Grounded Panel Discussion

Erin Davis: One thing I wanted to talk about was this book. Does this look familiar to you?

Laura Perry: Yes, it does.

Erin: Yes. Does this look familiar to any of you? This is True Woman 101, and you didn’t get to it in your testimony, so I did want to touch on it before we started fielding some questions about how the Lord used this in your story.

Laura: Yes. It was interesting. I was in a women’s discipleship group, which I wasn’t all that excited about to begin with. But then really throughout the year, the Lord was really speaking to me. I remember looking around the room one day and realizing, I was just one of the girls. It was so healing!

But this study, a few months into it, I was not excited about it. I was being obedient to the Lord, but I really didn’t want to love being a woman. Throughout that study, it was so hard. My first book (I don’t think I have the original book anymore, I have another copy now), but my first chapter or two I was like, “These questions are so stupid. This doesn’t apply to me.” I had the worst attitude.

And then all of a sudden, the Lord just began to melt away the ice, and I began to see that I really was a woman. I really began to see God’s beauty in the design, and it really began to transform my heart. So, I’m so thankful to this ministry. Now to be here, to be speaking at this conference, is huge for me, because this ministry has had such an impact on my life.

Erin: So, so sweet.

Well, I think we want to come from a place of understanding without compromising, which is a challenging place to be. So I’d love it, Laura, if you’d just help us understand those who choose to transition or consider themselves transgender. You spoke to some of your own heart issues, but what’s going on below the surface? We see the clothes or the appearance; that’s the tip of the iceberg. What do you think are some of the things going on behind that?

Laura: I think most of the time it’s based in rejection of themselves from other people. For whatever reason there are wounds there, and there are reasons that they don’t like being a girl or a boy doesn’t like being a boy. 

Sometimes it’s from family wounds. For example, if a girl has a father that maybe pays all the attention to the brothers, sometimes the girl will long to be a boy like her brothers. There are other situations where maybe they’ve been really abused—especially with sexual abuse. Sometimes being female feels so vulnerable, and it can be scary, so there are reasons like that.

Sometimes it’s peer rejection or even not measuring up to your peers, not being like your peers. Sometimes the girl will look at the cheerleader and go, Well, I’m not like that. I’m never going to be a girl. Or the football player.

I have an example; I have someone that I know in my life who has two very, very different sons. One of them is sort of this uber-masculine rugby player, this huge guy, and the other one is artistic and creative. So this younger one has decided he’s trans now. I think a lot of the problem is because he’s measuring himself against his brother.

Erin: Yes. I just had a similar conversation with a friend. Her son is not even feminine, he’s just sensitive. He just likes beautiful things. She said in a previous era he just would have been a sensitive boy, but now somebody’s going to want to slap a label on what might just be his temperament, and that can be really challenging.

Laura: Exactly. There are even biblical examples of that. If you look at Jacob and Esau and how different they were. The one was much more favored by the mother and spent his time with her, and he was the artistic, sensitive—well, it doesn’t say it was artistic— but he was a good cook. You can kind of infer those things; whereas, Esau’s the hunter and all this.

Erin: Very hairy.

Laura: Yes. That’s true, yes; very hairy, and probably more muscular because he’s out doing the manly things. But the reality was, God saw Jacob’s heart, and God loved Jacob.

Erin: Yes. 

Two words to latch onto, conviction and compassion. I don’t think we want to lose either one, but it can be so challenging. 

A couple weeks ago we were at our town fair. This sweet, young lady who I would guess to be about thirteen had a shirt on that said “Trans Lives Matter.” We were in the corn dog stand. I didn’t know whether to hug her or . . . I wanted to express love to her, but I didn’t know how to respond. We didn’t end up even having an interaction. But what about in a workplace environment, Mary, Laura, or Dannah? These conversations are bound to come up. This is such a common conversation now. Give us some talking points for how to have a biblical worldview of compassion and no compromise in this area of gender and transgender. Mary, you’re nodding. You have thoughts?

Mary Kassian: No, I’m just nodding. (laughter)

Erin: Just nodding! No thoughts behind it.

Mary: I don’t have any thoughts, but it’s challenging. I was just thinking, actually, I did have a thought.

Erin: I knew you did.

Mary: It’s hard, because unless you are in the situation, I don’t think there’s a good talking point. I think the talking point is what Kim Cash Tate told us: you cling! I think of the verse where God tells us in the New Testament that in that moment the Holy Spirit will give you what to say. So just having a dependence on the Lord, and I don’t think there’s a formula.

I think our love for people will shine through, even when there is a difference of opinion. I’ve had people go, “Oh, Mary, you’re not going to like this,” or “Mary, you’re not going to agree with this.” I think what makes it hard in this culture is we’re so divided, that if we’re in one category or another, we can’t even have a good discussion.

Erin: That’s true.

Mary: Grace goes a long way.

Dannah Gresh: I feel like there has to be relationship. A few weeks ago, an individual that my husband and I poured a lot of years into who now is not transgender but categorizes—I don’t want to say whether it’s a female or male . . .

Mary: Non-binary.

Dannah: They’re non-binary. So, we invited this friend (we still consider this person a dear friend) into our home for breakfast a few weeks ago. Jesus ate with sinners.

Erin: Breakfast, in fact.

Dannah: Yes, He ate breakfast with them. He didn’t sin with sinners, but He ate with sinners. If we don’t start there, I think the rest of the conversations aren’t going to have a lot of emotional deposits so that we can make withdrawals. Your aunt was able to make a withdrawal from your heart at a really important time because she had filled your heart with emotional deposits. It is essential that we stop being fearful, we stop being allergic, we start entering into friendship with people that are confused.

Mary: Yes.

Erin: At the same time, if we sit out of every casual conversation where there isn’t a relationship . . . I work at Revive Our Hearts, so I’m fortunate to be having really edifying conversations at work. But in other spheres, I often will just go quiet because I don’t have the relationship there, or I’m not sure what to say. If we’re always just quiet in that situation, then it seems a little bit more normalized than maybe even it is.

Mary: I just think of the power of the narrative and the power of stories. I think that even hearing stories and just going, “Well listen, I have a friend who lived transgender for nine years, and she just found in coming to Christ that it kind of resolved some other issues that were going on, that healed up some of the pain and woundedness in her life.”

I think also humility. My goodness, we’re sinners. I don’t have it together. It’s not like one person comes in as the expert. You come in as fellow journeyers in trying to walk the path of life and allowing the Lord to teach us.

Dannah: Yes.

Erin: You even said, Laura, you didn’t know any stories of anyone who had ever left the lifestyle.

Laura: Right.

Dannah: Is that still true?

Laura: Well, I had actually heard of one, but I didn’t know anything about it. This individual had a medical condition where she was 4’8” and very, very tiny. So my theory at the time was like, “Well, she just was never going to look like a man.” She had expressed some of that anyway, so I kind of had dismissed that. But I’d never heard somebody leaving this for Christ—not anywhere close to that.

Dannah: But now, there’s a growing movement of people who are de-transitioning.

Laura: Oh yes, there’s a lot.

Dannah: A lot of people, because as your story points out very clearly, the suicide rate is very high among the trans community—the depression, PTSD, anxiety, stress. Surgery doesn’t fix those things.

Laura: That’s right.

Dannah: In your life, Jesus fixed those things!

Laura: Amen!

Dannah: So, we are seeing a growing number of people de-transitioning now.

Laura: Yes.

Mary: Laura, you said that you had a honeymoon period.

Laura: Oh, yes.

Mary: We hear in the media that transitioning is what will make people happy and what will really fulfill them. Statistically, that seems to be borne out. So, what do you say about that?

Laura: Yes, I think it’s exactly what you’re saying. There is kind of a honeymoon period. If you look at a lot of the stories you’ll see on YouTube and all these videos that for the first four or five years, a lot of times they’re very happy. They’re putting out these great videos; but once in a while, God gives this window of clarity, and they’ll be really honest.

There was one particular girl who had made all these really positive videos, and she got in her car one day and had one of those little cameras there. She was intending to make this a normal, positive video talking about how wonderful this was. She said, “I just have to be honest, this is really hard. I wanted to get on here and make a really positive video, but this is hard.” She started being really honest about how bad the surgeries had gone. She’s one that had a bunch of corrective surgeries. She was frustrated, she was tired of trying to keep up this image. I actually downloaded this video so I have a copy of it, but she erased the video later. It’s no longer on YouTube. She’s gone back to making all these positive videos about how wonderful it is. But for a moment she was honest.

The reality is, when people are living this lifestyle, they’re constantly overriding the truth, because they want to do this, because they believe it’s going to make them happy. It seems to. It’s kind of like a drug; it does for a while, but then that wears off.

Erin: Any change can have that sort of effect. 

Laura: Right.

Erin: I mean, you repaint your living room, and for a little while it’s a happy change. Then you have to repaint something else.

Laura: It really is like a painkiller, to be honest. It numbs the pain of their lives, whatever that is, and it gives them that little bit of euphoria like a lot of painkillers do, but it’s not addressing the underlying problem. As soon as that wears off, that problem is still there.

Erin: Okay, we need help with pronouns.

Dannah: Oh, do we.

Laura: My favorite question!

Erin: If someone asks us to call them a different pronoun or to drop pronouns or tells us that their new pronoun is . . . do we?

Laura: This is probably the toughest question I get, and honestly, it is difficult. I can tell you that my parents did this very well. My mom never would call me Jake, she never used the male pronoun. I would get very angry with her, and I would cut her off for a while. But the reality was, they had invested so much in me, even as angry as my mom was, I still knew that she loved me. She was proving over those years that she loved me. So, I would cut her off for a while, and then the Lord would draw me back. They just kept praying. They were very firm on their stand, and yet, they would tell me how much they loved me. They would prove how much they loved me. They would do things for me. This became a very, very difficult road to walk, but I knew . . .

Erin: They would not say “he.”

Laura: No.

Mary: I asked your mum once, “So, what did you call your child?”

Laura: Yes.

Mary: “Did you call your child Jake, or did you call your child Laura?”

She said, “I called my child Sweetheart.”

Laura: Yes. Or Honey; yes, she had a bunch of names. You know, once in a while Laura would slip out, though. This is the funny thing; I knew she wasn’t doing it to be a jerk. But in those times it was like I would be reminded of who I really was. It was this tether to reality to me. She wasn’t throwing it in my face, but at the same time, God was using it. So, there was this dichotomy of it was the last thing on earth I wanted to hear. I wanted so desperately to have their affirmation, and yet hearing who I really was, was what I desperately needed.

Mary: I have a dear friend whose son is transitioning to the female gender. She doesn’t come from a Christian perspective, and she really wrestled with this. This is very, very difficult, because that’s her baby boy. She was so scared of the statistics of the suicide rate that she came to the conclusion that the best thing was just to give in. So now she refers to her son as her daughter, and as “she,” and all the female pronouns. 

I would find that difficult as a mum. It would difficult even with a friend, because to me it’s . . . I’ll call you whatever name you want. If you want to change your name, I’ll call you Jake, but the pronouns thing is a tricky one for me, because I feel like I’m not telling the truth. I feel like I’m lying and I’m agreeing with something that’s not true. So that’s really tricky for me.

Erin: Again, Laura, your story gives hope, because we all have so many of these stories now. There’s a family in my small town; the boy said, “This is my name now, these are my pronouns. If you don’t use them, you’re cut out of my life.” Some family members made the choice not to use them and are cut out of his life—for the moment. But the Lord kept drawing you back into your parents’ orbit. It was just for the moment.

Laura: Yes. I know of a mother—I’ve talked to several like this, but I know of one in particular that I’ve talked to—and she begs parents not to give in on these issues. She said she did this; she started calling them pronouns, using the name, and all the things that he wanted. And he kept wanting a little more and a little more and a little more and a little more and a little more. He just chipped away at her until she finally had to put her foot down. I don’t remember, I think it may have been his wedding or something, and she said, “I can’t do that. I love you so much, but I just can’t do that.” And he cut her off like that. So after years of compromising and doing the things that he wanted, all of a sudden it was not enough.

The reality is, a lot of times when people live as trans, they may cut people out of their lives anyway. Because even if my parents never said anything, just being around them reminded me of the truth of who I really was. It reminded me that I was living in sin, because I knew I was living in sin. What fellowship has light with darkness? It’s really hard when somebody’s running away from the Lord and completely rejecting God, they don’t exactly want to be around the Holy Spirit.

Dannah: Yes.

Laura: So there is a real war and a battle there; so keep praying, and don’t let the reactions—don’t make it about you. Jesus said, “If they hate you, it is me they hate.” They’re really rejecting God.

Erin: If I let my boys have ice cream for breakfast tomorrow morning, they’re going to want hot fudge on it the morning after that, and whipped cream on it the morning after that, and sprinkles on it the morning after that! So, it is maybe a place where we don’t bend.

Let’s talk about our kids. I’m the proud mama of four boys, three to thirteen, and I would not say I’m in fear as a parent, but man am I alert. I’m actually very angry, because they are (whoever “they” is), there’s an agenda targeted at my sweet boys.

Dannah: Yes, that’s right.

Mary: It’s the way I feel with my grandbabies. It’s like mama bear. These sweet, innocent children, and you’re starting to drip, drip—it’s drip marketing, right?

Erin: I don’t want my three-year-old sexualized at all!

Mary: “Oh, here’s a book, here’s a video, here’s a concept.” I just look at my granddaughter, and you’re thinking, she doesn’t even any understand any of that yet, and yet she’s already being . . .

Dannah: And they’re starting younger and younger.

Erin: Yes, Dannah, tell us what you’re seeing.

Dannah: Blue’s Clues just came out with a gay pride month video. Blue’s Clues is a program aimed at toddlers and preschoolers. The Muppets just came out with a little video—these are YouTube videos, not major features, but just normalizing things.

Mary: I was watching a cartoon, and they were animal characters, but I could not tell if the character was intended to be male or female. It bothered me, but I think it was intentional.

Dannah: I think sometimes that’s intentional.

Erin: It’s absolutely intentional.

Dannah: Here’s what’s really important: if the world is starting to talk to our toddlers, we have to start planting truth on this topic into our toddlers.

Erin: Okay, that’s my next question. Come on.

Dannah: We don’t wait until they’re twelve or thirteen or twenty-one and we’re not afraid of the topic anymore. You’re never going to not be afraid of the topic. Can I get on the soapbox?

Erin: Get on it!

Dannah: We are never going to be less afraid of this. This is scary. But the development stages of children, between the ages of two and six they’re copycats. They like to copy. Whatever you are, they want to be. But at the age of seven they start asking questions, and thankfully they ask us. Why, why, why? Or, did you know, did you know? Pascal said the word “why?” is always a spiritual question. “Why can’t I eat ice cream for breakfast?” Well, you can talk about how your body is the temple of the living God, we have to keep it strong. No matter how simple the why is. Certainly, when they come with these big why questions . . .

Erin: But sometimes you can eat ice cream for breakfast. No, just kidding.

Dannah: Well Erin Davis, we can talk about that later. (laughter)

But here’s what I want to tell you: generally, what we believe by our thirteenth birthday is what we die believing.

Erin: Which is why the enemy is pointing all the guns at our young people—one of the reasons. A whole generation set apart with this thinking.

Dannah: True Girl is the ministry I run; it’s a partner ministry of Revive Our Hearts, for girls ages seven to twelve. Until the last twelve months, we very rarely got questions and letters about transgenderism, homosexuality. Every day we’re getting them now, to the point where we have a book, It’s Great to Be a Girl. It talks about body care and, “for the love of God, take a shower”—those things. 

Erin: Please wash your hair; please.

Dannah: Please wash your hair. Brush it, at least. But the intention of that book is to plant the truth about gender without introducing her to any counterfeits. That doesn’t mean that she might not bring you questions about counterfeits, because you start telling her the truth, she’s going to start telling you what she’s heard. We’re actually doing an online Bible study on that book, starting at the end of October, because moms are just at their wit’s end about, “How do I talk to them about this?”

Erin: Right. We live in small-town America, which is the same town where my husband and I both grew up. On the surface it looks very similar to how it did when we were growing up forty years ago. But just this year we went to our little, tiny library that has had the same name all these years, has a girl statue playing out front. I mean, it’s just quaint. Picture a Hallmark movie; that’s where I live.

And for pride month, they had a plan. There were books set aside about two boy penguins raising an egg together (which I’m not sure how that works). I was amazed, but I wasn’t sure what to do. Do I walk out of that library and not use that library anymore? I want talking points, Mary. If you tell me to pray about it again, I will, but . . .

Dannah: Or the restaurants that are celebrating pride month.

Erin: Do we boycott? Do we not boycott? How do we talk to our kids?

Mary: That’s a difficult thing, because we’re fighting this on two levels.

Erin: We are.

Mary: We’re fighting it on an interpersonal level: How do I care for the person in my life, in my space, in my workplace who is struggling with gender identity. It’s on that level.

But then there’s this political level where we’re fighting against principalities and powers of darkness that are out and after the next generation.

Erin: Right.

Mary: I think that there are almost two different answers to that. Laura, you’ve walked that line well, because you have more compassion for trans than anyone I know. And yet, you’ve also started addressing that on a political level, because the political decisions and the messaging and the narrative is not benign. It is going to make an impact on our women.

Erin: Well, my assumption is that that was mandated for my small-town library from something higher up.

Mary: Yes. So Laura, how do we walk that line?

Laura: I think, first of all, it goes back to what you said earlier about listening to the Holy Spirit and really being so grounded in the Word of God that we’re unwavering, that we are solidly planted on the foundation of Christ and on His Word. Then on an individual level, really listening to the Lord about what to speak, what to share.

A lot of times, I start with a lot of questions and let them talk. They know I’m listening. But on an agenda level, sharing the truth with compassion. Even when I go and testify in front of these legislatures, I’m not there to tell them all how horrible they are and everything they’re doing is wrong, and they’re killing our children. I’m there to share Christ. I go there really as a testimony for the gospel.

So wherever we are, remember that the solution is Christ. The solution is not politics—God can use that—but the solution’s not politics. The solution is Jesus Christ and the gospel of His transforming power.

Erin: Which takes me to my next question, transgender people and people struggling with all manner of sexual issues need the exact same thing I do, which is the gospel.

Laura: Amen.

Erin: I want them in my church, but I don’t know how to facilitate an environment where they would feel welcome. I mean, the conviction’s going to be there, but how do we in our churches make it a place where the sexually broken feel welcome?

Laura: Honestly, I leave it up to the pastors. I think they need to really find out from the Lord. I just don’t feel like that’s a decision I can make for the churches. But we can all be welcoming. If you see that person walk in, go up to them and ask their name and talk to them like you would anybody else. Just start there.

Mary: That’s what I was going to say. I was going to say, Erin, if we love people well, we will love trans people well, right?

Laura: Absolutely.

Mary: Because they’re people.

Laura: But as far as bathrooms and things like that, I really that up to the pastors. I’m always worried about the little kids, too. It’s one thing to want to make this person feel welcome, but I don’t want a man in there with my five-year-old! So there are some logistical questions that are just hard. I don’t know that I have good answers, other than we really need to be listening to the Lord. But yes, we love them like anybody else that walks in our door.

Erin: Yes.

Something you didn’t get to talk about a lot when you were giving your testimony but is very riveting to me is the ways your mom’s Bible study cared for you, even in the desert and when you came home. Many of us are in Bible study groups. What are some practical things those women did for you?

Laura: They had been praying for me for years, and I didn’t know that. Then when I came home, they had written me these cards, and they didn’t just sign their names. I mean, they had really poured out their hearts to me, even before they’d met me. They’d raised over 1,600 dollars to find me a new wardrobe and pay bills and some other things, because I wasn’t going to have a job when I came home.

More than that, they invested in me, and they loved me. I was so blown away by how much these women loved me, how they accepted me. I looked so masculine my first day, but these women really treated me like I was just one of the women. They included me in so many other things. They would invite me to come do things. And even the rest of the church, not just them. I remember going on visitations with the church my second week out of the lifestyle. I still looked so masculine, but they weren’t afraid of that. They were like, “Yes, come with us!” They just included me, and I was just part of the body of Christ. I wasn’t this person that they didn’t know how to deal with. I was just Laura. I’ve just been amazed as I’ve been transformed. But I think the Lord used the body of Christ to bring so much healing to me.

Erin: So, so sweet.

Well, Mary, we have more questions, we’re going to continue to have questions. As you pointed out, this isn’t exactly a new phenomenon, but it feels new some of the time. We don’t know how to navigate the individual pieces of the puzzle sometimes. So where would you send us when we have questions? In Scripture, other resources, when we’re struggling with how to respond.

Mary: Laura, you might have more specific resources. I think there are resources just starting to be developed now. I think as the problem comes more to the forefront in terms of, how do we address this with our children, with our families, I think we’ll see more resources. Kind of like the True Woman movement—it’s like boom; okay, now we need some resources. So, I don’t have any suggestions right off the top of my head; I don’t know, Laura, if you do.

Laura: I have a couple, but I agree with you, the resources are just now really being written.

By the way, if you haven’t seen In His Image from the American Family Association, Mary and I are both in it. Please go watch that. It is an amazing, beautiful movie.

Mary: It’s a documentary that Laura is in; I am in it. It kind of walks through theology and how to deal with this question in our churches in a compassionate way. In His Image, and I think you can find it at InHisImage.movie.

Dannah: What are the other two that you were going to mention, Laura?

Laura: Denise Schick, who is also in that, she has some great children’s books. I haven’t gotten a chance to take a look at them, but I know Denise, and I imagine that those are great resources. She has quite a few books. Walt Heyer also has a couple of books.

Mary: What’s his last name?

Laura: Heyer. He has some really good books as well.

Dannah: Can I recommend one resource?

Erin: Absolutely!

Dannah: Peter Hubbard, The Gospel, the Homosexual, and the Church. It is not on transgenderism per se, but I believe it’s a book every believer should read, simply because it roots any questions about gender and sexuality in the gospel. It just teaches you how to compassionately have the conversations that we need to be having. It’s a phenomenal book. Some of you are shaking your heads; you know the book.

Erin: I didn’t plan this, but this feels like the right moment to also mention again True Woman 101, because you need to know what the Bible says about gender theology, and this is a primer for that.