Video Transcript: Sexual Empowerment

So today we're going to talk about sexual empowerment theory, a theory that  recognizes God's design for your gender, your person, as a sexual being, your  response, and most important, it's about empowerment, that whoever you are,  when you are redeemed in Jesus Christ, the Word of God, can change you,  make you new, make you a new creation, all within a biblical narrative. So let's  get started. So sexual empowerment theory provides a crucial framework for  contrasting with the modernist and the post modernist perspectives, focusing on  sexual identity, orientation and response through a biblical lens. A lot of times  when we talk about these discussions, we're talking about them not comparing  to the options. There are basically three options in terms of gender studies right  now. There's the Christian option, which I would call the sexual empowerment  theory. This theory says that God created a design. This design is with male and female, man, woman, man's an organic male, a female. Woman is an organic  female. And inside this design is incredible, miraculous intelligence. That's one  perspective. Then there is the modernist perspective that says that you are a  product of evolution and that it's the survival of the fittest and the biology of  propagating the human race was one of the first core absolutes about evolution.  And then the third theory is the post modernist theory that says there are no  absolutes. There is no such thing as gender. You construct whatever you want.  So those are the basic theories. Let's talk more in detail now about the sexual  empowerment theory. It's a God design, divine design and biblical integrated  theory, it goes like this. So God created the heavens and the earth. God created  a male Adam, and even alone without the creation of Eve, He is an agent, an  image bearer. He has a soul, a physical body of spiritual existence. So he's  doing his thing. We see in the biblical account Genesis 2, and God notices that  it's not good to be alone. So God imagines a counterpart, a partner, a woman,  together, the institution of marriage, sexuality, reproduction, all of that was  created. They were empowered in their sexuality, not just to subdue the earth,  name the animals and everything that's about being human, but they were  empowered to reproduce, the species, Be fruitful and multiply. And then God  made something interesting about this empowerment. He also empowered  pleasure in many animals, in the creation, that pleasure piece was not present,  at least we don't see that so present in as science studies it. But in humans, it's  pleasurable. It's pleasurable the act of reproduction, or seeking to reproduce,  there was a whole creation of stimuli, the penis, the clitoris, all of that all  designed for pleasure. And when procreation was not on the table, it was  pleasurable then too. So this whole design was a major gift from God to  humans. There was bad news, however, when Adam and Eve were tempted  with the full agency of their full free will in the Garden of Eden, next chapter,  Genesis 3, the narrative goes like this, instead of living in that complimentary  image, bearing as connected to God. The tempter tempts them. Satan tempts  them to build their own thing, and they take that option. They fell from God. That 

fall was so central that it affected their sexuality in such a central way, it fits, at  that point very well into the evolution narrative of the modernist who basically  would see basically the strong survive and strong gets stronger, even in Genesis 4, the next chapter we read about Lamech, who's so strong, and he has two  wives, and he sings a song, Ada and Zilla and and they're building a culture and  a society. And it's yes, filled with men and women, organic males, organic  females, but the strongest the men are taking over in those places. So it's  understandable that the narrative of dominating men fit so well with the  evolutionistic perspective the fall so affected sexuality that all kinds of things are  possible, and in the history of the world, we see what could happen. Now the  modernists would call so much of this deviations, but the fact is, Christians  would see it as sin, as brokenness. So throughout the history of humanity, this  goes forward, and then comes the Lord Jesus Christ redemption. And he  redeems that fallen human and has a different way of thinking about sexuality.  Instead of sexuality being about domination, yes, even included in all the  pleasure of domination, sexuality becomes giving a husband lays down his life  for his wife. His wife lays down her life for her husband, even when Jesus is on  earth, even with single sexual connection, he never being married. But there  were women that attended him and in that culture, even prominent women like  Joanna, they had such a positive role. So even if someone's not married, their  gender is vital to everything. The first person to saw Jesus alive from the dead is a woman. So Christianity does not create gender conflict. In fact, it talks about  serving one another. Early Christianity was characterized as the religion of the  poor, of the woman and of a few rich people who should know better. That was  Celsus in 30 AD. Christianity has always been about equal rights. In Galatians,  we see there is no difference between male or female in Jesus Christ. So that's  the biblical view that sees a beautiful design, sees the beautiful creation. In the  Old Testament, we see the Book of Song, of songs that talks about marital love.  It's extremely erotic. So sex is good. There is no shame as we align ourselves to the biblical narrative. So here we are today in a different place. So sexual  empowerment theory says you can be empowered to that biblical narrative of  your gender and of your sexual response, even if you are not married, your  sexual response can be oriented around God's design. The other theories, the  theory of the post modern would say, is, you know what? There is no God, there  is no universal truth of divinity. There is no design, and everybody can just  construct anything they want in the. Responses of pleasure they desire. If you  want to have a baby, fine have a baby, but there's no design to it. If you want to  identify as a man, though you are a woman, and even if you want to do that part  time, that's fine, but all of these things miss out on one important truth, God has  a plan as a minister. God's plan was to create a man and a woman, and there is  a limit. I can't completely free myself from my very creation of the body that God  gave me, if all becomes chaos through post modern individualism, pretty soon, 

our society has no understanding. And if you look at the history of the world, the  male and female, though fallen, has made societies and cultures. So as you  look through this material, look at it from the concept of the various  perspectives. So what does this mean for ministry? For ministry, you are called  to minister to people in a world that's in chaos right now, in comparison to the  Christian worldview, I call it the sexual empowerment theory worldview. It's a  world where people are confused and unclear, of anxiety, of despair, people are  trying to cope, and everybody has a story today. Somebody could be born a  female, a woman, a female, have some terrible experiences in her childhood,  watch pornography, see that you know, a nicer place to be would be, respond  sexually to another woman, begin masturbating with that response in mind,  create connections in the brain that basically found this to be erotic. And then  when she became older, she looks at men, and men are scary, and, you know, I  don't want to get involved in that. So she declares that she's interested in female company and female sexual response. And because God created sexuality to  have such pleasurable responses, it can fit all the boxes of how to live her life in  a certain direction, and yet, possibly it could reduce her full empowerment. We  believe God has a plan. We believe that God's plan is that man and woman  partner together, work together. And it's not all perfect, we grant that, but it  glorifies the maker. It promotes the gospel, the gospel being serve one another  in love. Out of that serve one another, love becomes sexual response. Out of  that, sexual response comes children, and even if there are no children,  because somehow in somebody could be different ages. There could be a  biological factor that pleasurable response empowers a couple to make a  difference in the world, in their community. The biblical vision is not oppressing  anyone, it's empowering people. Now, where this becomes difficult in ministry is  we live in a world where people now are in that life they're living. They may have come to their sexual identities in their mind, at a whole variety of journeys and  experiences, and they might have heard about their sexual person from a post  modernist at the university, or that, you know, they may have had some  experiences, and then the narratives of watching Netflix or watching television  have sort of like changed the direction that they're going, or pornography at a  young age might have affected the direction, and then through masturbation,  they started working on those connectors and developed all sorts of different  appetites. Remember sins in there too, and spiritual warfare, where people are  moving a certain. Direction. So what do you do? So we on one level, you pray  the Holy Spirit changes someone. And in my observation is that that is  happening all over the world. It's New Life conversion, and part of that  conversion is a different sexual orientation, and we celebrate that another part of it would be for someone that's going to be a journey, and they may engage in  holy masturbation, where, in a moderate way, they're thinking and imagining the  biblical worldview for sexual response. It may be that someone becomes 

celibate. The apostle Paul says, Be Single as I am. But one thing I want to say  about all of it is empowerment. We are not victims. We are not stuck. We are not like, oh, we can't do anything about it. On the other hand, we are not the judges. Jesus said, do not judge, lest you be judged. He who is without sin cast the first  stone. Well, we have a clear Bible worldview, a clear biblical picture of what is a  woman? What is a man? Yes, an organic female, an organic male. We have a  clear understanding of marriage and hot monogamy and God's design. It's a  design of service in self sacrifice. But we're not going to come off to the world  like the critical answer, people, no, it's about empowerment. Would you like to  see what Christianity is all about, what the theory of sexual empowerment is all  about, what Christianity offers into the discussion where I think I get frustrated  about is how these philosophies are posing themselves as a counterfeit gospel  or a counterfeit ministry. So you have the modernist kind of the determinist, and  they'll say, hey, who you are is who you are. It was all in your biology. Any  deviation is the deviation. And yes, and through our therapies will help find a  normal for you. And then the post modernists, oh, all your struggles are really  not struggles. Just identify as that or construct a reality for you, and the gospel is the gospel of it's only you. It's only you. But that's a philosophy. So the  philosophy of queer theory and post modernism is disguised in itself as therapy  or ministry would it's clearly a philosophy of a cynical philosophy that goes way  back to Aristotle's thinking about reacting against Plato. Plato had absolutes.  Aristotle no absolutes. Come on, this is philosophy being re engaged and  repackaged together, and then it's going through colleges and and then this  philosophy changes people's identity and is changing Western culture. But  here's Christianity. So Christianity, ours, is a message that God created the  heavens and the earth, and God created a human, and God created male and  female, and it's beautiful. Male is beautiful. Female is beautiful. Sexual response is beautiful. Having babies is beautiful. Seeing the world in as servant leaders of one another is beautiful. Being a single is beautiful. Being a single man or  woman is beautiful, working together with other men other women is beautiful,  but know that there will be temptation in that, and we'll want to respect each  other's boundaries, and we're we don't want to have every sexual urge that we  think of, that we act upon, because we know that we're seeking to honor God  and as ministers, this is a robust of fun, an amazing a Earth changing  perspective that has been given to us, that we can hand down to others. Couple, concluding. Statements. First of all, we're in a journey on this. Secondly, let's not come off as judgmental. Let's come off as aspirational, like wherever someone's  at. Hey, have you seen the Christian option? Have you seen the sexual  empowerment theory? Oh, what's that? Well, it's a theory that basically sees  God involved in all creation. We're going to, in the future, see incredible things in terms of what the philosophy of queer theory has made people into and made  them head cases about, and it's going to create for the future, many things that 

as ministers we're going to have to deal with. To me, what is our goal? Our goal  is to share the gospel. Our goal is to give hope. There's another worldview out  there. Our goal is to love those who do not know and don't expect that, someone who doesn't know the Lord who doesn't know the power of the gospel is  automatically going to understand what we understand. This is our goal, our  role, our encouragement, to share, to pray, to be ministers. This is ministry  sciences. This is not psychological theory. This is not philosophic theory. This is  a worldview, a belief that God is God and the gospel can change everything  everywhere. So God bless you as you contemplate these complicated subjects,  but know that in some ways it's so simple. God created the heavens and the  earth. God created male and female, and God made it that male and female  together were to populate and to be stewards in the earth, and that together, we  reflect the image of God.