When one struggles with a sin tendency, as Memorial’s pastor has so publicly confessed – and purportedly the church has attracted converts who struggle with the same sin tendency – the better way to follow Jesus is to shun exposure to the sin in question and actively pursue its redemptive opposite (as prescribed by WLC 139). The idea that believers who have (and may still) identify as homosexual should therefore gather the homosexual and transgender community thus reflects the logic of contemporary social theory far more than that of the Bible.

The Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), a denomination founded to be faithful to Scripture, the Reformed faith, and the Great Commission, has been rocked yet again, this time by news of transgender-promoting theater performances hosted by Memorial Presbyterian Church of St. Louis. The events were held in The Chapel, a building next to the church set aside as “a sanctuary for the arts where the creative community thrives.” The dramas in question were performed by the Q Collective as a “celebration of transgender, agender, non-binary, . . . [etc] artists,” with the aim of promoting the transgender experience. Details have been provided here and here.

What I find particularly noteworthy is that one of the primary defenses of this outreach is a positive comparison to Jesus’ ministry to the tax collectors and prostitutes. The suggestion is made that critics of the transgender dramas lack the compassionate concern showed by Jesus, while those supporting the Q Collective performances are following in the steps of their redeeming Master. To my mind, this comparison not only warps the biblical presentation of Jesus’ ministry but also reveals the secularized mindset of at least some of the progressive movement in the Reformed and evangelical world today.

First, when we consider Jesus’ provocative table fellowship with prostitutes, we must remember his own sublimely holy nature. Because of his perfect inward purity, Jesus possessed a unique liberty to expose himself to depravity. Jesus could enjoy free and open fellowship with all kinds of sinners because he was himself without any sinful desire or orientation (and no, the statement that Jesus “in every respect has been tempted just as we are” – Heb. 4:15 – does not mean that he had the slightest inward pull towards any sin – 1 Jn. 1:5). In contrast, when Paul was writing to believers who had been redeemed from sexual impurity, he gave instructions that reflect the difference between Jesus and his redeemed servants: “But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetous must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints” (Eph. 5:3). And because God’s wrath comes upon promoters of such sins, Paul commands: “Therefore do not become partners with them,” since Christians have been delivered from darkness into light (Eph. 5:7-8). This warning does not mean that Christians should dehumanize sinners of any sort. But it does mean that we must avoid giving even the impression of endorsing sin or promoting its spread. Speaking in a manner that would seem to apply directly to Memorial PCA and the Q Collective, Paul wrote: “it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret” (Eph. 5:12).

As an application of this concern, the list of Christian men who may wholesomely enter a strip club for evangelistic purposes is a short one. Last on such a list would be men who themselves have struggled with pornography or sexual addiction. This logic is only true, however, if we believe that sexually indecent behaviors and desires are aspects of the sinful darkness from which Christians have been redeemed. With this in mind, a church like Memorial PCA – host of the Revoice conference that advocated a gay Christian identity, and whose pastor has consistently denied that Christ can remove homosexual desires – does not provide a positive comparison to Jesus amidst the prostitutes.

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