{"id":1976,"date":"2023-03-10T10:40:41","date_gmt":"2023-03-10T16:40:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thelight.com\/index.php\/2023\/03\/12\/is-de-gendering-a-sin-desiring-god\/"},"modified":"2023-03-12T10:44:33","modified_gmt":"2023-03-12T15:44:33","slug":"is-de-gendering-a-sin-desiring-god","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thelight.com\/index.php\/2023\/03\/10\/is-de-gendering-a-sin-desiring-god\/","title":{"rendered":"Is \u2018De-Gendering\u2019 a Sin? | Desiring God"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Keen insight on God’s wisdom from a pastor’s pastor – John Piper!<\/p>\n

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Today\u2019s topic is a sensitive one. We get a lot of questions from a lot of listeners on a very wide range of life situations, obviously. And many of these questions come to us from pretty broken places. And I think that\u2019s true today. We address an email from a woman, a female by birth \u2014 born with two X chromosomes. She\u2019s written in anonymously to ask this: \u201cPastor John, hi. I find myself at a stage in my life when I am seriously considering removing my female body parts \u2014 namely, my breasts and my uterus \u2014 because I no longer want to be a woman. Women are perceived as weak vessels whose only purpose is to have children. Even Scripture supports that ideology,\u201d she writes. \u201cAs a modern \u2018woman,\u2019 I have no desire to have children or get married but to have a successful career to help support less fortunate people and animals live better lives. My question is this: Would doing this to my body be sinful?\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

Yes, it will be sinful, and it will probably be dreadfully destructive to you as a person. I want to give you six reasons for that response to what you\u2019ve said. So I hope you\u2019ll be willing to listen to me, because this is not going to be easy for you to hear. I hope you have the courage to listen.<\/p>\n

1. Purpose of Women<\/h2>\n

No, neither the Bible nor the church has ever said or hinted that woman\u2019s only purpose is to have children, nor is this the view of the vast majority of human beings in the world. The very fact that you would say this shows how conflicted you are, because you know that\u2019s not true. You know it\u2019s not true. You know that in the Gospels, women followed Jesus and served him in many ways (see Luke 8:1\u20133). You know that Paul refers to numerous women who labored side by side with him in the gospel. You know that love between a man and a woman in marriage is vastly deeper and richer than only baby-making. You know that in history, the prayers and the service of women have turned the tide for good in communities again and again. You know that today, women work in hundreds of vocations, and most of them do it gladly as women<\/i>, not in spite of being women.<\/p>\n

You know these things, and yet you still say women are perceived as having only the purpose of childbearing. I wonder why that is. Why do you say that? What it sounds like is that you\u2019re not thinking clearly. You\u2019re not speaking and thinking clearly. You\u2019re speaking and thinking carelessly, and that is not a good place from which to make a massive decision like the one you are contemplating. It would be folly.<\/p>\n

2. Weaker by Wisdom<\/h2>\n

Yes, woman is the weaker vessel, as Peter says (1 Peter 3:7) and as everybody knows. That\u2019s why there\u2019s a women\u2019s NBA, women\u2019s college volleyball, women\u2019s gymnastics, women\u2019s track and field, women\u2019s soccer, women\u2019s Tour de France. God made men stronger, and there are reasons for this, and he really is wise. He really is very good in making such decisions. If you don\u2019t trust him with the way he made the world, then that\u2019s one of the main reasons that what you are about to do is sin. You\u2019re not acting in faith, but anger and resentment at the way God made you. You are, evidently, not trusting God\u2019s wisdom but denying it. That\u2019s not a safe place from which to make this massive decision.<\/p>\n

But there\u2019s a sad thing as well besides this point. When you\u2019re done mutilating yourself, you\u2019re still going to be part of the weaker sex. You can make your chest flat \u2014 that won\u2019t make you strong. You can put testosterone into your body and grow more hair and make your voice lower, but you\u2019ll still be a woman. You\u2019ll be weaker than 90 percent of the men your age. In fact, you will be weaker than you were before, not stronger, because pretense is weakness. Living a life trying to be what you are not is a life of weakness.<\/p>\n

3. God\u2019s Better Desires<\/h2>\n

You say, \u201cAs a modern woman, I have no desire to have children or get married.\u201d I have two questions for you. First, is your desire your god? It sounds like it. Are you humbly asking the true and living God, \u201cGod, what are your desires? What is your will for me?\u201d Or does that matter to you? Is your desire final? If it is, that\u2019s another evidence of sin behind your thinking.<\/p>\n

Second, what if your desire changes in five or ten years? Oh, how I wish I knew your name so I could say with all earnestness, \u201cSeriously, Chelsea, seriously, think about this.\u201d Surely you have lived long enough to know that what you desire today may not be what you desire tomorrow. You know this. In one moment, you can destroy a whole life of possibilities that you may desperately desire someday. If you blow me off here and think you can predict your desires ten years from now, you are delusional. You know it. Wake up. Be realistic. You do not know what your desires will be in ten years. Don\u2019t cut off those possibilities.<\/p>\n

4. Serving Others for Christ\u2019s Glory<\/h2>\n

If you want to serve the less fortunate, do you want to do it for Christ\u2019s sake? Do you want to do it for his glory? If not, it\u2019s idolatry. If you do, then why wouldn\u2019t you consult with him for how you can glorify him through your body the way he made you? I mean, if his glory matters to you in serving the poor, wouldn\u2019t it matter in how to be a woman?<\/p>\n

5. Serving Others as a Woman<\/h2>\n

If you really love people and care about the disadvantaged, God cares about that as much as you do. He loves that, which is why millions of competent, caring, persevering, Christ-exalting women<\/i> are leading the vanguard in many such ministries of compassion and justice. Why in the world would you think that you will be a better lover of needy people as a fake man than as a real woman? You know that\u2019s inconsistent.<\/p>\n

If you really want to give your life for the sake of others who are less advantaged, praise God. That\u2019s what he wants for you. He wants it more than you do, and he made you perfectly suited for his calling on you to do it. Breasts and uterus and hormones and monthly cycle and brain structures \u2014 all of it is gloriously suited for what he\u2019s calling you to do. He\u2019s not stupid. He doesn\u2019t make mistakes. Your re-creation of you will not be a better lover of the poor than God\u2019s creation of you.<\/p>\n

6. Woman All the Way Down<\/h2>\n

God made us male and female, and we are male and female all the way down. The glory of womanhood is not something as superficial as breasts and uterus. It is marked in every cell of your body, every dimension of your soul, every part of your brain. You can\u2019t even begin to undo the pervasive mystery of your womanhood. Your womanhood is like yeast in the dough, like the color in the paint of your life, like the aroma in the flower that you are, like the melody in the song. Dear friend, whose name I wish I knew, you are a female wonder of God\u2019s handiwork, and no amount of chipping away at it will make it cease to be a God-designed masterpiece.<\/p>\n

So, I conclude, yes, it will be a sin, a tragedy, and almost certainly tragically regretted if you have yourself mutilated to try to be what you are not and what God did not make you to be. And I plead with you, don\u2019t do that. Surrender to him, and his will, and his wisdom, and his love, and his Son Jesus, and you will find an amazing life of purpose as he created you to be.<\/p>\n

This content was originally published here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Keen insight on God’s wisdom from a pastor’s pastor – John Piper! Today\u2019s topic is a sensitive one. We get a lot of questions from a lot of listeners on a very wide range of life situations, obviously. And many of these questions come to us from pretty broken places. And I think that\u2019s true […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1978,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-uncategorized","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8kHU7-vS","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thelight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/is-de-gendering-a-sin-bqfgigre-d8287afeee240a70d4a3fe767e80e228.jpg?fit=2000%2C1050","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thelight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1976","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thelight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thelight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thelight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thelight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1976"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/thelight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1976\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1980,"href":"http:\/\/thelight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1976\/revisions\/1980"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thelight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thelight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thelight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thelight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}