” (which many “conservative” figures applauded at the time), the US Supreme Court paganized the “profound mystery” of the Christian gospel, expressed in male/female marriage, which reveals God’s love for his people (Eph 5:31–32). Two men copulating cannot represent God’s love for his people, since, throughout history, this was the pagan image of the divine and human relationship.[3] Indeed, as Paul says a few verses previously, sexual immorality and impurity…must not even be named among you (Eph 5:3). In our time, the LGBTQ ideology has been accepted as a perfectly valid lifestyle, but it is an ultimate rejection of biblical faith.
Thus, in the “Negative World” we are opposed by a non-Christian, religiously pagan worldview. This is why we see such hesitation to appeal to the Creator as the source of our human rights. IN POD WE TRUST has become the new humorous statement of faith. It is just what Paul argued so long ago in Romans 1. In verse 25 he describes the basic worship exchange (worshiping the creation rather than the Creator). In the next verse, he argues, “For this reason,” people practice homosexuality. The pagan, religious opposition in the “Negative World” is causing our Christian young people to leave the faith of their youth in droves, either because they are afraid to be unpopular or because they are convinced of the validity and value of the new “public good” and “public moral order” of personal rights.
The place of sexuality is the dividing point between biblical and progressive morality and between the politics of the Left and the Right. For many progressives the “public moral order” is becoming more “free” and now consists of normalizing all pagan sexual expressions, which can be loosely categorized as “androgyny.” This term joins male and female, whereas God created these as distinct. We see androgyny in various forms of non-binary sexuality—homosexuality, bi-sexuality, trans-sexuality and drag culture, all of which claim civil rights, since they believe that there are no ultimate distinctions; all is homo, the same. It is little wonder that antagonism against Christianity is so often connected with issues of sexuality. Christianity affirms one foundational difference, namely the distinction between God and his creation. The male/female distinction is the capstone of all the other distinctions God put into the universe (such as land and sea, night and day, etc.). Yet that very male/female distinction is the target of most current public lawsuits against Christians who want to maintain their right to turn down work that would go against their belief in those creation distinctions. Christian business owners, such as bakers and photographers, want to maintain their public witness regarding sexuality. When Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) retired from the Senate and was chosen as the University of Florida’s next president, no one was particularly surprised, since Sasse had already been a university president earlier in his career. But the University’s Faculty Senate held an emergency meeting in which a large majority railed against the administration’s decision to make Sasse the sole finalist. Sasse’s conservative position on gender caused faculty members to express “no-confidence” in his appointment. Affirming conservative views on sexuality is the best way to get you cancelled!
Dr. Al Mohler’s November 2 “Briefing” was dedicated to showing how thoroughly the medical profession has adopted LGBTQ ideology as normative. “On LGBTQ issues and on a host of other issues,” Mohler said, “it is clear that the medical establishment is taking sides. And overwhelmingly, the medical establishment is taking sides by siding with those who are enthusiastic for the LGBTQ revolution.”[4] Perhaps the clearest example of the power of LGBTQ ideology on culture is the promotion of life-altering techniques—surgery and puberty-blockers that permanently sterilize an individual—on minor children who question their personal fit with the stereotypical sex of their birth. A huge majority of voters (78.7 %) “believe underage minors should be required to wait until they are adults to legally use puberty blockers and undergo permanent sex-change procedures.”[5] Yet Democrat politicians, aware of the vindictiveness of the transsexual movement and fearing to lose the huge campaign contributions of the LGBT lobby, refuse to support the public’s preferences.[6] Large corporations who were once culturally conservative have gone “woke,” progressive, and politically Leftist. Their vast wealth has allowed them to become monopolies, thus freeing them to cast off market theories of fair competition and to align with the newly erected moral icons of the day: targets for “environmental, social and governance” (ESG), and individual sexual freedom.
The future includes the emergence of a “new [Catholic] Church” under pro-homosexual Pope Francis, who is completely at odds with traditional Catholicism as understood by Cardinal Ratzinger/Pope Benedict XVI. Just before becoming Pope in 2005, Ratzinger noted: “Very soon it will no longer be possible to affirm that homosexuality, as the Church teaches, is an objective disorder in the structuring of human existence.”[7] Perhaps as he saw the compromises of the Vatican and realized that he would not be able to change them, Ratzinger had no option but to resign.
On the Protestant Reformed side, the decisions of Calvin University are disturbing. The school’s board recently chose to allow LGBTQ-affirming faculty to remain as recognized professors, even those who offer statements that they are not in agreement with the church’s confessional beliefs on homosexuality. “The big story here is that a college that has claimed evangelical identity for more than a century, completely owned by a denomination that has raised its affirmation of biblical sexuality to confessional status, is surrendering to the sexual and gender revolution.”[8]
So what cultural time is it? In what phase is our culture now? Emily Rizzo, clinical professional counselor in D.C. with the Counseling Center of Maryland, describes the present as a time in which “we’ve already moved away from the cis, straight world, [so] there is more of a possibility to be open.”[9] Rizzo plies her trade, counseling LGBT+ clients and individuals in non-monogamous or polyamorous relationships since “open relationships just tend to come more naturally to queer people.”
Today’s “time” sees teachers exposing young children in state schools to radical gender and sexual notions. Such instruction is surely part of the normalization of the LGBTQ agenda. Two spokesmen for “Drag pedagogy,” justify “drag queen readings for children. …[W]ithin the historical context of the USA and Western Europe, the institutional management of gender has been used as a way of maintaining racist and capitalist modes of (re)production.” To disrupt this dynamic, the authors propose “drag pedagogy,” as a way of stimulating the “queer imagination,” teaching kids “how to live queerly,” and “bringing queer ways of knowing and being into the education of young children.”[10] The goal is to expose “childhood innocence” as an “oppressive heteropatriarchal illusion,”[11]to make “queer thinking” the future “moral order” of society. Their task, they say, is to disrupt the “binary between womanhood and manhood,” seed the room with “gender-transgressive themes,” and break the “reproductive futurity” of the “nuclear family” and the “sexually monogamous marriage”—all of which are considered mechanisms of heterosexual, capitalist oppression. Powerful politicians support this ideology, in one way or another. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the third in line for the presidency, posted a clip of her cameo on the fifth episode of “RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 7” on Twitter, endorsing drag queens as “what America is all about.” She stated that “it was an honor” to make an appearance on the reality TV show and that she was “inspired by the contestants because they knew their power. Pelosi’s district is the site of a huge, annual public street fair for a sado-masochistic sex celebration, which she endorses.
Another politician, none other than President Biden, recently received in the White House the trans TikTok star Dylan Mulvaney, who publicly presented himself, dressed and speaking as a teenage girl, and discussed transgender issues with the President, who agreed with him that it was “immoral” to deny sex-change surgery to children. John Fetterman, senate candidate for Pennsylvania recently stated that “LGBTQ education should be mandatory in all schools.”[12] Will our future belong to proponents of “queer sex”?
The Human Rights Campaign thinks it will. They show that LGBTQ voters are on track to become one of the fastest-growing voting blocs in the country. They predict that by 2040, one in five Texas voters will be part of the group. “(LGBTQ voters are) emerging as among one of the most influential voting constituencies in the country, whose impact will permanently transform and reshape the American electoral landscape.”[13]
The church is already in Renns’s third culturally “negative period,” and I am taking the liberty to add a fourth stage. As the strength of pagan religious power increases, we will, no doubt, enter a fourth period.
A World of Persecution 
The church must be ready to face intense opposition. Already “cancel culture” has arisen from the reasoning of the LGBTQ community, who are convinced that their constitutional status removes any religious rights from Christian believers who might evoke their rights of free speech and free commerce. For the moment, most court cases on these issues take seriously the protections guaranteed by our constitutional religious liberty laws. What will happen when the moral high ground is held by the LGBTQ community? They believe that nature’s norm of heterosexuality has become an unjustified, outmoded definition of normalcy. The natural order has evolved into normative non-binary androgyny of all sorts. One cannot help but think of the Roman culture of Paul’s day.
In view of a possible fourth period, what should be the current stance of the church? To be sure, we must preach clearly the love of God available for all, since all are made in God’s image. But the pulpit must also show God’s created plan for men and women and the connection between worshiping creation and sexual degradation. Both unbelievers and believers, old and young, need encouragement to stand firm. Our younger believers are under immense pressure from the culture and often have no idea how to speak about the sexual issues in relation to the gospel message. They are often tempted to abandon their faith. Recent Barna research shows that “only 50 percent among teens who identify as Christians say Jesus was resurrected; not even half (44%) say Jesus was God in human form.[14] Only 40% open their Bible more than twice a year, and only 9% open it more than once a week. How will they be able to analyze and reject the pagan spirituality that surrounds them? Significantly, Barna did not even bother to ask them their views on sexuality which, as we have demonstrated, is the dominant worldview of our day.
Preaching a blend of gospel declaration and cultural apologetics follows the example of the apostles and of Paul in particular. Though he was not interested in creating a Christian empire, he was committed to training Christians how to represent God before the pagan world. Thus he taught the church, as well as any pagan who might hear him, how to think specifically about honest commerce, the traditional family, marriage and male/female sexuality—doubtless because it got them to think about God the Creator and Redeemer and how to glorify God in their daily living. Our Christian young people especially need wise instruction about the things they are hearing and seeing in their school and social settings. Yet some are deprived of any solid teaching about today’s androgynous, identity-oriented perversions. I beg all Christian pastors and youth leaders to dig deeply in understanding the theological connections with today’s sexual behaviors and then to train your young people to understand the issues and to stand firm, while reaching out to their friends with the gospel.
Of course, believers’ humble practice of God-honoring heterosexual marriage, though it may be costly, will also bear witness to the joy men and women have in biblical marriage. And in spite of stubborn resistance from opponents in contemporary culture, God’s powerful love and mercy is irresistible, as is his creative wisdom–in making us male and female—in his image. This we must seek to share in love with those who adopt androgynous sexual expressions. We must continue to express the love of Jesus, who was crushed on the cross for our redemption and for anyone who will receive it. To announce that love, we must be ready to give our lives, as Luther wrote 500 years ago:
Let goods and kindred go,This mortal life also;The body they may kill:God’s truth abideth still,His Kingdom is forever.
Dr. Peter Jones is scholar in residence at Westminster Seminary California and associate pastor at New Life Presbyterian Church in Escondido, Calif. He is director of truthXchange, a communications center aimed at equipping the Christian community to recognize and effectively respond to the rise of paganism. This article is used with permission.

[1] Aaron M. Renn, “The Three Worlds Of Evangelicalism,” FIRST THINGS, Feb 2022,
[2] See Amazon presenting page.
[3] Peter Jones, “Androgyny: The Pagan Sexual Ideal”: https://truthxchange.com/resource-library/articles/androgyny-the-pagan-sexual-ideal/
[4] Al Mohler, The Briefing, 11/2/2022.
[5] https://www.thecentersquare.com/national/poll-americans-support-banning-transgender-surgeries-drugs-for-minors/article_a969ff1a-5156-11ed-9243-733436a08713.html
[6] https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/4103360/posts
[7] https://www.frontpagemag.com/has-benedict-xvi-been-indicating-he-still-reigns-as-pope/
[8] Albert Mohler, The Great Evangelical Deconstruction, World, (November 4, 2022).
[9] https://www.verygoodlight.com/2021/08/19/gay-couples-open-relationships
[10] Christopher F. Rufo Oct 24, 2022.
[11] H Dyer – “Global Studies of Childhood, 2017,” – journals.sagepub.com
[12] Pennsylvania Democrat John Fetterman Agrees “LGBTQ Education” Should Be “Mandatory In All Schools”.
[13] https://hrc-prod-requests.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/LGBTQ-VEP-Oct-2022.pdf?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_axioslocal_austin&stream=
[14] Nick Hartman, “A Reflection on Barna’s Open Generation Report,” GenZ, October,26, 2022.
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Written by Dennis E. Johnson |
Thursday, September 19, 2024
While Hebrews urges us to fix our hearts and hopes on Jesus, who sits at God’s right hand in heaven (Heb. 12:1–2), our preacher is vividly aware of the faith-threatening challenges that confront his hearers on this sin-sick earth. The original congregation had endured the loss of social acceptance, property, physical safety, and freedom (Heb. 10:32–34; 13:3, 11–14). In the face of ongoing pressure to return to tangible and familiar old covenant rites, they needed encouragement to endure in their trust in Christ (Heb. 10:35–12:13). The trials of Israel in the wilderness, between exodus from slavery and entrance into God’s rest, soberly foreshadowed the trajectory of the new covenant church from slavery to sin and our final entrance into God’s rest (Heb. 3–4).

The Only Mediator
The theology of the book of Hebrews is distinct in that it draws together so many of the greatest truths revealed in God’s word to address the deepest of human needs. Hebrews introduces us to the only mediator who can reconcile sinful human beings to the infinitely holy God. Specifically, Hebrews displays the superiority of Jesus’s priestly ministry and his once-for-all sacrifice of himself, which cleanses our consciences and opens access to the presence of God. Hebrews orients us to the flow of God’s agenda for history, alerting us to how his covenantal bond with his people structures the outworking of his redemptive plan. As Hebrews unveils the connection between redemptive accomplishment and revelatory completion, this book shows us how to interpret the Old Testament as believers living in “these last days” in which God has spoken, climactically, in his Son. To Christians experiencing misgivings in the face of social rejection, financial loss, and physical threat, Hebrews offers the remedy of robust theology, calling them to “consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession” (Heb. 3:1) and to look to Jesus, “the founder and perfecter of faith” (Heb. 12:2).
The Letter That Is a Sermon
In our New Testament, Hebrews is grouped among other “general epistles” (James, 1 and 2 Peter, 1–3 John, and Jude). In fact, it is neither “general” nor, precisely, an “epistle.” It is addressed to a specific congregation whose history and present situation the author knows well and to whom he hopes to return (Heb. 6:9–12; 10:32–36; 13:23). Unlike an epistle, it opens not with the names of author and audience nor with preliminary blessing and prayer but with an elegant prologue that draws us into the theme: the superiority of the Son in whom God has spoken in “these last days” (Heb. 1:1–4). (Admittedly, Hebrews concludes as apostolic epistles often do, with assorted exhortations, prayer requests, travel plans, and benedictions [Heb. 13].)
The author calls Hebrews a “word of exhortation” (Heb. 13:22)—the term used by a synagogue leader when, after Scriptures were read, he invited Paul to present a discourse (a sermon) (Acts 13:15). Paul’s “word of exhortation” explained Old Testament texts and issued an exhortation to trust in Jesus (Acts 13:15–40). Although Acts includes digests of the apostles’ evangelistic sermons to the unbelieving audiences, Hebrews is the only post-Pentecost sermon to a Christian congregation in the New Testament.
Consistent with its character as “exhortation,” Hebrews interweaves indicative and imperative throughout. Repeatedly, robust doctrinal truth issues in heart-searching application: Since the Son is better than angels (Heb. 1:4–14), we must pay attention to the message of salvation spoken in the Son, which is even greater than the law spoken through angels (Heb. 2:1–4). Since the Son is better than Moses (Heb. 3:1–6), we must hear and heed his voice (Heb. 3:7–4:13). Since Jesus’s priesthood is superior to Aaron’s (Heb. 7) and his sacrifice cleanses more thoroughly and permanently than animals’ blood (Heb. 9:13–10:18), we must draw near to God’s throne of grace in confidence and reverent worship (Heb. 4:14–16; 10:19–39). Paul’s epistles typically “frontload” doctrinal instruction (for example, Rom. 1–11, Eph. 1–3), after which he draws ethical implications from gospel truths (Rom. 12–15, Eph. 4–6). Hebrews, one the other hand, applies each aspect of Jesus’s superiority—in revelation, in reconciliation, as the champion who leads us into God’s rest—with step-by-step in exhortations, all along the way.
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One in five Gen Z Americans now identify as LGBT+, double the number of millennials (one in 10) and quadruple the number of Gen X Americans (about one in 20). A surprising number of them—40 percent of Gen Z and millennials—also identify as religious. Increasingly, Christian pastors, youth pastors, and parents are fielding questions and declarations from young people examining their own gender or sexual orientation.
Eva was in a church luncheon when she got an email from her 12-year-old daughter Grace. (Their names have been changed.)
“Mom and Dad, I need to tell you I’m not actually a girl,” she read. “My pronouns are they/them.”
Eva couldn’t breathe. She felt like she’d been punched in the gut. She hadn’t seen this coming—in fact, a few months before, Grace had shared on social media her belief that God created people male and female.
Back then, Eva was sure that statement was going to earn Grace—who attended a progressive public school—some social problems. Instead, it seemed to blow over right away.
“I would’ve gotten bullied,” said Grace, who is now 16. “Instead, they decided to reeducate me. I got invited to groups where all they wanted to talk about was the transgender stuff. Over the course of a few months, I decided I was going to be agender. And then I ended up deciding I was a boy.”
Grace was experiencing what is often called “rapid-onset gender dysphoria,” in which friendship groups begin to experience similar gender questions at the same time. One in five Gen Z Americans now identify as LGBT+, double the number of millennials (one in 10) and quadruple the number of Gen X Americans (about one in 20).
A surprising number of them—40 percent of Gen Z and millennials—also identify as religious. Increasingly, Christian pastors, youth pastors, and parents are fielding questions and declarations from young people examining their own gender or sexual orientation.
“Martin Luther King Jr. talks about the long arc of justice,” said Falls Church Anglican rector Sam Ferguson, who has spent time with multiple transitioning young adults and their families. “The Bible also envisions the long arc of redemption, which aims at the resurrection of the body. There is continuity—the end reflects the beginning. Our Creator doesn’t need to start over. If your child has an XY chromosome, then he’ll be raised from the dead as a male. We need to work along the arc of redemption, not against it.”
That takes patience, Eva and her husband Seth found. (His name has also been changed.) For more than two years, they prayed for Grace. They searched the Scriptures. They built their relationships with her. They drew boundaries around how she could express herself. They took her to counseling and to church. They started homeschooling her. They asked her questions.
Basically, they played the long game. And when she was 15, Grace desisted—that is, recognized her body is female and switched her identity back.
These days, Eva and Grace often talk with other families whose children are transitioning.
“The church is the only place that has the freedom to address this, because the activism around this has been so powerful and well-funded,” Eva said. “When I think about where we were three years ago, and where we are now—God doesn’t waste anything.”
‘Ended Up Deciding I Was a Boy’
In many ways, it’s surprising that someone like Grace would struggle with gender identity. Her mom and dad love Jesus and each other. She’s got a couple of siblings, a strong church family, and a sharp mind. For as long as she can remember, she’s believed in God.
When Grace was 12, she logged onto a social networking site called DeviantArt. “At first, I was posting artwork with my friends, but eventually the ‘gay is good’ message became unavoidable,” she said.
She’d never heard of someone being transgender before. “I was like, ‘What is this?’ and they were like, ‘Oh, there are guys who are actually girls, and girls who are actually guys, and some people are actually neither.’”
Grace asked her mom about it, and Eva explained they didn’t agree with those categories of thinking. Grace, who is on the autism spectrum and thinks in black and white, told her online friends she didn’t agree with them.
They didn’t fight her or bully her. Instead, she was invited to the Gender & Sexualities Alliance (GSA) club at her school. Eva thinks she was targeted, and that’s not a crazy idea. Teachers in California have shared recruiting tactics, including “stalking” students’ Google searches or conversations for any indication they might be open to joining the faculty-advised, student-led clubs.
Grace began going to the weekly unsupervised lunchtime meetings, listening to other kids from her middle school and high school talk about sex, gender, and how they felt uncomfortable in their bodies.
Being a 12-year-old girl, Grace felt uncomfortable in her body too. She also didn’t like the tights, short shorts, and crop tops that other middle school girls were wearing.
“I believe strongly in modesty,” she said. “I started to associate womanhood with being sexualized. I wasn’t even really thinking male vs. female, but non-sexual vs. sexual.”
She thought maybe she was agender, which means not identifying with either sex. But as time went on, Grace realized she’d prefer to be male. After all, she’d love to be as tall and strong as her brother. And it seemed like all she needed was some testosterone.
“Nobody in the GSA club had gotten prescription hormones yet because we were all fairly young,” she said. “Nobody knew about all the side effects of giving girls testosterone—the bone demineralization, increased rate of cancer, heart attacks, and vaginal atrophy.”
Instead, what everyone talked about was the drama of coming out.
Coming Out
National Coming Out Day is October 11, and it has expanded to include National Coming Out Week and even National Coming Out Month.
“All my friends on social media and I were going around with each other, dramatizing coming out,” Grace said. “I made it way more dramatic than it had to be. I emailed my parents with my announcement and my pronouns.”
She’d already asked to cut her hair short and quit wearing skirts, but that was all the warning Seth and Eva had.
“It was a nightmare,” Eva said. “I’ve never suffered from anxiety before, but the first two weeks [after Grace’s announcement] I didn’t eat or sleep.” She couldn’t believe this was happening—didn’t kids who identified as transgender come from broken families or abusive childhoods?
Eva took Grace to the school counselor, to the pediatrician, to the principal. “They all tell you you have to affirm or your child will commit suicide,” Eva said. “But my background is in education and psychology, and I knew that didn’t make sense. I could think of 15 reasons [other than being transgender] why a young girl might do this.”
It took two weeks before she found her first ray of hope. “It was a blog run by liberals, but it had all kinds of gender-critical resources,” she said. “I found it in the middle of the night, and I just started crying. I was like, I’m not crazy.”
Theology of Gender
That website was a confirmation of what Eva already knew.
“My husband and I talked it through,” she said. “What do we know about God? We know he created us male and female. Are there true transgender people? Well, if there are, they’d be in the Bible. What about eunuchs? Jesus is certainly aware of bodily brokenness—he acknowledges people born as eunuchs in Matthew 19:12—but two distinct sexes are his good design. . . . So if we believe God is sovereign and doesn’t make mistakes, what does this mean for us?”
She couldn’t find many Christian resources—and while there are some now, they’re still few and far between (and not always allowed on Amazon). Her pastors weren’t able to help much, either. “The church helped us find a therapist, which was huge,” Eva said. “But otherwise, we did not get much support. . . . No one at the church had any guidance for us at all. I understand that, because this was all out of left field for everyone. But instead of feeling like we were working together to figure this out, I felt mostly abandoned and ignored.”
Although many Christians know someone who is struggling with gender identity, few churches are well-equipped with policies, counseling, or a deep theology of identity. The transgender movement is both young—entering the mainstream around 2015 when Bruce Jenner announced his transition to Caitlyn—and constantly evolving. Even more confusing, the transgender questions and assumptions are different from the homosexual ones.
The question isn’t “Whom do I love?” but rather “What does it mean to be human?” said Mike McGarry, founder of Youth Pastor Theologian. “The gender identity conversation is really about the created order, and turning it upside down.”
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