Selected Scriptures

February 21, 2021

Evening Service

Sean Higgins

Or, Pronouns Are Not a Preference

Series: Centers and Circumferences #12

Introduction

It’s hard to imagine anything so obvious and obscene, so laughable but heart-breaking, so inarguable yet argued, as those who can’t (or won’t) tell the difference between the sexes. We are in a very bad, not good day when male and female are subjective, debatable, pliable, and at times indiscernible. At least we’re moving toward a totally wireless society, because pretty soon it’s going to be a hate crime to plug things into a socket.

The sphere of sexuality is ubiquitous, even inescapable, and seems to somehow be becoming more exhausting every day. Understanding sexuality as a noun affects the nature of our identity, which affects what we pursue as ideal. Understanding sexuality as a verb affects the narrative of our relationships, especially our view of marriage and family and generations. While our Christian sub-culture thinks that the wider culture has gone crazy, they think we are in a cult. It used to be, “Do you want to be my girlfriend, yes or no?” And now it’s “Am I a girl? I don’t know.”

This Centers and Circumferences series has the aim to consider Christ’s lordship over various spheres of life under the sun. We are seeing how Christ provides the focal point–the center, and has interests extending out to the edges–the circumference. Sexuality, considered today as divided into gender identity and orientation, is different than, for example, Kuyperianism and Economics, in that sexuality is built into our person, part of our DNA, in a way unlike a man’s paycheck or purchases.

In what I’ve read by Abraham Kuyper I can’t recall him explicitly addressing the subject of sexuality. But there are some principles of Kuyperianism and its weltanschauung (world-and-life-view) that will help us keep our heads. To be clear, Kuyperian Sexuality is not about his sexual appeal.

As the elders also maintain, we are a church that teaches Dispensationalism, which comes from an approach to reading the Bible that, ironically, led to our becoming Kuyperian Dispensationalists. It turns out that Dispensationalists have not offered much when it comes to cultural issues, and even if they have, it isn’t from their Dispensationalism, it is almost always in spite of it. This series has been more of an opportunity to show that we Dispies can think outside of being Left Behind, not necessarily our attempt to contribute. But tonight I’d like to consider sexuality as a Kuyperian Dispensationalist and then tell you what I see as some really good news when it comes to our current cultural degeneration.

We need some encouragement for our souls, for raising our kids, for endurance in the re-education camps, for withstanding the propaganda, and for giving glory to God in whose image we are made.

It’s Bad Out There

Our culture has been circling the sexuality drain for a while. We have problems, serious and public. The gaslighting game is strong, and we are told that we’re the crazy ones. Trying to talk about what is “natural” is taken as oppression by those who want to be “free.” While we don’t glory in the depravity, we are to see it for what it is.

> “Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them.” (Ephesians 5:11)

Pornography is explicit and accessible in ways unimagined by previous generations, which messes with both the noun and verb of sex. It removes context, relationship, and the liturgy of porn teaches that physical release is the only goal. It messes with our brains, our expectations, and our consciences.

Schools have embraced explicit sex-education at the earliest grades with crude materials. It ends up causing more confusion and leads young people into despair. Therapists have become aut[...]