Last Sunday a friend online posted that she was told a pastor in her town preached on “Sexuality and Gender”. And in it he said early on that “If you’re transgender, you’re welcome here.”

I was curious, as this is not something I’m used to hear coming from the pulpit of a mainstream evangelical church. With minimal tracking I found the church being referred to and found they replayed their service online at 7PM. So I made it a point to check out their service.

If you’re transgender, you’re welcome here

7:00 arrived and I went to the church’s website as the service was beginning. The music engineer geek in me quickly noticed how good the mix was. The instruments were in a good balance yet you could clearly hear the words being sung and the harmonies of the vocalists. I even commented in their online chat “very nice audio mix of the instruments and singers”. The worship was great, and I was starting to think “Wow, if this is a church welcoming people who are transgender, I’m envious because the worship was really good both in performance quality and in spirit.”

Then, the pastor got up to speak. He started out softly, sounding pained and sorry for those who have to suffer with gender dysphoria. But over the next 40 or so minutes, starting quietly but growing into a crescendo, he proceeded to talk about how being transgender is practicing sin, that it’s not God’s design. Yet toward the end reiterated that people who are transgender were “loved and welcome here”. And then to his credit of at least being honest, he said they do not affirm someone being transgender.

I’m sure it makes them FEEL better to say they “welcome” people who are transgender. That they “love” people who are transgender (after all, that’s what Christ told us to do, so we better at least say it).

The pastor tried to justify his opinion with verses from the Bible, only demonstrating that he took the most simplistic English translations at face value without digging deeper into the original Greek/Hebrew or context of the verses. I’ve address many of them in earlier posts over the last few years so I won’t repeat myself here.

Then he PROVED that his research was superficial because he pulled out what he thought was his “ace in the hole” (I’m a poker player so I know what that means-it’s like your secret weapon that you have that no one knows you have). The pastor brought up Walt Heyer.

Walt Heyer is the flag Christian leader like to raise to prove their point because scripturally they know they are standing on sand. Walt is someone who thought he was transgender because a therapist told him he was the put him on a path to sex-reassignment surgery and living as a woman. But Walt was NEVER transgender. He was a victim of emotional abuse (according to his own words) by his grandmother who would give him praise and love only when he dressed like a girl when he was young. When he was dressed as a boy his grandmother ignored him in every way (and he spent most weekends with her). He later developed a drug and alcohol habit and that’s when the therapist said he was transgender.

they “love” people who are transgender

In living as a woman for several years he realized that in fact he WASN’T transgender, and was able to transition back into the male role that was correct for him. He started a ministry to help others, but the problem is that most people who are transgender are not like Walt, they haven’t gone through what Walt has, yet Walt thinks since HE wasn’t transgender, that no one else could possibly be. And that’s where he sadly goes wrong, yet pastors and those seeking anti-transgender arguments go to the very testimony that he offers.

The pastor (almost predictably) briefly delved into the homosexual verses of the Bible, because it’s an easy sell even though it has NOTHING to do with being transgender (like I’ve said so many times, being transgender is NOT about who you have sex with, it’s about who you are).

By the end of the message (which I could barely take by then) I replied to my friend telling her to stay away from that church. It reminded me of something else I’ve written about, how the Church has turned the “welcome mat” into a “trap door”.

I pray for the day when pastors will stop looking for verses to back their bigotry

This pastor had no intention of embracing a transgender person for who they are, as he embraces his non-transgender congregants. He was going to welcome them, and then figure he would “fix” them. There is a LONG post that is brewing in the back of my head because yes, I do believe there are teens these days with “sudden onset gender dysphoria” that are no different than the punk kids in the 90’s painting their face white and their hair jet black, just rebelling against the grain, and I agree that hormones and surgery are the LAST things you do after thorough psychological analysis by professionals well versed in the topic.

But you can’t lump everyone together if you’re being responsible, and that is what this pastor just as MANY pastors do. Find a few verses that work for you, find a use-case that fits the narrative and bam—no transgender Christian in “my church”.

I pray for the day when pastors will stop looking for verses to back their bigotry (distaste based on personal opinion) and be willing to talk with people who ARE transgender. My personal experience is that pastors don’t want to have those discussions because I think it puts them in a place they can’t defend, and they don’t want to have to, or they can’t afford it (and I mean that literally).

And pastors, your being “welcoming” isn’t love, it’s destructive in ways you can’t imagine. Being “welcoming” and then having the person leave because they learn they truly aren’t accepted leaves them without friends, without a church family. And worse, it leaves many thinking God doesn’t love them—and THAT is part of what drives people to suicide. You think you’re not responsible for that? You’re wrong.

I know for a fact of someone I was a part of preventing her suicide, and only by a matter of minutes. There’s another in an online group I’m in that I’m afraid we may have lost to suicide, but I’ll never know.

You want to “SAVE” people? Welcome them. Accept them.

If they say they are a follower of Christ—BELIEVE them. It’s not your place to question their salvation. You want God to change their heart? LET Him. Stay out of it. You just might be wrong, so don’t get in the way of God’s work in that person.

God has all kinds of soldiers to do His work in all kinds of areas, let HIM get it done—He’ll ask you if He needs your advice.

But what saddens me the most is that people on the worship team, people in the congregation, who have never really looked into this in any level of detail will just take the pastor’s word for everything, and only expand the damage done because “their pastor said…”.

Ignorance is truly bliss.

-Blessings

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