The central theme of today's discourse revolves around the intricate topics of gender and sexuality, as we engage in a profound conversation with the esteemed Dr. Mark Yarhouse. As an eminent professor and director of the Institute for Sexual and Gender Identity at Wheaton College, Dr. Yarhouse brings a wealth of knowledge to our discussion, particularly regarding the contemporary cultural conversations surrounding these subjects. We delve into the nuances of gender and sexual identity, exploring the emotional and psychological dimensions that individuals may navigate in their lives. Furthermore, we seek to equip parents and spiritual leaders with wisdom on how to approach these sensitive matters with grace, compassion, and fidelity to their convictions. Our aim is to foster understanding and empathy, recognizing the diverse perspectives that exist within the broader community while remaining anchored in our faith.

Takeaways:

• The Clarity Podcast aims to provide insightful discussions regarding gender and sexuality, encouraging understanding and compassion.
• Dr. Mark Yarhouse, a leading expert in gender and sexual identity, shares profound insights into contemporary cultural conversations.
• Parents navigating discussions with children about gender and sexuality are encouraged to respond with love while maintaining their convictions.
• Engaging in conversations about gender and sexuality requires sensitivity and a willingness to understand differing perspectives without judgment.
• The podcast emphasizes that Christians should focus on love and truth in relationships.
• Ultimately, the goal is to demonstrate the love of Christ through our interactions with individuals facing gender and sexual identity challenges.

Hey there and welcome back to the Clarity Podcast.

This podcast is all about providing clarity, insight and encouragement for life and mission.

And my name is Aaron Sanemier and I get to be your host.

Today we have the phenomenal opportunity to sit down with Dr. Mark Jarhouse and get to learn from him about gender and sexuality.

He is a professor and leads the Institute at Wheaton on this in the subject matter and subject area.

And so we get to sit down and just learn from him about the conversations that are going on in gender and sexuality in our culture today, maybe some of the differences and similarities between gender and sexual identity.

He is able to talk about some of the things that go on in the hearts and minds of those that are faced with this challenge, Give some advice, some wisdom for parents that are navigating this with their children, how to respond to a child that is struggling.

With this alignment and at the same time hold their convictions.

So how do you love your children and at the same time not feel like you're not holding to your convictions?

And then some wisdom and insight for pastors and missionaries on how they can not necessarily shy away from these discussions, but be able to engage them with grace, with truth, with the love of Christ and the importance of that.

And just once again, I just think you might not agree with everything he says, and that's perfectly understandable.

But I think having guests like this on the podcast, that kind of can stretch our mind, stretch our perspective, and it also helps us turn to God and say, have him give us wisdom and insight on what we truly believe and how we can care for people and share the love of Christ with people, and specifically people maybe that don't see the world.

We do.

The same way we do.

Or maybe you're seeing the world through a different lens.

You know, as Christians, we see it through the lens of Jesus Christ.

And sometimes gender and sexuality can become a lens in which people see the world through.

And so how can we put Christ first?

And all of the things are seen through Him.

So really enjoyed Mark being on the podcast, appreciated having an esteemed guest like him on, and just want to thank a friend who made the connection and I want to thank her for that very, very much.

Do want to ask you to continue to subscribe to the podcast.

I know the PODC I subscribe to are the ones that I show up on my feed and I know what I'm going to get to listen to throughout the rest of the week and just, it's just been a joy to do this for six plus years.

Well, there's no time better than now to get started.

So here we go.

Greetings and welcome back to the Clarity podcast.

So excited to be here today with a new friend, Mark.

Welcome to the podcast.

Oh, thanks, Aaron.

I'm really delighted to be here.

Mark, my friend Dr. Carrie Marsh got to hear you present at a conference and she said you need to have Mark on to your podcast.

And so I reached out to you and so kind to spend some time with me today.

For those who weren't at that conference and didn't get to hear you speak there, haven't seen you or heard you speak in the past.

Will you share a little bit about yourself before I jump into some questions today?

I'm excited for this conversation.

Sure.

Yeah.

So my name is Mark Yarhouse.

I'm a professor of psychology at Wheaton College, which is about an hour west of Chicago.

And I direct the Sexual and Gender Identity Institute, which is kind of a research institute for studying the intersection between either sexual identity or gender identity and religious identity.

So usually we.

Or studying the experiences of Christians.

And so sexual identity and gender identity is like same sex attractions would be sexual identity, and then phenomenon like transgender experiences would be gender identity.

Wow.

And so are those new.

I'm getting off script already, but those two.

You, you already talked about those three different categories.

Are those newer terms like gender identity, sexual identity?

Would you say a religious identity?

The third one there?

Yeah, just.

Yeah, just.

It's.

We don't exclusively study Christians, but most of the people that we work with and do research with would identify as Christian.

But we, yeah, we work with.

With everybody.

So are those newer segments of gender and sexuality, or is that something that's been for 40, 50 years?

I'm just trying to think of where they.

Because honestly, for me, you know, growing up, I didn't hear much about gender or sexuality, and it seems to be more prominent today.

That's.

That was.

That's my root of that question.

Yeah, it's definitely more common, more prevalent, more.

More of a conversation today.

I mean, the language is just describing, you know, you, you probably grew up knowing people who are gay.

And so when people describe themselves as gay or tell other people that they're gay, they're using what we just call sexual identity labels.

So it's even saying you're straight is a sexual identity label.

It's just a description of like your, your patterns of attraction or your underlying orientation.

That's all that refers to.

Okay, all right.

And then gender would be how you feel as man or woman.

Is that.

Is that the differentiation between the two?

Yeah.

So gender is kind of the psychological, social.

Elements of being like a man or a woman or boy or a girl.

It is tethered to biological sex, which is your, you know, your chromosomes and your genitalia.

So they're not identical, but they're obviously, they're super related to each other.

And then gender identity is like how you understand yourself and communicate that to other people.

Just correspondingly about your gender being a man or a woman.

And then it could get into the, do I identify as transgender?

Do I identify as non binary?

You know, language like that.

Wow.

Fascinating.

Fascinating.

So, and so you.

I guess that was one of my questions I had for you.

The similarities between that.

How can parents that maybe are not versed in these conversations don't necessarily know how to have conversations with their kids about gender and sexual identity.

How do they begin to.

At least you gave great points there to understand the difference.

So that's.

That's good for me to understand the difference and that gives you.

I feel like I'm more intelligent already.

But how do they discuss and describe the similarities and difference between the two?

Is that a fair question for you?

Yeah.

I mean, part of it is, you know, your child, you're depending on their age, you know, they're probably pretty familiar with the things that we're talking about through school or Internet or whatever.

So, I mean, I think it's just helpful to remember that when someone talks about, like, their gender identity as, like, transgender, they're not telling you anything about their sexual attractions.

It's a different category.

So sexual attractions brings you over to sexual identity.

Gay, bisexual, that conversation, gender is going to be more boy, girl, man, woman, and then maybe into the transgender conversation.

So just being clear that, you know, sometimes when.

When teenager, young adult comes out as trans, parents don't always even know are we talking about who they want to be sexually active with or, you know, that's not even the conversation that your teenagers having with you.

They're talking about something else.

Wow.

Wow.

And so in your, your experience, what.

What's going on or what happens internally and externally when someone doesn't feel that they.

They align is.

Is that maybe they're born their sexual.

I. I don't know.

I don't want to say it wrong.

So I don't know exactly how to describe this.

That someone feels like their body is of a man or a boy, but they.

They feel like they are gender of someone else?

Is that, is that.

Am I describing it correctly?

Yeah, I Think maybe one of the classic descriptions would be someone who says, like a biological male who says, I'm a woman trapped in the body of a male.

Like, that's kind of like the classic transgender phenomenon.

And that's been around for a long time.

I mean, that.

That there are many, many cases of that phenomenon, but it's not clear what causes it, you know, what.

How it comes about for people.

It's.

There's not a ton of research on this.

There's more research actually on sexual orientation, what makes someone have a gay or homosexual orientation.

But even there, we don't know what causes that.

But I'm just saying there's more research on it.

There's even less research on.

Transgender phenomenon and things like that.

So it's.

It's.

It's one of the harder things that we face in my field as a. I'm a clinical psychologist, so I meet with people and talk with people about things and.

Or in ministry.

You know, it's just.

It's.

It's one of these things that we just don't know.

And so I think there's some things that we're pretty confident do not cause it.

Probably the.

The number one thing that sometimes circulates through ministry circles is somehow the idea that parents cause their children to be gay or to be transgender.

And I don't think there's good research on that that would support that claim at all.

And I, sometimes I call that the John 9 problem.

Like in John 9, the disciples go to Jesus and they say, well, who sinned that this man is.

Is born blind?

Did he sin or did his parents sin?

And of course, Jesus famously says, neither have sinned.

And so he kind of points to more like.

A meaning tied to why someone might be presenting the way that they are.

And he says, you know, and essentially God can be glorified in this.

And so that actually points, I think, in a direction for parents or for people in ministry that we may have to.

Have some peace about not knowing, like, the cause, the causal explanation for why one person's gay or one person straight, one people.

Person has this kind of, you know, discordant gender identity.

Most people don't.

Maybe we will never know why that is this side of eternity.

But Scripture kind of points us in the direction of, how do you make you.

How can God be glorified in this?

How do you.

How do you make meaning out of this?

And I think that's really going to be important for Christians.

Wow.

That discordant reality, emotionally, psychologically, you know, we we say we're the body of Christ, the church.

We want to love, we want to care for people.

And you want to, you want to understand any, any, any guidance you can give us on under maybe having an understanding what's going on emotionally for somebody that's.

That feels that way.

So that we can respond in a compassionate way.

Is that, does that make sense?

Yeah, that's, that's great.

So I think so.

One, one thing is to.

I'll give you a couple of ways people have described this.

So we also have an outward facing clinic at our institute.

So I meet with families, I do evaluations around gender.

We call it gender dysphoria.

That's the actual diagnosis.

This is when there's distress that's associated with that discordance.

So for the vast majority of people, their gender identity aligns with their biological markers.

But for a small percentage of people, there's that misalignment or that discordance.

And when that's distressing to people, we call it gender dysphoria.

So if euphoria is a positive emotional state, dysphoria is a negative emotional state.

And so when I've asked people, can you describe it for me?

Because I've never experienced that.

Most people I know have never experienced that.

What's that been like for you?

So one person said, it's like puzzle pieces that just don't fit together.

You know, you try to ever try to, like, wedge that in there and say, well, I'm gonna make that fit, but it doesn't fit.

And they, they look around, they wonder why, how does it fit for other people?

And it doesn't fit for me.

So that's one person.

Another person said, it's like dissonance in music.

It's like a tonal combination that's seeking a resolution, but it never resolves.

Like, just in that constant state of lack of resolution.

Third person said, it's like.

It feels like in my stomach, like it's just unsettled all the time, and I'm just sick of feeling this way, and I just want to be normal.

And so you get, you know, you get different descriptions of it.

And it can be mild, it can be moderate, and it can be severe.

And if you had three people in front of you, one person could have mild, moderate, severe.

If you had one person in front of you, that person throughout the next several weeks or months could experience mild, moderate, and severe.

Because it can sort of spike at times, right?

It can be worse some days than other days.

So it's really interesting in that way.

Because it's, you know, I think this.

The understanding and then the realities.

And I appreciate the.

Appreciate the.

Yeah, the word pictures, because I do think.

I do think parents and friends, they want to.

They want to understand, but.

And there are ways to ask the questions.

Mark, you've already gathered for me.

I'm afraid of asking the wrong question or to phrase the question in the wrong way, that somehow my question is going to offend somebody.

So what are ways that we can ask questions?

Is a believer, follower of Jesus, that I can ask questions that it's not received in a judgmental way or some you're making a mistake you don't even know you're making.

Does that.

Does that.

Is that.

Yeah, I think a lot of people feel the same way, and so sometimes it just doesn't get talked about.

Like, we're really anxious about it.

So we all kind of collude on silence.

So I think if you're.

If it's a parent, you know, or even someone like, in youth ministry, I don't think I would go to a young person and say, are you, you know, transgender?

You know, do you have dysphoria?

I think that would put someone on the spot.

I think what young people do is they look for who they could talk to.

And so I think one thing to consider is just kind of prepare yourself in this space, you know, maybe just inviting God to, you know, to, you know, to kind of prepare your heart and your mind to be someone that someone could trust this part of their life with.

They could open this up to you.

And so, Lord, you know, just asking God, prepare me.

If that's something you want me to be prepared to do, then, you know, help me through this podcast or other things that I'm reading.

Maybe I'm in a better position than I was just a couple weeks ago that if someone came to me, I'd be able to ask good questions.

So I think the prayers on the front end is a good place to prepare your heart and your mind, just being aware of these things.

If God brings people into your life who are navigating these questions, you know, they're watching to see how you talk about this topic.

A lot of the ways that this topic is discussed today is in political terms.

You're either pro gay or you're anti gay, you're pro trans, or you're anti trans.

And of course, Christians can sometimes get caught up in that same polarizing discourse.

So we're not pro gay or anti gay or pro trans or Anti trans.

We're pro the image of God in all people.

And so God wants a relationship with people.

And so we want to sort of carry that heart forward that people are beloved by God.

Now they may be facing things that you've never faced.

They may be making decisions that you believe you wouldn't make if you were in that situation.

But the reality is.

You want to be somebody through thought, word and deed that they would trust with this part of their experience.

So one question is, do I have a track record of people coming to me with any other kinds of things, you know, whether you know what you name it.

And so I think you kind of want to be that person.

And then if someone shares, if it's your, you know, your teenager, young adult or someone in ministry comes to you and says the hey, I, I wanted to let you know that I am trans.

Okay, then I think what you want to do is say first of all, thank you for sharing that with me.

You know, thank you for trusting me with that part of your experience.

Kind of, kind of open that up a little bit.

You might even say something like, I've known other people who've also used that word to describe their experience and sometimes they've meant slightly different things.

I'm wondering for you, you know, how what that means for you.

That might be a nice open ended question to let them sort of tell you a little bit more.

Yeah, no, that's good.

And like I said, you don't want to turn, you don't want to say the wrong thing and put a wall up there.

When you're trying to build a bridge and you're trying, you, you do want to be a safe place to try to understand.

And so I think that's, that's been some of the tension because as you said, I think even in my, my personal life, a lot of times I'll, you just don't talk about it because you're either afraid of saying the wrong thing, maybe you're uncomfortable with it.

And so do you find that maybe in the church that we're just uncomfortable with the topic and so we avoid it and is.

I don't.

Does that make sense?

I think we avoid uncomfortable and maybe sometimes awkward for us conversations.

How can we grow in that?

So we don't.

Because you said we want to promote the image of Christ and the dignity that God has put in each and every one of us.

But if we avoid the conversations that people are having challenges with, then I don't necessarily know if we're doing that well.

Yeah, I think casting a vision for sort of who God calls us to be in Scripture around.

Generally how we engage the broader culture.

So in my thinking, we kind of have two extremes in our society.

Among Christians, we have culture warriors who believe that every conversation in this space is something you've got to defend yourself.

Yourself and the church and God against.

It's, you know, super threatening to norms that we hold to be true.

And so they feel like they're kind of embattled, their values are embattled, so they're kind of at.

At war with.

So even being compassionate sounds like, whoa, you're just, you're going down a slippery slope.

And so they're ready to fight.

And on the other extreme, you have what I would call cultural capitulators, which are people who just.

Anything goes.

And so if the Trevor Project reports, there's over 100 sexual identities and over 100 gender ident, these Christians are like, okay, well, thanks for letting me know.

Like, they're just kind of going about.

They don't even bring a Christian worldview into that conversation.

Right.

So I think Scripture teaches us to be ambassadors.

We're to be cultural ambassadors.

We're ambassadors of the kingdom of heaven to a culture around us that's increasingly unfamiliar with the ways that Christians think about sex and gender.

And so we wouldn't expect people to have the same language and categories for the things that we believe to be true.

And so, yeah, when you talked earlier about that wall versus that bridge, be thinking about the bridge.

What's the bridge to a culture that's drifting kind of further and further away from just the way that Christians think about these things?

How can I build a bridge to people versus put a wall up?

Yeah, someone.

You know, I was.

I was listening to a podcast.

Oh, probably about two or three years ago, and they were talking about they.

They do ministry in Islamic context.

And they said, you know, when I go in that context, I don't need to explain to a Muslim what, that I'm a Christian.

And this is.

They already know what I believe.

And they said, you know, in these conversations, when it comes to gender and sexuality, sometimes we lead with, hey, I don't agree with what you're doing.

Hey, I don't agree with this.

I don't agree with that.

I don't agree with that.

And it builds walls from the beginning.

And they said, you know, in general, people already, they have an understanding that maybe you're not.

You don't agree with all of.

And so you don't need to Lead with stating all the things you don't, all the things you disagree with.

Would you agree with that?

Not agree with.

It was convicting for me.

I remember where I was at on the interstate when, you know, when I heard that conversation, because I think when it came to these conversations of gender and sexuality, I somehow needed to give my statements or my declarations in the beginning of a conversation.

But it made me realize I was just building walls from the beginning, and there was no way to establish a relationship and.

And at least share the dignity of Christ and recognize that rather than building walls.

Does that make any sense, Mark?

Yeah, I think there's a lot of truth in that, and I think especially when Christians become somewhat compassionate or empathic, it's almost like an egg timer goes off every 10 minutes in a conversation.

We just have to remind people what our convictions are one more time.

And I agree with the person you heard who said, you know, people generally know as a.

That as a Christian, you know, especially evangelical kind of a Christian, you know, have convictions about sexuality and gender, and you have a sense of what's kind of right and wrong.

So replaying that over and over again just kind of falls into that.

That wall building sort of.

You know, it's almost like we're defending God, and God doesn't need us, I think, in that moment, to defend him, but he has placed us in a position, a relationship, to extend.

The heart of God, the heart of the Father, towards this person.

So God wants a relationship with this person.

So just like you would think, you know, being a missionary to a different culture, you do want to contextualize the Gospel to the mainstream LGBTQ community, which has really emerged as a culture of sorts in Western society.

So that's one way to think about it.

Like, you already have the tools.

You do this all the time.

If your neighbor who's straight and doesn't know the Lord, you know, doesn't know the Lord, then you have an opportunity to be in a relationship with that person.

It's not different if your other neighbors, transgender or gay, like, you know what I mean?

It's if they don't know the Lord, they don't know the Lord.

So it's like, okay, we get caught up.

I think, in the other analogy I'd use is kind of the iceberg.

Like, we get caught up in what's above the surface, which is the language of gay, transgender, these types of things, and we miss what's below the surface, which is, like, the desire to respond to the transcendent, the.

The Desire in all of our hearts to like, you know, what am I here for?

Why am I here?

You know, and what's the bigger purpose of life around me?

Like, those are the things we should be ministering to.

And so parents that are listening in, you know, they've maybe had conversations with their kids that they never thought they would have, and they're struggling personally.

Any wisdom for parents, maybe they're listening in Mark, that they're afraid if they listen, somehow they're agreeing.

Does that.

You know what I mean?

And I think those are two different things.

In my job in member care, I share frequently, I'll listen to anybody.

I can't agree to everything you say.

Right.

But, you know, I want to listen.

I want to hear.

But sometimes parents, as I've talked with parents, their concern is if they listen and they're building bridges, then somehow that'll be taken as they agree with their kids and they're championing it.

Does that make sense?

Yeah.

Yeah, that probably is that egg timer going off and they have to kind of remind them what their convictions are.

So for me, this idea of ambassadorship is characterized by three Cs, conviction, civility, and compassion.

So for the parent, you know, okay, it's good to kind of take, take a bit of a, an account of what your, what you believe about sexuality and gender as a Christian, okay, Those are your convictions.

Okay.

Civility is being respectful of your child, of their friends of the community.

There's no reason to denigrate their friends or people who are in this space who are making decisions, again, that you believe you would make different decisions if it was you.

But you're saying, you know, I.

I'm going to be almost uncivil towards them because of the way this, this dialogue's happening.

Of course, the Internet and social and digital media just amplifies all that.

So I think for the Christian to step into those spaces and say, no, I'm going to be civil, I'm going to be respectful.

I'm going to talk about and treat people in this space with the respect that they're due.

And I'm especially going to be mindful of the friends of my son or daughter because they're listening to how we talk about people that they love, that they care about.

Right?

And so conviction, civility, and then compassion, like, if this is not your personal experience, you don't know what that dysphoria feels like and you don't know what those challenges are that they're facing.

So just a little bit more compassion for Somebody who's probably navigating some really difficult things in their life.

Even if they're presenting with a lot of pride and a different kind of emotional experience than distress that I'm talking about, you can still have compassion.

That underneath some of that may be some real searching questions that they've had about God and their relationship and who they are and all these different pieces.

Yeah, and my father in law shared with me, he said, you know, there's the presented reality and then there's the.

There's the real reality, you know, and I think that's just what you, you know, you, the presented, sometimes it can come off strong, confident, and sometimes it's, you know, there's some insecurities that are there that, you know, they're maybe overcompensating on that.

When it comes to conversations that every Christian should have about faith, gender, and sexuality.

Do you believe that every Christian should be having these conversations?

And, and how do, how do they.

How do we.

What's a good place to start if you don't know where to start?

Where.

Where.

Where do you start?

Well, around faith, gender, and sexuality.

You know, I think, first of all, I don't know that every Christian should be having these conversations, but I think every Christian should be prepared to have these conversations.

They're just kind of everywhere, you know, and so, you know, I didn't always sit down and, like, prepare and expect I was going to now have this conversation.

But I think, you know what, we would always watch like, the Amazing Race or shows like that, and there'd always be like a gay couple or there' you know, things happen.

Like, at one time, I was picking up pizza with my son, and one of the workers coming out of the pizza place to do a delivery was transgender.

And so, you know, here's my son, he's maybe 8 years of age, saying, yo, yeah, I don't understand what we just, you know, what.

Just what was going on there.

And so, like, you have to be prepared as a parent to respond and use language that makes sense developmentally to their age and explain what's happening there.

Now.

I also think it's good to.

No, I think what I said to my son at the time was something like, you know, most people, like, you're a boy and I'm a man.

And for most people, you know, their body.

Mirrors or aligns with what they.

How they think about themselves.

And for a small number of people that doesn't line up.

And I think we just saw somebody where that didn't line up.

And so they're trying to figure out what to do.

And so I just, just, I went more with compassion in that situation.

I mean, I taught, I taught the norm, but I also noted that there's exceptions to that.

And I want you to think about that.

Must be a hard road to go down, is to kind of figure out how to respond when your experience doesn't line up with your body the way it does for everybody else.

Like, I kind of want to err on the side of compassion.

I still want to teach the norms, but I don't know that I know exactly what that person should do in that situation.

So a little bit of compassion, a little bit of empathy would go a long way.

And just a, you know, you have no time to prep this.

You're not Googling anything at that point.

You're like, your son just said this to you.

He's asked you a question.

You got to respond.

So I think being prepared for that is really important.

Yeah.

Mark, you've said a few times throughout the norm is that people don't.

There's not a, there's not a discordance there.

I think some, some.

My perception only, you know, I've been in Africa for the last 20 some odd years, until recently, media perception, it seems to make you think that this, it's common.

It's the, the other.

The other.

The discordance would actually be the norm.

And those that don't have the discordance would be the anomaly.

And is that just my perception or is that something that's in the media?

Or is that just maybe the way I've seen it?

Or my defensiveness of it?

Because does seem, I don't know.

You just talked about Amazing Grace.

I love the show, but sometimes there's discordance.

You see the percentage of people that would re present.

It's discordant there.

Any thoughts on that?

Well, we are seeing increases in prevalence estimates in national surveys.

The one that I track a fair amount is just the Gallup poll where they ask people if they're not, you know, heterosexual, so be identifying as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender.

And, and I, and I think the most recent one was something like 9.1%.

Something like that of American pop adult population.

But then if you break that down to transgender, non, binary, it was something like, I think it was like 4%.

But this is by generational cohorts.

You think of like Gen Z, I think they were the high end.

Like, like, like 4.1 or 4.2, something like that.

And then millennials were like 2 point something and it kind of comes down into one and under one we get to Gen X and boomers.

So.

So I think you're seeing an increase in younger cohorts identifying with non traditional gender identities and sexual identities.

So the question I think, which is more of a research question is is that they were always there and now with societal acceptance, they're telling us in surveys, I'm here, but before they wouldn't have.

Or is it something else that's going on?

And I think we just don't really know.

I mean, I think part of it's self awareness, part of it is social acceptance.

But there's other questions that have come up.

Is it, is it, is it, are people gravitating towards, toward it for a sense of identity and community?

And maybe a generation ago they would have landed on something else that was really salient.

But, but right now, you know, transgender as a phenomenon has really become more central in the cultural discourse.

And so maybe younger people, if they land on something in search for identity and in search for community, maybe they land there.

I don't, I'm not saying that's most people in that space, but I am saying maybe that happens for some people just like it would have happened in a different place, you know, a generation ago.

Yeah, Mark, you've, you spent, you got a lot, you have education and you lead in the space is there and worked and cared for people that have been, that have been struggling with gender and sexual alignment.

Are there areas that you've changed your change your thoughts or opinions on.

Over the last 10 or 15 years and maybe things that you used to focus on that you don't necessarily focus on now?

Yeah, or things you concentrated heavily on, you don't necessarily concentrate heavily on now.

So just kind of asking a question how you have, you've invested a lot of time, effort and experience in growing and caring for people.

Have you changed at all in those seasons?

Well, when I first started my career that what was more central in the cultural discussion was sexual identity.

So gay, lesbian, I mean these topics, I mean entire denominations were splitting over, over whether it blessed same sex unions.

You know, in that time we would eventually have the Supreme Court ruling around marriage.

Like a lot has changed in our culture in that, you know, that span of time.

And so, so yeah, I mean, when that was definitely the focus of a lot of my scholarship was around those issues, but I always saw people navigating gender identity was just such a rare phenomenon.

I never really thought it would become what it has become.

Today.

And, you know, help them in terms of discipleship and their faith and things like that.

And it was like youth ministers were telling me where the culture was going.

So I brought a proposal for a book to my publisher.

This was InterVarsity Press at the time, and it was a.

It would become a book called Understanding Gender Dysphoria.

And I don't think the church is prepared for this conversation.

And, you know, I think they took a risk.

They weren't sure they were going to, you know, issue me a contract.

But, you know, they.

I had published with them before.

I think they just felt like, well, we'll.

We'll, you know, placate him a little bit.

But, you know, my.

And I think, you know, that kind of in some ways symbolized, you know, this.

This moment for our culture.

And then you'd see it in, you know, television and movies, and it would just be increasingly, you know.

Represented in media and entertainment and things like that.

So it was.

That's probably been the biggest shift is kind of a. I still study, you know, lgb, gay and lesbian issues, but I am now doing it alongside, you know, transgender issues because they're both really important and they're pretty divisive topics.

Very difficult topics to cover.

Yeah.

And as you studied those, have you.

Have you changed at all in the process?

I mean, you said your focus.

But if.

Is your understanding changed any at all over those years?

I guess if I were to drill down on one thing that I was a little more confident around, it was early on I was just familiar with the research on whether orientation changes.

And I was more.

Wondering, why are people ignoring these different studies that have been published showing orientation change?

And then I would participate in a study I did a seven year.

What's called longitudinal.

So you track people for seven years, and they're in Christian ministries all over the country.

And the co investigator and I looked at people's experience over that time.

And when we first published our report in a book called X Gaze, you know, we were documenting cases that appeared to be change of orientation.

And then we kept tracking them for the next, you know, a total of like six to seven years.

And then we published that in a scientific journal.

And this is where, you know, I drew different conclusions at that point.

I feel, here's what I, here's what I saw in the data, not what I felt, but I saw in the data was that the changes that were reported were in the first year of being involved in a ministry and then they were just maintained over the next five or six years.

Well, that seemed odd to me.

In fact, the ministry leaders kept telling us, keep doing the study, the changes will come, the changes will come.

So we kept doing the study for six, seven years.

But the change that occurred that was reported was at the very beginning, the first year.

So then the question is, well, what changes in the first year?

If you're gay and sexually active and you're above and then you go into this ministry, what changes for people in the first year?

Well, the two things that change in particular is behavior.

You're trying to leave a pattern of behavior that used to characterize you as a person.

So behavior would change.

And then in many of the ministries, people were told not to call themselves gay anymore, to use descriptive language, say that you're same sex attracted.

And so as I looked at the measures, that's where much of the change was being reported was behavioral.

And in terms of identification.

Now I'm not saying that in no cases there was an underlying attractions that ever changed.

But what I found was there were kind of two extreme critics of our study.

There were cynical pessimists who said nobody has ever experienced any change whatsoever.

And I think our data pushed back against that.

And then there were arrogant optimists who said anybody who tries hard enough and has enough faith can expect 180 degree change.

And we didn't report either of those things.

So none of those extreme groups like this study.

And ultimately I felt like probably what most of the change was was more identity and behavior.

So that's probably an area if you were to say what, you know, was there a change?

But I, I'm still, you know, I'm a conservative evangelical, you know, believing in marriage between a man and a woman and that sex is intended for marriage.

So I mean, I, I would describe myself traditional, you know, conservative evangelical in those ways.

Those views haven't changed.

Probably become more compassionate, more empathic, you know, towards people in this space.

I think that's important and that's, that's definitely a change.

Yeah.

And no, I Appreciate that you have dedicated a lot of, of your life and your, your wisdom and experience and the, you know, I'm a scientist too at heart, so I love, love those studies and it, I do think that, you know, the data speaks right and so you can, people can want data to say one thing, but the numbers are there and the information you find is there.

Mark, for those that the majority of people listen in to this podcast are missionaries serving around the world.

Any last words of wisdom that you'd like to share with them?

Any words of encouragement to them when it comes to them as they share the gospel when it comes to gender and sexuality?

Yeah, I mean here's what I would caution people in Christian ministry against hyper claiming in two directions.

So let's not hyper claim theories of causation that don't have much research support.

So I mentioned one theory was parents.

The other theory is sexual abuse.

And it is true that a higher rate, you know, adults who identify as gay or transgender at higher rates would report sexual abuse in their childhood.

But it's not a theory of causation.

I think it complicates sexuality for people, but it's not a reliable like theory of what causes people to have this underlying orientation.

So I think we have to avoid hyper claiming, especially blaming parents because then parents go to a ministry to get help and they are told by the ministry that, you know, it's the parent child relationship and that's just, there's just not the data to support that.

So let's not hyper claim those types of theories, but let's also not hyper claim an outcome that even scripture doesn't prove.

Promise us like, you know, let's say that there is sexual abuse in someone's background.

Okay, let's minister to that.

But let's not hyper claim that if we did that they'd now become heterosexual.

Or let's say there's an emotional, you know, wound and a gap between their, them and their same gender parent.

Okay, let's minister to that.

But let's not hyper claim that if I minister to that now, they'll become heterosexual.

There's no need to make the that leap.

Just minister to what scripture teaches us that God does in people's lives.

He brings about healing, he helps reconcile relationships, he helps us become more Christlike, like sanctification.

Discipleship is what Christians should be standing behind, not making claims about changing orientation and sort of manipulating a certain outcome.

If you just have enough faith.

And I'm not taking away from individual testimonies of ways that God has shown up in people's lives.

But the reason you do research is to say how much can we predict that that will happen for the next person?

But from a testimonial standpoint, of course, I understand that.

But let's minister towards the things that Scripture teaches, like growing in maturity and discipleship and Christlikeness.

Those are things that God promises that he will deliver on as we minister to people in these spaces.

Wow.

Such.

Such a good word and such a, such an encouragement to keep the, the focus.

I was having a conversation with somebody probably two or three years back, and they said, you know, the.

In their church, their main focus, they just thought if they could help them be heterosexual, that that would solve.

Solve everything.

You know, I mean, and they said, you know, what the reality of they were.

They said, I was struggling with, with other things in my life and the sexuality was part of it.

But they said, even if I would have been heterosexual, I would have still had some challenges that I needed to work through.

And I wasn't following Christ.

Whether I was living this as a homosexual or if I was living as a heterosexual, I still wasn't following Christ.

So just because I would date a man wasn't going to make that.

It wasn't just going to make everything better.

And it really resonated with.

And I think that's what you've shared there.

Is this the idea of focusing on, on what the Bible shares and not looking at outcomes.

And the older I get, the less.

Well, I would say the more I realize I don't control outcomes.

I think as a younger man, I thought that I could.

Two plus two would equal four.

And if I, you know, but at the end of the day, the older I get, I realize, you know, you know, you do your best, but ultimately God controls outcomes.

We trust in him and be obedient and follow him, but ultimately trust him.

And I think, think I say in this conversation about, as we've talked about with parents and their kids, man, we love our kids, but ultimately knowing that God loves them more.

And I can say that cerebrally, but to live that out and specifically when our kids are making different decisions, when it comes in these areas, in these spaces, it can be challenging for parents.

We know God loves them more than we do, but at the same time, if we could just control them a little more, maybe it would be easier.

And so I, that, that, that just ends up in frustration.

So anyway, Mark, I appreciate you so much.

It's been an honor to have you on the podcast.

Would you mind praying I'M going to ask you specifically if you would consider praying for parents that maybe they're.

They're navigating some of these conversations with their kids.

And then if you would pray for the broader church.

That we would, as you talked about the.

The ideas of.

Of civility and compassion.

That we would.

We would be people of.

Of civility and compassion.

And, and, and, yeah, as we communicate with people that are walking through these different seasons.

Yeah.

Okay, let's do that.

So, Father, I just want to lift up to you particular parents right now listening to this and maybe feeling a lot of anxiety.

And I just pray for peace.

Just comb through their thoughts and untangle them and just give them peace that only youy Spirit can provide.

And do pray that, you know, if they feel like they've said and done things they wish they'd done differently, that they can re.

Engage and apologize for things that they would have liked to have said differently.

And then say them the way that you're leading them to.

And yeah, just for the broader church, you know, I just pray that we would, as the Bride of Christ, just point to you.

And in our ways in which we talk about these experiences, the way we treat people in this space would point to just how people are made in the image of God.

That you love them, that you want a relationship with them, and toward that end, help us to build relationships that are pleasing to you.

So we pray all this in Jesus's name.

Amen.

Amen.