Recently a candidate running for the US Senate has received some attention for having asserted that “God is trans” or “non-binary” — you may have read or seen something about it. Many conservative Christians have responded with incredulity — “How could someone believe, let alone preach, such a ridiculous idea?!” Others have reacted more hostilely, upset that someone would dare to misrepresent—and demean—their Lord in such a way.

But it shouldn’t be all that surprising. For anyone who’s been paying attention, this is the kind of “theology” that has become quite common in progressive seminaries (the candidate in question includes being a seminarian as a key point in his biography) and pulpits—not just in the past few years but for decades.

It has been possible for this to become common because in those circles the Bible has not been considered the first, last, and only authority on matters of faith for a very long time. They may call the Scriptures “God’s Word”, but they don’t mean the same thing that conservative Christians mean when they say that. For them, what the Bible says is just one thing among many to be considered when searching for wisdom about life and the world; the Scriptures are a human document that gives testimony to what people used to believe—and perhaps to some things the Lord actually said—but cannot be relied on today as a solid source of truth.

So what this candidate said—which is what many other preachers, professors, scholars, and theologians have said—is exactly what’s to be expected from the products of an educational system that defines “Christian” and “true” not by what God has infallibly said in his Scriptures, but instead by what the culture and “current scholarship” happen to be promoting. But even if we deal with his or their claims on their own terms (and not our own), there’s an acute intellectual inconsistency involved that, logically speaking, should invalidate their assertions about God’s nature and names.

Here’s the thing: The people who are telling us that we should no longer refer to God with male terms, address our “Father” in heaven, speak of “the Son”, or use he/him pronouns for him are the same people who insist that it’s a grave offense to refer to a transwoman with male genitalia as male, call a transman who gives birth a “mother”, call your child who transitioned by the name you gave at birth, or use the “wrong” pronouns for anyone who has chosen ones that don’t match that person’s natural sex.

That doesn’t work. Because if only the individual gets to decide how he/she/it will be addressed, isn’t it only God who gets to decide how he will be addressed? By what authority, then, do progressive voices in the church presume to dictate the Almighty’s name and pronouns?

There is one truth buried in their rationalizations: God is not like us. So clearly he is not “male” in the sense that humans with XY chromosomes are—no male sex organs, no testosterone, etc.* But that’s really beside the point here: if God chose to reveal himself to humanity by referring to himself with male terms and indicated that humans should speak to and of him with male pronouns, then—again, by their own standards—that should be the end of it. 

Even if progressives in the church don’t accept the Bible as inerrant, they still at least give lip service to the idea that it contains God’s testimony about himself, and that is consistently and overwhelmingly not female, non-binary, or trans. And if even that is a step too close to scriptural authority for them, there’s also the logical point that as long as they believe in A God—one who presumably is bigger, stronger, wiser, and more important than they are—why would they presume to speak for him as to his identity or how he wants to be spoken to and of? Why would they think this is a good and proper thing for them to do without his express command or permission?

So the thought of writing or speaking of him in any other way than male should be anathema to them. Unless maybe it’s just the whole idea of “male” that they really have a problem with—but it’s still a damning double standard any way you look at it.

We can make one further point—this time, more by our own standards than theirs: God has made clear that he is timeless and immutable. “Certainly I, the Lord, do not change” (Malachi 3:6). That is his nature; he is eternally what he was and will always be what he is. When progressives insist that a trans or non-binary person must be addressed by a new set of pronouns and such, that means that a change has happened—even if we were to accept the idea that “this is who they’ve always really been”, a choice has been made to do something different from what has been done before. But since God never changes, there’s no reason to change the way anyone speaks about him.  And even he were changeable, what human creature would have the right or responsibility, let alone the power, to determine that something different from what has been done before is now necessary? 

No one has the authority to change the way the Lord presents himself to the world except the Lord himself. Any assertion to the contrary is the worst kind of presumption—pride, rebellion, and idolatry.

And on the off chance that there are any progressive politicians or pundits who have read this far: I hope this gives you some idea of the mistake you make when you assume that everyone who claims to be a Christian is a Christian in the same sense as all other Christians. Bible-believing followers of Christ have a higher authority to judge claims by, and they easily and eagerly reject anyone who rejects that authority in favor of human “wisdom” and progressive pieties. You’re not drawing believers closer with claims like “God is trans, so you shouldn’t have a problem with our preferred policies”, you’re pushing them farther away.

* No serious Bible-believing Christians have ever claimed otherwise, unless we’re talking about the incarnate Christ, the Son of God made flesh, which is topic for another day.

If you came here through a link, why not check out my Five-Star Monday Mornings Newsletter? You can access it through the menu at the top of the page, or just go ahead and subscribe using the form below.