While theologians Dr. Denny Burk, Dr. Robert A. J. Gagnon, Dr. John Piper, and Pastor Douglas Wilson say Christians should not use incorrect pronouns when referring to people who pretend to be the sex they aren’t, increasing numbers of purportedly theologically orthodox Christians believe Christians should use them. They believe that refusing to use “preferred pronouns” will result in “trans”-identifying persons severing relationships. And to “woke” theologians and pastors, maintaining relationships supersedes truth.

Christian capitulation to sin will always be accompanied by theological rationalizations that will sound superficially reasonable. In a recent episode of his “Ask Me Anything” podcast, JD Greear, president of the Southern Baptist Convention, proffered such rationalizations as he revealed that he uses incorrect pronouns when referring to “trans”-identifying persons. He argued that his complicity with the false and destructive “trans” ideology constitutes “generosity of spirit,” which he contrasts with “truth-telling.” Greear also claimed that Preston Sprinkle, president of the Center for Faith, Sexuality & Gender, does likewise.

Before going further, I want to note that several of the quotes cited by Greear and to which I will be responding appear to be wrongly attributed by Greear to Sprinkle. These incorrectly attributed quotes come instead from a paper by Gregory Coles who identifies as a “celibate, gay Christian” and is part of the celibate, “gay” Christian movement criticized by many, including Denny Burk who wrote this about Coles’ memoir:

Coles seems to equate differences about homosexual immorality with differences that Christians have about second order doctrines. But how can homosexual immorality be treated in this way when the Bible says that those who commit such deeds do not inherit the kingdom of God.

Coles doesn’t merely say Christians may use incorrect pronouns. In his paper titled, “What Pronouns Should Christians Use for Transgender People,” which is littered with PC language created by the “LGBTQ” community to advance its ideology, Coles argues Christians should use incorrect pronouns:

… [T]he most biblical response to transgender people’s pronouns is a posture of unequivocal pronoun hospitality. That is, I believe that all Christians can and should use pronouns that reflect the expressed gender identities of transgender people, regardless of our views about gender identity ethics. If a person identifies herself to you as “she,” I hope you will consider it an act of Christ-like love to call her “she” out of respect, whether or not you believe that the way she expresses her gender identity is honoring to God.

Astonishingly, Coles grounds his defense of appeasement “Christ-like pronoun hospitality” in this passage from Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians:

Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law. To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some. I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.

Coles applies this passage to the current pronoun mandates, appealing also to “respect” to justify appeasement:

When we apply Paul’s linguistic approach to the pronouns we use about transgender people, I believe we arrive at a posture of pronoun hospitality: a willingness to accommodate the pronouns of our transgender neighbors regardless of our own views about the Christian ethics of gender identity. That is, when we order our language toward making sure that the truth of the gospel can be heard in an understandable way by those around us, we are compelled to use pronouns in a way that effectively communicates our respect for transgender people, even if we still believe that followers of Jesus are called to express their gender identity in accordance with their appointed sex.

If, instead of referring to “our own views about the Christian ethics of gender identity,” Coles had referred to “the truth of Christian ethics regarding gender identity,” the problem with his worldview would become clearer. Imagine a Christian saying, “We should be willing to use the pronouns of our transgender neighbors regardless of the truth of Christian ethics regarding gender identity.”

Does the anger of “trans”-cultists toward Christians who refuse to mis-sex people signify lack of understanding or does it signal rebellion? Is it an act of respect to concede to demands to call someone something that is an integral part of an ideology that denies reality, affirms sin as good, and grievously harms both individuals and society?  Can true respect—like true biblical love—ever entail denial or even the appearance of denial of another person’s embodiment as male or female?

Coles’ interpretation of the passage in Corinthians is at odds with that of theologian Thomas Schreiner:

Cultural flexibility, however, is not infinitely elastic. For instance, Paul does not compromise on moral norms or on fundamental truths of the gospel.

Theologian Paul E. Garland shares a similar understanding:

[Paul] does not think that fundamental and distinctive Christian demands are negotiable depending on the circumstances. He did not eat idol food in order to become “as one  without the law to those without the law.” He did not tone down his assault on idolatry to avoid offending idolaters or curry favor with them. His accommodation has nothing to do with watering down the gospel message, soft-pedaling its ethical demands.

Evidently, Coles doesn’t view Genesis 1:27 (“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”) or Deuteronomy 22:5 (“A woman shall not wear a man’s garment, nor shall a man put on a woman’s cloak, for whoever does these things is an abomination to the Lord your God.) as fundamental, distinctive, and non-negotiable.

It should trouble Coles, Greear, and Sprinkle that they are participants in what New Testament scholar N.T. Wright describes as a new and damaging incarnation of the heresy of Gnosticism:

The confusion about gender identity is a modern, and now internet-fueled, form of the ancient philosophy of Gnosticism. The Gnostic, one who “knows”, has discovered the secret of “who I really am”, behind the deceptive outward appearance. … This involves denying the goodness, or even the ultimate reality, of the natural world. Nature, however, tends to strike back, with the likely victims in this case being vulnerable and impressionable youngsters who, as confused adults, will pay the price for their elders’ fashionable fantasies.

To bolster his position, Coles points to Christianity Today (CT), which has now regrettably adopted secular journalistic practices, using incorrect pronouns for cross-sex passers.

A 2015 article by Dr. Mark Yarhouse in CT provides evidence that both CT and Yarhouse have capitulated to the wicked and deceitful “trans” ideology. Yarhouse writes,

I still recall one of my first meetings with Sara. Sara is a Christian who was born male and named Sawyer by her [sic] parents. As an adult, Sawyer transitioned to female.

Sara would say transitioning—adopting a cross-gender identity—took 25 years. It began with facing the conflict she [sic] experienced between her [sic] biology and anatomy as male, and her [sic] inward experience as female.

With absolute certainty, Sprinkle offers this dire warning about refusal to participate in the “trans” lie:

“If you want to immediately cut off a relationship with somebody, which is ending all opportunity to embody and share Jesus with the person, then don’t use the pronouns they want you to use. It is an immediate relational killer.”

He is saying that if unbelievers lost in spiritual darkness will become so angry at the refusal of Christians to participate in their reality-denying, body- and soul-destroying fiction that they sever relationships, Christians should capitulate. This position will result in an enfeebled relinquishment of culture-making to sinners lost in darkness.

The homosexual and “trans” communities use language as a tool to transform culture. They redefine words, emptying them of their former meanings, and invent new words that embody subversive and false assumptions. They become enraged at anyone who refuses to yield to their language diktats, and then some faith leaders say, “If we refuse to use their language, we kill relationships thereby killing our ability to witness.” What a diminished view of God’s sovereignty such a position reveals.

Moreover, enraged responses to encounters with truth sometimes signify the pricking of a conscience. Sometimes a respectful demurral from participating in serious sin is a seed planted. The ethics of speech are not determined by the subjective response of hearers of that speech. The ethics are determined by the content (i.e., is it true) and the delivery (i.e., is it civil).

Coles repeatedly appeals to the feelings of “trans”-identifying persons as determinative of the terms Christians should use. If, Coles argues, “trans”-identifying persons feel—or claim to feel—“shamed, invisible, sidelined, defiled, invalidated, microaggressed, disappeared, or leprous,” Christians should use whatever pronouns these people prefer, or we destroy our witness.

Is there any evidence that Jesus engaged in such “relational/missional” evangelism or fretted about how sinners would feel if he refused to affirm the sin they engaged in or placed at the center of their identities? When he encountered the rich, young ruler; the woman caught in adultery; or Zacchaeus, the tax collector, how long did Jesus dally in relationships before he told them to repent of their sins?

If refusing to concede through our language that a biological man is a woman makes such a man feel “defiled” or “microaggressed,” imagine if he had been part of the multitude that John the Baptist called a brood of vipers.

Dr. Gagnon, author of The Bible and Homosexual Practice: Text and Hermeneutics, makes clear what Greear’s, Coles’, and Sprinkle’s purported hospitality and respect signify:

It is not an act of “hospitality” or “respect” to the offender to use fake pronouns and proper names but rather (1) a scandal to the “weak” and young in the church and a rightful violation of conscience for many that will lead many to stumble to their ruin; (2) an accommodation to sin that God finds utterly abhorrent, to say nothing of the fact that it is an egregious lie; and (3) a complicity in the offender’s self-dishonoring, self-degrading, and self-demeaning behavior that does him or her (and the grieving ex-spouse and children, if there are any) no favor because it can get the person in question excluded from the kingdom of God.

What’s next? Treating as a married couple an incestuous union involving a man and his mother, allegedly as a show of hospitality and respect? Is that what Paul would have done at Corinth? Addressing the man and his stepmother as “husband” and “wife” so as to extend “hospitality” and “respect”? What kind of revisionist lunacy is this? Paul would not have taken this approach even for those who don’t profess to be believers.

Attorney, journalist, senior editor at the recently launched political website The Dispatch, and Christian, David French exposes the error in manipulative tactics used to shame Christians into rhetorical concessions to the destructive “trans” ideology:

When I use a male pronoun to describe Chelsea Manning, I’m not trolling. I’m not being a jerk. I’m not trying to make anyone angry. I’m simply telling the truth. I’m reflecting biological reality, and I’m referring to the created order as outlined in Genesis 1 — “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”

Nor is this a matter of “manners.” I’ve encountered many well-meaning people who’ve told me that I should acquiesce to new pronouns because it’s the polite thing to do. I want to avoid hurting feelings, don’t I? I want to treat someone the way I’d like to be treated, right? What’s the harm in a little white lie?

But when your definition of manners requires that I verbally consent to a fundamentally false and important premise, then I dissent. You cannot use my manners to win your culture war. I will speak respectfully, I will never use a pronoun with the intent of causing harm, and if I encounter a person in obvious emotional distress I will choose my words very carefully. But I will not say what I do not believe.

Coles asserts there are two assumptions “about the nature of language” on which Christians who reject “trans” language diktats rely:

Assumption #1: Pronoun gender always and only refers to an individual’s appointed sex.

Assumption #2: When our definitions of words differ from other people’s definitions, “telling the truth” means using our own definitions.

Assumption #2 implicitly rejects the Christian view that objective truth exists. Christians have no obligation to treat assumption #2 as if it’s true. It’s passing strange that a Christian would treat his own definitions of words like “he,” “she,” and “they” as just other assumptions. Coles seems to hold the view that Peter Kreeft disdains when he says the phrase “your truth” is both oxymoronic and moronic.

Burk reveals the sullied underbelly of Coles’ expectation that Christians treat their biblically informed definitions—not as true—but as merely one set of assumptions in the diverse universe of competing assumptions:

So much of the evangelical conversation on these issues has been colonized by secular identity theories. Those theories are premised on an unbiblical anthropology which defines human identity as “what I feel myself to be” rather than “what God designed me to be.” If there is to be a recovery and renewal of Christian conscience on sexuality issues, secular identity theories must give way to God’s design as revealed in nature and scripture.

Coles justifies the redefinition of pronouns by the “trans” cult by arguing—accurately—that language changes, but the reality of linguistic shifts doesn’t mean that Christians should acquiesce to politically driven changes that embody lies and which are increasingly imposed by force.

Greear also quoted conservative theologian Andrew T. Walker’s book God and the Transgender Debate in which Walker says,

“My own position is that if a transgender person comes to your church, it is fine to refer to them by their preferred pronoun.”

Greear failed to include what Walker said in an article published four months after publication of his book:

“Though it is politically incorrect to do so, I will not refer to someone with their desired pronoun in a public venue such as a talk. Those with writing or speaking platforms have an obligation to speak and write truthfully and not kowtow to political correctness or excuse falsehood.”

The abandonment of theological orthodoxy always happens incrementally, as it’s happening today. C. S. Lewis warned of this in The Screwtape Letters in which the senior demon Screwtape writes this to his nephew Wormwood, a Junior Tempter:

My dear Wormwood,

Obviously, you are making excellent progress. My only fear is lest in attempting to hurry the patient you awaken him to a sense of his real position. For you and I, who see that position as it really is, must never forget how totally different it ought to appear to him. We know that we have introduced a change of direction in his course which is already carrying him out of his orbit around the Enemy; but he must be made to imagine that all the choices which have effected this change of course are trivial and revocable. He must not be allowed to suspect that he is now, however slowly, heading right away from the sun on a line which will carry him into the cold and dark of utmost space.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Pronouns_2.mp3

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The more you look into the “gay but celibate” movement advancing rapidly into once theologically orthodox Christian churches, the more disheartened you become by church leaders who have been slow to counter it, or worse, are embracing it.

The conservative Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), a small but influential denomination that separated from liberal mainline Presbyterianism in the early 1970s, is at a tipping point because of Revoice, a ministry that claims to be “observing the historic Christian doctrine of marriage and sexuality” but whose inaugural conference last summer included workshop titles like “Redeeming Queer Culture: An Adventure.” An ecumenical effort that’s primarily Protestant but open to Catholics, Revoice was not organized by the PCA, but Revoice leaders and supporters include pastors and others in the PCA.

While disavowing homoerotic acts, Revoice leaders sound like secular LGBT activists in portraying “gay Christians” as oppressed minorities who deserve the right to define themselves on their own terms, no matter how bizarre or disruptive to the larger Christian community. In defiance of logic, they celebrate “gay” identity and aspects of “gay” culture while promising never to engage in homoerotic sex.

Revoice conference speaker Eve Tushnet, a Catholic, has written approvingly of celibate “gay Christians” joining the festivities at homosexual pride parades. Her Twitter bio says her “hobbies include sin, confession, and ecstasy.” Even Episcopalians might find it tacky to name sin as a hobby, but apparently, it’s to be cheered as harmless fun by evangelicals if they want to appear sensitive to those struggling with homosexual attraction.

While Revoice primarily promotes “gay but celibate,” some involved in Revoice are in what they call “mixed-orientation marriages.” They are married to someone of the opposite sex, but continue to publicly identify as gay and talk openly about their persistent homosexual desires. In the world of Revoice, this is vulnerability worthy of praise. For others, it is a sickening disregard for marital vows and the respect owed one’s spouse.

Revoice held its second annual conference in early June. So far, the PCA has not disciplined PCA leaders and promoters of Revoice for their role in perversely trying to blend traditional Christian teachings with a worldly LGBT mindset. At its annual general assembly June 25-28 in Dallas, the PCA approved the Nashville Statement as a document of biblical fidelity to share as a discipleship tool. But the statement, released by an evangelical coalition in 2017 to bolster orthodoxy on sexual matters, will likely not be binding within PCA church courts. The PCA at its general assembly also approved a study committee to examine its own confessions as they pertain to sexuality. The Chicago Metro Presbytery was among those asking for a study committee.

If the words “study committee” sound familiar, that’s because the mainline denominations set up study committees when they were hit with debilitating brain fogs about their long-held beliefs related to sex, marriage, and family. They went on to approve homosexual “marriage” and help the culture usher in transgender pronouns and drag queens as children’s entertainment. It’s also noteworthy that on their way to giving full approval to homosexuality and homosexual “marriage,” mainline denominations endorsed “gay but celibate,” including among clergy.

The storm in the PCA has become especially fierce because one of its pastors has come out as a celibate “gay Christian.” Greg Johnson hosted the first Revoice conference at his St. Louis church last year but didn’t publicly wear the “gay” label himself until May when he wrote a revealing piece for Christianity Today. At the denomination’s recent general assembly, Johnson took to the floor to deliver a speech, both self-pitying and self-glorifying, in which he denounced Article 7 of the Nashville Statement, which says, “We deny that adopting a homosexual or transgender self-conception is consistent with God’s holy purposes in creation and redemption.” Johnson, who likened people with homosexual desires to paraplegics and infertile women, said Article 7 “hurts” him. While Johnson has at times described homosexual desires as sinful, these comparisons in his speech underscore a profound lack of consistency and clarity in doing so.

Johnson’s speech was applauded by many at the general assembly and praised by others on social media. Even Denny Burk, a Southern Baptist academic critical of Revoice who overall has written commendably on sexuality from an orthodox perspective, wrote that Johnson “spoke powerfully of his own experience, and I was genuinely moved by what he said.” One thing that has slowed the gears in addressing the “gay but celibate” movement is the insistence of leaders in the evangelical world to give credit where it’s not due. Johnson’s speech was disturbing. It’s genuinely moving when someone fighting unwanted homosexual attraction, or any sinful desire, humbly seeks help at his church to walk closer with God. It’s deeply troubling when a pastor pleads at his church body’s annual meeting for recognition of a sinful identity as part of a divisive movement that threatens a denominational split.

To his credit, Burk identifies where Johnson goes wrong in his interpretation of Article 7:

Adopt means to embrace or endorse. The point of the article is simply to say that it is out of bounds to embrace an understanding of oneself or one’s sin that is at odds with God’s design in creation and redemption. This is not a controversial point, or at least it shouldn’t be among Christians.

Johnson’s own presbytery in Missouri investigated Revoice and released a report shortly before the PCA general assembly with words of caution for the “gay but celibate” ministry. But the report had sharper words for critics for supposedly making snap judgments about Revoice leaders and failing to appreciate the “nuance and complexity” of the issues they raise. The Missouri Presbytery, like the Chicago Metro Presbytery, asked for a denominational study committee. As onlookers wait to see if the PCA will take meaningful action to stamp out the contributions of its leaders to the “gay but celibate” movement, activists with Revoice and similar efforts will undoubtedly march on, pushing into more conservative churches of various affiliations to further desensitize believers to “queer” culture with a Christian spin.

Revoice conference speaker Pieter Valk, an Anglican, is the founder of EQUIP, a Nashville advocacy group whose mission is to “equip the church to better love sexual minorities.” EQUIP wants to remove any shame associated with homosexual lusts and is adamant that homosexual orientation is fixed, holding out no hope for Christians who want to be rid of homosexual desires. On the “Beliefs” page of its website, EQUIP says that “while we affirm and teach from a traditional sexual ethic, we respect all people’s right to follow their own paths.” Not exactly a robust statement of Christian orthodoxy. But it’s in keeping with what others in the “gay but celibate” movement sometimes say. They insist they are against homoerotic sex. But unlike Christians who believe such acts are categorically wrong, they make it sound like this belief is something to be subjectively determined based on the intensity of one’s religious sentiments.

EQUIP has little to say about sin and repentance, except in its shaming of the church for alleged past mistreatment of homosexuals. Its website even suggests a prayer for the church to pray in which the church repents of “destructive theology”:

Most merciful God, we, Christians, confess that we have sinned against you and LGBT+ people in our homophobia, with our destructive theology, and by treating LGBT+ people as problems – by the ways we have actively mistreated LGBT+ people, and by doing nothing to make the Church better for LGBT+ people as ourselves. We have not loved you with our whole heart; we have not loved LGBT+ people as ourselves. We are truly sorry and we humbly repent that our sin has led many LGBT+ people to lose their faith or commit suicide. For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ, have mercy on us and forgive us; that LGBT+ people may delight in your will, and walk in your ways, to the glory of your name. Amen

Even more troubling is the participation of Revoice speakers in LOVEboldly, a Kentucky-based group that reaches out to church staff, including youth pastors, on behalf of both celibate gays and those who see nothing wrong with homoerotic acts. The group promotes “reconciliation and healing” between homosexuals and Christians with traditional beliefs.  The LOVEboldly website explains, “We are deeply persuaded that agreement with one another’s political and theological perspectives on sexuality is not essential for moving towards loving one another boldly.” Imagine if Christian marriage counselors were to partner with an organization that believes adultery and open marriages are acceptable. The sympathy Christians feel for people in difficult marriages would not be seen as justification for linking arms with advocates of views so strikingly at odds with orthodox Christian beliefs.

That the “gay but celibate” movement has made so many inroads with such a morally compromised agenda reflects the degree to which far too many conservative Christians have been emotionally manipulated to see LGBT people as victims who must be treated with special sensitivity, even if that means giving celibate “gay Christians” exemptions to biblical teachings about personal holiness. Well-meaning Christian leaders have wanted to assume that activists have good intentions when they should have been more concerned about protecting their flocks from wolves.

Revoice leaders would have you believe that if it weren’t for them, there would be no one to help Christians with homosexual desires. But that’s far from the truth. Organizations and individuals sympathetic to the challenges posed by homosexual attraction have been around for years to help such Christians. But their message of leaving “gay” identity and culture behind is one many in Revoice want to silence. At the recent Revoice conference, a speaker mocked Rosaria Butterfield, a Christian writer and former lesbian now married to a man. (After getting pushback from some at the conference, the speaker later apologized.) Butterfield is controversial among many Revoice leaders and supporters because she doesn’t believe Christians should embrace a homosexual identity. As Butterfield puts it, “How can any of us fight a sin that we don’t hate?”

The insidious “gay but celibate” movement has started to drown out voices like Butterfield’s because activists have deftly exploited the fears of Christians who don’t want to be called haters. The message of Revoice and similar efforts is tailor-made for people-pleasers who want to be Christian and LGBT-friendly in a way that might lessen cultural pressure to go along with LGBT pride and delay or make unnecessary the taking of a costly stand in defense of orthodox convictions. But going along with the drift in the church on this critical issue is cowardly and unloving. True love rejoices in the truth and the time to stand for truth is now.

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No, the title of this article was not ripped from the virtual pages of the satirical website Babylon Bee.

A Time Magazine article on InterVarsity Christian Fellowship’s (IV) 20-page internal policy position paper on human sexuality is generating a huge brouhaha.

IV, an evangelical parachurch organization that includes 667 college chapters as well as InterVarsity Press which publishes books by D.A. Carson, William Lane Craig, Os Guinness, J.I. Packer, R.C. Sproul, and John Stott, distributed this position paper, which addresses sexual abuse, divorce, premarital sex/cohabitation, adultery, pornography, and same-sex “marriage,” to employees in March 2015. Beginning in November 2016, employees will be required to affirm these historical and biblically consonant positions.

It will come as no surprise that the IV position that is causing all the vexation,  huffing, and puffing is its position on marriage—a position that “progressive” disciples of diversity believe no individual and no organization should be permitted to affirm. And I guess that goes for Jesus who created marriage:

“He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?

As theologian Denny Burk tweeted, “We live in a day when this is news: Intervarsity stands with scripture and the consensus of the entire 2,000-year history of the Christian church.”

Leftists are fake-enraged over this non-news, and others are wondering why the theologically orthodox IV is making clear its theologically orthodox views on marriage now.

There are two good reasons for IV to make clear its views on marriage now, neither of which should need to be identified but for the cave-dwellers among us, here they are:

1.)  If churches and parachurch organizations are not crystal clear in articulating their positions on matters related to sexuality and if they do not require affirmation of and behavioral adherence to these theological positions, the litigious Left will come after them.

2.) The anti-cultural mess we’re mired in has resulted in either the church’s cowardly silence on essential matters pertaining to homosexuality or its embrace of heretical views on these matters. Between the corrosive ideas on sexuality in general and marriage in particular that pervade American public life, Christians and especially young Christians are being deceived. Christians need clarity, correction, and unequivocal, unambiguous teaching.

A young IV worker cited in the Time Magazine  article provides troubling evidence of the heretical views being adopted by Christian youth:

Bianca Louie, 26, led the InterVarsity campus fellowship at Mills College, a women’s liberal-arts school in Oakland and her alma mater….Louie and about 10 other InterVarsity staff formed an anonymous queer collective earlier this year to organize on behalf of staff, students and alumni who felt unsafe under the new policy. They compiled dozens of stories of individuals in InterVarsity programs and presented them to national leadership. “I think one of the hardest parts has been feeling really dismissed by InterVarsity….The queer collective went through a very biblical, very spiritual process, with the Holy Spirit, to get to where we are. I think a lot of people think those who are affirming [same-sex marriage] reject the Bible, but we have landed where we have because of Scripture, which is what InterVarsity taught us to do.

I’m pretty sure it was neither Scripture nor the Holy Spirit that led the queer collective to affirm same-sex “marriage.”

Theologically orthodox pastor and well-known speaker Skye Jethani has written a very good blog post articulating the reasons IV’s policy directive is both a “big deal” and a good and even necessary document. That said, Jethani concludes his post with this head-scratching comment:

However, I do grieve that rather than allowing Christians, and particularly younger Christians, grow in their understanding of these matters in an environment of grace and inclusivity, wonderful ministries like InterVarsity are being forced to take premature and artificially divisive stands.

Would Jethani grieve if IV were to take an unequivocal and explicit position on consensual adult incest, bestiality, polyamory, or slavery? Would he grieve if IV required employees to affirm biblical positions on these issues rather than allowing them to “grow in their understanding of these matters in an environment of grace and inclusivity?” How is requiring employees to hold fast to biblical truth lacking in grace?

And although Christianity (like “progressivism”) is exclusive in that it holds some beliefs to be false, it is inclusive in that anyone who repents and follows Christ is included. In order to repent and receive God’s grace and mercy, people need to know what constitutes sin. And surely those, like IV employees, who already claim to be Christ-followers, should know and affirm truth.

Moreover, IV’s position is neither premature nor artificially divisive. If IV has employees who reject biblical truth on marriage, heresy has created the division—not IV. And if IV has employees that embrace heresy, IV is late to the party decorated with rainbow-appropriated streamers.

Marriage is a picture of Christ and his bride, the church. The belief that marriage can be the union of two men or two women necessarily entails the belief that there is no difference in role, function, or nature between Christ the bridegroom and his bride, the church. Further, affirming the false belief that marriage can be a same-sex union undermines respect for the authority of Scripture and not just on marriage.

Every church and parachurch organization and every Christian should explicitly affirm the biblical view of marriage as InterVarsity Christian Fellowship has done.

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A Time Magazine article on InterVarsity Christian Fellowship’s (IV) 20-page internal policy position paper on human sexuality is generating a huge brouhaha.

Read more here…

In recent years, leaders in the Southern Baptist denomination have been among the most stalwart and unequivocal faith leaders on the issues of homosexuality and gender dysphoria. In particular, Dr. Al Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, and Russell Moore, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, have demonstrated exemplary courage, wisdom, and grace in addressing the pagan sexuality that threatens to destroy the family, children’s rights, public education, church unity, and constitutional protections. Unfortunately, in the past year, both Mohler and Moore as well as Southern Baptist theologian Denny Burk have made statements that harm the cause of truth and, if not clarified or corrected, undermine the credibility of their leadership.

Since clarity is becoming a rarity, I want to be clear: Mohler, Moore, and Burk all believe that homoerotic activity is a serious sin that Christians are not permitted to engage in or affirm, and that marriage has a nature, central to which is sexual differentiation and without which a union is not a marriage.

Dr. Al Mohler

Dr. Mohler made this comment in 2014 at a conference held by the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission:

Now early in this controversy, I felt it quite necessary, in order to make clear the gospel, to deny anything like a sexual orientation. And speaking at an event of the National Association of Evangelicals twenty-something years ago, I made that point. I repent of that.

It was a confusing statement to many, in large part because the press took it out of context, omitting most of what Mohler said about “orientation.” Because the term “sexual orientation” means different things to different groups, it is confusing when a Christian leader like Mohler uses it. It’s even more confusing when the press dishonestly exploits his use of it.

“Sexual orientation” is innocuous if or when it is used as a kind of shorthand term simply to describe a powerful, seemingly intractable feeling or desire that arises non-volitionally. Christians could reasonably appropriate it in this usage to succinctly identify any type of besetting sin. Christians could refer to a “pride orientation,” a “polyamorous orientation,” a “minor-attraction orientation,” a “covetous orientation,” or an “idolatrous orientation.” We could tack “orientation” on to any powerful, deep-seated, unchosen, unwanted predilection to engage in any kind of sin, but Christians commonly don’t because they understand the unbiblical connotations and political implications embedded in the term “sexual orientation.” Dr. Mohler should understand that as well.

“Sexual orientation” is the language of “LGBTQQIAP” activists who more effectively utilize language than do conservatives. Embedded in the term are the arguable assumptions that homosexuality is immutable and innate, and because it’s innate, it’s—in their view—inherently good. Christians, like Mohler, also acknowledge a kind of innateness to homosexuality in the sense that humans have inherent fallen, sin natures and our sinful natures manifest in all kinds of powerful, persistent, unchosen disordered desires including homosexual desires. Here is what Mohler said that the secular press and homosexual activists largely did not report:

Biblical Christians properly resist any suggestion that our will can be totally separated from sexual desire, but we really do understand that the will is not a sufficient explanation for a pattern of sexual attraction. Put simply, most people experiencing a same-sex attraction tell of discovering it within themselves at a very early age, certainly within early puberty. As they experience it, a sexual attraction or interest simply “happens,” and they come to know it.

Given the depth of the Bible’s teachings on sin and this fallen world, this should not surprise us. In some sense, each of us finds within ourselves a pattern of desires — sexual and otherwise — we did not ask for, but for which we are then and now fully responsible. When it comes to a same-sex attraction, the orientation is sinful because it is defined by an improper object — someone of the same sex. 

Christians also believe that the bondage to our innate sinful natures that grips us is broken by the broken body of Christ. Christ frees us for holiness. So the meaning of “orientation” by Christians would be very different from the meaning it holds for homosexual activists.

While the Holy Spirit sanctifies our corrupt natures, conforming us to the image of Christ, complete eradication of some sinful desires may not come until our next life, which leads to another problem with statements from these well-respected Southern Baptist leaders.

Evidently heavily influenced by the work of Heath Lambert, associate professor of Biblical Counseling at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, they are rejecting what they call “secular reparative therapy” as ineffectual for facilitating change in unwanted homoerotic attraction, largely because it does not offer redemption.

Reparative therapy (RT) is a non-coercive form of counseling that helps clients—including minors—who desire to reduce homosexual attraction and explore their “heterosexual potential.”

Here are some of the issues that RT seeks to address:

The RT therapist does not simply accept at a surface level the client’s sexual or romantic feelings and behaviors, but rather, invites him into a non-judgmental inquiry into his deeper motivations. The RT psychotherapist always asks “why” and invites the client to do the same.

The gay-affirmative therapist, however, typically addresses this clinical material regarding homosexual attractions “phenomenologically” (i.e. accepting the attractions at face value without questioning their origins). This is a highly unprofessional omission.

The RT therapist must go much deeper: he recognizes, for example, that a teen may believe he is gay for a variety of reasons that have nothing to do with his core sexual identity. His sexual feelings may be rooted in a need for acceptance, approval, of affection from males, or may reflect his loneliness, boredom, or simple curiosity. He may engage in same-sex behavior for adventure, money, peer pressure; or to express hostility against male peers, or general rebellion. He may also find himself reenacting an early trauma of sexual molestation by another male….

A higher-than-average percentage of homosexually oriented men were sexually abused in childhood by an older male. One study found that 46% of homosexual men compared with just 7% of heterosexual males reported homosexual molestation. The same study also found that 22% of lesbians reported homosexual molestation compared with just 1% of heterosexual women (Tomeo, et.al., 2001). In these cases where the person was molested in childhood, homosexual behavior reenacted in adulthood can represent a repetition compulsion.

Indeed, a teenager may become convinced that he is gay through the influence of a persuasive adult– a gay-affirmative therapist, mentor, teacher, or even his own molester. Such influential adults could succeed in swaying an uncertain youth that homosexuality, is for him, simply inevitable.

Homosexual behavior may also reflect some kind of developmental crisis that has evoked insecurities, prompting the fantasy that he can receive protection from a stronger male. Anxieties and insecurities regarding approaching the opposite sex (heterophobia) may also prompt the search for the perceived safety and ease of finding a partner for same-sex behavior.

Environmental factors such as incarceration in a prison, or living in a residential treatment facility where young males sleep together and are isolated from females, may promote same-sex behavior and consequent gay self-labeling. In addition, gay self-identification may represent a political or ideological statement to the world, as seen in radical-feminist lesbianism in the women’s movement.

On Monday, just before the start of the “Homosexuality: Compassion, Care and Counsel for Struggling People” conference, Dr. Mohler made a number of troubling statements to the press, including these unhelpful, confusing, and ill-conceived statements:

We don’t think the main thing that is needed is merely repair but rather redemption.

The Christian Church has sinned against the LGBT community by responding to this challenge in a superficial way….It’s not something that is so simple as converting from homosexual to heterosexual, and from our Gospel-centered theological understanding that would not be sufficient.

[O]ur biblically-informed understanding of sexual orientation will chasten us from having any confidence that there is any rescue from same-sex attraction to be found in any secular approach, therapy, or treatment.

First, a therapeutic protocol need not offer redemption in order to be helpful and healing.

Second, what is Mohler’s evidence for his implicit charge that RT therapists promise conversion from homosexual to heterosexual or that they suggest such a shift is “simple”?

Third, might a deeper understanding of the environmental factors that may contribute to the development of same-sex attraction be helpful even in the absence of complete change in sexual desires and despite the absence of redemption? Is it possible for “secular” counseling like RT to provide such help–help which, like medical interventions for other health issues, is limited in scope?

Russell Moore

Mohler’s anti-reparative therapy sentiment is shared by Russell Moore who in 2014 described RT as “severely counterproductive,” telling the press that “The utopian idea if you come to Christ and if you go through our program, you’re going to be immediately set free from attraction or anything you’re struggling with, I don’t think that’s a Christian idea….”

It’s unfortunate and surprising from a sophisticated thinker like Moore that he chose to  mischaracterize RT by implying that RT therapists promise something they don’t. Proponents of RT do not suggest clients will “be immediately set free from attraction or anything” they’re “struggling with.” In implicitly alleging that they do, Moore is demonstrating either that he woefully ill-informed or that he is dishonest. I hope it’s the former.

Moore demonstrated a similar lack of wisdom at the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission conference last year when he offered an intellectually incoherent and theologically baffling response when asked if Christians should attend same-sex anti-weddings. He responded that they should not attend same-sex weddings, but they may attend the after-parties that celebrate anti-weddings, also known as receptions. Say what?

And then there was the Wall Street Journal article about Moore in which he shared that he meets regularly with a “gay pastor.” Of course, Christians should spend time with sinners as Jesus did, calling them to repentance. But should Christians meet regularly with church leaders who embrace sin and affirm and promote heresy? Would Moore meet regularly with incestuous pastors who embrace, affirm, and promote incest? Aren’t “gay” pastors among the false prophets and ravenous wolves disguised in sheep’s clothing (Matt. 7:15) with whom we should not even eat (1 Cor. 5:11)? If they’re not, who is?

Denny Burk

Dr. Denny Burk admits that he too has “turned away” from RT. As mentioned, Mohler,  Moore, and Burk, have been heavily influenced by Heath Lambert whose reductionist critique of the theories and work of RT Dr. Burk cites as “the most thoroughgoing critique from an evangelical perspective” that Burk has seen.

Lambert first posits that the goal of RT is heterosexuality, which Lambert views as an unbiblical goal: “The Bible never says that heterosexuality, in general terms, is a good thing.” This smacks a bit of Leftist claims that Jesus never said anything about homosexuality.

There are several places in the Bible where we can reasonably infer that heterosexuality is a good thing, including in Song of Songs. As Lambert accurately asserts, the Bible neither commands nor commends heterosexual desire per se, but neither does it condemn it, and the Song of Songs account of marital love surely communicates the  beauty, goodness, and hence desirability of heterosexuality, which is an integral component of marital love.  

Lambert further argues that “Reparative therapists believe that male homosexuality is, in the main, a problem that comes about from a break in the parent-child relationship.” He then claims that because not all men who experience same-sex attraction have had dysfunctional relationships with their fathers and because some men who did have dysfunctional relationships with their fathers don’t experience same-sex attraction, reparative therapy theories are unsound.

But that claim itself seems unsound. Few doubt that many girls who have been molested in childhood become promiscuous. No one doubts the causal effect of molestation even though not all girls who have been molested in childhood become promiscuous and even though some girls who were not molested become promiscuous. Humans are complex critters with complex multi-factorial reasons for their feelings and behaviors.

Are Lambert, Mohler, Moore, and Burk asserting that there are no cases in which attraction to men that becomes sexualized in adolescence results from absent, distant, or abusive relationships with fathers? Would they argue that childhood molestation never results in same-sex attraction? Are they arguing that “secular” counseling can never help identify and heal childhood harm? Do they make this claim about “secular” counseling for other powerful, persistent disordered desires?

Burk rightly claims that “For Christians, the goal of change is holiness not heterosexuality.” But is it wrong to desire and seek both? If heterosexual attraction (and marriage) is good, is it wrong to desire and seek it? And might not the Holy Spirit work through “secular” RT to contribute to either a diminution of homoerotic desire and perhaps the development of opposite-sex desire? It seems that a false and severely counterproductive dichotomy between biblical counseling and RT has taken root among some Southern Baptist academicians.

Conclusion

Dr. Mohler issued yet another apology to homosexuals for the church’s failure to address the sin of homosexuality properly. I wonder if adulterers, zoophiliacs, sibling-lovers, minor-attracted persons, and porn-users are awaiting their apologies. Perhaps Dr. Mohler, Dr. Moore, and Dr. Burk should also consider issuing an apology to RT therapists for misrepresenting their work—work through which many men and women have been helped.

At such a time as this, when truth about sexuality is under siege, our Christian leaders should be much more careful with their rhetoric and thorough in their research or they risk giving aid, comfort, and an unholy, gleeful energy to the enemy.

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Written By Denny Burk

Christy McFerren shares her gut-wrenching testimony in a recent post at the online Prodigal Magazine. The story is gut-wrenching because she has experienced powerful attractions to other women throughout her life, yet she has never given in to a homosexual identity. In fact, her whole testimony is aimed to communicate that it’s okay to fight if you’re a homosexual. It took her years to come to this conclusion, but that is where she ended up. For me the most powerful part of her testimony is in the following lines. Pay special attention to the underlined portion:

Sometimes I agreed with God about my sexuality because He is Lord, and love is a choice, and that is all. My emotions were left out of the equation so many times because I had to believe either my feelings were lying to me or God was. I purposed in my heart to honor God’s design no matter how it felt, for a very, very long time. I could feel in the waiting that Life was at work in me. Hope was at work in me.

There was never a pinnacle moment when I knew, “I’m not gay anymore. I feel different.” My liberation was unceremonious. Freedom matured in me through a process, from the seeds of truth that God planted and people watered along the way. It wasn’t one decision I made not to be gay, there were many. Like Proverbs 4:18 says, “… the path of the righteous is like the light of dawn, that shines brighter and brighter until the full day.”…

—but its brightening from morning to noon happens in indiscernible progression. Yet noon is undeniably brighter than the dawn. In the same way I can say with confidence today that I am free.

I am a testimony that homosexuality can be a choice. It was a fight, but it was worth every tear I cried and every drop of blood Jesus shed. We won this thing together. It was a fight for honor. For dignity. For agreement. Out of that agreement comes the power that overtakes the impossible, and if you’re struggling with this, I’m here to tell you…

It’s OK to fight.

I don’t know anything about Ms. McFerren except what I’ve read in this article and on her website. But what I see here is glorious. I hope and pray that some of you who struggle with this issue will be strengthened by McFerren’s testimony to believe God that it’s okay to fight against a homosexual orientation (Rev. 12:11). It’s not a fait accompli that you have to give in to. You don’t have to give in to voices that are telling you otherwise. Read the whole thing, and see that God can do the impossible (Matt. 19:25-26).