The Gospel and Your Identity

Dannah Gresh: Who are you, really? Dr. Christopher Yuan says we need to be careful about how we throw around the concept of identity.

Dr. Christopher Yuan: Identity is essence, and our essence should be grounded in union with Christ, because we’re created in the image of God. That’s an ontological essential reality, not just a label.

Dannah: Welcome to the Revive Our Hearts podcast for June 5, 2024. I’m Dannah Gresh, and our host is the author of Adorned, Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth. 

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: We’re dedicating much of the month of June here on Revive Our Hearts to the topic of prodigals. I hear from so many moms and grandmoms, family members, friends, whose hearts are absolutely breaking because young people, or even older ones, that they love have turned their backs on everything they’ve been taught and have gone their own way.

We want to encourage you not to give up, to keep waiting on the Lord, to keep praying for these that you love. In fact, I hope you were able to attend the Revive Our Hearts online event last night called When You Love a Prodigal.

Among the speakers was Dr. Christopher Yuan, along with his mother Angela Yuan, who were also on Revive Our Hearts on Monday andyesterday. Let’s listen to a little of last night’s event. Here is Angela and her formerly prodigal son, Christopher, talking with our content director, Erin Davis.

Erin Davis: How would you define that concept of a prodigal?

Christopher: Well, we obviously get that right from the gospels, Jesus’s own words, the prodigal son. It’s just the one that, essentially, had everything but then wasted it. He had the love of his father, even took what was—I guess—rightfully his, but really belonged to the dad, and he just wasted it. 

So it’s anyone that the parent blesses—that God our Father loves—but we reject that. And with that definition, Erin, that is everyone one of us!

Erin: You’re absolutely right! And that’s the point of Jesus’ story. It’s not that we would be pointing fingers: “Oh, they’re the prodigal!” But it’s that we’d recognize our own prodigal tendencies. 

I’m glad, though, that you illustrated the love of the Father because I hear from a lot of parents with prodigals, and the thought in their heart is, What did I do wrong? Did I not love them well enough? Did I not parent them well enough? Did I not take them to church enough? Did I take them to church too often?

I know you didn’t grow up in a Christian home, but I wonder what are your thoughts looking back and your own experience. Can you speak to that guilt the parent might be feeling, Christopher?

Christopher: Absolutely! And even though I’m not a parent, in this ministry I have the blessing to be able to minister with my mom and dad, so this isn’t like something I just do, or see as my ministry. First of all, it’s God’s ministry, but I have the immense privilege of doing it with my mom and my dad (who’s now with the Lord). We did it for a couple decades together—a huge blessing! 

Sometimes I had to pinch myself! My mom said sometimes she had to pinch herself. But no, I had to pinch myself just to think how God had so transformed and redeemed us.

The enemy puts a wedge between loved ones, between families. That’s what the enemy wants to do. The enemy wants to destroy the family. We see it everywhere, even now. Even same-sex relationships, they can’t have biological kids. Of course you can do all the things in a test tube, stuff like that, but that’s destroying the family. The enemy wanted to put this wedge between my mom and dad and me, and he was successful . . . for a time. 

In our ministry we see parents that have so much shame and guilt, not only that they put on themselves, but it’s kind of the church that does that—especially on this issue of sexuality. They go absentee father, dominant mother, etc., whatever it is, in trauma. And to be clear, those are definitely negative influences. If you’re watching right now and you’ve experienced trauma or abuse in your childhood, that’s going to affect you. We need to seek help, some pastoral biblical counseling, just to help us work through those things in community, in the body of Christ.

But to be clear, that’s not the cause for our own sin or for our children’s sin. Now, you’re probably that mom or dad and you’re thinking there are a lot of things you could have done better . . . which is actually true. 

Even with my mom, she talks about that there were a lot of things where she could have been better. There is no such thing as a perfect parent. And furthermore, perfect parenting doesn’t guarantee perfect children. 

 

Look at Adam and Eve. They were in a perfect garden environment; they had a perfect Father, but they still rebelled. So I always want to remind parents, “Though you could have done something better, even if you were perfect, your kids are still sinners!”

Erin: That’s such an important reminder!

Christopher: We need to go back to the Word of God; that’s our foundation. We’re all created in God’s image, yes, but we’re all sinners. So, parents, if you have that guilt and shame, it’s not your fault!

Nancy: That’s just some of what Christopher and Angela Yuan shared last night in our online event When You Love A Prodigal.By the way, even though it’s already taken place, it’s not too late to sign up to watch that event, When You Love A Prodigal. You’ll find information about how to do that at ReviveOurHearts.com/help.

Not long ago my cohost Dannah Gresh spent some time with Christopher Yuan talking about his Holy Sexuality project. Let’s listen.

Dannah: I am so excited about the conversation you’re about to hear on today’s Revive Our Hearts. Our guest today was a guest on Grounded, and it may have been one of the best episodes in the first three years of our Grounded videocasts.

The entire team was riveted by this man’s perspective on sex and sexual identity. He breathed hope into us and provided practical thoughts to converse with those who are lost in the deception that our identity is found in our sexuality. 

This is a must-hear episode of Revive Our Hearts. Our guest is Dr. Christopher Yuan. Christopher, welcome back to Revive Our Hearts!

Christopher: Dannah, thank you so much for having me on again!

Dannah: We are so happy to have you. You’ve been a guest, along with your mother, and shared your story at length. For those who haven’t heard it, it’s a riveting story. Let me ask this: have you always wanted to honor God with your sexuality?

Christopher: I hadn’t, because I didn’t want to honor God—period. I didn’t know Christ, which is why it’s so radical how God transformed not only me, but also my mom and my dad in that process.

Nancy: We heard the story of the transformation in Christopher’s life, as well as in the lives of his parents, earlier this week on Revive Our Hearts. You can listen on the Revive Our Hearts app or at ReviveOurHearts.com.

Christopher told Dannah that his understanding of who he really is, is now tied to his relationship with the Lord.

Christopher: My identity should not be found in my sexuality alone. My identity is not gay, it’s not ex-gay, it’s not even heterosexual, for that matter. My identity as a child of the living God must be in Jesus Christ alone!

God says, “Be holy, for I am holy” (1 Peter 1:16), which, you know, is just so radical! In the past I had thought that I needed to become a “heterosexual” to become a Christian, that I needed to be sexually attracted to the opposite sex.

I was even under this false impression that the more sexually attracted I was to lots and lots of women, the more of a Christian man I would be. But I realized that even if men have opposite sex attractions, they would still need to flee temptation and resist sin. 

So, heterosexuality is the right direction, it’s just not the right goal. The opposite of homosexuality is not heterosexuality. The opposite of homosexuality is holiness. As a matter of fact, the opposite of every sin is holiness.

So it was through this process that God just not only gave me life, but He showed me the importance of justification and sanctification and how that has huge implications to sexuality. Then God did so many other miracles!

He called me to full-time ministry. While in prison I applied to Moody Bible Institute and was actually accepted and got my Master’s and my Doctorate degrees.

Dannah: Wow! I have to ask: had they gotten any applications previously from men in prison? Was that a first?

Christopher: Yes, I think so. I even heard later that when the Admissions office got this, they said, “I think we need to give this to the Legal Department, because we don’t know how to handle it.” It was a hot potato. (“You take it! No, you take it!”) 

It was just God’s sovereignty that led me not only to Moody, but then into ministry. So God is so, so good!

Dannah: Beautiful! I’m thinking right now that you’re just pouring hope into so many hearts as they’re praying for their loved ones, or really even just praying for their own clarity on this issue or prodigal children.

You talk about that your identity was not in your sexuality. Take us to the Word of God and prove to me why that is true.

Christopher: Yes. In Acts the apostle Paul was talking about, “In him we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28). So we see, in Him, in Christ. When we’re talking about identity, we’re talking about finding who we are in Him. This is union with Christ!

I’ve been in this discussion on identity so long that I’ve heard people pushing back. “Identity is this new concept that is not found in the Bible.” Well, actually, not true! Union with Christ is what we’re talking about, abiding in Him.

Throughout the New Testament we have, “in Him,” “in Him,” “in Him.” Union with Christ is not a label. It’s everything! It’s not just an emotional reality. It’s not just lip service. It’s not just a spiritual reality. It’s holistic. It’s our whole being—our thoughts, our actions, our relationships, everything!

 

You see, this is why I think as we are finding the need as Christians and as the church, that we need to be so clear, “What does that mean?” It means we need to be very clear that sexuality is not who we are.

You see, before I knew Christ I could not hate my sin without hating myself. I could not separate sexuality from who I am. Even in the church today, we’re finding people who are just using what I call a little bit of “sloppy identity.” You know, “I’m a gay Christian,” or they may even say, “I’m a straight Christian.”

Our sexuality should never be a permanent modifier before who we are in Christ. Rosaria Butterfield, a good friend of mine, was a tenured English professor before she knew Christ. She says something that I love: “Words matter!” 

The words we use mean something. And also, as an English professor, she knows that different types of words—adjectives—matter. What is the purpose of an adjective? The sole purpose of an adjective is to limit the scope of the antecedent, the noun, or what it’s modifying.

Adjectives limit. So let’s say, “a blue car.” It’s not just any car, but it’s limiting the scope of that noun. “Christian,” am I a “gay Christian?” That limits the scope of who I am in Christ. To be honest, there should be no limitations to who I am in Christ, no bondage to who I am in Christ.

Furthermore, “gay” is rooted in the Fall. Should we ever try to put who we are grounded in the Fall? Because that would be almost like trying to resuscitate my dead self! Paul so clearly says, “You are a new creation. The old is gone; the new is come!” (2 Cor. 5:17 paraphrased).

Now, does this mean I’m going to continue to struggle? Jesus Christ was tempted in every way. We will be tempted as well. But we should not put our sole identity in our sin struggle. We are set free from those struggles. 

That doesn’t mean that we are no longer going to struggle, but we are set free from the bondage of that struggle. So don’t identify by our bondage, our old man. I think this is so important today. As we are pointing this younger generation, don’t point them to an identity that is rooted in the Fall and in sinful bondage.

We want to set people free. That’s the beauty of Christ! That’s the beauty of what we call people to do. The gospel is about setting people free!

Dannah: That’s right. Well, so you’re saying our identity isn’t in our sexuality—whether it’s the fallen sexuality or healthy sexuality. So let me ask this question, let’s approach it a different way: what is sexuality, then?

Christopher: Yes, great question. I’m not saying that “straight” or “heterosexual” is fully wrong, it’s just not fully right. If we just say “straight,” well, a young man could be watching pornography, and that’s not holy. So we need to be so precise, which I call “holy.”

So defining sexuality. There are three important aspects of sexuality: the attractions, the actions, and the identity. This is actually pulling from the professional world, even from the secular world, these categories.

But it’s very true, when we’re talking about sexuality, it’s the attractions. And then from that, we have the desires, the temptations, the feelings, the thoughts. But then the action, when you actually act on it, and then the identity.

So when we think about it in those three categories, it actually helps us to really be much more precise. I love categories because I think that brings much more clarity to the discussion. I like to be really clear in what we talk about.

I mean, just the concept of “holy sexuality” is just a very precise category. I didn’t want to live in the gray and live in ambiguity, because God doesn’t do that. He’s very, very precise and clear. And so, when we’re talking about sexuality, we’re talking about attractions, actions, and identity.

Now, I just talked on that identity aspect, that we need to make sure that who we say we are . . . Identity is not just the label. Some people will say, “Well, I say I’m an American.” 

I could say, “Well, that’s not actually who we are. That’s just our citizenship. Furthermore, the Bible says that our citizenship is in heaven, it’s not on earth.”

And all the other things that we might like to say, “These are our identities . . .” These are things that we do, maybe like a job, or things that we like, sports or a hobby. So we’re talking about essence. Identity is essence, and our essence should be grounded in union with Christ, because we’re created in the image of God. That’s an ontological essential reality, not just a label.

And when we confuse that, we’re set up on the wrong trajectory. That really distorts how we’re going to think and live. So that’s helpful just think about the entity aspect. And then the actions compared to the attractions.

A lot of times Christians will say, “Well, they chose that.” And I do understand, because that is true, that we choose how to act on it. But the world, when they can’t separate their sexuality from who they are, they can’t separate their actions/attractions from their identity, it’s all kind of convoluted, conflated into one. 

We see that it’s sometimes best not to oversimplify this complex category. When we think we’re talking about, “Well, you choose the actions,” they’re thinking, “Well, I didn’t choose these attractions.” And, there is some truth to that.

We don’t choose the temptations that we have. Jesus didn’t choose to be tempted. But it’s the reality, but that’s not who we are. So sexuality has these three aspects: attractions, actions, and identity.

Dannah: Well, you have certainly come a long way from a rebellious God-hating man who didn’t want to have anything to do with the truth of His Word to a man who loves the Word and is a pastor and Bible teacher and the author of this new project for families, the Holy Sexualityproject.

I want to end today by talking about the hope that I think probably a lot of parents and grandparents are feeling for their children right now. Speak to the mom or the grandma, the dad or the grandpa who has a child who’s decided, “My identity is rooted in my sexuality; it’s who I am.” First of all, practical tips about how they interact with that person. 

Christopher: I think we need to recognize, number one, what is the biggest problem. A lot of times as we see our loved ones who are prodigals, the big “elephant in the room” is their sinful behavior. And yes, that is a problematic, but ultimately, that’s not the biggest problem.

I’m so glad that my parents realized that, because I was dealing with a lot of big problems—whether it was the drugs that I was doing and I was selling, or it was the sexual immorality. But that was not the utmost problem.

The utmost problem, the biggest problem, was my unbelief. I needed to surrender my life fully to Christ! And when we see that, that’s going to change our prayer life for our loved one. That’s going to change how we interact and not get pulled into these things that are almost secondary to the most important thing.

If I say to a listener right now, you might have a daughter who’s identifying as lesbian, she might even have a female partner. If this daughter were to begin dating a man—even marry a man—and she didn’t know Christ, she’s actually still in the same boat. We want our children to know and follow Jesus.

If I can add this, if you’re one of those parents and you have that prodigal son, prodigal daughter—whether they’re identifying with their sexuality wrongly or maybe they’re confused about their gender—I bet many of you parents are blaming yourself: “What did I do wrong!? If I just could have done this or I did that, maybe things would have been different.” Etc. Etc. And who knows? Maybe. 

But please hear me. If that’s you, if you are just weighed down with guilt, hear me carefully: it’s not your fault! Perfect parenting does not guarantee perfect children! Look at Adam and Eve. Didn’t they have a perfect Father? They did! Didn’t they have a perfect environment? You couldn’t get more perfect than the Garden of Eden! They still rebelled!

Sometimes parents think that they can do better than God, that somehow if they do “ABC, XYZ,” all the right things then poof! They’re going to get a godly child. No, the job of a Christian parent is actually not to produce godly children. I say that’s not your job because you can’t actually do that. Because if you could, you would be God!

But the job of the Christian parent is just to be a godly parent. Be godly, still do everything you can to point your children to Christ, but then let God be God. Because the ultimate issue over all of this—whether it’s that your child is on drugs or sexual immorality or homeless . . . or just a very “successful” life in the world but they’re rejecting Christ—they’re all in the same boat.

The biggest need is to know and follow Jesus. As I often end my testimony, it’s very sensational and maybe you haven’t heard a testimony like mine before—a guy who used to identify as gay and now no longer does. That definitely is an important aspect of it, but actually that’s not how I best summarize it. This is how I summarize it: “I once was lost and now I’m found! I once was blind and now I see! I once did not believe and now I believe in the Son of God and His name is Jesus!” That’s my testimony!

Nancy: What a wonderful expression of the gospel of Jesus Christ! That’s Dr. Christopher Yuan talking to Dannah Gresh. He’s joining us all this week on Revive Our Hearts. And what a fitting response to what many are celebrating in this so-called “Pride Month.”

Dannah mentioned a project that Christopher’s involved in called the Holy Sexuality project. This is a video series for parents to go through with their teens. It will help prompt meaningful conversations, and help you look at what God’s Word has to say about sexuality.

You’ll find the link to more information about this video series for teens and their parents, Holy Sexuality, in the transcript for this program at ReviveOurHearts.com. And for parents or grandparents who are praying for their prodigal son or daughter or grandchild, I want to tell you about a special 30-day prayer challenge from Revive Our Hearts. 

It’s called While You Wait for Your Prodigal. It’s going on right now, and when you sign up you’ll receive an email each day in June. There’s a passage of Scripture, a devotional thought, and a prayer to help prompt your own prayers.

And this 30-day devotional called While You Wait for Your Prodigal is also available in a beautiful book format that our team has produced. It’s got space where you can journal your prayers, your thoughts, as you walk through this 30-day challenge.

We’d be glad to send you the book While You Wait for Your Prodigal when you make a donation of any size this month. Be sure and ask for it when you contact us with your gift. To do that, head to ReviveOurHearts.com, or call 1-800-569-5959.

And one more thing! Because we know that so many moms and grandmoms are burdened about this area, we’ve produced this 30-day challenge in Spanish, Portuguese, Italian and German, and a digital version of that is available at ReviveOurHearts.com. So if you know somebody who could use that or be blessed by it, be sure and let them know.

Tomorrow Christopher Yuan will be back to help us understand how love is a means to an end, not an end in itself. He’ll explain. Please be back for Revive Our Hearts.

This program is a listener-supported production of Revive Our Hearts in Niles, Michigan, calling women to freedom, fullness and fruitfulness in Christ! 

*Offers available only during the broadcast of the podcast season.