Thanks for posting this. I am going through and reading topics in this forum to prepare for the possible future where I am out.
I came about my religious struggle with myself from a different angle than self-love deficit. My own struggle has been the adulteration of God's creation. God made me and doesn't make mistakes, but I have a deep heartfelt longing to be very different in physical appearance and gender expression than I am today. I feel like this alone is a sin to want to be different.
Oddly though I have had 6 back surgeries for chronic pain and disc issues, and those "tweaks" to how he made me didn't raise my internal moral radar. But doing something for myself to feel good and be at peace with who I am seems selfish and going against His plan and creation.
Any words of wisdom for me to help process this conflict?
Thanks
I have written extensively about this on Quora, but I have also written a little but about this here on the forum. You can check out my "dealing with evangelicals" thread in the Spirituality->Christianity section. Several Bible based objections are addressed in detail in that post.
Since I love explaining this stuff, I will give a brief explanation.
The big question I had to address within myself was
why? Why am I like this? Why me? Why did it have to be
this of all the things my life could have been afflicted with?
A lot of people object by saying "God doesn't make mistakes!". As true as that is, it's just a straw man arguement employed to get away from dealing with the truth: the world is full of broken people. People born with cleft palates, spina bifida, etc. How did the world get this way? Didn't God make make everything perfect?
This is where a lot of Chrisitans go off the rails with their own beliefs. Both in Genesis and Romans the Bible is explicit in saying that all brokenness in the world came by sin. Every broken body, every broken mind, every broken relationship, all brokenness came because we broke away from God. When that happened death and disorder entered the created order. I hold to the position that we aren't the way that people were designed to be. Whatever it is that causes us to experience profound gender dysphoria is in some way a result of the disorder that entered our created order. It is no different from any other condition that nobody asks for.
We deal with something uniquely painful. All other medical conditions
combined can't match the suicide attempt rate of transgender people. Having to live in a fractured reality where the very essence of who you are feels like it is constantly being torn apart is painful in ways that even amputees and those with other severe disabilities and chronic conditions can't comprehend. The battle for us is
survival.
Matthew 5:29-30 says, "If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30 If your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to go into hell". God has an attitude of "do whatever it takes" to finish the race, fight the good fight, and keep the faith! You can't do that if you are dead. And I would even argue that you are not nearly as effective or alive spiritually when you are drowning in self-condemnation. When I finally stopped fighting against myself and trying to suppress who I really am, I suddenly found myself with more opportunities to share the good news of Jesus with others, encourage other Christians, and rejoice in God's love than I ever dreamed was possible! You might have to amputate your former identity, amputate the expectations of others that you worked hard to satisfy, but you will be healthier without the rotting parts of your life that are infecting your life.
I personally don't believe in a gendered resurrection. Male and female genders and sexes were designed for this world and age and won't be needed in the age to come. Jesus said we will be like the angels in heaven, who are neither male nor female. We're also told that in Christ Jesus there is neither male nor female.
1 Corinthiand 15:35-49 states, "35 But someone will say, “How are the dead raised? And with what kind of body do they come?” 36 You fool! That which you sow does not come to life unless it dies; 37 and that which you sow, you do not sow the body which is to be, but a bare grain, perhaps of wheat or of something else. 38 But God gives it a body just as He wished, and to each of the seeds a body of its own. 39 All flesh is not the same flesh, but there is one flesh of men, and another flesh of beasts, and another flesh of birds, and another of fish. 40 There are also heavenly bodies and earthly bodies, but the glory of the heavenly is one, and the glory of the earthly is another. 41 There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; for star differs from star in glory.
42 So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown a perishable body, it is raised an imperishable body; 43 it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; 44 it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. 45 So also it is written, “The first man, Adam, became a living soul.” The last Adam became a life-giving spirit. 46 However, the spiritual is not first, but the natural; then the spiritual. 47 The first man is from the earth, earthy; the second man is from heaven. 48 As is the earthy, so also are those who are earthy; and as is the heavenly, so also are those who are heavenly. 49 Just as we have borne the image of the earthy, we will also bear the image of the heavenly".
There is new created order coming. This will all be done away with. Even our gender distinctions. All of those cisgender people harping on us will be in for a shock when
they undergo a gender change! I hope they don't cling to their gender identity too firmly!
For 22 long years, I questioned what my purpose was as a Christian. I couldn't seem to find my niche. Some people are called to minister to the poor and impoverished. Some are called to be missionaries and church planters in the jungles. Some are pastors. But I just didn't see where I fit in. When I first came out and began searching for my own answers, I found a
bunch of people like myself: evangelical Christians suffering from gender dysphoria and feeling like there was no good answer for them. When I began explaining these things to others who were hurting struggling with the very same questions I had, it was my "hidden treasure" moment (Matthew 13:44). I had finally found something precious and amazing that I really hope someday I can leave everything else behind and dedicate my life to helping other transgender people overcome internal and external religious transphobia.
