Call Me Carlos Danger

One must wonder if ancient man, after painting images on the cave walls of great battles and beautiful animals, took out a tablet and scratched out a new picture that he flung across the cavern to his lady love. “Look, Myrtle (You got a better name for a cave-dwelling mama?), I send you picture of my penis.” Somehow I think her response, also flung across the cave, would be a tongue-in-cheek, “I guess it was cold today.” It took some effort for our ancestors to send pictures to one another. For us, it can take mere seconds. Sadly, our efficiency has made us less likely to ask the question of whether or not it’s a good idea. Even people that we think should be smarter than us, make stupid decisions when it comes to communicating visually using their smart phones. More than one politician or celebrity’s career has crashed and burned due to leaked photos or videos. The reality is that even if we really trust our partner or go to the precaution of using applications like snap chat, the images we send don’t really go away. In America, some NSA agent has already, no doubt, reviewed your naked selfie to determine if your booty is a threat to national security. And that clever recipient, who may or may not actually be the person you think it is, can pretty easily keep a copy for themselves. From a purely practical side, sexting doesn’t seem like a great idea. Even so, millions do it, with many of them being younger. (It’s not so much that older people are any wiser, just that we realize nobody would keep talking to us if they saw us naked.) Beyond practicality, what are the moral implications of sending sexual pictures? You may recall that when asked to sum up the law of God, Jesus was able to condense it into two basic thoughts: “ And he said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.’” (Matthew 22:37-40 ESV) This is a good starting point to consider whether things not specifically addressed in scripture (Like the use of cell phone cameras) are things we ought to be involved in. Starting with the first part, does sexting show your love for God? Though many might respond to illicit images with “OMG” that is not exactly a devotional statement. It is possible, without blasphemy, to look at one’s spouse’s nude body and praise God for giving them to you. Pics snapped in the bathroom at 3am, however, rarely reflect that attitude. When the person you are communicating with is a stranger or someone to whom you are not married, it is tough to see how it can be pleasing to God when we do things that promote lust or sexual immoral behavior that God has counseled us about avoiding. What about loving our neighbor? Isn’t that what we’re doing? Wink, wink? Barring underage students from the discussion, what does it matter if consenting adults exchange sexy snaps? Is this the kind of selfless love for neighbor Jesus preached and demonstrated? After all, we are essentially reducing the relationship to body parts. I can recall working with teenaged girls who routinely slept with guys in order to feel good about themselves. The young man would comment about how hot she was or that he liked her breasts; they’d participate in sexual behaviors and . . . that was it. There was no relationship, no love, just enough compliments to get some. Those girls ended up devastated and felt worse, instead of better, about themselves. They started to believe that their only value was as a sex object. God created sex to be something awesome that not only provided fun, but actually deepened and matured relationships. Done properly, your spouse should feel more valued as an entire person because of your active sex life. The best case scenario for sexting with non-spouses is that it is essentially benign. If we truly loved our partner, we’d develop a committed relationship and we’d find a better opportunity to express that than hanging out shooting selfies. Having said that, there are potentially legitimate times when exchanging such erotic imagery may be okay. I can imagine a married couple separated due to deployment, work situation, a family emergency or some other reason where they cannot be physically together for an extended period of time. Using technology, they may wish to communicate about all the areas of life including sexuality. As noted in a previous post, the main problem with masturbation is lust. Since your spouse is the legitimate object for your sexual desire, there is no real issue with separated spouses using self stimulation due to physical separation. It can fulfill the law by showing love to God for providing your spouse and love for that person by valuing them and your relationship. The same practical concerns, exist, however. Many people have been embarrassed by accidentally hitting “reply all.” Not an endorsement, per se, but an understanding that it is a possible option in certain settings. Perhaps we should just go ahead and use our cell phone cameras for their proper use–taking pictures of cute animals and posting them all over Facebook, Reddit, YouTube . . .

Is it Private Wo-Manning Now?

Convicted Wiki-leaker Bradley Manning made big headlines recently, not so much for his 35 year sentence for espionage, but for his desire to now be known as Chelsea and to live as a woman. Governor Jerry Brown of California sparked debate as, with his signature, his state became the first where students could choose their own gender with full freedom to use whatever bathroom or locker room they desire. The cultural debate regarding LGBT issues seems to have, after successfully normalizing homosexual conduct for young Americans, moved on to the T–transgender/transsexual issues. How should believers respond to people who choose to live as the opposite gender or believe that they are, in fact, that gender just with the wrong packaging? Before going too far, it is necessary to clarify the issues. There are a small number of persons born each year (Generally believed to be less than 1%) who are biologically gender indeterminate. These intersexed individuals have birth abnormalities that may result in confused male and female genitalia, internal organs or features. We used to call such persons hermaphrodites, though the condition is far broader than that term permits. Some of these individuals require surgery to correct the defects, while others do not. As with any birth defect, we ought to respond with compassion for both parents and children as they deal with their condition. Typically, however, transgender individuals are not struggling with a biological problem, but a psychological one. Before you get too riled up about that, individuals seeking sex reassignment surgery typically require a medical diagnosis prior to undergoing that procedure. Gender dysphoria (Or Gender Identity Disorder) fits the bill. In a nutshell, an individual, despite their biological gender, believes that they are really the other. Surgery seeks to rectify the situation by giving them the gender traits they desire. It is not medically possible, however, to actually change someone’s gender, so these individuals often must take hormones for the rest of their lives in order to maintain their new identity and their genetic structure remains unchanged. So is this a good thing? If Bradley becomes Chelsea is he now a woman in God’s eyes? The verse that probably comes to many Christians’ minds first is:“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” (Genesis 1:27 ESV) It is a good one as it reminds us of God’s intentionality in creating male and female as distinct genders. He assigns our identity, as it were. Perhaps more to the point, however, are a couple of other verses worth examining. “For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” (Psalm 139:12-14a) God doesn’t just, like the Deists posit, sit back and relax after the creation. Nope, He is actively involved in each and every life. It is He that forms that child in the womb–its gender included. That can be puzzling, especially for those of us who would prefer that God had given us better genetics. Whether we are short, tall, freckled, skinny, blind or tone deaf, we are exactly who God wants us to be. That includes our gender. He has a plan that includes sexual identity. At the heart of gender dysphoria is a genuine and heartfelt dissatisfaction with one’s identity. It is as if we are raising our fist to the sky and crying out, “Why did you make me like this!” I don’t want to discount the reality of those feelings. They can be devastating. I have known people with various physical and emotional difficulties that have felt exactly the same way. Truth be told, most of us couldn’t get through Junior High without at least a little bit of that feeling. Here’s the rub, though: are we to be a discontent people? And is the solution to just get what we want? As a Kindergartner, I wanted to be in the circus. My ordinary life in a small apartment in an ordinary town wasn’t nearly as thrilling as the worlds I’d read about. I could be happy only if I were on the flying trapeze, riding an elephant or clowning with the clowns. So should my mother have sent me off to Ringling Brothers? (Not–did she want to send me at times, but should she?) Obviously not. She recognized that I would be just as unhappy there, too. The real issue was learning to be content where I was. Paul had struggled with similar feelings: “Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need.” (Philippians 4:11-12) This was a guy who had been repeatedly beaten, left for dead, imprisoned, knew hunger and had even been afflicted with a “thorn in his side” which God had chosen not to remove. “For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” (1 Corinthians 12:10) Paul learned the secret of having contentment even in sorely disappointing circumstances: “ I can do all things through him who strengthens me.” (Phil 4:13) Uncomfortability with one’s gender is an opportunity for God’s grace. Instead of seeking a new identity to try to feel better about yourself, why not rest in the arms of the One who loves unconditionally? The writer of Hebrews strikes just that chord: “be content with what you have, for he has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’ So we can confidently say, ‘The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?” (Hebrews 13:5b-6) The reality of a transgender existence is that even if one opts for surgery, they are still the same gender they were born as. It similar to a well-known performer bleaching their skin and changing their facial features through surgery in a seeming attempt to reflect less of their racial heritage. It doesn’t matter how much work he had done, he was still an African-American. Many of us wished he had found some way to be content with that identity, to rejoice in it, instead of undergoing countless procedures. The challenge for those struggling with their gender identity is to do the same–learn contentment that grows into joy. But what of the church? How should we respond to those who didn’t heed Paul’s counsel? Ultimately, we want to deal with them like we would with anyone else–with love and grace. They are, after-all, dealing with identity issues we all struggle with at times: Am I the man I should be; am I content to be a wife and mother; does my career define me?; wouldn’t it be nice to be someone else for awhile? We can help them to embrace the person that God created them and intends them to be. That can be difficult. Society likes easier solutions. It sounds odd to describe radical surgery as an easy solution, but it is. The person seeking a new gender is unwilling or unable to deal with who they are (Hence the diagnosis of gender dysphoria), so they just go ahead and pretend to be someone else. It is not an easy thing to do to call upon someone who now refers to himself as Sally to be the man God made him to be. Ultimately, finding contentment with who you are and were made to be will be more fulfilling than playing glorified dress up. We need to drop the anger and bitterness and earnestly seek to love those who are confused about their identity without excusing the sinful discontent that spurs those feelings. As we do so, we must remember that we, too, are sinners who often bridle at our own identities. Together we can turn that T from transgender to trusting that God has a plan for me.

Caught Red-Handed

A hot date with Rosy Palmer and her five sisters. Choke the chicken. Flog the log. Spank the monkey. Put a quarter in the meter. Four of these are euphemisms for masturbation; one is what you do if you don’t want a parking ticket. Hint: Attacking a gibbon won’t get you 15 minutes more parking. It is amazing how many different phrases there are to describe masturbation. For something so infrequently openly discussed, it sure has a long thesaurus entry. It is, however, worth discussing. It has been suggested that. According to polls, 85% of men admit to masturbating while 15% lie about it. It is a very common activity for both men and women. The question is: what does the Bible say about it? Ready to be shocked? Nothing. Well, it shouldn’t be that shocking. The Bible also doesn’t mention the stock market, cell phones or the internet. (Though two of those are often associated with our topic.) The Bible is not a rule book. It doesn’t have an indexed entry for every possible thing you might encounter. At its core, it is about building a relationship with the God who made us. As we learn more about Him and grow in that relationship, we get to see the things that He loves . . . and hates. We also get to see what benefits us most. It’s kind of like getting a tutorial on your new iPhone directly from the late Steve Jobs. So we do have guidance from the Lord about our sexuality, but it is, annoyingly, not just a list of do’s and don’ts. (Annoying, because if there were just a list, if I could find something that wasn’t covered, I could do it with impunity. For example, the Bible never mentions marrying lawn furniture, so. . . dum, dum, da, dum. . . ) Now, if you attended a Catholic school, you probably remember the nuns railing against self-love. (You are also likely to be dealing with phobias of yard sticks and penguins.) You were told to turn from the sin of Onan. Interestingly, onanism is another term for masturbation. Here’s the problem, though: Onan got a bad rap. “Then Judah said to Onan, ‘Go in to your brother's wife and perform the duty of a brother-in-law to her, and raise up offspring for your brother.’ But Onan knew that the offspring would not be his. So whenever he went in to his brother's wife he would waste the semen on the ground, so as not to give offspring to his brother.” (Genesis 38:8-9 ESV) This needs a bit of explanation. The Jews had a law that if a man died without producing an heir, it fell to his next-of-kin to sleep with that man’s wife in order to give her a son. He would then raise that son as if it were the other man’s and that boy would be the heir to the deceased man’s holdings. It was a strange, but sadly, necessary custom of the time. But Onan wanted none of it. Well, not exactly none. He rather enjoyed the whole “having sex with my sister-in-law” part, but he wasn’t so keen on giving a child to his brother. No doubt he expected to gain his lands, or some portion thereof, if no child resulted. So he pulled out before ejaculation and spilled his seed on the ground so that the woman couldn’t conceive. Onan’s sin wasn’t masturbation (In fact, he seems to be practicing good old-fashioned two person sexual intercourse.), it was selfishly denying his brother a legacy. Does that mean that masturbation is okay? There is nothing intrinsically evil about touching one’s own private parts. Babies do it before they have any sense of what Victoria’s secret is. The issue has to do with why one touches themself. And that is, pardon the pun, the rub. For most, the act is designed to elicit sexual arousal. That arousal, typically–unless you are the guy marrying your lawn furniture, is a result of lust. You have sexual thoughts or feeling toward someone or, more often than not, some digitally altered creation of online pornographers. And lust isn’t the best thing for us or our relationships. Jesus taught about this problem. People of His day were trying to be good legalistic rule followers and boast about not having violated that whole adultery command. Then Jesus brings the smackdown. “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” (Mt 5:27-28 ESV) But, but, but. . . I never touched her! The problem is that sin isn’t external. It always starts in the heart. That lustful attitude is just as wrong as the actual act. (And before you go there, actually having sex with someone is just making things worse.) Think of it this way: Your significant other tells you that they have never cheated on you, but that they regularly have sexual thoughts about and masturbate to mental images of all of your friends, people on TV, musicians, etc. How good does that make you feel? How valued? Even if you don’t have someone in your life, lust ends up cheating you. You end up with this crazy imaginary world that will never match reality. You set yourself up for a fall. I’m not pretending that this isn’t a tough issue. As adults, we all struggle with sex, desires and the best ways to act on them. But God really does want the best for you. He created sex, you may recall, and He wants you to enjoy it. (Something we’ll discuss in a later post.) Lust just doesn’t help that. So the simple answer to the question of masturbation is that though the Bible doesn’t address it directly, when you take the sinful motivation of lust away, it isn’t as much fun anymore. If this is an area you have a really tough time with, consider doing some simple things to help. Tell a trusted friend and ask them to hold you accountable (Yes, you will slip up.); put a timer in the bathroom that will go off before you have a chance to get too dirty in the shower; take a porn fast and, one day at a time, skip the sites, snap chats, kiks or whatever it is that tempts you. The nice thing is that it forces you to pay more attention to your partner and to rebuild passion within your relationship.

How to Save Money by Not Buying Oysters

Locker room talk is fascinating. It has almost nothing to do with sports, plays or even whether or not you can remember the combination to your locker. It has become a euphemism for the kind of raunchy conversations that happen in the guys’ locker room. Not being a female, I don’t know if similar conversations happen on their side, but I imagine they spend their time talking about world events, poetry and recipes for baked yams. . . or discussing which new movie vampire is super hot! The guys, though, talk about sex. A lot. As a young teen, I can remember boys talking about sexual stuff and remarking, “You know what I mean?” I didn’t. But you can’t let them know that, so you just go along and create, out of whole cloth, things that, when said with authority, become new truth to the group. That is, I imagine, how the notion of oysters as an aphrodisiac began: “You know what gets a girl hot? Oysters.” Yep, slimy, raw, fishy-stinking globules. Nothing sexier. If you ask a question, however, you end up mocked and ridiculed, so you just don’t ask. So we get into the habit of avoiding difficult and awkward questions . . . and not just about sex. There are tons of questions that we ponder, but are too uncomfortable to ask. We either don’t want to look stupid or we honestly don’t want to know. I can remember living in a ministry residence during college that had a phone booth. (You probably have no idea what that is, but Superman used to dress in one and Dr. Who travels around in one, of sorts.) Before cell phones, you would put quarters into the slot in order to call your friends. Ours was broken, however. You could call without putting money in. Sadly, our staff didn’t bother to ask why that was. They preferred not to know, so that they could feel less guilty about using the phone to call long distance. Many of our questions are like that when it comes to God. We don’t want to ask what the Bible says about something because it might mean we shouldn’t be doing that. So we keep silent. It is a good time, however, to break the silence and go ahead and ask those weird, creepy, awkward questions that bounce around in the back of our craniums. (Crania? Should have taken Latin!) I’ve had a lot of experience with such things. People don’t often feel comfortable talking to their pastor about them, (What would he think of me?) But the youth pastor? No problem. I get asked about stuff as diverse as shop-lifting, masturbation or, one of my favorites, a question from a home school mothers group about anal sex in marriage. (That was a fun phone call.) So feel free to ask you question anonymously by sending it to me at ipymin@gmail.com. As you ask, think about where your beliefs about things come from. Is it set by your culture? Philosophy? Parents? Peers? My responses unashamedly start with scripture and that can lead to some uncomfortable places for some people. I’m not interested in being all judgmental, but in simply sharing what God’s Word says on the subject. If it is silent, I will tell you that, too. I will treat the responses like a doctor treats you as a patient. She doesn’t tell you what you want to hear, but what you need to hear. I should also note that some of the topics will be of a more adult nature, so if you are shocked by questions about sex, you probably should turn back now. Let’s clear out of the locker room and start getting answers to those awkward questions.