Ep. 45 - How Should Christians Approach Transgender Issues?

Discover the intricate relationship between Christian faith and transgender issues in our latest episode. We dive deep into the theological perspectives, historical context, and personal experiences surrounding this topical conversation. As the world grapples with identities that challenge traditional norms, Christians are called to respond with compassion while remaining grounded in biblical teachings.

Throughout the episode, we tackle profound questions about the nature of identity. Is it merely a social construct, or does it have deeper spiritual implications? Understanding what transgenderism means is pivotal, as we explore how cultural movements have redefined gender and the implications they have on individuals and society.

We also share invaluable insights on how to engage with transgender individuals, emphasizing that love and grace are crucial, even amidst differing beliefs. The importance of fostering dialogue rather than conflict cannot be overstated. We urge listeners to seek understanding and take a compassionate approach to conversations about such sensitive subjects.

Finally, we present several recommended resources for those wishing to further explore the intersection of faith and gender identity. This episode invites open-hearted discussion aimed at appreciating our diversities while affirming truth in love. Don't miss out! Join us and explore how we can navigate these challenging waters together.

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction and Overview
• 5:13 Context of the Episode and Guests
• 26:16 Transgenderism: Definitions and Distinctions
• 40:03 Historical Perspective on Gender and Transgender Issues
• 51:00 Christian Responses to Transgenderism
• 58:53 The Role of Compassion in Discussions
• 1:10:01 Engaging with Individuals vs. the Ideology
• 1:27:34 Practical Advice for Families and Friends
• 1:37:15 Recommended Resources and Conclusion

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

All right, everyone, welcome back to the Psych and Theo podcast. We are excited to release a special episode for you guys today. Tim and myself we're kind of in a busy season, so we've been recording, or we did a lot of pre-recordings, and are able to release these special episodes that we did with a couple of friends, and the one that you're going to tune into today is one that Tim did with our friend, cassian Bellino. She has a podcast called the Biblically Speaking Podcast, so tune into that and she interviews biblical scholars and talks about all things related to scripture and understanding passages of scripture, understanding the Bible in general. So she has Tim on and Tim discusses the very important topic and very controversial topic of transgenderism and its effects on society and how should Christians respond. So I'm really looking forward to having you guys tune into that, because it's a very important topic and it's a very controversial topic.

Speaker 1: 0:58

On our Instagram page, it was probably the most watched video and also the one that brought up a lot of somewhat nasty comments. But you know, we just rolled with it. It is what it is and we knew that that was going to happen, but I think we handled it with grace and yeah. So if you don't follow us on Instagram, you can do so by going to psych underscore and underscore Theo, and you'll be able to find us there with our page. So, as always, thank you for tuning in, thank you for providing comments, thank you for sending questions, and I hope you enjoy today's episode.

Speaker 2: 1:36

Hello, hello, welcome back to Biblically Speaking. My name is Cassie Ablino and I'm your host. I'm more than excited to have Dr Tim Yance back on my podcast. Welcome back, I am so excited to have you on here and I don't think I gave you a proper bio introduction. So for those that didn't tune into our last episode talking about homosexuality, dr Tim Yance, you grew up in Cincinnati, so that's where I grew up, and you have a Master of Divinity from Liberty University, a PhD in the theological studies at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, and you also are an adjunct professor at Liberty University, so that's where you're teaching now. You're teaching theology, worldview, apologetics and ethics, and you also co-host a podcast called Psych and Theo, which I love this podcast. You guys are bold and courageous on that.

Speaker 2: 2:22

You guys cover some interesting topics but, just like the biblical perspective on same-sex attraction, I'm excited today to talk to you about transgender issues and the biblical perspective on that as a Christian. So welcome back, Tim.

Speaker 3: 2:35

I'm glad to be back and looking forward to having this discussion. We're going to dive deep. This one's a bit more complicated, I, than than uh, same-sex attraction, but it's related, so let's get into it yeah, I, I mean, again, I'm coming from this very egocentric place.

Speaker 2: 2:52

I'm a christian. Uh, transgenderism is a huge topic. So, as a christian, how do we respond? You know how do we respond if I'm having thoughts, you know.

Speaker 2: 3:00

I think that this is where that relative concern comes into play. But it also just feels like everything we see online always aggressive. It's always from a place of who's going to win, who's right, somebody's better than the other person. And that's not really what I want to do on this conversation, you know, I just really want to understand, as a Christian, what does the Bible say about it, because my standard for living aligns with what the word of God says and so I'm just going to default to that. And again, that's kind of where we start splitting from what is of this world and what is set apart. But this is meant to be educational and I guess I'm starting, you know, with that sensitivity and trigger warning at the at the start of this podcast, that I assume that we're not going to be talking about child friendly topics and we're definitely going to be talking about some more sexual surrounding topics, and you might be a little triggered if this is something that is sensitive to you and your ears or those around you, so for the purposes of education.

Speaker 3: 3:52

Thank you, tim, for leading the discussion all right, yeah, I'm, I'm ready to get into it. Yeah, there, there are some issues in the transgender subject, especially when we get into history, that might there might be some graphic descriptions, like we'll curb that language, but you know, there's some things we got to talk about that the scriptures either allude to or were aware of. The authors of scripture were aware of in their day that was going on and how that relates to today.

Speaker 2: 4:21

So, yeah, Well, just starting off with you, what is your experience with this topic? Have you taught on it, have you just studied it, or what's your experience with just? You know all the depths that we're going to go into.

Speaker 3: 4:32

Well, you know, I'm an ethicist by training. So, as I said in the previous episode, we ethicists we kind of have to be generalists in a lot of different fields and then try to integrate them all together. So our job, at least as a Christian ethicist, is to help Christians think ethically or morally about different issues, all kinds of different issues. So with this topic it's related, like all the LGBT issues. They're all related together. So my experience with it has been teaching at the undergrad level, introducing students to what it is, so that they know the terms, they know the lines of debate and what a biblical approach would be, and then also not just training them on what the Bible says but also training them on natural law type arguments, not unbiblical arguments, but non-biblical things, where you don't necessarily need the Bible to make an argument like this.

Speaker 3: 5:26

And sometimes if you're talking to someone who doesn't, they don't believe the Bible. Just pointing stuff out in the Bible is going to be of no effect on them, but you could use arguments that are what I call non-atheological or non-religious to persuade them. So I train students in that too.

Speaker 2: 5:43

So that makes sense. I feel like this topic is pretty secular as a whole and it really kind of comes down to you know how I feel about my identity and what I want to decide with my own bodily autonomy.

Speaker 1: 5:54

So how does?

Speaker 2: 5:55

God fit into this. You know how is this? Even like moral issues fit into this. It seems like a very individualistic perspective. But again, we're here to learn about the Bible. So what does that Bible, what does that old book, say about?

Speaker 3: 6:08

it. Yeah, it actually says a lot surprisingly.

Speaker 2: 6:13

Interesting. I don't think I've ever heard in all my years of church going and Bible study, I've never heard of a verse that references transgender. So is it fair to say that? You know, just like from an origin standpoint of transgender issues, was it non-existent during, you know, ancient Near East culture? Was it well known? I know we talked a lot about like Greco-Roman culture and how open that was when, like Paul, was writing. But can we just like kind of start at the origin, like when did this pop up? Where did it pop up?

Speaker 3: 6:41

and where did the?

Speaker 2: 6:42

influence start.

Speaker 3: 6:43

Okay, so the modern movement of transgenderism is different than historically how we've kind of understood the gender bending, crossing kind of behavior. I say that because transgenderism as a movement really springs out of modern feminist movements and I would encourage people to go back and listen to on the Psych and Theology podcast. Our very first episode is called there Are Only Two Genders. Here's why and we give a brief overview of the history of the feminist movement and really transgenderism is like the fourth wave of the feminist movement and it's really kind of the culmination of a feminist movement and it's really kind of the culmination of a feminist movement and it's become quite anti-feminist in a sense. Because now third wave feminists are at odds with the transgender movement because they see it's undoing.

Speaker 3: 7:37

Like JK Rowling many people know who she is the author of Harry Potter, she's what one might consider to be a TERF and that's called a trans-exclusionary, radical feminist. So you could put her in the camp of a third wave feminist. But she is very much opposed to not people having the ability to modify themselves, but she's opposed to the transgender movement being a part of the feminist movement and and disrupting women's sports and other things like that.

Speaker 2: 8:04

So so a transgender, exclusionary, radical feminist is essentially like oh, it sounds like to me and again like I'm just first time hearing about this is someone who just like boldly defends the feminist I'm the feminine, rather than like, makes it open for interpretation, like she's saying strongly in her lane is that it's not able to be a debate that's what it sounds like.

Speaker 3: 8:26

Yeah, so the?

Speaker 2: 8:27

they would say that the, the feminist movement, is exclusively for women, for biological women, to challenge gender roles and to rewrite gender roles in society and things like that yeah got it, so they see transgenderism as undoing a lot of their progress I see, because now it's like open up to interpretation rather than, you know, kind of highlighting the role of the feminine and giving her equity and equality and yeah, I see, but the modern.

Speaker 3: 8:53

So the modern, the modern uh movement of transgenderism has sprung from uh, 20th century sex studies. Um, I can't remember the gentleman's name right now, but there was a few psychologists and researchers who had kind of picked up on this idea that some people have this experience of being a different gender than what their biological sex is, and now we call that gender dysphoria. So this is early 20th century. They were studying transvestites. They were studying people who were born with hermaphrodism and some other, what we call man I am blanking on the term, it's deep in my notes here and I can't pull it up. It's called DSD, so it's a sex disorder, when people like hermaphrodism would be one of those. So they're studying these types of people, but they are picking up on this idea that maybe gender, which is the outward expression, a social expression of something, is different than sex. So they would start to make this distinction between sex and gender. And that's really at the root of what we refer to today as transgender ideology is that sex and gender are distinct and are not that they're unrelated, but that one that is sex biological sex should not be determinative of the other that is sex biological sex should not be determinative of the other. That's the key premise of transgenderism.

Speaker 3: 10:28

So if someone's getting into this topic, there's a few terms then that they need to be aware of. One is sex. What that means Sex would be like the biology, like you're either born with XX chromosomes or XY chromosomes. That's a chromosomal makeup of someone and that determines your sex. You're either biological male or female. Then there's anatomical features, the things that you're born with, that would show what biological sex you are. But then gender they would define as the inner subjectivity, that psychological understanding of masculine, feminine or something in between, or something totally different.

Speaker 2: 11:07

So it's interesting. I feel like the sex or the XY chromosome and like your genitals. Wouldn't those be like the same? Or I don't understand how those could even be distinct from one another.

Speaker 3: 11:15

Well, so they wouldn't distinguish between your genetics and your anatomy, but they would say that. So your genetic markers, really in the in the productive, in the development process, will ultimately determine the sex distinctions of your anatomy, your genitals and things like that. Okay, so it's all your chromosomes are will drive your body toward that way, if the body naturally develops without um, uh, malformities or abnormalities or anything like that. So, by and and large, most people, xx chromosome is going to develop into a healthy girl, xy, healthy boy. Okay, what they distinguish between is gender, is what they would call the social construct, or the social norms and rules and customs of how boys should act and how girls should act and how they should dress and behave and the roles they take in society.

Speaker 3: 12:09

So someone who's experiencing gender dysphoria, which is a real phenomenon, is they are experiencing this disconnection between their psychological understanding of masculine or feminine and the body that they are born with. So if they're born anatomically, biologically, male, but they quote unquote feel like a woman, then they might be experiencing gender dysphoria and there's, and that's a real state. You know it's not. It's not everyone who claims that is faking it or lying or anything like that. There's people who really struggle with this, but that's a, that's that phenomenon and the transgender movement comes sort of out of that. What the transgender ideology says is that someone who is experiencing gender dysphoria, the proper treatment for them is to transition into the other gender. I think a Christian approach, a biblical approach, is to try to treat the gender dysphoria, the experience of that, not to permanently alter the body in such a way that they would basically encourage them to transition.

Speaker 2: 13:15

There's a difference in the solution. Right. Well, I guess I don't understand because I'm not them, but I having some sort of disorder or even like body dysmorphia, would that kind of be like relative, not like same same, but different as far as like?

Speaker 2: 13:31

thinking you're huge when you're anorexic of like, just not being able to comprehend or see the rational difference here that like you would treat body dysmorphia, you know you would treat anorexia. You wouldn't let them be like, be like, okay, you are now skinny and I'm you're just gonna be, you know, 10 pounds or whatever. But it's one of those topics that I have no insight into, so I'm trying to understand it, but well, you're hitting on something.

Speaker 3: 13:58

We might be jumping ahead of ourselves, but you're hitting on something that I think most people intuitively pick up on, and that's the logical implications of transgender ideology, and that is, if my identity is ultimately rooted in a subjective state that is like something in my mind, if my identity is rooted in that and it's separated from my biology, then who's to say that I can't redefine myself in all kinds of ways, including that body dysmorphic movement which now is called trans ableist?

Speaker 2: 14:30

And I'm sure that if there is a trans person listening to this, they're probably extremely offended that it's not something subjective. This is who they are. This is their identity. How is this different, like, how does it now become an identity when it's something where I you're right from a logical perspective, if I don't connect to the genitals I was born with? That seems like something you could treat similar to anarksis same same, but different again. But the identity aspect is what makes it different. It makes it more threatening to want to change does that make sense?

Speaker 3: 14:59

um, well, if someone has been convinced to believe that their root identity, their fundamental essence of who they are, is the experience, the gender experience that they have in their mind, then yeah, it's going to be really, really hard for them to let that go. We didn't get into this in the previous episode on homosexuality in the Bible, on the problem of identity, but many people and this goes for anything if we root our identity in our sexuality, like either our sexual orientation or sexual expression or something like that, like in the Christian worldview, we would say that's not where your identity is ultimately rooted anyways. So right away there's a problem where, if someone is rooting their identity, they're fundamental of who they are as a person. In that we're already getting off to a rough start.

Speaker 2: 15:53

Because your identity is in Christ.

Speaker 3: 15:56

Yeah, well, in the Christian world, yeah, but what that means is that we are created beings, we're loved by God, and God is the one who actually gets to define what we are and who we are and how we live.

Speaker 2: 16:08

Oh, so it's almost like idolatry of the self. By saying no, I'll decide.

Speaker 3: 16:11

Well, in a sense I wouldn't say that everyone who experiences gender dysmorphia is, like you know, in idolatry. You know I don't want to go that far, but the transgender movement or the LGBT movement, I have no problem saying that it is a form of idolatry, just like lots of other things would be forms of idolatry in our culture. Politics, political parties, can be idolatry, or certain movements in our culture, a sports team, you can make that into your idolatry.

Speaker 2: 16:38

Taylor Swift.

Speaker 3: 16:40

Yeah, swifties, I'm going to get in trouble now.

Speaker 2: 16:43

I know they're hearing us. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3: 16:45

Yeah, so anything like that, when it is elevated to the point that it drives and confers meaning and purpose to your life and it's not God, then it has taken the place of God and therefore it's idolatry.

Speaker 2: 16:59

Okay, but not with transgender. You don't see the same thing happening there?

Speaker 3: 17:03

Well, not with people who are experiencing gender dysphoria. I don't think the experience of that is idolatry. I do think the movement is idolatrous. Okay, it's a movement of sexual liberation, of throwing off the patriarchy, of throwing off all norms and customs in society and dismantling systems of power, like all that kind of stuff is wrapped up in an idolatry because it's giving new meaning and purpose to someone's life. That's not God Interesting.

Speaker 2: 17:38

Okay, so we keep. You keep referencing kind of gender dysmorphia as different than transgender. Is it two separate things?

Speaker 3: 17:46

Dysphoria.

Speaker 3: 17:46

Sorry, so I could talk about that. Yeah, gender dysphoria is a just it's, it's the. It's a psychological state where someone feels distress, uh, if they feel this incongruence between their biological sex and their um, psychological experience of gender. So that's gender dysphoria. Transgenderism is the. Is our transgender, let's say a transgender is someone whose gender identity does not conform to their biological sex. So it's someone who might be experiencing gender dysphoria. And then they decide I'm going to have a, I'm going to be have a sex transition and gender transition surgery, transition and gender transition surgery, something like that. Or I'm going, at the very least I'm going to present myself as the other gender. I may not go through with the transition surgeries, but I may put on the outward attire and start acting like the other gender. Or I might just deny altogether that there's what's called a gender binary, that is, the belief that there's only two genders men and women. So some people say there's a gender binary. That is the belief that, uh, there's only two genders, male and or men and women.

Speaker 2: 18:47

So some people say there's no gender. It's just the next step of the dysphoria, yeah, yeah okay, you were so just to go back in history, because I love a history lesson, but was there so really early?

Speaker 3: 19:00

20th century yeah early 20th century did this I don't know.

Speaker 2: 19:04

It feels a little ignorant to say that's when it started. I'm sure that there are occurrences of transgender or gender dysphoria before you know.

Speaker 3: 19:12

Yeah, I'm sure there were. In fact, you know, we can find examples all throughout history of someone who might be like sex disorders, like developmental sex disorders that's the word I was looking for earlier DSDs, developmental sex disorders are something that occurs naturally and that it's something that goes wrong in the developmental process, and so someone could be born intersex or hermaphroditical or have something like Kleinfelter's syndrome or something like all these other kind of disorders that we've identified. It's perfectly reasonable to think that people throughout history have been born with those, but they're exceedingly rare.

Speaker 3: 20:00

I guess he talks about all those like their disorders, but they were never identities the discussion about how, what to do with people who are born with these disorders is. The real question is how do we bring them into conformity with their um chromosomal, like their genetic makeup? So someone who is born intersex here's a good example uh, the olympics, just to see the boxer, the female female who won gold. Or she, the person who won gold in the female boxing she is a biological male, she has XY chromosomes. So there's this whole debate and there's a lot of confusion around this topic because her defenders will say, well, no, she is a woman, she's been a woman her whole life, I think, and I think that's because she's born biological male. But she's born intersex, which is like the genitals don't quite form clearly, like they're sort of mixed up, and the doctor then has to make a decision. The parents have to make a decision. In what way are we going to structure this person and raise them? How are you going to raise them? A boy or a girl?

Speaker 3: 21:25

and it's a tough decision to make. Um, so that's why the the challenge, the controversy with this boxer is that, having xy chromosomes, she has all the genetic markers of a man, including like elevated testosterone and other things that give her an advantage like an advantage as a man would walking into female boxing and I'm probably going to get canceled for saying these things, but that was what the controversy was swirling about and that's why she was disqualified from the. I think some boxing federation before the Olympics said you can't box in women's sports because of these things in the Olympicslympics letter and I'm saying her just kind of loosely, because it helps.

Speaker 2: 22:08

But I would say she's a biological man I think anybody can understand that a male and a female in a boxing ring, it's very clear that the male is gonna win. So if a woman, who is, you know, identifying as a woman and has lived her whole life as a woman because of that intersex decision at her child's birth, I think the way that she lives her life makes sense. But I also think, yes, you have significantly more of, like, certain hormones and muscle builds than I'll ever have bone density, everything yeah I mean both are true.

Speaker 2: 22:35

I mean, yeah, she was raised as a woman her whole life because of a decision at birth, but you did have access to different things than me, than my human, my female body ever would yeah, yeah, it would.

Speaker 3: 22:44

I mean it would be like it'd be akin to um, um, you know, someone taking, taking, uh, like thc their whole life, not thc, that's marijuana uh yeah it's like where are we going? I'm definitely going to get canceled now.

Speaker 2: 23:06

We're way too tired for this podcast right now. One of the things that I feel like comes up a lot, especially now today, is how do you reconcile with God made me this way? I genuinely feel in my heart that he misgendered me. So where am I supposed to land in my relationship with God, who is supposed to know me, supposed to love me, supposed to care for me? But I genuinely feel like he misgendered me. Like where does that go?

Speaker 3: 23:30

Yeah. So there's a lot of scientific research and debate about what causes gender dysphoria. To date, there's no study that has proven oh, it's this genetic marker or it's this hormonal imbalance or something that is actually. Oh, it's this genetic marker or it's this hormonal imbalance or something that is actually causing this and it's a natural thing for this person and therefore this is a good thing to transition them, because a lot of these studies there's correlations, but there's nothing that shows a causative or causation between something that happened biologically and that's what's driving this identity in me now. So that's one piece.

Speaker 3: 24:09

It's similar to the argument of are people born gay? The question are people born gay? Why could I not live this way? I'm born this way. So the question is are transgender people simply born transgender or with gender dysphoria? And that's all we can say about it. But the answer is no.

Speaker 3: 24:26

It's not as simple as that. But let's recognize something that the fall does affect us in lots of different ways and we live in a fallen, broken world and sometimes, just like, we can see these disorders in sexual development developmental sexual disorders, as they're called. Sometimes those happen. They're rare, but they do happen and it's tragic when they do happen. We can recognize that sometimes it's psychological, like the body may be intact but something happened in the brain. And the point there is not to root the identity, a person's identity, in what has happened in the head, but to look at the given natural reality of the person. They're born chromosomal male, they're anatomically male, so the body is actually telling us something about what ought to be.

Speaker 3: 25:17

And so one of the arguments that the Ryan T Anderson's book goes into that, um, what's happened in the transgender movement is that it's actually reversing our understanding of medicine and what, how we ought to treat someone. Because if we say well, the, the, we started out, you know, for traditionally we've said the body is what should direct our treatment, but now they've reversed and said no, the mind of the subjective state that can't be observed by anyone is the thing that directs treatment. So when you get into the Hippocratic oath of, my first responsibility as a doctor is to do no harm. But if I'm permanently altering the body, which is intact by itself, like it's functioning properly and it's an organism that is, all the parts are working properly, and I'm taking this person's subjective state or feeling and using that as the basis for my treatment, that seems like a slippery slope that can cause all kinds of problems.

Speaker 3: 26:14

Anyway, I'm going down a road. That's a little bit different of an answer. But why would God let me be born this way? I think the problem we need to recognize is that the fall affects us all, and affects us all in lots of different ways. But God calls us to live as men and women.

Speaker 2: 26:29

Despite the fall.

Speaker 3: 26:30

Yeah, the fall pushes on our natures as human beings and God calls us to holiness. I mean I'm born with a proclivity to seek revenge on people if they do me wrong. Does that mean it's right? It's a good point? Yeah, so I can be born with a predisposition to alcoholism. Does that mean God doesn't love me because of that? No, god recognizes those struggles, but he still calls us to holiness and he calls us back to him. Okay, but you asked about the Bible and I think you want to go deeper into history, am I right?

Speaker 3: 27:06

Yeah, I want to talk about the Bible if you haven't caught on, so let's, let's transport way, way back into ancient history, shall we? Yes, so I admit I'm not an authority when it comes to things like Native American two-spirit stuff, because oftentimes the transgender groups will point to like, well, look there's, there's two spirit people in animistic religions and Native American religion. We can see that it's usually a shaman or something like that that lived as both genders and sort of channeled both quote unquote spirits in the spirit world which you know. That's a whole. Nother topic we could get into sometime is religions like that, but I'm not an authority on that, so I'll just kind of punt to someone who probably is better at that. I actually have some books I can recommend at the end of the episode for people if they want to check stuff out.

Speaker 3: 27:56

But let's go all the way back. I said the Bible has a lot to say about this issue. I said the Bible has a lot to say about this issue, even though the word transgender doesn't show up, or gender dysphoria or any of the medical modern terms that we use. Okay. Similarly, the word abortion doesn't occur in the Bible, but the Bible has a lot to say about life, especially unborn life. So there's a lot of things that the Bible doesn't address directly like a modern issue, but there's principles that we can see in scripture that definitely apply. And then there's some things that are tucked away that we should be aware of. That may help us, like you know, cultural things. Okay, so let's get into this.

Speaker 3: 28:35

The point I made in the homosexuality episode I'll make here again. We need to first get a big picture of what the Bible says about gender, just like we need to get a big picture of what the Bible says about sex and how it's placed in the heterosexual marriage union. Well, we need to look at the broad picture of what the Bible says about gender, the big picture, and then so that's our positive case, and then we can address some of the what I call a negative case, like the prohibitions and things that say this is wrong. But what the Bible says is good. It overwhelmingly, universally describes the genders as man and woman, and it does that from beginning to end. So right off the bat you know Genesis 1 and Genesis 2, you see the creation narratives.

Speaker 3: 29:22

God creates man and woman, male and female, and he doesn't just create them that way. They have roles to play that are based on their genders. So God creates a woman and he says like hey, adam, I've made a helper for you, someone who is suitable for you when they fall, well, let me back up. So then he tells them be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. So there's definitely a role to play for both men and women in filling the earth and being fruitful and multiplying. You need the complementary gender roles to do that. You can't do as the old quip, the old joke says. You know, in the evangelical world God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve, okay.

Speaker 2: 30:03

So I don't know if you've ever heard that or not, but I've heard it, but I do think that a lot of people I mean I want you to keep going, so I'm not going to sidetrack too much.

Speaker 2: 30:10

I'm already hearing kind of the conversations that I were brought up with of like well, that's kind of dated, like we've got enough people, don't you think like we, I don't think we need to abide by that old commandment because like that was when the earth was empty, so what's the point? Like it shouldn't apply? Would it be a non-sequitur? Or do you feel like that is what the word of god says? So if we're gonna throw out one verse why you know like you gotta stay with all of them. How would you respond to that?

Speaker 3: 30:35

yeah, well, you know, we, our natures haven't changed, like we're still human beings, created in the image of god. So again, if I if I'm talking to Christians, I would say, genesis 1 and 2 say that we are in the image of God, do you think that's dated? If they say no, then I say, why not? Because, well, it's still our same nature, we're still created man and woman, and that is consistent throughout history. And so our genetic and sex differences actually clue us into how we need to relate to one another and to God.

Speaker 3: 31:05

Now, that doesn't necessarily mean that if you don't go out and get married and have children, that you're therefore sinning. I mean, there's verses in the New Testament that talk about being single or being married, and both can serve the Lord. But the fundamental genetic sex distinctions and how we relate to one another, that hasn't changed, and I would say no society in the history of the earth can function unless they recognize those sex differences and accommodate them. Now, each society does that a little different, but each society has done that. When a society tries not to do that, we get chaos.

Speaker 3: 31:42

They try not to reproduce tries not to do that, we get chaos. They try not to reproduce? Well no, when they begin to blur the sex distinctions or deny them altogether and redefine them as something totally different, as we see today, Okay, good answer, keep going.

Speaker 3: 31:58

Yeah, so even the curse there's effects on men and women. Men, because of their physicality and their responsibility to provide and to work and to defend, God says you're going to go out into the field and you're going to have to work hard and the ground is not going to yield the fruit that it once did. So the curse on man has to do with his labor and his work, which relates to his physicality and his ability to provide, so that's going to be much harder for him. A curse on women her pain and childbearing is going to be much worse. And if we're related to the feminist movement, God says and your desire is going to be for your husband, but he's going to rule over you, and that the first desire there means the desire to control.

Speaker 3: 32:38

So, yeah, I mean there's some debate about that, but I think that's a pretty strong argument, that that's what that means, because in the next chapter, cain, when God rejects Cain's sacrifice, god says Behold, cain sin crouches at the door and its desire is for you. It's the same word the sin is crouching at Cain's door and it desires to have its way with you, cain.

Speaker 2: 33:00

So it's the same word there. Yeah, I would have attributed desire to like more like a sexual, like attraction type of thing.

Speaker 3: 33:05

Yeah, some people do, because they the same word pops up in Song of Solomon. But again, that's a different context, that's poetry, that's centuries and centuries later. What you have is in the immediate next chapter you have this like the same, you have a similar concept at play with the same word, because he says look, this is I mean mean, it doesn't sound like much of a curse, if you like. Like hey, you guys are really going to want to have sex? Like that doesn't sound like a curse. That's what my I take that from my theology professors like that wouldn't be a curse that's a good point, yeah, so he says your desire is going to be for him, but he will rule over you.

Speaker 3: 33:41

So the contrast, that's that's what clues us in. So anyway. So, like the even in the curse on on human beings, the consequences for sin relate to our genders in some way, so we can't really escape that.

Speaker 2: 33:53

Okay, I'm calling.

Speaker 3: 33:55

Yeah, but we can go even further. I mean, let's, we'll come back to some of the old Testament law stuff, law stuff. Let's jump all the way into the New Testament. We see gender distinctions in Jesus, how he teaches on marriage. He goes all the way back to the beginning. The Jews are asking him about divorce and he says, hey, from the beginning it wasn't so, but God created the male and female and the husband will leave his father and his mother and the wife and he will cleave to his wife and they too shall become one flesh, so the two of them being complementary to one another. Uh, that that clues us in and how human beings, how men and women, are to relate to one another. Uh, similarly, there's that marriage complementarianism, uh is a model for the church in the bride of Christ as the bride of Christ.

Speaker 3: 34:43

So Paul talks about this in Ephesians 5. He says the relationship between a husband and wife is this mystery that models Christ and his church. So there again, you see this distinction, this gender if you'll forgive the term, gender binary between men and women, this distinction in the roles that they play. Paul says husbands, love your wives and give yourself for them. Wives, submit to your husbands. And then he goes on and gives a lot of other different responsibilities for each, and that's just one passage. We have 1 Peter 3, colossians 3, or a couple others. 1 Corinthians 7,. Paul says that the relationship between man and woman, the sexual relationship, is important between them because you don't want to fall into sexual immorality. So man and woman, husband and wife, are responsible to like. They can't claim ownership of their own bodies. He says the wife owns the husband, the husband owns the wife, so the two of them have to give of themselves to one another again, yeah, the, the gender, the gender distinctions are there.

Speaker 2: 35:53

I feel like the gender distinctions definitely are there and I think this really supports like the same sexual attraction. Um, a lot of the verses that we discussed before. But what if you, you know, had two people, you and that I'm a born female but I identify as a male, and then my partner? It's the reverse, so born male but identify as female? Couldn't I arguably be like Tim? I agree with you and that's why I'm the husband you know like. How do I'm? You know, I'm aligning myself biblically here because I'm well suited within that male husband role and I'm abiding by that. I'm well suited within that male husband role and I'm abiding by that in God. I feel like those verses, kind of like you always said those roles at the beginning of what we were made to do biblically, where is God pointing out you don't get to question it, you don't get to have that second guess.

Speaker 2: 36:37

You don't get to decide something that I decided for you.

Speaker 3: 36:42

Does God really put his finger on that? In other words, is it morally permissible for us to change our bodies and assume the role of the other gender?

Speaker 2: 36:48

The marriage is male and female as long as one of us steps into the roles. Technically it's biblical right.

Speaker 3: 36:53

Yeah, so do you remember? In the homosexuality talk we addressed the issue of just the sexual relationship. Like men and men, women and women, there's no indication that a woman can become a man or a man become a woman. That would be patently obvious to the first century Christian to look at that and say, no, you can't do that. But here's why Because they would have been aware of cults, religious cults in their day that were doing that too. But even more than that, well, not not entering into uh like transgender type relationships, but but, um, cross-dressing, doing a transvestite type stuff, uh, castration, uh all that kind of stuff was was taking place. They relate that back to the old testament law too. There's, there's prescriptions in the old testament law that talk about uh mutilating one's body and why that's a big word yeah, that actually.

Speaker 3: 37:53

Uh change. Israelites weren't supposed to do that for various reasons. Is there a difference? Mutilating their genitals?

Speaker 2: 38:00

right, but is there a difference between like that could be, that's torture. That was torture, that was not. Them being like I don't identify with my genitals, I'm gonna change them and we're calling it mutilation. Like is that possible that like you're referencing like torture or something?

Speaker 3: 38:14

no, it's, it's religious devotion. Is what is what's happening? Now some okay, some people. If they're, they're forcibly made eunuchs because they were captured by a conquering army or something like that. That's one thing. But well, let's get into it, because I think there's good evidence to show what the prescriptions in the Old Testament are talking about. Are not just people who've been physically altered by coercion and violence.

Speaker 2: 38:40

There's something else going on there. There's some consent there.

Speaker 3: 38:42

Yeah Okay, violence. There's something else going on there, yeah, okay. So the main verses that come up in this debate are Deuteronomy 22.5 and then Deuteronomy 23.1. Deuteronomy 23.5 says that men and women should not wear the clothing of the other gender. Okay, that a man should not put on the clothing of a woman and the woman should not put on the clothing of a man. In other words, they should not appear as, or disguise themselves as, the other gender. And I apologize for looking to the side, I'm looking at my notes as I talk to you.

Speaker 2: 39:10

That's pretty out there. I mean there it is.

Speaker 3: 39:12

Yeah, so why would they say that? Let me read a quote to you from Alan Branch, who wrote a book on this subject called the Affirming God, god's image, addressing the transgender question with science and scripture. So that's one of the books I'll recommend. Oh, that's it.

Speaker 3: 39:29

Yeah, so there's a quote here says a woman he's summarizing a woman shall not wear a man's clothing. That's the. That's what the verse says, the the word clothing. There is kelly, k-e-l-e or k-e-l-i, excuse me, that hebrew word kelly did not just refer to a man's outer garment, but also to vestments, utensils, tools, furnishings, etc. And what he's, what he's saying here is that and it's not just clothing, but anything that would make a woman appear as a man, uh, that's, she should not do that. She's not basically fool anyone into thinking she is a man. And similarly, uh, nor shall a man put on a woman's clothing. And the word there is simla, and that refers just specifically to the outer garment or mantle that a woman would wear. And this points to the fact that neither sex should attempt to confuse people by appearing as the opposite sex. So cross-dressing in that passage, in that verse, it's called an abomination, so it's put in the same level as other sexual sins that are listed in that section in Leviticus.

Speaker 2: 40:35

Does it say why? Because that seems like, oh, I can't wear menswear or else I'm sinning. Or is it referring to something way bigger?

Speaker 3: 40:41

Yeah, because cross-dressing was associated with all the other types of sexual immorality. Homosexuality, not necessarily like cross-dressing would be like these, but all of these are listed together as forms of sexual immorality. Because you're changing the gender roles and you're doing this for sexual, quasi-sexual, religious practices. Yeah, so in the very next chapter, deuteronomy 23.1, it says that men with mutilated genitals were not permitted in places of worship. Now, the grammar of that verse we don't have time to parse it but it speaks of men in two different ways Men who have it says basically they've been crushed, like their genitals have been crushed, and then men who have basically cut off their own.

Speaker 3: 41:35

So it may be referred to some men who this has been done to, or that they've done it themselves, or that they've done it themselves. But the context seems to be related to occult prostitution in some way, because a few verses later it talks about temple prostitution, how men and women should not give their sons and daughters over to temple prostitution. So there seems to be in the context. Again, context is what needs to guide our discussion here and the context seems to be alluding to ritualistic practices going on. Now what possibly could be going on?

Speaker 2: 42:13

Yeah, what is cultic prostitution or temple prostitution?

Speaker 3: 42:16

So this is important to remember that the Israelites they're going into the land of Canaan and they are told to live differently than the people of Canaan. Well, the people of Canaan have all kinds of religious practices and there's a very prominent deity that comes from Babylon. Her name is Ishtar and she's later brought into Canaanite religion. Her functions kind of change a little bit, but she's later identified with Asherah or Ashtaroth in the scripture. So if you come across the word Asherah or Ashtaroth or Asherah pole, that is likely an allusion to Ishtar, now Asherah starting out, which is a Babylonian god.

Speaker 3: 42:58

Yeah, some of the Hebrew scholars are going to like say, well, wait, wait, wait. You know, like Asherah started out as something different, as the wife of a different God, but later on Asherah and Ishtar are kind of conflated together in a lot of Canaanite religions.

Speaker 2: 43:13

Wasn't Jezebel like a leader in that cult? I thought I remember that. Yeah, she erects.

Speaker 3: 43:17

Asherah poles at the high places around Israel, which is a common thing Whenever idolatry would return to. Israel, they would erect the high places around Israel, which is a common thing. Whenever idolatry would return to Israel, they would erect the high places in the Asherah poles. So it's likely at that point they've probably mixed the worship of Asherah with the worship of Ishtar.

Speaker 3: 43:35

Now why is Ishtar important? She is a Babylonian goddess, but she's known for her ability to change her genders, and change the gender of men and women back and forth, and her male devotees, which were called the Kogaru. They were known to castrate themselves and to make themselves quote unquote female, so they would sometimes castrate themselves and then assume the female role in sexual relations.

Speaker 2: 43:58

Willingly with consent.

Speaker 3: 44:00

Yeah, they were devotees of the cult. Yeah, they were devotees of the cult, yeah, yeah. So we have lots of evidence for this, both in Canaanite literature, babylonian literature, that this was going on. So when scripture is referencing it, it's well aware of this happening. Yeah, that seems to be the context of why God is telling the Israelites do not do this, because when you are blurring the gender distinctions, you are acting like these idolaters. That is not how. Basically, it's not how I created you. I created you made a woman, so you're not to blur the gender distinctions. So that's the key text that come to us from the Old Testament.

Speaker 1: 44:40

Let me scroll down here for my notes.

Speaker 3: 44:44

Yeah, so that seems to be the link in the Old Testament. When we get to the New Testament, there's also, what about the New Testament?

Speaker 3: 44:51

Yeah, well, I didn't even mention some of the other gender role passages, but one that's important is 1 Corinthians 11.

Speaker 3: 45:00

And there's a lot of debate about all the different gender roles that Paul gets into in that passage. But essentially, if you want to boil it down to like a brass tacks, paul is pointing to men act a certain way and women act a certain way in the church, and he doesn't just say because it's in the church, he relates it back to their natures. Again, we don't have time to kind of exposit the whole chapter, but he's addressing this problem of women not covering their head in church and why that's inappropriate. So there's a lot of cultural things going on here, but he is pointing to that there's natural things for men to do and natural things for women to do and it's related to their natures. God creates man and then he creates woman, and that order is important because it reveals a little bit about our functions and how we relate to one another. Yes, I know it's vague. Again, I don't want to get bogged down into the weeds of that chapter because there's like umpteen million different debates just on that chapter alone.

Speaker 2: 46:08

I was about to say, like what do I?

Speaker 3: 46:10

oh my gosh, I'm not ready to change my ways now yeah, no, no, no, I don't think it's saying that women need to cover their head in church. I don't think that's that's an appropriate that's. I think that was a cultural thing that was going on. But the principles that derive from that are that, uh, essentially one, well, one principle that I think is from that chapter that's appropriate is that, uh, well, for instance, with women, they should not um present themselves in a way that's uh, that would accentuate their sexuality. I think that's one of the principles that comes from that passage. Again, uh, again, I don't want to get into it because it's like we'd have to get into, like looking at each verse, but I think that's one of the principles that would come from that.

Speaker 3: 46:51

Another one would be like Paul says, even nature teaches that it's a shame for a man to have long hair. Now, he doesn't say that men having long hair is a sin, but he's pointing to there's something in nature that says men should not look like women. It was an honorable thing for women to grow their hair out and there was sexual connotations with that. So for a man to do that to grow his hair out and basically look like a woman, he's like. Nature teaches you not to do that Interesting. Okay, now I will defer to my New Testament scholars. If you ever want to just dive a deep dive in 1 Corinthians 11, just buckle up. There's a lot there.

Speaker 3: 47:33

But the first century, when I said that Christians, in the first century, it would have been obvious to them that of course you can't change, you ought not to mutilate yourself, you ought not to change, you ought not to mutilate yourself what we might call.

Speaker 3: 47:52

It's a bit of an anachronism to say sex transition, because someone who is in a cult like this, devoting themselves, they're not really transitioning to the other gender, but they are embodying the other gender, let's say so. There's a couple of prominent cults, greco-roman cults in the first century that we know a whole lot more about than we do the cult of Ishtar, which we know a lot about, the cult of Ishtar. These cults were the cult of Demeter and then the cult of and if you look at it in English it looks like Sybil, but in Greek it's Kubile, which I think is a lot cooler of a name. It's spelled C-Y-B-E-L-E. I'll just say Sybil, because even though I like saying kubole, it sounds kind of pretentious to always keep saying it, you know when you say cults, I guess I'm imagining like the modern day cults we watch documentaries on.

Speaker 2: 48:32

Is there much difference there, or were they just religions that had sacrifices?

Speaker 3: 48:37

they weren't cults like we would think of today. Oh, these were uh mystery cults. I'll often tell well uh some of them are mystery cults each, each god in the pan god or goddess in the roman pantheon had their it was called their own cult it wasn't like.

Speaker 2: 48:56

This is like we would. It wasn't mythology type.

Speaker 3: 48:58

Yeah, it wasn't like we would think of the day of like, oh, like that group over there. They got their own prophet, their cult. This was more like a normal word to use, like oh, it's the cult of sybil. It use Like oh, it's the cult of Sibyl, it's the cult of Demeter, it's the cult of Apollo. Like it's their group and the devotees and how they worship that god or god. There was the cult of the emperor.

Speaker 2: 49:17

Got it but you wouldn't call, like the Hebrews, like the cult of Jesus.

Speaker 3: 49:20

No, no, they didn't really. Yeah, the Jews would say that they weren't true Jews, they were called the Christians. They're not true Jews and they would actually use the Roman Empire. They would tell the Romans like you can't trust these Christians, you need to kill them.

Speaker 2: 49:35

That's what the first century Jews would often do. So it's very separate just the way that those organizations functioned Like. One functions like a cult, the other functions like a group, what would you call the Hebrews?

Speaker 3: 49:44

Yeah, well, the Jews. The Romans made a lot of accommodations to the Jews when they took over Palestine. The Jews were like we're monotheists, we're not worshiping any of your gods, and again I'm a little fuzzy on why this happened. But the Romans basically made a lot of accommodations for the Jews. They were allowed to keep their temple worship, monotheism to Yahweh, and all that.

Speaker 3: 50:09

When Christianity comes on the scene and says Jesus is the one true Lord, he's the one true God, this starts worrying the Jews. This is partly why Jesus is crucified is because the Jews cook up. They go to Pilate and they're like look, these Christians are saying that only Jesus is God and they're not part of us. And if you don't take care of this guy, then we're going to say that you're not a friend of Caesar. And that was a really bad thing for Pilate because he didn't want to get, you know, chopped up by Caesar. Yeah, so the Jews separated themselves from the Christians and they said that the Christians were some wackos out there. So the Christians oftentimes were probably seen more as like an offshoot mystery cult. So the mystery cults were a little bit different. We don't have time to get into those, but they were more secretive. It all revolved around secret knowledge that you had in this group that gave you certain access to the divine and all that stuff. But the christians were kind of slandered as like a really wacko group that engaged in cannibalism and incest and all kinds of other things. That's a slip, that's like you could. We see this in Brecker Roman literature how they talked about Christians in the first three centuries. Yeah, okay, anyway. So we're we're getting a little bit off base.

Speaker 3: 51:18

The cult. So when I say cult I don't mean like the H of certain religions within the Roman pantheon. So the cult of Demeter and the cult of Sybil, along with Attis Attis is another god that's kind of associated with Sybil these cults were known for what we might call like transgender-like behavior. Let me just read to you this so Sybil, or Kubele as she's called, she's brought in to the Roman pantheon and she's called the Great Mother, the Magna Martyr as they call her, and her devotees are known for gender-bending-type behavior because of her myth and the stories surrounding her. But the male devotees were called the galley g-a-l-l-i it's where it's a root of the word gaelic, like the goals and gaelic.

Speaker 3: 52:15

Yeah, so she was really big up there too, um, but they lived in communities together and they underwent self-castration. So they would go through this ritual, oftentimes public, so the first time they do this. Like the romans are like all happy that they've brought in this new god or goddess because she's given them victory in battle. And the devotees are like walking down the street and then just at sunset, they all castrate themselves. And the Romans are like whoa, oh, like this is fine. You know that meme. The meme with the dog on fire, like this is fine. Or the kid on the bus, like I'm in danger.

Speaker 1: 52:48

Like that kind of stuff.

Speaker 3: 52:54

But the galley would I think, in memes sometimes that's just what I do, you know.

Speaker 1: 52:58

So the galley would.

Speaker 3: 52:59

they would castrate themselves, and then they would dress as women and they would don even they would don heavy makeup at times.

Speaker 3: 53:07

And this was for worship purpose. Yeah, well, it was. Yeah, to show that they're devoting themselves. They're so devoted to Sybil that they would change their gender and present themselves as a woman. Got it? Yes, they would do that.

Speaker 3: 53:20

Now we know that the first century Jewish writers talk about this. Philo and Josephus are two of the most well-known Jewish writers at the time, and they both describe this behavior and they both talk about how it's inconsistent. Like Jews, do not do this. Like good Jews do not do this, because it violates those laws that we just talked about in Leviticus. So I'm not even talking about Christian authors. Even the Jewish authors are pointing to this behavior, describing it as confusing the created order, that they're disrupting and destroying the created order that God has set up, and that Jews themselves should not do this. Now, christians consider themselves an offshoot of the Jews. Many of them are Jewish, and so they would also be aware of this type of behavior. It would be all around them, and they would know that men and women ought not to confuse their gender roles in that way.

Speaker 2: 54:18

Just looking back from a 2024 perspective, it's historically known that this happens. This isn't just like a transgender movement of 2024 and the 21st century. This has been, you know, going on in the past and even in the past it was not seen as an alignment with god. So it's not like we suddenly have this resurgence of a different type of identity and now that people have are having their own valid personal experiences, we need to embrace it as if it was at the same level of just male and female. Even in ancient near Near East culture, when this was occurring, this was not seen as an alignment with God. So today, in 2024, we should not see it as an alignment with God.

Speaker 3: 54:57

Yeah, I would stop short of and I don't think you're saying this, but I would stop short of anyone who would say that what's going on in the 21st century is just like what was happening in the first century, even though I think there are a lot of parallels and a lot of similarities, and there is in some circles of the LGBT movement there is some, let's say, calling back to ancient paganism and these practices, that some of them are actually religious and or quasi religious in that sense, but not everyone that's involved in the movement today would be like that. But, to the point, christians would have known about the appall, certainly would have known about this. I mean, he was a jew, trained just like josephus and philo. He would have known about this. He would have known about the law and all these cults so when he's talking about gender roles and not to confuse them.

Speaker 3: 55:48

He may not have had these cults specifically in mind, but the Christians would have known about them. It would have been surrounded by them.

Speaker 2: 55:54

Okay, so, since we don't have the cults today and the cultic practices today and it is very different you know's the relationship between the action in the past for these cultic purposes and then what's happening today at like pride, festivals and transition, and you know, non-binary, what's the?

Speaker 3: 56:16

well, I think what we said before about idolatry, uh, that idolatry doesn't look the same, but there are are similar aspects to it. So no one is ushering out like a big statue of Sybil, let's say, or Ishtar, and saying, hey, this is who represents us now, but the idolatry of elevating let's elevating my sexual expression as the end-all, be-all in life, that would be a form of idolatry, instead of saying trying to reckon with how God has created men and women and their roles in society, trying to throw all of that off and redefine ourselves through moral relativism and naturalism, atheism, whatever all the other things that come along with it, or even, at times, paganism all of these things would be very similar.

Speaker 3: 57:10

Uh, forms of idolatry and that's it, so that's what I would. That's the link that I would.

Speaker 2: 57:14

I see I would make I see that, gosh, I'm really struggling with this, tim, just from a from a standpoint of like knowing all of this, knowing it's coming from a place of like lack of choosing god, or lack of better, how, how do I now love my friends who are transgender?

Speaker 1: 57:30

How do I love?

Speaker 2: 57:31

them through this? How do I make them not feel like I'm forcing something on them Because, again, it's their choice? I have no place to judge this Literally, don't have that power whatsoever. It's all on God. But, like my job here is to love them, how do I love them through this? It's something I can't relate to, I don't understand, but I, so clearly I'm like I just want you in good graces with God. So what would be the best advice here?

Speaker 3: 57:52

Yeah, yeah, you know. Again, I want to be clear. When I'm talking about idolatry and I'm sort of hard hitting on this stuff I'm talking about the movement like transgender ideology, because ideologies set themselves up as worldviews to explain and give meaning to our lives. But when we're talking about individuals who experience gender dysphoria or perhaps they've gone through gender reassignment surgery and then they wake up, you know, and they're like I made a mistake or, if not, maybe they're not there yet and they're experiencing gender dysphoria and they find their community among people who say you know what we want to affirm you in this and we want to help you transition, and they're getting all this advice and what might be akin to love bombing from a community like this. It can be very, very alluring to them. It can be very, very powerful alluring to them. It can be very, very powerful. So I think, as Christians, we need to understand that and not just stereotype everyone who is in that space and think that, oh, they're all radical political activists and they're all out to get me and all that stuff. Certainly, there's political fights going on. I'm not going to deny that. But when you're dealing with individuals, we need to be very diplomatic, careful, and I think our attitude needs to be seasoned with mercy and grace.

Speaker 3: 59:20

I think if you were to look at a person, you know Jesus. Often, when he's, jesus surrounds himself with social misfits and he doesn't actually. He doesn't act, he doesn't condone sin. Okay, when, when the woman caught in adultery, uh, is left by the pharisees and she's just there with jesus, he looks around and says who condemns you? And she's? I don't know no one. He says neither do I, but go and sin no more. So you know he's willing to associate with social outcasts, but also leading them to a place of holiness and repentance. And I think we need to do that too. We need to look at people with mercy. You know, when Jesus, oftentimes he looks at crowds or he encounters a demoniac, a demon possessed person, and he says he looks at him and he has compassion on that person because he's God, he understands that person, he understands how they got there, and I think when we're dealing with individuals, we need to look at them and maybe just consider how did this person get there? Not that we condone everything that they did, and not that we're saying that we need to now accept their lifestyle and call it good and all that stuff. But you're talking to an individual and you're going to drive them further away from the gospel if the first posture you take with them is hostility.

Speaker 3: 1:00:38

I was listening to an interview recently of the daughter of Anton LaVey. Her name is Zina. What is Zina LaVey? I don't know. I can't remember her name now after she got married, but she was the high priestess of the Church of Satan in California and she was being interviewed by Jordan Peterson. This is years later. This interview is fairly recent, and she's a Buddhist now. She's no longer a Satanist. She left the Satanist church, she became a Buddhist. And I was listening to the interview and I was like that's interesting. I wonder if she's going to say anything about why she became a Buddhist, or maybe why she didn't become a Christian and she dropped this hint. As she's talking, she remembers how, when she was the high priestess, she was meant to go out there and basically be public relations for the church of Satan and she remembers very vividly um, christian, protestant, evangelical giving her death threats, uh, trying to physically assault her and other things like that. And she, she makes this, she made this vow in her heart that I'm never going to be. That.

Speaker 2: 1:01:41

It's really sad yeah, as a sadist that's. Yeah, yeah, so.

Speaker 3: 1:01:44

Yeah, yeah. So I would say, you know, with the transgender community, if some of them are considering maybe they're not necessarily considering Christ just yet, but maybe the scales are starting to fall from their eyes and they're like you know what, Maybe this isn't what it was promised to be the transgender ideology and the life of transitioning. I'm starting to have regret. Are you the kind of person, as a Christian, who could actually sit down with them and persuade them to come to Christ? I think that's a good reflective question.

Speaker 2: 1:02:16

No, definitely not. I do not think. I, absolutely not, but I think the best I could. I don't want to say accepting, but like hold space for them, love them. Yeah, not make them feel like they're less than me, because who am I to judge? You know like I'm sure that I do things that they don't agree with. I'm a human.

Speaker 3: 1:02:35

Well, I think you know, I think there's an advice that I would give to people is that think about ways that you can give hope to someone no-transcript who have gone through surgeries and permanently altered themselves. Those things are irreversible and for someone like that, if they come out of that movement, they're going to have this realization that I can't really go back to the way it was beforehand. I can't have my body is forever changed and that can have. My body is forever changed and that can have real effects on someone.

Speaker 3: 1:03:30

Absolutely yeah, yeah. And so I think for the Christian, we need to be able to give hope to that person, one that life isn't the end, all be all of life is not our sexual expression, so like if I think of this in terms of like a single person or a widow or someone who's been just permanently marred in some way and they're not able to have sex or be in a loving relationship and have that fulfillment, that's not the end, all be all of life, and God can give us meaning and purpose and happiness in other ways. So that'd be one step in that direction.

Speaker 2: 1:04:08

What if they have transitioned and they don't recall? Do you think it's the same thing? Give them hope that Jesus still loves them.

Speaker 3: 1:04:16

Well, I think if someone really comes to Christ, or at least they really come to terms with what God is saying about gender men and women I think the light bulbs are going to come on in their head.

Speaker 2: 1:04:29

So again, like this is a conversation for those earnestly seeking. This isn't a conversation to say we're right and everyone else is wrong because we believe in God. This is really a closed circle of. If you're trying to seek God and know him truly, these are principles that will fundamentally change you.

Speaker 3: 1:04:45

Yeah, I think, if you're talking about those who and there are people who go through the transition, they don't regret it, they have the inner feeling of happiness and they're surrounded by their community, that's certainly possible. I wouldn't say that's evidence of truth, but that's what we have to do apologetic and we have to provide reasons Maybe not that would convince them, but convince people that are listening to both of us. And we need to provide persuasive arguments for why the Christian worldview about gender is actually the one that makes the most sense and has the most explanatory power about human nature. But those who are earnestly seeking, you know, I would say this you know there's a lot of a lot of us theologians and ethicists are doing a lot of thinking about what the Bible says about eunuchs and how God loves eunuchs and how you know, in the Old Testament, eunuchs were not allowed to go inside the temple because they were physically marred in that way. But in the New Testament, god uses a eunuch who knows he can't go to the temple. This is the Ethiopian eunuch in Acts. When Philip encounters him, this eunuch, he's called a God-fearer. He's not a Jew, but he knows about the God of Israel and he's a worshiper of the God of Israel. But he knows I'm a eunuch, I know the law, I can't go into the temple ever. But when he meets Philip and he gets baptized, he's sent down to Ethiopia and he is the one that carries the gospel to Africa. So God entrusts the spreading of the gospel to Africa to a eunuch.

Speaker 3: 1:06:19

As I said in the other episode with you on homosexuality, there's good evidence that Daniel was likely a eunuch in Babylon his whole life and he served in the rural courts. And there's a really great verse when Daniel, there's an angel that comes to Daniel and delivers him a message. This is in Daniel 10. But when he shows up and Daniel gets scared you know like you think of all people, like Daniel would not get scared of these things. But even Daniel gets scared. But the angel says to him Daniel, you are greatly loved by God. This is a guy who doesn't have a family, he's never married, doesn't have kids that we know of, he lives away from his homeland the whole time he's in exile. And God says to him you are greatly loved. Jesus says some have been made eunuchs for the kingdom and others have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom, and those who are able to receive it will receive.

Speaker 2: 1:07:15

Yeah, I think you make a really good point, tim, on. Just the sexual identity isn't the end all be all, because, yes, I mean you could say that he was greatly loved because he was a eunuch, but he was also a fundamental person in the movement and representation of Jesus in a society that did not worship God. You know he was an advisory source to people on a council that he set himself apart that did not adhere to. You know the Babylonian, you know just their overall rules, the sorcerers and the magicians. You know he played a different role in that that represented Jesus in Christ. So I'm sure he was loved greatly by God for a lot of reasons, not just because he was unique, but he did not let that overall define him or separate him from people and still worshiping God and had a wife.

Speaker 3: 1:08:01

Yeah, you know, early on in the first part of Daniel, the famous verse in Daniel, chapter one, when he says Daniel committed that he would not defile himself with the king's meat. And that sets up the whole book of the character of Daniel and who he was.

Speaker 3: 1:08:17

So yeah, for him as a good Jew, it was like the end, all be all was to be a good Jew, and that meant get married and have kids and all the other things that you do as a good Jew. But he's not able to do any of those things, being in Babylon, living in exile.

Speaker 2: 1:08:31

Interesting. I feel like I'm going to ask a question. You won't have a very simple answer that I'm looking for, but it's more so. Advice for those that are within Christ, are within the word, trying to raise a family that is in alignment with the word of God, but they have a child that's transgender, or they have a friend or they have a brother, is. I don't assume that there's a simple solution here, but how do we encourage?

Speaker 3: 1:08:55

and give hope. Well, I would say this first, remember the experience of gender dysphoria. If that person is really experiencing that, that the experience itself I would not say is a sin, because it's something that actually there could be physiological things that are driving that and we need to be sensitive to that. But maybe it's a teenager who's being very influenced by their friend group or school or something like that. I would say, first of all, talk to your like, quickly, talk to your pastor, talk to a counselor or a Christian counselor that you know. If not, there's the American Association of Christian Counselors, aacc. They have a website you can go and get connected to a Christian counselor in that way. I'd say that's probably the immediate thing that I would do is connect with someone like that in your immediate space.

Speaker 2: 1:09:47

But if I'm not a Christian counselor and I want to support that person, I don't want to necessarily make them feel ashamed. I don't want to make them feel isolated. So I want to make them feel loved and known by God. Without condoning that I agree with what they're going through. Is it as simple as that? It's just like loving with them and praying with them and encouraging their walk with them.

Speaker 3: 1:10:07

Well, when I mean like find a Christian counselor, what I don't mean is like just throw that person into counseling. What I mean is like just go talk to someone who can give you advice on how to conduct yourself and how to reach your loved one. You know, if your loved one is experiencing gender dysphoria, or oh, you're saying me.

Speaker 2: 1:10:29

I go find a counselor, Sending my child to that counselor.

Speaker 3: 1:10:33

No, go get advice from a counselor. Go get advice from a pastor who can, because there's so many variables with situations like this. But your pastor or counselor will be able to give you sound advice on what to do next and you can kind of lay out here's what's going on and they can advise you.

Speaker 2: 1:10:52

Cool, I thought you were talking about. My hypothetical child goes to counseling, not me, but that's good.

Speaker 3: 1:10:58

I do think eventually that would take place. But first, if you are not sure what to do with your child or a loved one, go get godly advice.

Speaker 2: 1:11:06

Wow, that's awesome. That's refreshing.

Speaker 3: 1:11:09

I wasn't expecting that Proverbs says, in a multitude of counselors there is a oh, nice answer, Nice and short.

Speaker 2: 1:11:14

Yeah, yeah, all right, let's see those books that you've got for us today.

Speaker 3: 1:11:18

Yeah, you see me looking at the books. So we'll wrap it up. There's probably people that are listening to this saying, hey, you didn't get into the science, you didn't get into all the different arguments against it and all this stuff, because, again, we were just talking about the Bible and the culture of the New Testament, old Testament. So let me give you some books that you can do a deep dive into the subject if you want. And then a trick of the trade with scholarship when you're reading one book and you see a lot of sources, go and buy those sources at the back of the book too.

Speaker 3: 1:11:48

So, yeah, lots of reading. So the first one I mentioned was Affirming God's Image by Alan Branch. It's called Addressing the Transgender Question with Science and Scripture. It's a really good synopsis of the whole debate and it's not that big. You can see it right there. So that's the first. Second one, another Christian book. This guy was my third, my outside reader of my dissertation. His name is Andrew Walker. This is called God and the Transgender Debate. What does the Bible actually say about gender identity? Wow, so another like short book and it's not very meaty, you know. I mean it's a good, sound book but it's not like heavy hitting, Like you got to know Greek and Hebrew and things like that to understand this book. The next book and I think this is an amazing book, this is written by this one's called when Harry Became Sally Responding to the Transgender Moment. This is by Ryan T Anderson. He is a Catholic philosopher at the Heritage Foundation and this book.

Speaker 3: 1:12:43

This is the hard hitting book on the movement and he provides a really really good non-biblical argument. So this is a public, almost like public policy type book. It's a really really good book and, to make it more intriguing, it got banned from Amazon, so you can't get it on Amazon. You got to get it from somewhere else.

Speaker 2: 1:13:04

Why did it get?

Speaker 3: 1:13:05

banned Because the LGBTQ movement accused him of misinformation and hate speech and bigoted and all this other stuff. It got banned in 2019, I think he was on a lot of different conservative talk show hosts talking about it. I've sat in classes not with this guy. He was lecturing my class. This is a sound book. It's sound research and sound argumentation. So it's really unfortunate that Amazon gave into the mob.

Speaker 2: 1:13:37

Interesting Because the other books are.

Speaker 3: 1:13:39

No, they're on Amazon. This is the prohibited book, so you got to get it.

Speaker 2: 1:13:45

Interesting, do you? Think it was maybe private, because it wasn't saying like we're a christian book, it was just saying like this is just you know, I that was a, I think that it was.

Speaker 3: 1:13:55

The debate was so ramped up at that time and amazon has now kind of backed away from like banning a lot of books I think it's a thing to do. I think if that book came out now it probably wouldn't catch that much attention, but it was the book that was just taking a sledgehammer into the ideology.

Speaker 2: 1:14:15

So go to good old bookstores, or is there, like another website that you can?

Speaker 3: 1:14:18

get on Barnes and Noble, actually, or you could probably get it from his website or find a way to order it, yeah, and then the last book. I referenced this in the previous episode. This is the bible and homosexual practice by robert gagdon. Uh, this is the foremost like scholarly book on the subject. He does address transgenderism directly in this book, but it's a related topic when you're talking about, uh, new testament and old testament backgrounds. So any of those books are going to be good, cool, yeah, I'll put them all in the show notes if people want to buy them.

Speaker 2: 1:14:48

I'll try to find all of New Testament and Old Testament backgrounds. So any of those books are going to be good. Cool, yeah, I'll put them all in the show notes.

Speaker 3: 1:14:52

if people want to buy them, I'll try to find all of the links, all right? Well, I hope I answered all of your questions sufficiently.

Speaker 2: 1:14:57

No, we have so much more to talk about. We have so much more to talk about, but I do think that you have painted a very historical picture on it and I think we point to a lot of verses as far as how it's referenced, but I don't think that this topic can be, you know, discussed and wrapped up nicely in just one hour, I mean.

Speaker 3: 1:15:16

I hope not. No, we can't.

Speaker 2: 1:15:17

These are people's lives and identities and this is also God, and you know, god is an evident pit that we can continually fall into, and understanding him and how it applies to our lives and how we can live just won't ever be simple. But I think you've done a really nice job, at least laying some biblical groundwork, and doing so with gentleness and respect. So I really hope that anybody that is tuning in understands that the purpose of this is to understand the biblical perspective, which you don't agree of, and this is a learning process of getting to know God and ourselves and how we can align ourselves and set ourselves apart. It's just, it's never going to be simple, which is why probably a lot of people don't talk about it, but I think that you've done a pretty good job, I think, scratching the surface. I think there's more to be said.

Speaker 3: 1:15:58

Well, thank you very much. It's a pleasure to always discuss these topics. Who knows, maybe we'll talk about another controversial topic down the road.

Speaker 2: 1:16:05

Or a non-controversial. We could do something simple.

Speaker 3: 1:16:08

We could actually we could do something really simple.

Speaker 2: 1:16:12

Let's find a nice easy topic about God and love and just stick with that. But no. And you know, putting yourself on the line Because you know I hope it doesn't happen. And it hasn't happened with homosexuality, which I'm so glad I think I was anticipating the hate, which I'm so glad I think I was anticipating the hate. People have been receiving it and maybe keeping their comments to themselves.

Speaker 2: 1:16:30

Thanks for putting yourself on the line, that's encouraging it is and you know it's for you to be bold and courageous as far as like talking about something that could have potentially opened yourself up to a lot of hate. So, thank you, my pleasure. Okay. Well, we'll find a nice topic soon, but other than that,