As I look across the Smokies this morning in its stunning natural beauty, the red sunrise, dark foliage, and hazy mist which gives the range its name, I’m struck by the assurance of it all. The mountain never questions it is a mountain. Not once does it decide to be a tree. The Eastern Red Cedar almost within reach of my perch never doubts it is a tree. It stands tall, giving shade and providing habitat for the morning dove and the nuthatch, never demanding to be called the sun. The sun rises and sets like clockwork without insisting it is instead the moon. Why, then, do some humans, also creations of God, become so disillusioned with who they were created to be insist on a false identity?
Identity confusion is a deep deception constructed to ensnare the conscience of those who have not discovered their identity in Christ. We were each uniquely made in the image of God. He decided what and who we are. In the same way the mountain is a mountain, and the tree is a tree, we are who God, in His infinite wisdom and sovereignty, made us to be. A male human is a male human. A female human is a female human. You do not get to be what you feel like, or what culture convinces you of. A human cannot be a cat, or any other “furry” creature. It is all deception.
Genesis 1:27 “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him, male and female he created them.” Having the “image” or “likeness” of God means, in the simplest terms, that we were made to resemble God, not in the sense of God’s having flesh and blood because Scripture says that “God is spirit” (John 4:24). The image of God refers to the immaterial part of humanity. It sets human beings apart from the animal world, fits them for the dominion God intended them to have over the earth. This is a likeness mentally, morally, and socially which allows us to communicate with our Creator, the God of the Universe. Morally, humanity was created in righteousness and perfect innocence, a reflection of God’s holiness.
Humans were given the ability to reason and choose which is a reflection of God’s intellect and freedom. But within this freedom, it was not “anything goes.” There were good choices, acceptable to God’s morality and holiness, and there were bad choices that would corrupt the “image of God” we were created to be. Dividing the human race into two genders, male and female—was God’s idea, not the invention of some outdated society. Sexual orientation is not fluid, it is God’s choice for His plan.
The Bible is binary and knows no other gender categories besides male and female. Gender assignment is not a cultural construct. God intentionally designed the existence of a male and a female as essential to his creational plan. The two are neither identical nor interchangeable. But when the woman, who was taken out of man, joins again with the man, the two become one flesh.
The second of the ten commandments is to not make any type of image of God to worship. Why is that? Because God has already carved out an image of Himself in us. When one carves out an image of themselves that is contrary to what God created, they are exalting themselves above God and worshiping an image of themself.
In our culture there are those who insist on living in this deception, yet at the same time want to feel they are justified to call themselves a Christian, even though they are living counter to Christ. These “Transgender people of faith” or “Christian furries” have twisted scripture to support their ideology. They will argue about gray areas in scripture. This is the same deception of the serpent in Eden who took what God said and added nuance to cloud God’s purpose.
You want to pretend your an animal? The only instance of this in the Bible was a severe curse on Nebuchadnezzar’s pride. “He was driven from among men and ate grass like an ox, and his body was wet with the dew of heaven till his hair grew as long as eagles’ feathers, and his nails were like birds’ claws.” (Daniel 4:33) When the king humbled himself before God he was restored to no longer act like this.
Paul warned Timothy “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.” 2 Timothy 4:3-4
If I do not recognize your feelings or call you by your preferred pronouns, it is not because I hate you. It is because I love you AND I love the truth. It breaks my heart that you have believed the lie of the enemy about who you are and who you can be in Christ. I do not want you to miss eternity in heaven.
So mountain, fill the landscape as a mountain. Eastern Red Cedar, stand tall and sure. Child of man, be the image of God you were created to be, not what the enemy of your soul whispers in your ear.
