Listen. We're running a little bit behind. I wanna catch this up.

But really, this next is really about, like, equipping church leaders to respond to the transgender trend. And this is basically, like, next steps, practical, pragmatic. What do we as a church do? What do we do as as lay ministers?

And here's what I would say. I hear you. There are no, see there is no, like, senior leadership, senior pastors, in this building, here, in this particular room. However, that you are here, and that matters.

That makes a big difference. The goal really is is for you to say, hey. Here is what I learned in this area to take it to your senior leadership and say, I wanna present you with something. This is an opportunity.

It is low hanging fruit, and then hand them as much material as possible. So I wanna welcome you to that. You know, earlier, we were listening to just how evil is really just indoctrinating our kids. That that that that that is just it's overwhelming, and I and I can feel it.

I can feel the tension in the room, the sobriety that is in the room of what is happening with our culture. And once again, we feeling alone as one. Right? I mean, look at look at how big this room is.

This is a great response, but honestly, right, in comparison to the world, it's a very small one. So what do we feel? We just kinda feel overwhelmed and under equipped. And I just wanna say this to you.

We have authority. Now I will say this.

Use the mic. Should I use the mic? I should use the mic.

How's how's this?

So I'll say this. Listen. The tolerance of evil leads us all to two great tragedies. And number one is this, we give away our power.

We give away our power and we come by standards to a world that's just slowly burning away. Here's the other thing. We bypass persecution, and persecution we know is this. It's the struggle, the promise, and the blessing that makes us look more like Jesus.

We don't get to become like Jesus with all things fluffy.

It's just there is some persecution here. And so standing firm on what we believe is absolutely crucial. If we don't stand firm right now, we'll be on our knees tomorrow begging for forgiveness. Yeah. Our job is to stand firm now.

So that gives us great context to Matthew five ten. Blessed are those who are persecuted for doing what is right.

Scripture, Jesus, right, is talking about us in this room right now. We are the persecuted. Welcome to the persecution.

But here's the thing, here's why, because we're standing against these radical forms of belief systems that are rising up against biblical beliefs and moral values. New language demanding the acceptance of transgender ideology is emerging in the name of civil justice.

That's what's happening. Accept me for my pronoun. No no no no no. But what about civil justice? Well, okay.

Right? When we hear that word civil justice, we have this weak spot in our heart for it, right? It's hard, and that's what's being happening right now. We're just seeing all of this stuff done in the name of civil rights. And so church leaders and parishioners are feeling the weight of this accept us or beware rhetoric.

And this is creating passivity and fear based decision making amongst clergy and church members. And so here's what we see that is, happening in our churches. There is a church identity crisis. And what's happening is the church at large, okay, not here, not your church, I'm not talking about you guys, but just the church at large is caving in to the demands of a sexually broken culture at the expense of truth. And this is setting this tone. Okay? That the church is bendy.

We can manipulate, we can say in the name of social justice, we can say, hey, what are you doing that's progressive? What are you saying that's inclusive?

And the church says, oh, you're right.

Right? Because of that fear, the fear of what's to come. The fear of consequence for not allowing someone to be a certain way.

Here's another thing that's happening. The Sparkle Creed, which in June two thousand twenty one, a queer identifying minister of the United Church of Christ, created the sparkle creed for pride month that took the place of the Apostles' Creed. Now I'm gonna read three excerpts of it. Okay?

This is what it says. Okay. This is out there. Okay. Here's one. I believe in the non binary God whose pronouns are plural.

Right? But wait, hold on. Listen to that though. It's like if if if there was if you were wrestling with your own stuff, wouldn't that sound appealing?

If you had your own deficits and concerns and you were fractured and your identity was threatened, or you have no sense of identity, doesn't that seem kind of right? If you were broken I understand that all of us as pastors, leaders, and influencers in this room, we're like, no way. But what if you're lost?

Here's another word. Here's here's I believe in Jesus Christ, their child, who wore a fabulous tunic and had two dads and saw everyone as a sibling child of God.

I believe in the rainbow spirit who shatters our image of one white light and refracts it into a rainbow of gorgeous diversity.

So here's where confusion and trauma and this fracture of the self grabs onto these lies.

Because there's some sort of inclusion, and there's poetry, and you hear that language, it seems so bright and colorful and welcoming.

And and so what I'm asking you is yes it's easy for us to say in this room as leaders who know the Bible and who stand firm in our faith to say oh that's horrible.

But if you were broken and lost and confused, isn't there something about that that says, oh, this this might be the way?

Here's another thing that's happening. Here's how the here's how trans activism is is having drag queens are coming to church. They're replacing biblical doctrine with gender identity ideology, and we know what this is. It's it's basically a showcase of queer theology.

And and we see this, in in a few cases where people are dressing up as drag queens, doing bible story hour in their drag.

We have this rhetoric, this language, okay? And all of this stuff that's happening, inclusive to this rhetoric and language stuff, again, it's build, the drag queen story hour.

Build as progressive, imaginative, and all inclusive. We don't reject anybody.

All is welcome. What you believe is welcome. So for the person who's rejected and who has no Jesus, to hear that statement, it can sound absolutely appealing. For us, we know better. But for the brokenhearted, it's a welcome mat. If the door is open, the light is on.

Accept us where churches don't wanna risk coming across as non inclusive. So leaders are being tempted to resort to one or two extremes, silence or celebration.

And this is hushing the church's prophetic voice. When we we have two polarities that we're jumping into.

I either be silent about the issue or I am forced to celebrate it.

And for some reason, there's this polarity, and there hasn't been this this biblical middle that we can stand on and say, but Jesus.

And so we have to understand this, that what the church won't address, our broken culture will define it. And so it is up to the church as we respond to the evil that is trying to indoctrinate our children, our youth, the lost.

We have to step up as the body of Christ and help people understand what healthy biblical godly sexuality looks like. And here's the the biblical blueprint. Okay? We've gotta be having conversations.

We have to be hosting learning pods. We have to be having, our small group leaders equipped. Everyone from the top down in the middle, all volunteers understanding the Imago Den. That when it comes to teaching biblical sexuality, it's not about what two people do in a bedroom when they're married.

This goes far beyond that. This is about the Imago day. Now I'll say this, in my opinion just, this is commentary, but in my opinion if the devil can get after your sexuality that's just a consolation prize. What the devil is really after is the image of God.

It is the image of God that he's after. And if we're not talking about the image of God as it is expressed through our sexuality, how men and women relate to each other and to a world that is dark, then we have lost them to a broken culture who will pick up those reins and help them identify their meaning and their purpose of their own sexuality.

And they'll be forced to comply with the standards of this world because there is nothing greater to compare it to. The Imago Dei is the image of God. The unique connection between God and humanity, fully alive in both male and female.

And that's another thing. We have to start talking about the beauty of male and female, a beautiful and purposeful difference. Their pairings, their differences are all essential to his creative plan as defined in Genesis. Their beautiful and purposeful existence, how we complement each other, not compare, not compete, not covet.

And we have to see that. Not only do we have to teach it, but we have to demonstrate this.

And here's what I will say about that. If you were to talk to someone who is growing up in a church, what would they say about men's roles and women's roles in the church?

Who would they rather be, if they were on the fence about their own sexuality, about their own gender, who would they side with as having most power, most significance, most relevance, more most more more importance?

Right?

And so we have to start learning how to flip the script and start to help people understand that both sexes, male and female, are good, godly, and purposeful.

We're staying silent about those roles. And the roles, if we're not talking about that, what they're left up to is nuances and typecasting and labels where the husband does all the preaching and the wife just sits there and runs her little small group with her little PDA and taking notes for her husband.

And you have some powerful women who are CEOs out there where that does not play.

That's just not exciting for her. She doesn't wanna be that.

And so we have to start celebrating both roles powerfully. What does it look like? What does it look like for the expression of God to be manifest through the feminine?

Nurturing, brooding, to have this connection, to give life, to see and to feel? What about Ben who are to lead, who are to speak truth into chaos, to give shape and form, to serve and protect that which he loves sacrificially unto death, and how both of them are complete together as one, and that they complement that and that both of them are equal powerful expressions of God. Not only do we say it, but do we demonstrate it? Do we showcase it?

Do we actually say, Man, that is a powerful woman of God? That is a powerful man of God. Both commanding the platform with great authority. Yes and amen.

We've got to almost affirm and bless both sexes All the time, looking for ways. Workshops.

We have almost, we have a workshop here where we bless kids with rites of passage, and this is absolutely crucial that we're doing this in our communities. And again, we need to do this because children are finding these legitimate needs met by fake counterfeit alternatives that the world is offering. And if the church steps up and offers the real thing, they will at least have a fighting chance in a world of darkness.

And so what we need to start doing is understanding how do we do that? How do we create rites of passage? The Hebrew culture was big on rites of passage.

That's why I believe they were so successful, so connected to each other, so strong as a people, because there were rites of passage that were blessed and honored and it was publicized.

There was blessings spoken upon them. And I think there is a Hebrew model that we can follow, a Jewish model that we can follow that says, Hey, this is working.

And so what really needs to happen is when we do the blessing, with the rites of passage, number one, I think it has a lot to do with safe and meaningful touch and eye contact.

It's not enough to just say, hey, you're gonna be a great person when you grow up. That's kind of vague.

I mean, it's really dropping on their level, eye to eye, looking at them, laying on of hands, affirming them, and speaking words of life, specific words of life into their destiny.

Something that their spirit can grab onto. And I told this to my son, I said it this morning, I said you will be a great man of God.

You are going to affect our culture.

You will speak truth into darkness.

You will be a leader and an influencer.

And on the way home after I spoke that over over each of my children this morning, he, as soon as we get out, he says to me, So I'm thinking about all that.

I wanna do that.

What is that? Like what job does that?

What is I think it's and then my my other son says, I know what it it's a it's a fireman.

A fireman does it. And then my daughter kicks in. She's like, no. I think well, you could be a pastor.

He's like, well, yeah. I wanna be a pastor, but I also wanna be maybe a police officer does it. Now the goal is that he doesn't start working on his twenty year plan right now. The goal is that he's thinking about it.

He's mulling it over. He's understanding there is a template. There is a direction in which I'm going. How that takes shape and form.

That will be found out through my curiosity, but at least I'm reserving in my heart that there is a space for me to truth to speak truth into chaos and to give shape and form. And I know that. And anything else that rivals against it, I know it's not me because daddy didn't speak that over me.

A spoken message. I'll tell you this, audacious and audible words of life can be healing balm to the confused, aimless, and ruptured soul.

People who have been broken in their path and in their understanding of who they are.

That's what's happening.

Rejection, shame, embarrassment.

These kids are struggling with so many issues right now that are knocking them off their direction, knocking them off their trajectory.

But it's funny what those words of life can do to bring them back online.

And our job is to is to lay the cement and bring it back online.

Words of life always do that.

And then we have to use words that assign extremely high value.

When you talk to them, when we bless them, and again these are workshops and this is this is how we do it here. We wanna visualize a future. We wanna open up their mind's eye, the creative imagination of God, the sanctified imagination, giving them a concept to hang on to. I see you doing this. And honestly, what it's doing is it's opening up the portals in their mind to the prophetic voice.

I see you blessing generations. That's okay. I know the prophecy has been used weirdly lately. I get it, but we're not that.

Opening up their mind's eye to see a future that has a lot to do with Jesus, their identity, and who they are is absolutely powerful.

And then also I think, once you plant those images of purpose and service, I think the next best thing that we can do is offer the gift of commitment. And what I say in my prayers to them, I didn't say it this morning but I did say it last night, and at the end of my prayer I say Lord Jesus, I commit the rest of my life to making sure that my son does everything according to your will. And I tell my sons once in a while, we have this little Starbucks where we go in and we check-in and I say, hey, what can I do better for you?

This is the hard part, all right?

What do I need to repent of?

Where have I dropped the ball?

That list is long sometimes. Sometimes it's a little ridiculous. It's like, you couldn't let me watch TV in ten more minutes. No, that's not what I'm talking about, okay? But I do offer myself and say, this is who I am to you. Another thing is this, is that we have to start learning how to practice the ministry of presence.

This is an intentional practice of cojourning with people, kids, congregants, and loved ones as they wrestle with trauma and the broken understanding of themselves.

We have to learn how to sit and be still and hold stories, not be rushed. And I get it, I am in a fast growing church. And what I love about this church who's always moving from sermon to sermon, from event to event, hustle to hustle.

Our people are learning how to take the time to sit with people and hold their stories. That's one thing I'm super proud of of this staff. There is no rush, there is no hurry, They're simply sitting with people, understanding, holding their story, being curious about where they're at and I absolutely love it. And when you communicate that both with your words and your still presence, it sends so much value to the other person.

It lets them know that you're there, that they matter, that they're important.

And so we all need to understand that. I'm gonna talk a little bit more about that in just a second.

But I wanna, you know, again, responding to gender dysphoria, young people and adults. So here's something that I want us to know. We really, as far as ministry of presence goes, we kinda have to know the hearts and minds of those who identify as transgender. Okay?

We need to know this, that number one, personal stories drive the perception of who we are. They're personal stories. So I would say this, let's take the challenge of getting out of our Christianese or getting out of our echo chambers, and step into another person's story. Be curious and ask ourselves this big question.

What are the underlying issues that drive a trans identified person's thoughts and fears?

What are what are we doing? We have to understand that there is there is this, somewhere, somewhere in the journey of a person who now identifies as transgender, some form of tragedy, some form of trauma took place. Maybe a rupture, whether minor or major, took place where the idea of rejecting their God given maleness or femaleness became an option.

What happened in a person's life that made them go offline and say, you know what? I'm not a male. I am a female.

If we can start to ask those questions, maybe not necessarily directly, but find ways in which we could hold a conversation that would bring about the truth of what is the rupture that needs attention in your life right now rather than argue and debate with them.

How do people get here?

We have to learn how to, again, and here's another thing, we have to know the hearts and minds of those, So sorry, getting back on track. So here's another thing.

Love over righteousness.

The community who is sexually broken, right now the belief is this, is that God's power to love forfeits his right to judge, and we know that this that's just not true.

Here's the other thing. We have to understand this, is that while we all have good intentions, but churches, have not been viewed as safe. We've hurt some people along the way. Yeah.

And so there is a big red flag on the church doors. And people do come in here with their guard up. Mhmm. So if they have any questions, if they're sitting down, if they hear something in the sermon, they're gonna rise up and they're gonna wanna talk to somebody.

And I've had several times when people are out there, and the two threats that we get all the time is this, I've got social media and I've got an attorney.

And I'm ready to pull the trigger on both. And for the minister who's not equipped says, okay, okay, just what do I do?

What do you want me to do?

And so our job really is to create, again, safety. And I would I would I wanna challenge you with this.

We get a chance to pursue the wounded heart.

Those that feel ostracized and dehumanized deserve to be aware of God's pursuit and kindness. Now I want you to understand something.

We are called to graces graciously engage, and there's a difference between engagement and agreement.

We need to understand that balance.

John four one through forty two is really, really clear about this.

And I would even say that we all know this story. This is the Samaritan woman at the well. And so if you will, let me do a little storytelling for you.

What we see is Jesus and his disciples walking. And Jesus decides to take a different path. He excuses his smell from his all male entourage, sends them in a different direction, and he demonstrates by the separation to have this exclusive encounter with his beloved.

And as he separates himself from his crew, he walks into a town where Jews would not go.

He creates this sacred space in the most unusual place besides a well under a hot sun with a stranger he's never met. And Jesus we witness entering Samaria the same way he entered the world. No crown, no title, and unafraid to get messy.

And as he sits there, we get a chance to observe this scripture and realize that every moment in this encounter is Jesus frustrating the taboo and the cultural norms of his time. Now you can call it what you want to, but what this really is is a true scene of a husband pursuing his betrothed.

Jesus chases, leans in, and listens to her story without flinching or finger wagging.

He doesn't fold his arms. He's not rolling his eyes.

Instead, he puts down through his presence. Again, this is his presence, his sacred presence, his visceral presence, the ministry of presence. He puts down shame and guilt because he knows that shame and guilt would not extract one word out of her mouth.

But through his gentle wooing, the Samaritan woman felt safe.

And what she does is she offers the beautiful gift of trust then confession.

And that confession is beautiful. This is how Jesus responds to it.

He leans in further. It becomes more interested.

And Jesus shows us here that face to face connection is the antithesis of shame and condemnation.

And it is the key that unlocks closed and calloused hearts.

If you ask me, ladies and gentlemen, Jesus isn't just talking about cultural norms and how he meets the brokenness of mankind.

He's talking about how to get through to a person who simply feels like they don't belong.

This is the recipe for me of how to approach people.

Everything about this is Jesus snapping his fingers to the Christians saying, watch this.

This is how you do it.

This is how you make your approach.

And he's tapping the shoulder of the wounded saying, I'm coming for you.

This is how I come for you. And this is how I'll send my people.

And so this is this beautiful story of how we're to engage the lost, the broken, the ostracized.

Now a couple of things in there.

We become aware.

We've gotta become aware. We have to learn how to listen, empathically. Like we have to learn how to just listen ears, ears, ears engage with curiosity. We have to have question based conversation.

Offer them invitations to reflect and reconsider and always be praying.

Something practically you can do is then have build build in house ministry capacity. That includes training. Help people understand sexual brokenness. We have a ministry here that is designed to help people walk out and be discipled through their sexual brokenness.

And it's led by volunteers who are highly trained to handle every situation, to handle every letter in the acronym of LGBTQ.

We spent time doing that. You gotta recruit champions.

Find people who have a gift for this. It might not be you. It might be you. But there are people out there in your churches who want to lead groups like this.

And then create a community, creating safe and confidential spaces for people to tell their story and unravel without judgment so that one day they can be put back together in a safe place without the fear of being ostracized again.

We call it the cafe.

You don't need a pulpit. You don't need a counselor's office.

You don't need to be a therapist or theologian.

Just passion, kindness.

That's what you need.

Creating a safe space for people to fall apart and to ask questions. You can't expect that person to just give their life away to God, to come back the next day and be completely different.

I'll say this, I'll say this.

It just takes time.

I mean, you have to understand this, that the opposite of homosexuality, transgenderism, lesbianism, it's not gay, straight, normal sexuality.

It's not, that's good but with God the opposite is holiness.

The opposite is holiness, the likeness of Christ, the likeness of Jesus. That is the end goal.

And so with that said, I just I just I wanna encourage you. You you have that spirit in you to do that. The spirit of God to do that work through you and in you.

And so for the next few minutes Twenty five minutes to table time. Yeah I just you know here's the thing I want to hear you can I want you to talk amongst yourselves? Talk about you know groups of four if you will.

What does that do for you? What do you have in your church? Do you have people in mind that can do this in your church?

How do you see yourself creating a safe space for people? How is your church, your organization, a well space?

Just like Jesus had that well moment, how do you have a well moment in your current environment right now? Does that make sense?

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