Biden, Transgenderism, and the Church

Shared restrooms, shared sporting competitions, and now a shared military. Biological women in this generation have been cancelled by the President of the United States.

The President in a flood of Executive orders, that have come out in the first few days of his new administration, has made moves to normalize and main-stream trans-genderism. The Transgender movement is a branch of the LGBTQ community. And it is an argument that basically says, “If a biological male decides to put on panties and a bra and say that he is a woman, he can now participate in anything that biological women do.” Sporting events in high school or college, shared restrooms in public places and as of this week the President has reversed by Executive order the ability for transgendered men to serve in the military where they would share private spaces with biological women. We have put our women in the military at risk by putting them in a situation where they have to share their most intimate space with a biological man.

Well, I’m afraid that this President in his next Executive order will need to put a warning label on all high school biology textbooks. Because if you open a biology text book you’re going to risk the discovery that there are only two genders in the world. And they are easily defined by physical characteristics.

We have, in this situation, a response that we have to provide as Christians. How do we approach this issue of people who say, “Gender is a social construct. So, whatever I decide I want to be, that’s what you have to acknowledge.”

I remember when my children were little. They would often play pretend. My daughters come out of their rooms and they would be wearing princess dresses. And they would have jewelry and make-up. And we would pretend that they were a princess. Sometimes they would bring me a play phone and they would hand it to me. And I would say hello. Because when a toddler hands you a phone, even if it’s pretend, you say hello. It’s ok to pretend when you’re with toddlers.

But what we’re being asked to do is we’re being asked to allow adults to pretend that they are something that they are not. And the President wants the rest of us to be forced to join in the pretense.

What does the Bible have to say about this unusual issue of transgenderism? Well, if we go to the very first chapters in the Word of God, in Genesis 1:26,27 we’re told this.

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness. They will rule the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, the livestock, the whole earth, and the creatures that crawl on the earth. So God created man in his own image; he created him in the image of God; he created them male and female.

The creation story tells us that God created Adam from the dust of the ground. He fashioned him into a human body and breathed life into him. What distinguished Adam from all the rest of the animals was not the original material that he was created from. What separated him was the distinctive that Adam was the only creature created in the image of God. That is, there was something about Adam different from all the other animals that reflected who God was. This is also an argument that we used why mankind is not just the dominant animal on the planet. We are not animals. We are not like animals. We were created in the image of God. And that is a distinctive that no other animal can lay claim to.

Now Adam walked with God for a time. But God acknowledged that it was not good for Adam to be alone. So, He decided to make companion, a partner. And when He did, He did not go back to the dust of the earth and fashion a second species, a different creature. This time He put Adam into a deep sleep, took a rib from his side and fashioned a woman from that rib. Now this has tremendous potential to help us understand the distinction that God has in making men and women different while the same.

As men and women come together, particularly in the Biblical relationship that we call marriage, they reflect together the image of God. Now, men and women in general are very different from each other. Men are more aggressive. They tend to be more rational in the way they analyze the events around them. Women are intuitive. They’re generally more trusting and more sensitive. Now, those are generalities and they overlap in the individual personalities of specific people. But the reality is that together they reflect the image of God in different ways or from different perspectives. It’s like a diamond that would turn and with each turn we see the light from a different facet. It shows us something we didn’t know before. Both genders mirror different aspects of God on earth.

Both genders bear the image of God, though they reflect God in different ways. Therefore, when it says that God created them male and female, He established a boundary. And in that creation there were biological men and biological women.

Now, it’s common at this point in the discussion for people to say, “Well, what about those chromosomal anomalies, those people that are born with some sort of difference in their chromosomes? They’re not one gender or the other.” I understand that. And that is a very special case. Those statistically though are insignificant and should be dealt with on a case by case basis in each instance.

What we have done instead is said that because we don’t want to recognize the two genders that were a foundational part of the design of the Creator for men and women, we have now pasted laws to put everybody in the country in the mode of pretending that we can be something that we’re not.

Well, how does the Church respond to this issue? Well, it’s clear that no fair and hermeneutically appropriate examination of the Bible can find affirmation for the idea that gender is a social construct. Transgenderism as it’s practiced in this generation, transgenderism and the Word of God are incompatible.

So how do we handle it?

Well, let me give you the guidelines that I believe the Church should use as we face this issue. First of all, and this is very important, we need to repent of the double standard that we apply to sin.
It’s a shame that the Church has become known for its attitude toward homosexuality and transgender individuals. We believe that their sins are morally repugnant and deserve judgment. And yet, our sins of adultery, tax fraud, racial prejudice, somehow those sins are respectable. They’re minor. We’ve categorized sin so that our sin is easy and their sin is hard. Our sin is okay. It’s respectable. Their sin is off the charts and unacceptable. The fact of the matter is none of those sins are unforgiveable. But they are all sins.

And until we quit pretending like the Church is made up of perfect people looking down our noses at others outside of the Church who are sinners, we don’t have much credibility as what Paul calls “ministers of reconciliation.” If we’re to bring people to Christ, if we’re to attract people to Christ, we have to be like Christ. Christ found Himself in the midst of tax-collectors, prostitutes and others sinners. Why? Because He never challenged them? No, He absolutely challenged them. He challenged them turn away from their sin and to be different. But they knew that it was a call to something better. It was not a judgmental self-righteous attitude.  And they were attracted to Him. The world should be attracted to the Jesus in us because they see Him in us. The first step towards dealing with this transgender issue is we’ve got to repent of our double standard for sin.

The second step is we need to emphasize that opposition to the topic of transgender is not hate but rather it’s debate.

One of the strategies of progressives today is instead of having a reasonable conversation about the facts of any matter, they try and use smear labels as weapons to avoid actual conversation and thought. What we need to hold on to is this, don’t be backed into a corner. Morality is not bigotry. Do not accept the smear labels. They say, “Well you’re a racist. You’re a bigot.” No, I’m not any of that. I just disagree with you. And if we can talk about this, let’s have a conversation. As long as we call names, as long as they call names, we cannot accept those names. Don’t run scared because somebody says you’re a racist if you’re not a racist. Don’t accept the label that you’re a bigot if you’re not a bigot. Now, that means that you’ve gone before the Throne of Grace, you’ve confessed your own sin. You’ve examined your heart to make sure that you’re representing Jesus. But don’t let those are afraid of a conversation based on fact, don’t let them scare you off because they throw smear labels in your direction.

Repent of our double standard. Emphasize that our opposition is not hate. It is not hate, it is debate. But here’s the third step. We have to be open and willing to have reasonable conversations with homosexuals and transgendered individuals, men and women who practice alternative lifestyles, that in the end are self-destructive. We need to not stand back in self-righteousness and judge. We need to be open to the conversation of why we think what we think, why we stand with the Word of God in calling those things dangerous and destructive. I don’t want transgendered individuals to be judged. I want them to find their way to a God of mercy.

But here’s the thing. We have to hear their story. Because their story is often filled with the pain of the human condition. We overlook that sometimes. The technical term for what drives a lot of transgenderism is “Gender Dysphoria.” It’s a psychological term that describes a kind of confusion and brokenness related to the awareness of gender.  We need to help people who are struggling because they don’t understand the brokenness of their human condition.

What happens is these politically correct progressive wrong-headed policies actually hinder those who are broken from finding peace and restoration. It is our job, despite what the President would order by his Executive pen, it is our job to treat these people as human beings as we listen to their story, we share our story. Not a story of perfection, not a story of being always right, but a story of brokenness. A story of human condition that’s been transformed because somewhere along the way we met Jesus Christ. Listen to their story. Recognize their pain. Share your story and offer Jesus.

Transgendered individuals are not our enemies. They are fellow travelers along this earthly path. And they need Jesus. We are here to share Jesus with them.

This is TruthCurrents.