July 7, 2025 • 56 mins
Pastors' Perspective is a one-hour call-in program where listeners can call in and get answers to questions about the Bible, Christianity, family, and life. The program is live Monday through Friday from 3:00 PM - 4:00 PM Pacific. You can call 888-564-6173 to ask your questions.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
Hello and welcome to Pastor's Perspective. I'm your host, Brian Perez.
Welcome to this Tuesday, June 31st edition of the program.
Wait a minute, there's no such thing as June 31st.
It must be July 1st. Happy new month. We are
here to answer the questions you have about the Bible,
the Christian faith, just about anything that's on your mind.
Grab an open line at 888-564-6173,888-564-6.
(00:39):
173. Bobby Conway and Richard Cimino are going to be
here for the full hour to answer the questions that
you have. Bobby is an apologist. He's an artist. He's
a pastor. He's the doctor, Doctor, the great doctor, whom
we're gonna miss immensely. This is his last week with
us here on Pastor's Perspective, except maybe for some guest
(00:59):
appearances here and there. But man, Bobby, thank you so
much for the impact that you've had on our listeners
through your ministry and, um, yeah, you're gonna be missed, man.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Oh my goodness, I'm gonna miss you guys.
So much as I've said, this was just such a
beautiful opportunity and it really is, uh, it's kind of heartbreaking. Uh,
I've loved the audience. They've been just amazing and in
many ways it just felt like the most perfect fit
I ever had with everything I've ever done in my life. Uh,
(01:32):
you know, it's, it's, it's an interesting seat, right? You,
you know, but.
I'm wired as an apologist and a pastor and that blend, um,
you know, it's, it was special for this role and
then I've got this wrecked past and I love to
show up and be real with people and they've just
embraced me and I just thank you too, Brian. It's
(01:53):
been a privilege and I'm gonna miss you, Richard and
just thank you to all you wonderful listeners out there. um,
you've challenged me and I'm just so thankful.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
Bobby's gonna miss us until he has that first early
dinner at 6 o'clock, because right now he's, he's back east.
So it's 6 o'clock, it's dinner time for him. He
always has to eat dinner at 7 or 8, but
as soon as he starts having dinner at normal times,
like 6 or so, he's gonna be like, yeah, forget
those guys.
Speaker 2 (02:20):
Well, you know, the sacrifices we make. Yes,
Speaker 1 (02:25):
that's true. Richard Cimino's here too. He's one of the
assistant pastors at Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa. How are you, Richard?
I'm doing well. Good. Yeah, glad to see you here.
Thanks for coming in. And, uh, we've got lots of
great questions that were sent in online too, so we'll
get to those to begin our program before we go
to the phones at 888-564-6173. There are 3 ways to
(02:47):
send your question to us online.
First, you can go to the Pastor's perspective Facebook Messenger.
Send us your question that way, or you can DM
us on the pastor's perspective Instagram, or you can do
what Terry did from Inglewood, and that's, uh, well, I
don't know exactly what Terry did. She might have either
gone to the pastor's perspective page on Kwave.com, which you
(03:09):
can quickly get to by clicking on my forehead there
on the banner on the home page, or, uh, if
you're watching us on Facebook or YouTube,
Or Instagram, you can scan the QR code there, and, uh,
that'll take you right to that page without you having
to flick on my forehead. So, Terry and Inglewood sent
this question in. Oh, it says Terry listens on the app. And, uh,
(03:31):
Terry's question. The Bible is clear regarding a cheerful giver.
For some time now, I have my tithes set up
to autopay, biweekly.
I don't consciously think about giving since it's automatic. I've
made sure the amount covers the income from both of
my jobs. So my question, does that mean I'm not
giving with a cheerful heart? Bobby, what would you say
(03:52):
to Terry? It's, I mean, it's, it's autopay. She doesn't
even have to think about it. So is it being
given cheerfully? Great question, Terry.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
Well, of course, I think that you know you've just
made a commitment to be cheerful about an ongoing giving
structure in your life and if you wanted to, you
can just each time you're paid and know that, you
know what, thank you Lord for allowing me the opportunity
to be a part of giving, but I think it's
just an administrative piece and when you invest that way, uh,
(04:25):
you know, you're being cheerful about it. I don't think
you have to do it every week.
To be cheerful or every two weeks you can make
a commitment to have it on auto pay and be
glad you did it,
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Richard.
Yeah, and, and first of all, um, I think it's
wonderful that you just, you, you love giving to the
Lord and, and you know every now and then like
you could have been really cheerful when you set it
up you just wanna make sure you're cheerful when you
see that that's been taken out of your bank.
Right, yeah, no, that's a good point that's a good point.
really cheerfully giving, and you know, sometimes you can feel
(04:57):
strained and stressed at certain moments, but you know, if
you're in your heart you're going, Lord, I'm just so
glad that even though things are tight this week, I'm
so glad that that you, you received this from me
this week. So you just gotta kind of check your heart.
It's like anything we can be on auto pay sort
of going to church on Sunday, like just rolling in automatically, right?
And are we really rolling in because it's auto? It's
(05:19):
what you do, or because you're really glad to be there? You,
I was glad when they said to me, let's go
up to the house of the Lord. So yeah. Side
question here when it comes to tithing, and we haven't
heard this one in a while, so I'll ask it
now on your behalf and then we don't have to
answer it again for a while. But does God want
us to tithe on gross or on net? What would
(05:40):
you say, Bobby?
Speaker 2 (05:42):
Uh, I mean, this is such a tough one, and
it's not, uh, you know, a, a break faith issue
at all. Uh, Pastor Brian, you know, when he talks
about it, he thinks, you know, it's just, you determine
in your own heart what you're going to give, and
that might be, you know, not so much or might
(06:02):
be a lot. It's just a decision that you make,
and he makes a case for that and I understand
that case, um.
For me, if I'm gonna lean in one direction, um,
the way that that I, I look at that is
we would give a full tithe off of whatever our
(06:23):
income is, uh, and the way that I look at
that where it says, oh, each person should determine in
their heart what they want to give, or God loves
a cheerful giver, all that kind of stuff. In 2 Corinthians.
I don't look at that passage as it's related to
the person's local church giving. So I look at that
(06:45):
as an above and beyond gift that's being taken up
in that context. And so I see these people already giving,
and then they found a way to determine in their
heart to even give more sacrificially.
So it's hard for me to think that when Jesus,
you know, dies on a cross, just because we're under
(07:08):
the gospel, and if we understand Old Testament giving and
it was north of 20%, OK, so it's tough for
me to picture that all of a sudden.
The church, because Paul says each person should determine in
their heart what they'll give. Now, uh, because of the cross,
people were cutting their giving from what they were making
(07:29):
to 2% or 1%.
Uh, I don't think, uh, that was the purpose of that.
So I think that the extra was for the kind
of things that people come to us and say, hey,
will you support this ministry or that ministry, they're committed
to they're giving a full tithe, and then they were
sacrificing and determining in their own heart what they could
(07:50):
give for the collection that Paul was taken to Jerusalem.
And that's how I interpret it. So if I had
to think about which side to err on.
I'd rather err on the side of, you know what,
I'm gonna folk, I'm gonna, I'm, I'm not gonna try
to figure out how to give as little as I can.
I'm gonna try to focus on on starting at that
(08:13):
place that I think where God puts it, but that's
just my thoughts on that.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Now, there's a, there's a, I've heard it said in
the church before, sometimes pastors will say this kind of
thing when they're asked, you know, should I tithe on
gross or tithe on net? And the response is, well,
do you want God to bless you on the on
the gross or the net? But is that how we
should be looking at our giving anyway, where, oh, if
I give something, God's gonna bless me in return with
(08:41):
however he blesses me. Yeah, I, I don't like um
I don't like
The the idea of giving as being transactional. Um, I
don't think that's a healthy way to look at our
relationship with the Lord. Um, we don't worship the Lord
in song because when I I worship him in song,
then he's gonna do this, he's gonna bless me, you know,
(09:04):
so I think any form of our worship and and
and the the totality of our lives where we're supposed
to be a living sacrifice, right? Um, it, it, it
can't be like, well, I know that if I do this,
God will do that.
And so when it comes to giving, we don't want
to give that way. Um, when it comes to serving,
we don't wanna serve that way. And I'm just glad,
(09:26):
Bobby that you prefaced that your statement was saying there
are guys who take these different positions on the subject
of tithing, and this is not like, uh, this is
not a salvation issue. Um, it, it's, it's something that
there's a, there's a, there's a diversity in the way
people look at it, but I think the biggest thing is,
is just
You know, you, you, whatever you're gonna do.
(09:50):
Do it wholeheartedly and is under the Lord, like whatever
position you're gonna take. You, you just want to sit and,
and you know, the Bible says whatsoever is not a faith,
it's is sin and we, I don't ever want to
be operating in in an area of my life where
it's like I'm just
There's no faith engaged in it. I, I, I want
to be convinced in my heart that the Lord is
(10:10):
approving of what I'm doing. And when I can't say that,
then I'm, I'm, I think I'm, I'm in a, in
a not a very stable position. So Bobby.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Yeah, so, I mean, in a, in a lot of ways, I'm,
I was just, I'm thankful for the way it started off.
I was at Saddleback under Pastor Rick Warren.
And they taught giving a tithe, and I've shared the story.
I remember getting my check from the Ritz-Carlton and Dana
Point as a valet parker before I was a bellman,
(10:46):
and I think that I first wrote the check out
for 10 bucks, which was like 3%.
And I was like, man, I, I, I'm just gonna
do 30 bucks, which was the tie of 300 bucks.
And from that point forward, it just was set in
(11:06):
my Christian life for me. Uh, since I was 2021
years old, so for over 30 years that has been
a part of my life and I'm really thankful because
for me, uh, the way that I'm wired, I, I
think if I didn't sense some guidance from the Lord.
(11:28):
I, I probably would hold on to a lot more.
I'm a pretty selfish individual, uh, and the idea of,
you know, like when Randy Alcorn says, God doesn't give
you raises to increase your standard of living, but your
standard of giving. Well, I kind of like the thought
of raising my standard of living, right? Like I, I,
I've enjoyed the getting a king size bed instead of
(11:51):
sleeping on that full size or whatever when we were
married and early on and
We started off living in a trailer, uh, you know,
now we've got a nice home, so, you know, I,
I admit I'd be a horrible missionary, right? I mean, I, I,
I don't like bugs. I don't like specialty foods that
I don't recognize. I don't like, uh, getting out of
(12:13):
my comfort zone and so that's why, um, you know,
when God puts these things in place for me, it
makes it clear.
Uh, because left to myself, um, you know, the, some
of the stuff's tough for me, uh, that grew up
in California and I like
The, the, the finer things in life, right? A comfortable bed,
(12:34):
a nice vacation, air conditioning, nice tasting food, uh, uh,
you know, uh, uh, some people, they go, man, I just,
I just wanna get, I, I wanna buy one pair
of clothes and wear them for the rest of my life,
and I want to live like John the Baptist and
never get a haircut and.
Uh, I don't relate to that, and that means you
can pray for me. I need a lot of sanctification.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
And, and I think this is, you know, we, I, I,
there's Bobby being real again. We we just talking about that?
But you know, here's the deal, we can become so
self-righteous in our spiritual disciplines, and I remember when Valerie
and I were first married and we're just living across
the street over here from the church.
And we had 11 light in our little living room
(13:16):
and we had an upstairs downstairs apartment over in the
Gospel Gulch over here and and we had one light.
And so when we had friends over, everybody had to
gravitate to that corner of the room, and I just
thought like we don't need another light, like we're serving
the Lord and it would be such a waste of
money to buy another light. And it was almost like,
how can you call yourself a Christian if you have
more than one light in your living room, right? And
(13:38):
it was like and
or like, you know, you'd walk in the parking lot
and I remember one time I saw a Ferrari parked
in the parking lot. I'm going, how can you even
be a Christian and own a Ferrari? Well, you know,
I could say that because I didn't own a Ferrari and,
and I, and I kind of use my self-righteousness. It's
I'm 3 now. I would, I could use my, I
could use my myself right my lack of not having
(13:59):
those things. I could, I could.
I, I would start acting as though it's yeah, I'm
more righteous than that guy. And the question is, is
I have no idea what that guy does, like, like that,
that might be nothing to that guy and he gives
a ton to the Lord, right? You know, and so
we just want to be careful that we don't want
to be found living in, um, in a legalistic relationship
(14:20):
with the Lord. And if the Lord gives you a
king size bed, praise the Lord. I mean, we had
a full size bed for I don't know how long, Bobby.
I think we were gosh.
We made a long, long, long, long time and that. Well,
if you sell one of the Ferraris, you'll be able
to buy a, you know, well anyway, I digress. Um,
thanks for that, Bobby. You made me feel really much
(14:41):
a lot better.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
Well, you know, that's what I'm here for. Misery loves company, Richard. Uh,
I'll tell you, in all seriousness, when, when I first
got married to Heather, I told her, we're never gonna
make over $40,000 a year or $45,000.
And she didn't like that vision and um I, that
(15:03):
was the young zealot in me as well, right? Um, we,
when my, when I went to Dallas seminary.
Uh, in the early 2000s, we were living off of $35,000.
We had two kids. My, my school payment was $500
(15:23):
a month.
And we were giving above and beyond a full tithe,
just a little bit above, and, um, it was unbelievable
in that season to watch God provide like the checks
that would come out of nowhere or people who would
feel led to give to our ministry and they would help.
(15:44):
And so I, I, I'm saying some of this stuff
tongue in cheek. I always want to be willing to sacrifice, uh,
but I have found that I like, um, you know.
A nice good meal compared to fast food or I like,
you know, soft clothing versus stiff clothing or I like
a a comfortable bed versus a cot. Uh, so there,
(16:07):
but I think that some of that's normal, but the
question is, is, are we willing if God asks for
us to give these things up, you know, like, it
would be a hard ask, right? Like, is there a
place that
You know, God would ask you to go, to live,
or is there something in your life that if he
asked you to give up? Like, it wouldn't take me
(16:29):
long to think about how I could be thrown into
an instant.
Trial of surrender. And so in many ways where I
fear like sometimes it's like I just picture like, oh man,
I'm gonna show up in prayer and then I'm scared
to ask the Lord what he wants because it's just
gonna mean, you know, go sell this or get rid
of this or go do this. But what's been so
(16:52):
amazing about the Lord is I think in some ways
he's been really just teaching me as well, you know what, son?
Enjoy the good gifts that I've given you as well.
Don't feel bad about it, but always be ready to
be faithful and obedient, and that's the kind of God
we serve. He lets us enjoy those things, and so
sometimes people feel like if they are enjoying anything that
(17:14):
uh that I'm not really a Christian. I need to,
I can't enjoy things in life, and that's not true,
but if, if that becomes your ultimate, then that's a problem.
And uh and I have to be careful because I
think
My greatest shadow as a human being is.
A hedonist. Like I love, I love pleasure, right? And that, I, I, I,
(17:38):
I'd imagine there's a lot of people out there that
like that, but
I go, for example, but I go on a cruise
and I gained 15 pounds in one week, eating 6
square meals a day and visiting the Ocean View Cafe at,
at midnight. But when I come back,
I basically rein myself in and don't eat that much
(18:02):
for a couple of weeks. So it's, it's a you,
you can't live in that space constantly. You have to
know how to make sure you're living with self-control and discipline,
otherwise hedonism will overtake all of us.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
Richard. Yes, we just don't want pleasures to become our,
our master passion in life. That's right. And I think
as God is our master passion, he will give us desires.
I've always felt like, you know, delight yourself in the
Lord also and he will give you the desires of
your heart. It wasn't like, OK, I'm delighted in you, Lord.
So now you, will you please give me what I desire.
(18:37):
It's I believe he gives us desires, and he's at
work in us both to will and to do of
his good pleasure. And as we delight in him, he's
gonna show us, he'll lead us, he'll guide us, he'll
give us peace, you know, when he is when he's
our all in all, everything else is just we see
it in its right place, so.
Good conversation today on Pastor's perspective. I don't think we
(18:58):
left anything out when it comes to money and tithing
and all that gross and net, and, yeah, Terry, thank
you for sending in your question online. And we're gonna
do another online question before we go to the phones
at 888-564-6173-888-564-6173. Cathy and Bellingham Washington wrote in and says,
(19:19):
if my transgender nephew became a Christian,
He'll need to go to church, or I'm sorry, he'll
need a church to go to where he can participate
fully to grow as a Christian and begin the process
of sanctification. How can I lead him to Jesus and
then leave him with no prospect of a Bible believing
church that will accept him as he is?
(19:41):
And then Cathy asks, Would you as pastors, welcome transgender
Christians to participate fully in your church and let God
deal with their process of sanctification? Bobby, what do you
say to Cathy?
Speaker 2 (19:54):
It's a loaded question. Would we accept Foley into our church,
a transgender, well, of course, but you have to define fully. Um,
would we accept an alcoholic in our church? Of course, uh,
but if I'm just gonna show up and be in
a drunken rampage all the time and say, and then
(20:17):
make the church feel bad because they're not just, you know,
celebrating my alcoholism.
Uh, then that's a problem right there. So I think, um, our,
our task as pastors is to help people to understand
what their true identity is and who and and who
their identity is in and so if somebody is sexually confused.
(20:42):
Uh, that doesn't mean, um, in order to accept somebody
that we have to embrace the confusion in areas that
God has made clear. And so that's my fear of
the culture is we bought this narrative that
That it wouldn't shake out anywhere else. What are we
gonna say to the person that's a pedophile that wants
(21:05):
to serve in children's ministries? Well, and if we don't
accept him, or does that, so, so, so would we
accept somebody that, yes, but we're not going to put
that person in children's ministries, uh, and we're not gonna,
you know, say that that's a good thing.
And so we're gonna, we're we're gonna teach what the
(21:27):
Bible would have to say, but we want the person
to know that in doing so we, we do love
you and we do care about you and we do
accept you, but it doesn't mean that we agree with
the confusion that you're experiencing. So you can't apply that
across the board, right? I mean, think about like all
(21:49):
the different things that people have.
They can't just show up and then say, well, if
you don't celebrate this about me, then you don't accept me. Uh, no,
you come to the church and it's our job to
lay out what the Bible has to say, and then
the dying in all of us begins. If it's transgender
for me, it's uh it's been 100,000 things it seems
(22:12):
like since I became a Christian. It's, it's taking up
a cross. It's denying myself. It's embracing who God said
that I am, and today.
Culture is saying, you know what, you are what you feel, uh,
and that's just not the way to go about it.
And so I would say that if somebody's going to say, well,
(22:33):
if you don't embrace this my way, then you don't
accept me. Well, they're setting terms for what acceptance means
it's not even biblical. So we can accept people without
agreeing with each other.
Um, and I think that that is a higher view
of love than mandating that we agree in order to
show that we accept,
Speaker 1 (22:53):
Richard, yeah, I, I think that.
There's, there's a little bit of stuff that's like, OK,
so what, what's the starting point with such a person?
Are they coming in with not knowing Jesus at all?
And how do we, we don't say to that person, look,
it's obvious, you do not understand um what God has
(23:15):
to say about gender and sexuality. So when you get
that straightened out,
You, you, you're gonna be welcome here. Well, they don't
even know Jesus, right? I think, you know, when, when
a man or a woman truly encounters Jesus Christ, when
the Holy Spirit truly shines into the heart of a
(23:36):
man or a woman, the light of the knowledge of
the glory of God in the face of Jesus, it's transformational.
But that transformation is, is sometimes a a process, and we,
we don't want to run them out the door because
we've we've met them and they, when they haven't even
met him yet, they really don't know him, but they
wanna know about him. How are we gonna receive them?
(23:58):
How are we gonna deal with them? And then there's
the sanctification. Sanctification is, is, is a reality, the Christian life.
There is no new life in Jesus without the process
of sanctification being begun in your life, the the when
you meet him.
And that process is so different in each of our lives,
the pace is different, but pastorally, we really want to
(24:19):
lead people in that process of change. And I know
for myself,
It really stirs up in me I need to like,
to understand a whole lot more things about what's happening
in the life of somebody who's actually moved forward and
transitioned like all of the, the whatever the chemical stuff
is that they've been using.
Um, before that, um, how far along, how much of
(24:41):
that is reversible, how much of it is not reversible, and,
and all of those things. But Bobby, you nailed it
when it's like, who are we in Jesus? And I,
I just believe you cannot discover who you are in
Jesus without there being a move in the direction of
discovering your real true identity in him. And so I
think it's such a, this is not like
(25:04):
I don't think it it sits at all like this situation,
it's like somebody who's gotten a a substance abuse problem,
that's a deep thing, it's a hard thing, and, and
we can't expect them. Sometimes the Lord will change somebody
in a like that. The minute they meet Jesus, the
drug stuff is done. For other people, it's not like that.
(25:24):
It's a process, and they have their they have their
great seasons and they have stumbling seasons. How do we
deal with them in that moment?
So I just think it's so important that we that
we recognize, yes, if any person is a new is
is is in Christ, they become a new creation. How
do we walk with them in that reality? And Bobby,
you're right, you can't come in and just if somebody
(25:46):
comes in and says, look at, I'm never gonna change, um,
I'm I'm just here.
Um, well, you don't know Jesus yet. We'd love for
you to meet Jesus, because I can promise you, when
you meet him, you're gonna think differently. Yeah. It's a reboot.
I remember, uh, Cathy Keller said that when you meet Jesus,
it's like you get a new operating system and it's
a total reboot. And, and again, it's God is at
(26:08):
work in you both to will and to do of
his good pleasure, and that's on on across the board
on everything, whether it's an anger issue, substance abuse issue, uh,
is a gender identity.
issues like, but Jesus walks with us through those things
and I think that's the most important thing. Are we
willing to actually walk with somebody who we don't understand
(26:31):
at all and and best know how? How do I
love this person in this process of real transformation by
the renewing of their mind in Christ? Bobby.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Yeah, so, I mean, the Bible lays out
Clearly, God's plan for sexuality, that there's two genders, male
and female, uh, I don't think, you know, God made mistakes.
I think we get confused. I think that, um, I mean, listen,
there was, I think, a 4,000% increase in gender dysphoria
(27:05):
amongst females in the UK.
But what, what's going on there? A lot of this
has been just absolute cultural, it is, uh, you know, indoctrination. Now,
are there people that really do stru absolutely there is,
and that in that, and that warrants a ton of compassion.
But I too, when I showed up in the church
(27:26):
was totally promiscuous, always, you know, sleeping around different girls, uh,
you know, just giving myself to my lust and
Uh, did the church accept me? Yeah, but it didn't
say what I was doing was right. If it, if
the church view of acceptance means just telling everybody what
they do is OK and right and no big deal,
(27:48):
then how do we even get to the cross for
what Jesus died for?
So I don't think the idea of somebody, if somebody's
struggling with transgender stuff just in general, I wouldn't say
that person's walking in sin if they're confused, they're just confused.
I think there's things that they can do in the
department of intimacy that can lead that way, but our
(28:10):
job is to take the Bible and for everybody's issues
as it relates to intimacy and how that's supposed to
be channeled.
Whether it's the pedophile, the transgender, the, this, the total
promiscuous straight person, uh, whatever that is, our job is
to talk about the context, the way that we're wired
and our identity.
(28:31):
And if we start making certain exceptions in one department,
then why can't we make exceptions in other departments? And
before you know you're making so many exceptions, then why
do we even need a savior? Because basically we got
a cultural past in the name of acceptance. So I
think you have a hard time looking at the word
and making sense of that. No,
Speaker 1 (28:51):
I, you, you're not just saying, well, we're just.
This is too much for us to deal with, but
you just keep, you know, keep looking to the Lord
and you're gonna be great. No, it's like, as they walk.
Forward, and that's the thing, are they willing to follow Jesus?
And we, we meet them where they are, and then
(29:12):
walk with them as they, as they're following Jesus, and,
and we can understand like, oh, now here's where we're
at with this person.
It's not like, well, you get special pass on this thing,
because really, you know, you're transgender. So that's a different
thing than just coming in and having an anger issue.
It's the same way you just walk with people as
(29:32):
they as they are being changed by this power of
the indwelling Holy Spirit without no with no compromise concerning truth, yeah, so.
Yeah, it's break time now, but yeah, we could continue
this conversation. There's so much more that we could talk about.
I don't know, 888-564-6173, because you just mentioned anger right now.
Somebody could have an anger issue, but they don't show
(29:54):
it when they're here on Sunday morning, whereas or when
they're on the radio, or we're on the radio, but
when it's a transgender issue, it's like that's kind of visible.
So that's, yeah, we'll be back on Pastor's perspective.
(30:19):
Hey, we're back on Pastor's Perspective. Excuse me, 888-564-6173 is
our number. Brian Perez here along with Bobby Conway and
Richard Cimino. Bobby is the pastor of Image Church in, uh,
hold on, Charlotte, North. Just a moment. How soon we forget.
Uh, Charlotte, North Carolina. That's where he pastors. Plus you
(30:41):
can find him on YouTube. He's got a new YouTube
channel called the Graphite Apologist. So like and subscribe and
click that little bell icon. You'll get notified every time
Bobby puts up a new video. And here in the
studio with me is Richard Cimino, one of the assistant
pastors at Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa. You guys ready for
more questions?
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
Let me just mention one last thing, um, as it
relates to the final part of our conversation.
On accepting, you know, a transgender in our church. I mean, it, it,
it really is like, if anything, if I see somebody
that's transgender coming to the church, I'm gonna want to
(31:21):
show even more love.
That's gonna be my heart. So for the person that says, oh,
you're just not accepting, no, my heart is to show
more love. I used to have this guy that would
come to church and, and he was, you know, showing
up in long leopard jackets and pink hair and.
And he'd be the first person I would go up
(31:42):
to and hug. Um, we had a lesbian that was
in our church, and she came and she kept coming,
yet she knew what I taught about it, but she
felt like she could be there because she knew that
we loved her, but she knew that there was a
difference of opinion maybe as it relates to.
(32:04):
How that's fleshed out and so I, I don't think
it's a fair statement to say because of what pastors
are doing is look, they're trying to be faithful to
what they see in the scripture and maybe the transgender
person is trying to be faithful to who they believe
themselves to be.
And when it comes down to a moment like that of, OK,
(32:25):
this person thinks they need to be this, but the
pastor feels this is what the Bible teaches, I'm not
gonna say that the person isn't loving to me if
they're being loving to me because they don't adopt what
I teach about the Bible, and they shouldn't say that
I'm not loving to them because I'm trying to follow
my conscience.
And if a pastor truly believes that, and that's accurate
(32:50):
in the Bible, then what's happening is the pastor is
trying to help the person to not shrink their identity
down just to their sexuality, but to offer them a
bigger identity that encompasses encompasses so much more. And so
I think that people.
The struggle because, you know, people struggle. And the fact
(33:15):
is is empathy can be good, but a lot of
talks gone in the church lately about toxic empathy.
And toxic empathy is when our empathy goes too far,
where now we start siding with people as believers because
we feel like we have to do so in order
for them to feel accepted and then we start rejecting
(33:37):
God's word. But when I read the scriptures and I've
read it a lot, not enough.
The Bible's so heavy on what it has to say
about our sexuality and how that's lived out, and to
see the culture that we live in and how it's
literally minimize that, it's problematic.
(33:57):
And I don't think people that try to make arguments,
it's so weak when I hear the types of arguments
that expand stuff out, that it's, it's pretty desperate and
it's not as if this is a new struggle. When
Paul was writing some of the most.
Strong passages on sexuality in the Bible. He was writing
(34:21):
in a context where there was all kinds of sexual
immorality from heterosexual to homosexual. Uh, there was lots of
stuff where men were dressing up like women. This wasn't new.
This was the Greco-Roman world. And so we think that
(34:41):
we're like arriving at new revelation.
And really, what's happening is, is we're losing our moral
compass in the name of toxic empathy.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
Yeah, well, you know, I just, Bobby, I think part of,
part of the
The thing that that the church is facing is that
it has previously done really poorly in the way it
even talked about same-sex attractive people. Um there was this
there was this this
(35:12):
But
It was just not kind, you know, and
Now, because of that that that stigma, people have overreacted
to it, right? And and and and overcompensated for it,
but I think the idea is that I'm trying to
express is that when somebody who is somewhere along the
(35:34):
line and transitioning.
They come to know Jesus Christ. I'm sure they have
101 questions.
And to be able to walk with them through it.
I think the biggest concern in the question that I,
that as I read it was like, will you embrace
them as being truly having given their life to Jesus?
Of course I will. But how do we walk with
(35:56):
them through when they go now uh obviously then now
what is, well, now what? Now you we're we're gonna
be committed to living as God has made his plan
clear to us concerning our our identity.
And our sexual identity. But for some, like for you
and me, Bobby, you, for you, when you got saved,
like God was saying, like, yeah, you're you're you're the
(36:18):
way you think about your sexuality was a very promiscuous
point of view.
And when, when you, it wasn't a problem for you
to go like, I, I am, I am attracted to
the opposite sex, but sex has become my idol. Now
I have to dethrone that idol. I'm giving my life
to Jesus Christ. There wasn't any question to your gender,
(36:42):
it was a question to your moral behavior in it.
And I couldn't, uh to me like that's that's that's
a different category than somebody who's
You know, half a mile down the road on on
in in literally hormonally transitioning to be a different gender
in their mind. The questions and the problems that they're
(37:03):
gonna have at that time, uh, sometimes I feel like
that's just beyond my pay grade. What I do know
is that God, in the beginning, God created man, male
and female, he created them in the image of God. Uh,
that is not negotiable for me.
But it's like when you're meeting somebody there, how do
you love them and walk them through the complexities of
what it's gonna look like them for now, for their
(37:24):
lives to be made conformable to the to the scriptures.
It is such a, that is not
I don't know about you, Bobby, but I haven't met,
I haven't had that personal problem yet. I haven't had
that personal moment, but I'm sure there's gonna be one
where you're gonna have to talk to them about like,
now that you've really given your life to, and you
know it, you just know you're going, I am here
(37:44):
and I know this is not where God wanted me
to be, though to walk them back.
It is gonna be a very different kind of walk,
but to love them fully in it, you know, that's a,
that's a thing that I think a lot of people
are really afraid, like, how are you gonna love me
when I show up in the doorstep of your church.
And if God brings, God brings somebody like that into
(38:07):
your congregations like, like you said, Bobby, I'm gonna go
I'm running at that one, right? But I just think
like we we can't just simplify that whatever they, whatever
it is that's happened to them and how far down
the road they are in in making literally all of those,
those biochemical changes that they've been doing and how how
do you
(38:27):
How do you work that backwards? How do you do
any of those things? I'm not saying, therefore you have
permission to just continue to whatever. I, honestly, I'm just
raising my hand and saying I, I don't know where
I would take them other than keep taking them to
Jesus and taking them to Jesus, letting them know his plan.
In the very beginning, it hasn't changed. In the beginning,
God created man in His image, male and female, he
(38:49):
created them in his image. That's, that's where we stay,
that's where we keep walking, but how do you walk
somebody in that category faithfully, it's gonna require a lot
of love and patience that a lot of people maybe
have never had to exercise in ministry or church just
think the person sitting next to them in church, how
are they gonna walk with them in that? How are
(39:12):
they gonna love them in that?
And I just, you know, like you said, by Paul,
Paul wasn't immune like, like people who are very like
atheists and very committed in their views on on gender
and sexuality, like they just make no mistake, like when
people try to say, well, Paul didn't know anything about
monogamous same-sex relationships as they are today. They didn't exist
(39:35):
in first century Rome. Oh yeah, they did, and even
the the the opponents of Christianity, who they they're they're
they're they're they're
Their professors and their, their point of, uh, their specialty
is sexuality and gender and stuff like that. They'll go,
oh no, that that was not uncommon in Paul's day.
There were monogamous uh uh same-sex relationships. So you can't
(40:00):
argue that part, right? So when you have that, when
you have opponents of the gospel saying, no, that's invalid
to talk about that Paul didn't know what was going on,
like what's going on today. Paul saw what we see.
And he's probably saw it in greater volume and things
that would be more like mentally arresting and and and
unsettling than we see. But I, I just think like,
(40:23):
we just need to face some things like how do
we walk with somebody? how do we, how like in
the same way we want to be fully known and
fully loved, how do we fully know and fully love
somebody and love.
is always going to be rooted in truth. Love rejoices
in the truth. It's not gonna rejoice in a lie.
So we can't bring untruth to these people, but really
(40:45):
what's it gonna look like when the rubber meets the road,
when you're gonna walk with somebody who truly wants to
follow Jesus, but they're, they, they got problems.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
So, so I mean that's well said, Richard, and walking
with someone's important. So I would say in this situation
we can say, yeah, gender dysphoria is a real thing
and effect of the fall. It's been.
You know, hyped up where you're seeing an increase of
it due to some of the confusion of sexual ethics
(41:16):
in our culture, but what are we going to address?
Are we going to believe in the biology of a
person or in what their feelings say?
And this is where we are. So now, the person says,
I feel this way. Well, it, what about the anorexic
that feels like they're overweight, but they're skinny? Do we
(41:40):
just say, yeah, you know, you feel like you're overweight,
so you must be overweight, so just keep starving yourself. Well,
that would be, that would be cruel. So when people
think that as Christians we're being harsh, we're actually trying
to believe that God
created us, and yes, he understood the effects of the
(42:00):
fall that there could be some confusion in it, but
I don't think the job is is to change our
body to fit our feelings. I think the job is
to change our feelings as much as we can.
To fit our body and if that change doesn't take place,
we don't start saying that just because somebody feels like
one gender that they are because that creates chaos and
(42:22):
why would you, why did, why will it stop there?
What about the person that feels.
like something else. Uh, this, then all the logic begins
to fall apart, and that's why you have over 100
different pronouns that anybody that is just using their common
sense realizes that there's male and female. There's not
(42:43):
Zins and and they and all these different pronouns that
are out there that's just culturally manufactured. Not only that,
you end up in the problem, so OK, now we're
gonna get behind the transgender idea and so the person is, um,
say I've become a female, but I want to marry.
A male. Well, now I'm now it's two issues, homosexuality
(43:09):
because now I want to date a male as I'm
disguising myself as a female because I feel like a female,
and so now you got homosexuality in it. Uh, if
you date.
Uh, if you, if I become a woman and date
a female, well, now I give the perception that I'm
in a lesbian relationship if I pull off the, the,
(43:30):
the new look. And so this is not, this is
not something that I think that the, the Bible is
inviting us into. It's always inviting us to embrace our
identity and embrace his sexuality and.
We're talking about transgenderism because that's what came up, but
I could equally talk about just my own struggles as
a man, you know, I'm called to live in a
(43:52):
monogamous marriage. Uh, does, but does that mean that I've
never had another thought of another lady? By no means.
And if anybody's shocked by that, well, you haven't either,
but I'm walking in obedience to God's word, and I,
I've lived.
as a faithful husband one day at a time by
(44:13):
God's grace, and I hope that I can continue that
till I get home. But if I just caved into
some of the feelings on a bad day, well, guess what?
That wouldn't be a good, uh, that wouldn't have been
a good look. And so I'm thankful for the Bible
and its call up, and we shouldn't feel bad that
the Bible calls us to, we have to get behind
the why, like God's actually trying to protect us. Think about.
(44:37):
The the confusion of so many kids that are going
through hormone therapy and everything that they would just rode
that out, they would have been OK. And there's testimony
after testimony of regret. Uh, that doesn't mean that there's
not some that are satisfied with it, but I don't
know how you could be satisfied with it and lay
out a clear biblical vision as well.
Speaker 1 (44:57):
Yeah, well, I think, again, the, the key is, is
where is the person relative to who they believe Jesus is.
Because then, like the the the will of that individually,
that that individual is, is at stake, right? Like I,
(45:18):
I'm either gonna follow Jesus or I'm not, and they
understand that following Jesus is going against everything they felt
that led them to this place where they're at.
And now where they're at, we're not saying, well, we'll
just take you, you can just stay there as long
as you understand that what got you here was not good. No,
what we understand is is now, like when you're talking
(45:41):
about your will and your thought life or whatever, it's like,
of course we we face those struggles, but isn't it
important for somebody to come alongside of some, like, say
if somebody's really like just
Ruined by pornography.
And there are there are men, I'm sure that the statistics, if, if, if,
if there was a private ballot of how many men
(46:04):
in a congregation um are addicted to pornography, this, this,
this statistics would be staggering. So here they are, here
are born again men.
that have a problem because of a habit that they
let grow into uh an an an addiction. And how, how,
what are you gonna do with this now?
(46:24):
Well, they want to walk with Jesus, so we embrace
them fully, we love them fully, we accept them fully,
but we realized that now somebody's gonna walk with them
and help them follow Jesus when everything in their body,
because the way pornography changes the brain, the literally the, the,
the physical nature of the, the operational way the of
(46:47):
the brain, it's like, how are we, we're gonna walk
with that person because they're just going like, I just,
I don't want to be doing this.
And I don't understand that because that was, that's never
been my pornography has never been a thing for me.
I don't understand that person.
But what I wanna do is I wanna, I wanna
walk with them through that thing. And the same thing
(47:08):
is like when
It's not, it's not, we're not validating any hormonal like
and it's for some of those young kids, Bobby, like
the pressures of adults like wanting to just fast track
their kid into being transgender, you know, it's like, uh,
what are you talking about? Because statistically it says that
there's a certain percentage of of kids who are, they
(47:31):
have gender dysphoria, and the vast majority of them outgrow it.
But the parents will fast track them into hormonal therapy,
and then they're down the road, and one day that
kid comes to his senses and goes, uh, what? How? No, they,
they meet Jesus. Now what do we do with them? We, it's, I,
(47:51):
I'm just saying I don't know how to, how you
literally like, what's entailed to walk them back from there.
Um, especially if they've gone undergone like literally, um, anatomical changes.
Like now what, now we're gonna, we want them to
understand that this is how God has made us, but
now now your body doesn't even look like a man anymore.
(48:16):
So now how do we do this? I wanna walk
with you in it. Uh, that those are quite, those
are things that are like, it's not like sitting down
and talk to somebody about pornography, right?
It's not like somebody, you know, who has had substance
abuse issues. It's this is the substance, I've abused it.
I'm an addict. I know I need somebody to love
me here, not not validate me here, but walk with me.
(48:42):
And be faithfully helping me to be faithful to follow Jesus,
when my will, and now even physically, physiologically and emotionally,
my dependence on this substance is something that that that
the person sitting next to me in church doesn't understand,
but how do we, we're gonna, of course, we're gonna
love them as a brother or sister in Jesus. And
(49:02):
we're not gonna affirm their abuse, but we're gonna have
to walk with them through very consistently hard things that
they're gonna have to go through in life.
And I just don't know, I'm just saying I don't know.
I wouldn't even know how to start this so some
somebody going, I've made all these these these these physiological
changes in my life, all these hormonal changes, and I've
(49:23):
given my life to Jesus and I'm, I know.
Yeah, I believe what the Bible says that God made
them man and woman.
Help. I would need help to help them, for sure.
Got a phone call here from Deborah in Lake Forest.
Welcome to Pastor's perspective, Deborah.
(49:43):
Hi, thank you. Glad to be on the line with
you guys. And uh Pastor Broderson, I pray for you
and Cheryl, you're on my heart. I've never even met
you or seen you.
Um, now, now, just, just so you know, Deborah, we
know that Richard Cimino sounds like Brian Broderson, but it's
not him. It's not Brian, just so you know. No,
(50:06):
I tricked you.
They look alike, they sound alike. Yeah, yeah, we do
it on purpose to trick to trick people like that.
I'm stunt. He's the stunt double, yeah.
OK. Well, what my question is, is, um, my sister-in-law
is gay and she's married to her lesbian, you know, lover,
(50:30):
their wives, and I always thought my sister-in-law was born
again because she went to, well, kind of a cult church.
But she was married before to a man, and that's
when I believe she came to know the Lord. Uh,
(50:50):
so now, they go to a Christian church that's supposed
to be a pretty good, uh, Christian church, and, uh, they're,
they're accepted there and they're even doing some ministry work. Uh,
so my main question is, uh,
(51:11):
You know, how am I supposed to think about them
and pray for them. Sometimes I'm just like clueless. I'm,
I'm at a lot.
Now, really quick question for you, Deborah, what extent of
ministry are they doing at this church?
Well, I don't think it's like, you know, teaching Sunday
school or something like that. I think they're just involved
(51:34):
in a general church like health ministry, you know, like
maybe helping the homeless or something or other like that. OK.
All right. Bobby, what would you say to Deborah?
Speaker 2 (51:47):
Yeah, I mean, again, this is, this is a situation
where my heart truly can feel for the person that
That
Experiences feelings for somebody, um, you know, even though I'm
heterosexual and I can't relate to it, I can't be
(52:07):
so naive to think that just because I can't relate
to it that there's not other people that struggle there
and so it's back to what Pastor Richard's, uh, really articulating.
We still have to walk with people in scripture and unfortunately.
Because many churches have compromised the gospel, there's churches that
people can find you don't, you don't like the idea
(52:29):
of hell. Oh, great, there's churches for you. You don't
like the idea of Jesus being the only way, great,
there's churches for you. You don't like the idea of
sex between a man and a woman in marriage exclusively. Great,
there's churches for you. And so you can find people
in those churches that are serving.
But it doesn't mean that they're living in alignment with
(52:52):
the gospel, and there's plenty of Christians that lived the
gay lifestyle. I'm thinking of Christopher Ewan or Rebecca McLaughlin
and others that would basically be begging the church. They
feel like they're putting a fork in the ground to
follow the teachings of Jesus in.
(53:13):
of feelings that they still struggle with same-sex attractions, but
they are looking at the scriptures and they're feeling like
the culture has caused the church to sell out in
some ways in order to make the culture feel accepted.
And Jesus was never one to compromise teachings. He would
(53:34):
lay out
A hard truth and then people would walk away from him,
but think about the person with all the riches. Go
sell all the other and come follow me, and he
went away, and it says that Jesus loved him, uh, right?
It wasn't a love issue. He did love him, but
he told him what he felt like his real issue was.
And so the fact is many people have made an
(53:55):
idol out of their sexuality.
That they have to lay that down at the altar
of the cross, and that's what it means to take
up the cross. It doesn't mean we'll take up the
parts that we like and we'll discard the parts that
we don't, but how do you relate? I think you
just continue to be, uh, uh, loving and caring and
(54:18):
friendly and.
Uh, it, it, you know, if you're asked about your
thoughts biblically, you can share that in a, in a,
in a loving way, and pray that the Lord will help, uh,
her to recognize the truth of the gospel and all
of its ways that it relates to life, including our sexuality,
and the follow him in it.
Speaker 1 (54:38):
Richard, 45
seconds. Yeah, um.
Rosario Butterfield, who was a lesbian, she said this, this guy,
this pastor in town in Syracuse, and his wife spent
over 2 years telling her about Jesus, but loving her,
just loving her and having discussions. And she said, after
(55:00):
years and years of this, something happened. The Bible got
to be bigger inside of me than I. It overflowed
into my world and I fought against it with all
my might. And then one Sunday morning, 2 years after
I first met Ken and Floyd.
Um, I left the bed. I shared with my lesbian
partner and an hour later I was sitting in a
(55:20):
pew at the Syracuse Reformed Presbyterian Church. Like that's the
power of the word of God and that she didn't
go like, well, can't you just, I want to be
here because Ken and Floyd, you're so wonderful. Can I
still be me and be with you? And that's not,
she just goes, no, I got out of the bed
that I'd shared with my lesbian lover and went to
(55:40):
church to give my life to God.
Deborah, thanks for your phone call. We are out of
time on Pastor's perspective. Thank you all for listening and
for watching as well. We will be back tomorrow. Bobby
Conway and Richard Cimino, thank you for joining me, and, uh,
we'll talk to you again tomorrow on Pastor's Perspective.
Hello and welcome to Pastor's Perspective. I'm your host, Brian Perez.
Welcome to this Tuesday, June 31st edition of the program.
Wait a minute, there's no such thing as June 31st.
It must be July 1st. Happy new month. We are
here to answer the questions you have about the Bible,
the Christian faith, just about anything that's on your mind.
Grab an open line at 888-564-6173,888-564-6.
(00:39):
173. Bobby Conway and Richard Cimino are going to be
here for the full hour to answer the questions that
you have. Bobby is an apologist. He's an artist. He's
a pastor. He's the doctor, Doctor, the great doctor, whom
we're gonna miss immensely. This is his last week with
us here on Pastor's Perspective, except maybe for some guest
(00:59):
appearances here and there. But man, Bobby, thank you so
much for the impact that you've had on our listeners
through your ministry and, um, yeah, you're gonna be missed, man.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Oh my goodness, I'm gonna miss you guys.
So much as I've said, this was just such a
beautiful opportunity and it really is, uh, it's kind of heartbreaking. Uh,
I've loved the audience. They've been just amazing and in
many ways it just felt like the most perfect fit
I ever had with everything I've ever done in my life. Uh,
(01:32):
you know, it's, it's, it's an interesting seat, right? You,
you know, but.
I'm wired as an apologist and a pastor and that blend, um,
you know, it's, it was special for this role and
then I've got this wrecked past and I love to
show up and be real with people and they've just
embraced me and I just thank you too, Brian. It's
(01:53):
been a privilege and I'm gonna miss you, Richard and
just thank you to all you wonderful listeners out there. um,
you've challenged me and I'm just so thankful.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
Bobby's gonna miss us until he has that first early
dinner at 6 o'clock, because right now he's, he's back east.
So it's 6 o'clock, it's dinner time for him. He
always has to eat dinner at 7 or 8, but
as soon as he starts having dinner at normal times,
like 6 or so, he's gonna be like, yeah, forget
those guys.
Speaker 2 (02:20):
Well, you know, the sacrifices we make. Yes,
Speaker 1 (02:25):
that's true. Richard Cimino's here too. He's one of the
assistant pastors at Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa. How are you, Richard?
I'm doing well. Good. Yeah, glad to see you here.
Thanks for coming in. And, uh, we've got lots of
great questions that were sent in online too, so we'll
get to those to begin our program before we go
to the phones at 888-564-6173. There are 3 ways to
(02:47):
send your question to us online.
First, you can go to the Pastor's perspective Facebook Messenger.
Send us your question that way, or you can DM
us on the pastor's perspective Instagram, or you can do
what Terry did from Inglewood, and that's, uh, well, I
don't know exactly what Terry did. She might have either
gone to the pastor's perspective page on Kwave.com, which you
(03:09):
can quickly get to by clicking on my forehead there
on the banner on the home page, or, uh, if
you're watching us on Facebook or YouTube,
Or Instagram, you can scan the QR code there, and, uh,
that'll take you right to that page without you having
to flick on my forehead. So, Terry and Inglewood sent
this question in. Oh, it says Terry listens on the app. And, uh,
(03:31):
Terry's question. The Bible is clear regarding a cheerful giver.
For some time now, I have my tithes set up
to autopay, biweekly.
I don't consciously think about giving since it's automatic. I've
made sure the amount covers the income from both of
my jobs. So my question, does that mean I'm not
giving with a cheerful heart? Bobby, what would you say
(03:52):
to Terry? It's, I mean, it's, it's autopay. She doesn't
even have to think about it. So is it being
given cheerfully? Great question, Terry.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
Well, of course, I think that you know you've just
made a commitment to be cheerful about an ongoing giving
structure in your life and if you wanted to, you
can just each time you're paid and know that, you
know what, thank you Lord for allowing me the opportunity
to be a part of giving, but I think it's
just an administrative piece and when you invest that way, uh,
(04:25):
you know, you're being cheerful about it. I don't think
you have to do it every week.
To be cheerful or every two weeks you can make
a commitment to have it on auto pay and be
glad you did it,
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Richard.
Yeah, and, and first of all, um, I think it's
wonderful that you just, you, you love giving to the
Lord and, and you know every now and then like
you could have been really cheerful when you set it
up you just wanna make sure you're cheerful when you
see that that's been taken out of your bank.
Right, yeah, no, that's a good point that's a good point.
really cheerfully giving, and you know, sometimes you can feel
(04:57):
strained and stressed at certain moments, but you know, if
you're in your heart you're going, Lord, I'm just so
glad that even though things are tight this week, I'm
so glad that that you, you received this from me
this week. So you just gotta kind of check your heart.
It's like anything we can be on auto pay sort
of going to church on Sunday, like just rolling in automatically, right?
And are we really rolling in because it's auto? It's
(05:19):
what you do, or because you're really glad to be there? You,
I was glad when they said to me, let's go
up to the house of the Lord. So yeah. Side
question here when it comes to tithing, and we haven't
heard this one in a while, so I'll ask it
now on your behalf and then we don't have to
answer it again for a while. But does God want
us to tithe on gross or on net? What would
(05:40):
you say, Bobby?
Speaker 2 (05:42):
Uh, I mean, this is such a tough one, and
it's not, uh, you know, a, a break faith issue
at all. Uh, Pastor Brian, you know, when he talks
about it, he thinks, you know, it's just, you determine
in your own heart what you're going to give, and
that might be, you know, not so much or might
(06:02):
be a lot. It's just a decision that you make,
and he makes a case for that and I understand
that case, um.
For me, if I'm gonna lean in one direction, um,
the way that that I, I look at that is
we would give a full tithe off of whatever our
(06:23):
income is, uh, and the way that I look at
that where it says, oh, each person should determine in
their heart what they want to give, or God loves
a cheerful giver, all that kind of stuff. In 2 Corinthians.
I don't look at that passage as it's related to
the person's local church giving. So I look at that
(06:45):
as an above and beyond gift that's being taken up
in that context. And so I see these people already giving,
and then they found a way to determine in their
heart to even give more sacrificially.
So it's hard for me to think that when Jesus,
you know, dies on a cross, just because we're under
(07:08):
the gospel, and if we understand Old Testament giving and
it was north of 20%, OK, so it's tough for
me to picture that all of a sudden.
The church, because Paul says each person should determine in
their heart what they'll give. Now, uh, because of the cross,
people were cutting their giving from what they were making
(07:29):
to 2% or 1%.
Uh, I don't think, uh, that was the purpose of that.
So I think that the extra was for the kind
of things that people come to us and say, hey,
will you support this ministry or that ministry, they're committed
to they're giving a full tithe, and then they were
sacrificing and determining in their own heart what they could
(07:50):
give for the collection that Paul was taken to Jerusalem.
And that's how I interpret it. So if I had
to think about which side to err on.
I'd rather err on the side of, you know what,
I'm gonna folk, I'm gonna, I'm, I'm not gonna try
to figure out how to give as little as I can.
I'm gonna try to focus on on starting at that
(08:13):
place that I think where God puts it, but that's
just my thoughts on that.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Now, there's a, there's a, I've heard it said in
the church before, sometimes pastors will say this kind of
thing when they're asked, you know, should I tithe on
gross or tithe on net? And the response is, well,
do you want God to bless you on the on
the gross or the net? But is that how we
should be looking at our giving anyway, where, oh, if
I give something, God's gonna bless me in return with
(08:41):
however he blesses me. Yeah, I, I don't like um
I don't like
The the idea of giving as being transactional. Um, I
don't think that's a healthy way to look at our
relationship with the Lord. Um, we don't worship the Lord
in song because when I I worship him in song,
then he's gonna do this, he's gonna bless me, you know,
(09:04):
so I think any form of our worship and and
and the the totality of our lives where we're supposed
to be a living sacrifice, right? Um, it, it, it
can't be like, well, I know that if I do this,
God will do that.
And so when it comes to giving, we don't want
to give that way. Um, when it comes to serving,
we don't wanna serve that way. And I'm just glad,
(09:26):
Bobby that you prefaced that your statement was saying there
are guys who take these different positions on the subject
of tithing, and this is not like, uh, this is
not a salvation issue. Um, it, it's, it's something that
there's a, there's a, there's a diversity in the way
people look at it, but I think the biggest thing is,
is just
You know, you, you, whatever you're gonna do.
(09:50):
Do it wholeheartedly and is under the Lord, like whatever
position you're gonna take. You, you just want to sit and,
and you know, the Bible says whatsoever is not a faith,
it's is sin and we, I don't ever want to
be operating in in an area of my life where
it's like I'm just
There's no faith engaged in it. I, I, I want
to be convinced in my heart that the Lord is
(10:10):
approving of what I'm doing. And when I can't say that,
then I'm, I'm, I think I'm, I'm in a, in
a not a very stable position. So Bobby.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Yeah, so, I mean, in a, in a lot of ways, I'm,
I was just, I'm thankful for the way it started off.
I was at Saddleback under Pastor Rick Warren.
And they taught giving a tithe, and I've shared the story.
I remember getting my check from the Ritz-Carlton and Dana
Point as a valet parker before I was a bellman,
(10:46):
and I think that I first wrote the check out
for 10 bucks, which was like 3%.
And I was like, man, I, I, I'm just gonna
do 30 bucks, which was the tie of 300 bucks.
And from that point forward, it just was set in
(11:06):
my Christian life for me. Uh, since I was 2021
years old, so for over 30 years that has been
a part of my life and I'm really thankful because
for me, uh, the way that I'm wired, I, I
think if I didn't sense some guidance from the Lord.
(11:28):
I, I probably would hold on to a lot more.
I'm a pretty selfish individual, uh, and the idea of,
you know, like when Randy Alcorn says, God doesn't give
you raises to increase your standard of living, but your
standard of giving. Well, I kind of like the thought
of raising my standard of living, right? Like I, I,
I've enjoyed the getting a king size bed instead of
(11:51):
sleeping on that full size or whatever when we were
married and early on and
We started off living in a trailer, uh, you know,
now we've got a nice home, so, you know, I,
I admit I'd be a horrible missionary, right? I mean, I, I,
I don't like bugs. I don't like specialty foods that
I don't recognize. I don't like, uh, getting out of
(12:13):
my comfort zone and so that's why, um, you know,
when God puts these things in place for me, it
makes it clear.
Uh, because left to myself, um, you know, the, some
of the stuff's tough for me, uh, that grew up
in California and I like
The, the, the finer things in life, right? A comfortable bed,
(12:34):
a nice vacation, air conditioning, nice tasting food, uh, uh,
you know, uh, uh, some people, they go, man, I just,
I just wanna get, I, I wanna buy one pair
of clothes and wear them for the rest of my life,
and I want to live like John the Baptist and
never get a haircut and.
Uh, I don't relate to that, and that means you
can pray for me. I need a lot of sanctification.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
And, and I think this is, you know, we, I, I,
there's Bobby being real again. We we just talking about that?
But you know, here's the deal, we can become so
self-righteous in our spiritual disciplines, and I remember when Valerie
and I were first married and we're just living across
the street over here from the church.
And we had 11 light in our little living room
(13:16):
and we had an upstairs downstairs apartment over in the
Gospel Gulch over here and and we had one light.
And so when we had friends over, everybody had to
gravitate to that corner of the room, and I just
thought like we don't need another light, like we're serving
the Lord and it would be such a waste of
money to buy another light. And it was almost like,
how can you call yourself a Christian if you have
more than one light in your living room, right? And
(13:38):
it was like and
or like, you know, you'd walk in the parking lot
and I remember one time I saw a Ferrari parked
in the parking lot. I'm going, how can you even
be a Christian and own a Ferrari? Well, you know,
I could say that because I didn't own a Ferrari and,
and I, and I kind of use my self-righteousness. It's
I'm 3 now. I would, I could use my, I
could use my myself right my lack of not having
(13:59):
those things. I could, I could.
I, I would start acting as though it's yeah, I'm
more righteous than that guy. And the question is, is
I have no idea what that guy does, like, like that,
that might be nothing to that guy and he gives
a ton to the Lord, right? You know, and so
we just want to be careful that we don't want
to be found living in, um, in a legalistic relationship
(14:20):
with the Lord. And if the Lord gives you a
king size bed, praise the Lord. I mean, we had
a full size bed for I don't know how long, Bobby.
I think we were gosh.
We made a long, long, long, long time and that. Well,
if you sell one of the Ferraris, you'll be able
to buy a, you know, well anyway, I digress. Um,
thanks for that, Bobby. You made me feel really much
(14:41):
a lot better.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
Well, you know, that's what I'm here for. Misery loves company, Richard. Uh,
I'll tell you, in all seriousness, when, when I first
got married to Heather, I told her, we're never gonna
make over $40,000 a year or $45,000.
And she didn't like that vision and um I, that
(15:03):
was the young zealot in me as well, right? Um, we,
when my, when I went to Dallas seminary.
Uh, in the early 2000s, we were living off of $35,000.
We had two kids. My, my school payment was $500
(15:23):
a month.
And we were giving above and beyond a full tithe,
just a little bit above, and, um, it was unbelievable
in that season to watch God provide like the checks
that would come out of nowhere or people who would
feel led to give to our ministry and they would help.
(15:44):
And so I, I, I'm saying some of this stuff
tongue in cheek. I always want to be willing to sacrifice, uh,
but I have found that I like, um, you know.
A nice good meal compared to fast food or I like,
you know, soft clothing versus stiff clothing or I like
a a comfortable bed versus a cot. Uh, so there,
(16:07):
but I think that some of that's normal, but the
question is, is, are we willing if God asks for
us to give these things up, you know, like, it
would be a hard ask, right? Like, is there a
place that
You know, God would ask you to go, to live,
or is there something in your life that if he
asked you to give up? Like, it wouldn't take me
(16:29):
long to think about how I could be thrown into
an instant.
Trial of surrender. And so in many ways where I
fear like sometimes it's like I just picture like, oh man,
I'm gonna show up in prayer and then I'm scared
to ask the Lord what he wants because it's just
gonna mean, you know, go sell this or get rid
of this or go do this. But what's been so
(16:52):
amazing about the Lord is I think in some ways
he's been really just teaching me as well, you know what, son?
Enjoy the good gifts that I've given you as well.
Don't feel bad about it, but always be ready to
be faithful and obedient, and that's the kind of God
we serve. He lets us enjoy those things, and so
sometimes people feel like if they are enjoying anything that
(17:14):
uh that I'm not really a Christian. I need to,
I can't enjoy things in life, and that's not true,
but if, if that becomes your ultimate, then that's a problem.
And uh and I have to be careful because I
think
My greatest shadow as a human being is.
A hedonist. Like I love, I love pleasure, right? And that, I, I, I,
(17:38):
I'd imagine there's a lot of people out there that
like that, but
I go, for example, but I go on a cruise
and I gained 15 pounds in one week, eating 6
square meals a day and visiting the Ocean View Cafe at,
at midnight. But when I come back,
I basically rein myself in and don't eat that much
(18:02):
for a couple of weeks. So it's, it's a you,
you can't live in that space constantly. You have to
know how to make sure you're living with self-control and discipline,
otherwise hedonism will overtake all of us.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
Richard. Yes, we just don't want pleasures to become our,
our master passion in life. That's right. And I think
as God is our master passion, he will give us desires.
I've always felt like, you know, delight yourself in the
Lord also and he will give you the desires of
your heart. It wasn't like, OK, I'm delighted in you, Lord.
So now you, will you please give me what I desire.
(18:37):
It's I believe he gives us desires, and he's at
work in us both to will and to do of
his good pleasure. And as we delight in him, he's
gonna show us, he'll lead us, he'll guide us, he'll
give us peace, you know, when he is when he's
our all in all, everything else is just we see
it in its right place, so.
Good conversation today on Pastor's perspective. I don't think we
(18:58):
left anything out when it comes to money and tithing
and all that gross and net, and, yeah, Terry, thank
you for sending in your question online. And we're gonna
do another online question before we go to the phones
at 888-564-6173-888-564-6173. Cathy and Bellingham Washington wrote in and says,
(19:19):
if my transgender nephew became a Christian,
He'll need to go to church, or I'm sorry, he'll
need a church to go to where he can participate
fully to grow as a Christian and begin the process
of sanctification. How can I lead him to Jesus and
then leave him with no prospect of a Bible believing
church that will accept him as he is?
(19:41):
And then Cathy asks, Would you as pastors, welcome transgender
Christians to participate fully in your church and let God
deal with their process of sanctification? Bobby, what do you
say to Cathy?
Speaker 2 (19:54):
It's a loaded question. Would we accept Foley into our church,
a transgender, well, of course, but you have to define fully. Um,
would we accept an alcoholic in our church? Of course, uh,
but if I'm just gonna show up and be in
a drunken rampage all the time and say, and then
(20:17):
make the church feel bad because they're not just, you know,
celebrating my alcoholism.
Uh, then that's a problem right there. So I think, um, our,
our task as pastors is to help people to understand
what their true identity is and who and and who
their identity is in and so if somebody is sexually confused.
(20:42):
Uh, that doesn't mean, um, in order to accept somebody
that we have to embrace the confusion in areas that
God has made clear. And so that's my fear of
the culture is we bought this narrative that
That it wouldn't shake out anywhere else. What are we
gonna say to the person that's a pedophile that wants
(21:05):
to serve in children's ministries? Well, and if we don't
accept him, or does that, so, so, so would we
accept somebody that, yes, but we're not going to put
that person in children's ministries, uh, and we're not gonna,
you know, say that that's a good thing.
And so we're gonna, we're we're gonna teach what the
(21:27):
Bible would have to say, but we want the person
to know that in doing so we, we do love
you and we do care about you and we do
accept you, but it doesn't mean that we agree with
the confusion that you're experiencing. So you can't apply that
across the board, right? I mean, think about like all
(21:49):
the different things that people have.
They can't just show up and then say, well, if
you don't celebrate this about me, then you don't accept me. Uh, no,
you come to the church and it's our job to
lay out what the Bible has to say, and then
the dying in all of us begins. If it's transgender
for me, it's uh it's been 100,000 things it seems
(22:12):
like since I became a Christian. It's, it's taking up
a cross. It's denying myself. It's embracing who God said
that I am, and today.
Culture is saying, you know what, you are what you feel, uh,
and that's just not the way to go about it.
And so I would say that if somebody's going to say, well,
(22:33):
if you don't embrace this my way, then you don't
accept me. Well, they're setting terms for what acceptance means
it's not even biblical. So we can accept people without
agreeing with each other.
Um, and I think that that is a higher view
of love than mandating that we agree in order to
show that we accept,
Speaker 1 (22:53):
Richard, yeah, I, I think that.
There's, there's a little bit of stuff that's like, OK,
so what, what's the starting point with such a person?
Are they coming in with not knowing Jesus at all?
And how do we, we don't say to that person, look,
it's obvious, you do not understand um what God has
(23:15):
to say about gender and sexuality. So when you get
that straightened out,
You, you, you're gonna be welcome here. Well, they don't
even know Jesus, right? I think, you know, when, when
a man or a woman truly encounters Jesus Christ, when
the Holy Spirit truly shines into the heart of a
(23:36):
man or a woman, the light of the knowledge of
the glory of God in the face of Jesus, it's transformational.
But that transformation is, is sometimes a a process, and we,
we don't want to run them out the door because
we've we've met them and they, when they haven't even
met him yet, they really don't know him, but they
wanna know about him. How are we gonna receive them?
(23:58):
How are we gonna deal with them? And then there's
the sanctification. Sanctification is, is, is a reality, the Christian life.
There is no new life in Jesus without the process
of sanctification being begun in your life, the the when
you meet him.
And that process is so different in each of our lives,
the pace is different, but pastorally, we really want to
(24:19):
lead people in that process of change. And I know
for myself,
It really stirs up in me I need to like,
to understand a whole lot more things about what's happening
in the life of somebody who's actually moved forward and
transitioned like all of the, the whatever the chemical stuff
is that they've been using.
Um, before that, um, how far along, how much of
(24:41):
that is reversible, how much of it is not reversible, and,
and all of those things. But Bobby, you nailed it
when it's like, who are we in Jesus? And I,
I just believe you cannot discover who you are in
Jesus without there being a move in the direction of
discovering your real true identity in him. And so I
think it's such a, this is not like
(25:04):
I don't think it it sits at all like this situation,
it's like somebody who's gotten a a substance abuse problem,
that's a deep thing, it's a hard thing, and, and
we can't expect them. Sometimes the Lord will change somebody
in a like that. The minute they meet Jesus, the
drug stuff is done. For other people, it's not like that.
(25:24):
It's a process, and they have their they have their
great seasons and they have stumbling seasons. How do we
deal with them in that moment?
So I just think it's so important that we that
we recognize, yes, if any person is a new is
is is in Christ, they become a new creation. How
do we walk with them in that reality? And Bobby,
you're right, you can't come in and just if somebody
(25:46):
comes in and says, look at, I'm never gonna change, um,
I'm I'm just here.
Um, well, you don't know Jesus yet. We'd love for
you to meet Jesus, because I can promise you, when
you meet him, you're gonna think differently. Yeah. It's a reboot.
I remember, uh, Cathy Keller said that when you meet Jesus,
it's like you get a new operating system and it's
a total reboot. And, and again, it's God is at
(26:08):
work in you both to will and to do of
his good pleasure, and that's on on across the board
on everything, whether it's an anger issue, substance abuse issue, uh,
is a gender identity.
issues like, but Jesus walks with us through those things
and I think that's the most important thing. Are we
willing to actually walk with somebody who we don't understand
(26:31):
at all and and best know how? How do I
love this person in this process of real transformation by
the renewing of their mind in Christ? Bobby.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Yeah, so, I mean, the Bible lays out
Clearly, God's plan for sexuality, that there's two genders, male
and female, uh, I don't think, you know, God made mistakes.
I think we get confused. I think that, um, I mean, listen,
there was, I think, a 4,000% increase in gender dysphoria
(27:05):
amongst females in the UK.
But what, what's going on there? A lot of this
has been just absolute cultural, it is, uh, you know, indoctrination. Now,
are there people that really do stru absolutely there is,
and that in that, and that warrants a ton of compassion.
But I too, when I showed up in the church
(27:26):
was totally promiscuous, always, you know, sleeping around different girls, uh,
you know, just giving myself to my lust and
Uh, did the church accept me? Yeah, but it didn't
say what I was doing was right. If it, if
the church view of acceptance means just telling everybody what
they do is OK and right and no big deal,
(27:48):
then how do we even get to the cross for
what Jesus died for?
So I don't think the idea of somebody, if somebody's
struggling with transgender stuff just in general, I wouldn't say
that person's walking in sin if they're confused, they're just confused.
I think there's things that they can do in the
department of intimacy that can lead that way, but our
(28:10):
job is to take the Bible and for everybody's issues
as it relates to intimacy and how that's supposed to
be channeled.
Whether it's the pedophile, the transgender, the, this, the total
promiscuous straight person, uh, whatever that is, our job is
to talk about the context, the way that we're wired
and our identity.
(28:31):
And if we start making certain exceptions in one department,
then why can't we make exceptions in other departments? And
before you know you're making so many exceptions, then why
do we even need a savior? Because basically we got
a cultural past in the name of acceptance. So I
think you have a hard time looking at the word
and making sense of that. No,
Speaker 1 (28:51):
I, you, you're not just saying, well, we're just.
This is too much for us to deal with, but
you just keep, you know, keep looking to the Lord
and you're gonna be great. No, it's like, as they walk.
Forward, and that's the thing, are they willing to follow Jesus?
And we, we meet them where they are, and then
(29:12):
walk with them as they, as they're following Jesus, and,
and we can understand like, oh, now here's where we're
at with this person.
It's not like, well, you get special pass on this thing,
because really, you know, you're transgender. So that's a different
thing than just coming in and having an anger issue.
It's the same way you just walk with people as
(29:32):
they as they are being changed by this power of
the indwelling Holy Spirit without no with no compromise concerning truth, yeah, so.
Yeah, it's break time now, but yeah, we could continue
this conversation. There's so much more that we could talk about.
I don't know, 888-564-6173, because you just mentioned anger right now.
Somebody could have an anger issue, but they don't show
(29:54):
it when they're here on Sunday morning, whereas or when
they're on the radio, or we're on the radio, but
when it's a transgender issue, it's like that's kind of visible.
So that's, yeah, we'll be back on Pastor's perspective.
(30:19):
Hey, we're back on Pastor's Perspective. Excuse me, 888-564-6173 is
our number. Brian Perez here along with Bobby Conway and
Richard Cimino. Bobby is the pastor of Image Church in, uh,
hold on, Charlotte, North. Just a moment. How soon we forget.
Uh, Charlotte, North Carolina. That's where he pastors. Plus you
(30:41):
can find him on YouTube. He's got a new YouTube
channel called the Graphite Apologist. So like and subscribe and
click that little bell icon. You'll get notified every time
Bobby puts up a new video. And here in the
studio with me is Richard Cimino, one of the assistant
pastors at Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa. You guys ready for
more questions?
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
Let me just mention one last thing, um, as it
relates to the final part of our conversation.
On accepting, you know, a transgender in our church. I mean, it, it,
it really is like, if anything, if I see somebody
that's transgender coming to the church, I'm gonna want to
(31:21):
show even more love.
That's gonna be my heart. So for the person that says, oh,
you're just not accepting, no, my heart is to show
more love. I used to have this guy that would
come to church and, and he was, you know, showing
up in long leopard jackets and pink hair and.
And he'd be the first person I would go up
(31:42):
to and hug. Um, we had a lesbian that was
in our church, and she came and she kept coming,
yet she knew what I taught about it, but she
felt like she could be there because she knew that
we loved her, but she knew that there was a
difference of opinion maybe as it relates to.
(32:04):
How that's fleshed out and so I, I don't think
it's a fair statement to say because of what pastors
are doing is look, they're trying to be faithful to
what they see in the scripture and maybe the transgender
person is trying to be faithful to who they believe
themselves to be.
And when it comes down to a moment like that of, OK,
(32:25):
this person thinks they need to be this, but the
pastor feels this is what the Bible teaches, I'm not
gonna say that the person isn't loving to me if
they're being loving to me because they don't adopt what
I teach about the Bible, and they shouldn't say that
I'm not loving to them because I'm trying to follow
my conscience.
And if a pastor truly believes that, and that's accurate
(32:50):
in the Bible, then what's happening is the pastor is
trying to help the person to not shrink their identity
down just to their sexuality, but to offer them a
bigger identity that encompasses encompasses so much more. And so
I think that people.
The struggle because, you know, people struggle. And the fact
(33:15):
is is empathy can be good, but a lot of
talks gone in the church lately about toxic empathy.
And toxic empathy is when our empathy goes too far,
where now we start siding with people as believers because
we feel like we have to do so in order
for them to feel accepted and then we start rejecting
(33:37):
God's word. But when I read the scriptures and I've
read it a lot, not enough.
The Bible's so heavy on what it has to say
about our sexuality and how that's lived out, and to
see the culture that we live in and how it's
literally minimize that, it's problematic.
(33:57):
And I don't think people that try to make arguments,
it's so weak when I hear the types of arguments
that expand stuff out, that it's, it's pretty desperate and
it's not as if this is a new struggle. When
Paul was writing some of the most.
Strong passages on sexuality in the Bible. He was writing
(34:21):
in a context where there was all kinds of sexual
immorality from heterosexual to homosexual. Uh, there was lots of
stuff where men were dressing up like women. This wasn't new.
This was the Greco-Roman world. And so we think that
(34:41):
we're like arriving at new revelation.
And really, what's happening is, is we're losing our moral
compass in the name of toxic empathy.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
Yeah, well, you know, I just, Bobby, I think part of,
part of the
The thing that that the church is facing is that
it has previously done really poorly in the way it
even talked about same-sex attractive people. Um there was this
there was this this
(35:12):
But
It was just not kind, you know, and
Now, because of that that that stigma, people have overreacted
to it, right? And and and and overcompensated for it,
but I think the idea is that I'm trying to
express is that when somebody who is somewhere along the
(35:34):
line and transitioning.
They come to know Jesus Christ. I'm sure they have
101 questions.
And to be able to walk with them through it.
I think the biggest concern in the question that I,
that as I read it was like, will you embrace
them as being truly having given their life to Jesus?
Of course I will. But how do we walk with
(35:56):
them through when they go now uh obviously then now
what is, well, now what? Now you we're we're gonna
be committed to living as God has made his plan
clear to us concerning our our identity.
And our sexual identity. But for some, like for you
and me, Bobby, you, for you, when you got saved,
like God was saying, like, yeah, you're you're you're the
(36:18):
way you think about your sexuality was a very promiscuous
point of view.
And when, when you, it wasn't a problem for you
to go like, I, I am, I am attracted to
the opposite sex, but sex has become my idol. Now
I have to dethrone that idol. I'm giving my life
to Jesus Christ. There wasn't any question to your gender,
(36:42):
it was a question to your moral behavior in it.
And I couldn't, uh to me like that's that's that's
a different category than somebody who's
You know, half a mile down the road on on
in in literally hormonally transitioning to be a different gender
in their mind. The questions and the problems that they're
(37:03):
gonna have at that time, uh, sometimes I feel like
that's just beyond my pay grade. What I do know
is that God, in the beginning, God created man, male
and female, he created them in the image of God. Uh,
that is not negotiable for me.
But it's like when you're meeting somebody there, how do
you love them and walk them through the complexities of
what it's gonna look like them for now, for their
(37:24):
lives to be made conformable to the to the scriptures.
It is such a, that is not
I don't know about you, Bobby, but I haven't met,
I haven't had that personal problem yet. I haven't had
that personal moment, but I'm sure there's gonna be one
where you're gonna have to talk to them about like,
now that you've really given your life to, and you
know it, you just know you're going, I am here
(37:44):
and I know this is not where God wanted me
to be, though to walk them back.
It is gonna be a very different kind of walk,
but to love them fully in it, you know, that's a,
that's a thing that I think a lot of people
are really afraid, like, how are you gonna love me
when I show up in the doorstep of your church.
And if God brings, God brings somebody like that into
(38:07):
your congregations like, like you said, Bobby, I'm gonna go
I'm running at that one, right? But I just think
like we we can't just simplify that whatever they, whatever
it is that's happened to them and how far down
the road they are in in making literally all of those,
those biochemical changes that they've been doing and how how
do you
(38:27):
How do you work that backwards? How do you do
any of those things? I'm not saying, therefore you have
permission to just continue to whatever. I, honestly, I'm just
raising my hand and saying I, I don't know where
I would take them other than keep taking them to
Jesus and taking them to Jesus, letting them know his plan.
In the very beginning, it hasn't changed. In the beginning,
God created man in His image, male and female, he
(38:49):
created them in his image. That's, that's where we stay,
that's where we keep walking, but how do you walk
somebody in that category faithfully, it's gonna require a lot
of love and patience that a lot of people maybe
have never had to exercise in ministry or church just
think the person sitting next to them in church, how
are they gonna walk with them in that? How are
(39:12):
they gonna love them in that?
And I just, you know, like you said, by Paul,
Paul wasn't immune like, like people who are very like
atheists and very committed in their views on on gender
and sexuality, like they just make no mistake, like when
people try to say, well, Paul didn't know anything about
monogamous same-sex relationships as they are today. They didn't exist
(39:35):
in first century Rome. Oh yeah, they did, and even
the the the opponents of Christianity, who they they're they're
they're they're they're
Their professors and their, their point of, uh, their specialty
is sexuality and gender and stuff like that. They'll go,
oh no, that that was not uncommon in Paul's day.
There were monogamous uh uh same-sex relationships. So you can't
(40:00):
argue that part, right? So when you have that, when
you have opponents of the gospel saying, no, that's invalid
to talk about that Paul didn't know what was going on,
like what's going on today. Paul saw what we see.
And he's probably saw it in greater volume and things
that would be more like mentally arresting and and and
unsettling than we see. But I, I just think like,
(40:23):
we just need to face some things like how do
we walk with somebody? how do we, how like in
the same way we want to be fully known and
fully loved, how do we fully know and fully love
somebody and love.
is always going to be rooted in truth. Love rejoices
in the truth. It's not gonna rejoice in a lie.
So we can't bring untruth to these people, but really
(40:45):
what's it gonna look like when the rubber meets the road,
when you're gonna walk with somebody who truly wants to
follow Jesus, but they're, they, they got problems.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
So, so I mean that's well said, Richard, and walking
with someone's important. So I would say in this situation
we can say, yeah, gender dysphoria is a real thing
and effect of the fall. It's been.
You know, hyped up where you're seeing an increase of
it due to some of the confusion of sexual ethics
(41:16):
in our culture, but what are we going to address?
Are we going to believe in the biology of a
person or in what their feelings say?
And this is where we are. So now, the person says,
I feel this way. Well, it, what about the anorexic
that feels like they're overweight, but they're skinny? Do we
(41:40):
just say, yeah, you know, you feel like you're overweight,
so you must be overweight, so just keep starving yourself. Well,
that would be, that would be cruel. So when people
think that as Christians we're being harsh, we're actually trying
to believe that God
created us, and yes, he understood the effects of the
(42:00):
fall that there could be some confusion in it, but
I don't think the job is is to change our
body to fit our feelings. I think the job is
to change our feelings as much as we can.
To fit our body and if that change doesn't take place,
we don't start saying that just because somebody feels like
one gender that they are because that creates chaos and
(42:22):
why would you, why did, why will it stop there?
What about the person that feels.
like something else. Uh, this, then all the logic begins
to fall apart, and that's why you have over 100
different pronouns that anybody that is just using their common
sense realizes that there's male and female. There's not
(42:43):
Zins and and they and all these different pronouns that
are out there that's just culturally manufactured. Not only that,
you end up in the problem, so OK, now we're
gonna get behind the transgender idea and so the person is, um,
say I've become a female, but I want to marry.
A male. Well, now I'm now it's two issues, homosexuality
(43:09):
because now I want to date a male as I'm
disguising myself as a female because I feel like a female,
and so now you got homosexuality in it. Uh, if
you date.
Uh, if you, if I become a woman and date
a female, well, now I give the perception that I'm
in a lesbian relationship if I pull off the, the,
(43:30):
the new look. And so this is not, this is
not something that I think that the, the Bible is
inviting us into. It's always inviting us to embrace our
identity and embrace his sexuality and.
We're talking about transgenderism because that's what came up, but
I could equally talk about just my own struggles as
a man, you know, I'm called to live in a
(43:52):
monogamous marriage. Uh, does, but does that mean that I've
never had another thought of another lady? By no means.
And if anybody's shocked by that, well, you haven't either,
but I'm walking in obedience to God's word, and I,
I've lived.
as a faithful husband one day at a time by
(44:13):
God's grace, and I hope that I can continue that
till I get home. But if I just caved into
some of the feelings on a bad day, well, guess what?
That wouldn't be a good, uh, that wouldn't have been
a good look. And so I'm thankful for the Bible
and its call up, and we shouldn't feel bad that
the Bible calls us to, we have to get behind
the why, like God's actually trying to protect us. Think about.
(44:37):
The the confusion of so many kids that are going
through hormone therapy and everything that they would just rode
that out, they would have been OK. And there's testimony
after testimony of regret. Uh, that doesn't mean that there's
not some that are satisfied with it, but I don't
know how you could be satisfied with it and lay
out a clear biblical vision as well.
Speaker 1 (44:57):
Yeah, well, I think, again, the, the key is, is
where is the person relative to who they believe Jesus is.
Because then, like the the the will of that individually,
that that individual is, is at stake, right? Like I,
(45:18):
I'm either gonna follow Jesus or I'm not, and they
understand that following Jesus is going against everything they felt
that led them to this place where they're at.
And now where they're at, we're not saying, well, we'll
just take you, you can just stay there as long
as you understand that what got you here was not good. No,
what we understand is is now, like when you're talking
(45:41):
about your will and your thought life or whatever, it's like,
of course we we face those struggles, but isn't it
important for somebody to come alongside of some, like, say
if somebody's really like just
Ruined by pornography.
And there are there are men, I'm sure that the statistics, if, if, if,
if there was a private ballot of how many men
(46:04):
in a congregation um are addicted to pornography, this, this,
this statistics would be staggering. So here they are, here
are born again men.
that have a problem because of a habit that they
let grow into uh an an an addiction. And how, how,
what are you gonna do with this now?
(46:24):
Well, they want to walk with Jesus, so we embrace
them fully, we love them fully, we accept them fully,
but we realized that now somebody's gonna walk with them
and help them follow Jesus when everything in their body,
because the way pornography changes the brain, the literally the, the,
the physical nature of the, the operational way the of
(46:47):
the brain, it's like, how are we, we're gonna walk
with that person because they're just going like, I just,
I don't want to be doing this.
And I don't understand that because that was, that's never
been my pornography has never been a thing for me.
I don't understand that person.
But what I wanna do is I wanna, I wanna
walk with them through that thing. And the same thing
(47:08):
is like when
It's not, it's not, we're not validating any hormonal like
and it's for some of those young kids, Bobby, like
the pressures of adults like wanting to just fast track
their kid into being transgender, you know, it's like, uh,
what are you talking about? Because statistically it says that
there's a certain percentage of of kids who are, they
(47:31):
have gender dysphoria, and the vast majority of them outgrow it.
But the parents will fast track them into hormonal therapy,
and then they're down the road, and one day that
kid comes to his senses and goes, uh, what? How? No, they,
they meet Jesus. Now what do we do with them? We, it's, I,
(47:51):
I'm just saying I don't know how to, how you
literally like, what's entailed to walk them back from there.
Um, especially if they've gone undergone like literally, um, anatomical changes.
Like now what, now we're gonna, we want them to
understand that this is how God has made us, but
now now your body doesn't even look like a man anymore.
(48:16):
So now how do we do this? I wanna walk
with you in it. Uh, that those are quite, those
are things that are like, it's not like sitting down
and talk to somebody about pornography, right?
It's not like somebody, you know, who has had substance
abuse issues. It's this is the substance, I've abused it.
I'm an addict. I know I need somebody to love
me here, not not validate me here, but walk with me.
(48:42):
And be faithfully helping me to be faithful to follow Jesus,
when my will, and now even physically, physiologically and emotionally,
my dependence on this substance is something that that that
the person sitting next to me in church doesn't understand,
but how do we, we're gonna, of course, we're gonna
love them as a brother or sister in Jesus. And
(49:02):
we're not gonna affirm their abuse, but we're gonna have
to walk with them through very consistently hard things that
they're gonna have to go through in life.
And I just don't know, I'm just saying I don't know.
I wouldn't even know how to start this so some
somebody going, I've made all these these these these physiological
changes in my life, all these hormonal changes, and I've
(49:23):
given my life to Jesus and I'm, I know.
Yeah, I believe what the Bible says that God made
them man and woman.
Help. I would need help to help them, for sure.
Got a phone call here from Deborah in Lake Forest.
Welcome to Pastor's perspective, Deborah.
(49:43):
Hi, thank you. Glad to be on the line with
you guys. And uh Pastor Broderson, I pray for you
and Cheryl, you're on my heart. I've never even met
you or seen you.
Um, now, now, just, just so you know, Deborah, we
know that Richard Cimino sounds like Brian Broderson, but it's
not him. It's not Brian, just so you know. No,
(50:06):
I tricked you.
They look alike, they sound alike. Yeah, yeah, we do
it on purpose to trick to trick people like that.
I'm stunt. He's the stunt double, yeah.
OK. Well, what my question is, is, um, my sister-in-law
is gay and she's married to her lesbian, you know, lover,
(50:30):
their wives, and I always thought my sister-in-law was born
again because she went to, well, kind of a cult church.
But she was married before to a man, and that's
when I believe she came to know the Lord. Uh,
(50:50):
so now, they go to a Christian church that's supposed
to be a pretty good, uh, Christian church, and, uh, they're,
they're accepted there and they're even doing some ministry work. Uh,
so my main question is, uh,
(51:11):
You know, how am I supposed to think about them
and pray for them. Sometimes I'm just like clueless. I'm,
I'm at a lot.
Now, really quick question for you, Deborah, what extent of
ministry are they doing at this church?
Well, I don't think it's like, you know, teaching Sunday
school or something like that. I think they're just involved
(51:34):
in a general church like health ministry, you know, like
maybe helping the homeless or something or other like that. OK.
All right. Bobby, what would you say to Deborah?
Speaker 2 (51:47):
Yeah, I mean, again, this is, this is a situation
where my heart truly can feel for the person that
That
Experiences feelings for somebody, um, you know, even though I'm
heterosexual and I can't relate to it, I can't be
(52:07):
so naive to think that just because I can't relate
to it that there's not other people that struggle there
and so it's back to what Pastor Richard's, uh, really articulating.
We still have to walk with people in scripture and unfortunately.
Because many churches have compromised the gospel, there's churches that
people can find you don't, you don't like the idea
(52:29):
of hell. Oh, great, there's churches for you. You don't
like the idea of Jesus being the only way, great,
there's churches for you. You don't like the idea of
sex between a man and a woman in marriage exclusively. Great,
there's churches for you. And so you can find people
in those churches that are serving.
But it doesn't mean that they're living in alignment with
(52:52):
the gospel, and there's plenty of Christians that lived the
gay lifestyle. I'm thinking of Christopher Ewan or Rebecca McLaughlin
and others that would basically be begging the church. They
feel like they're putting a fork in the ground to
follow the teachings of Jesus in.
(53:13):
of feelings that they still struggle with same-sex attractions, but
they are looking at the scriptures and they're feeling like
the culture has caused the church to sell out in
some ways in order to make the culture feel accepted.
And Jesus was never one to compromise teachings. He would
(53:34):
lay out
A hard truth and then people would walk away from him,
but think about the person with all the riches. Go
sell all the other and come follow me, and he
went away, and it says that Jesus loved him, uh, right?
It wasn't a love issue. He did love him, but
he told him what he felt like his real issue was.
And so the fact is many people have made an
(53:55):
idol out of their sexuality.
That they have to lay that down at the altar
of the cross, and that's what it means to take
up the cross. It doesn't mean we'll take up the
parts that we like and we'll discard the parts that
we don't, but how do you relate? I think you
just continue to be, uh, uh, loving and caring and
(54:18):
friendly and.
Uh, it, it, you know, if you're asked about your
thoughts biblically, you can share that in a, in a,
in a loving way, and pray that the Lord will help, uh,
her to recognize the truth of the gospel and all
of its ways that it relates to life, including our sexuality,
and the follow him in it.
Speaker 1 (54:38):
Richard, 45
seconds. Yeah, um.
Rosario Butterfield, who was a lesbian, she said this, this guy,
this pastor in town in Syracuse, and his wife spent
over 2 years telling her about Jesus, but loving her,
just loving her and having discussions. And she said, after
(55:00):
years and years of this, something happened. The Bible got
to be bigger inside of me than I. It overflowed
into my world and I fought against it with all
my might. And then one Sunday morning, 2 years after
I first met Ken and Floyd.
Um, I left the bed. I shared with my lesbian
partner and an hour later I was sitting in a
(55:20):
pew at the Syracuse Reformed Presbyterian Church. Like that's the
power of the word of God and that she didn't
go like, well, can't you just, I want to be
here because Ken and Floyd, you're so wonderful. Can I
still be me and be with you? And that's not,
she just goes, no, I got out of the bed
that I'd shared with my lesbian lover and went to
(55:40):
church to give my life to God.
Deborah, thanks for your phone call. We are out of
time on Pastor's perspective. Thank you all for listening and
for watching as well. We will be back tomorrow. Bobby
Conway and Richard Cimino, thank you for joining me, and, uh,
we'll talk to you again tomorrow on Pastor's Perspective.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!