Theology in the Raw - Bonus Q&A: Church Bathrooms For Transgender Individuals, Should We Talk To Our Kids About Masturbation, and More!

Episode Date: February 26, 2025

-- If you've enjoyed this content, please subscribe to my channel! Support Theology in the Raw through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/theologyintheraw Or you can support me directly through Venmo: @Preston-Sprinkle-1 Visit my personal website: https://www.prestonsprinkle.com For questions about faith, sexuality & gender: https://www.centerforfaith.com 0:00 Introduction 0:28 How should churches handle bathroom situations for transgender individuals? Different for teens and adults? 8:18 Your recent video with Sean McDowell...I noticed increased tension. Did this affect your friendship? 13:19 Knowing what you know, how do you handle being around Pro-Israel Christians and/or are insensitive toward what's going in Palestine? 20:55 In the "Upside Down Kingdom Bible", yuoiur commentary on Genesis 9:18-27 surprised me. How do we know "rape" vs. "mockery" happened here? 25:13 If both sexes are called to be Christlike and exhibit the fruit of the spirit, does it make sense to be called a "Biblical Man or Women?" 37:13 Should we talk to our kids about masturbation? 39:00 While the Bible seems to approve of wine, does it suggest that beer and hard liquor lack the same biblical support? 43:09 Thoughts on the "Man of lawlessness" in 2 Thess. 2:3. Is it a future antichrist? I'm unsure. 46:48 Was Jesus as God capable of sin? 48:19 Any tips for preparing for a daughter's wedding? 52:55 Were Paul's letters written before the gospels? How do we know? 55:53 How would you address folks who disagree with fundamental theological convictions of a church community, but insist on remaining in the church and promoting disagreement? 58:55 Is it unbiblical for a woman to explain and lead communion? 1:01:55 What is the difference between Luke 12:19 and the American idea of retirement?  1:06:13 How do you respond to the criticism that the "Upside Down Kingdom Bible" isn't a study Bible, but a special-interest Bible? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How should a church handle bathroom policies for transgender individuals? Did my recent and increasingly intense conversation with Sean McDowell affect our relationship? Should we talk to our kids about masturbation? How do I handle Christians who seem indifferent toward the suffering of Palestinians? What does the Bible say about beer and hard alcohol? And much, much more on this second bonus Q&A episode at theology neural. Let's dive into these questions. Okay. As you probably know by now, since I say it on every single Q&A episode, these questions come from my Patreon supporters who support the podcast. If

you would also like to join the Patreon community, you can go to patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw and become a part of the theology in the raw community for as little as five bucks a month. Okay. First question, Lynn wants to know, how do I think a church should handle bathroom policies for transgender individuals? Is it different for transgender teens rather than for transgender adults? This is a very hot topic, very disputed, could be very heated when people talk about it. I was actually with a bunch of, about, I don't know, like 150 youth pastors in San Diego a few weeks ago. And this was like the first question that came up and it occupied like our entire like hour long time together. It was fantastic. I mean, they were all talking about

different situations they've been involved in and how they handle it and want to know, you know, did I handle it right? What else could we have done? And, yeah, it's a very live question, I think, especially for youth leaders. But as you mentioned, this isn't just for youth groups, it's for churches as a whole. So, you know, with anything, I always like to make sure we get our definitions correct. Like, what is it we're actually talking about? So, first of all, what do we mean by transgender individuals? And here I just like to be super clear on what we're even talking about, okay? So we're talking about biological males or biological females who either experience gender dysphoria and or use the English word transgender as some kind of self description or you know, might call it like an identity, identity label. So when we say

transgender individuals, we're not talking about like some kind of third ontological category alongside male and female. So just if you want to word the question as specific and precise as you can, the question is, should males with gender dysphoria or males who use the term transgender as, you know, self-description or identity label, should these males be allowed to use private spaces, in this case bathrooms, designated for females? So my quick answer to that is I think bathrooms should be based on biological sex, not whether someone has gender dysphoria or uses the term transgender as a self-description. Private spaces where males and females have access to, and only males and females have access to, this has always been based on biological sex, not one's self-identity or not whether somebody

is suffering from a particular mental health condition. Now, this gets really tricky when, and I keep referring to males, I mean, this is typically what people are concerned about, right? I mean, you don't hear a lot of concern about, you know, biological females wanting to use male restrooms. That's obviously, you know, the case in some, that's the case in some situations. Typically people aren't as freaked out about that,

but this, everything I'm saying now, I'm using kind of males and female spaces, but this applies to both. So yeah, this gets tricky when an individual male or female fully presents as the opposite sex, not simply identifies as the opposite sex or has a gender identity that is different from their biological sex. I'm talking about people who, if you looked at them and they use the bathroom or whatever, you would assume this person is the sex of the bathroom that they are using even though they are biologically technically not that sex. Okay, so maybe they've had surgeries or maybe they're just presenting in a way that is passing completely as the opposite sex. I don't know if I have

the solution for that, honestly, because there's certain people that have fully transitioned. Again, I'm not saying that has changed your biological sex, you can't change your biological sex, but you can make your body look very much like the opposite sex, a different sex. And so, you know, you can, I'm sure you can think of some popular transgender individuals in media or in Hollywood or whatever that, you know, have fully transitioned and there's no, you wouldn't be able to tell that they are not the biological sex that they identify as.

So that does get tricky. This is why I think having single stall options is really the best solution to this dilemma that we have. Or even better, if you can afford it, just make all the bathrooms single stall, one room only. Go in, lock the door, and you're not with other people. Obviously, most churches, I don't think, can afford to do that.

That's going to cost a lot of money to rip out all the public bathrooms or shared spaces and just put in all single stall. But that would be the best case scenario that would kind of alleviate the issue altogether. But at least having a single stall option. Yeah, if you can't put in all single stalls, that's probably the best case. Now, I do want to point out though, that while everybody's freaked out about males who identify as transgender entering female spaces, there are cases that are typically not talked about in, I hate to broad brush, but in right-wing media of trans-identified

people using the bathroom of their biological sex and they are being harassed or even assaulted. I have a friend who is biologically female and has been harassed on a multiple, I think more than one occasion, when they are using the female bathroom. And there's other cases like that. So I think having the single stall bathroom is the best option. I do want to point out too that any kind of public shared bathroom space is always, it's never a completely safe space. I mean, before this became kind of a big issue, I mean, we've always had the issue of biological males who don't identify as transgender, don't

experience gender dysphoria, and yet still are pedophiles and are going into the bathroom that they should be going into and putting other people at risk. And how do you police that? So public shared private spaces, even if you have a strict policy, males in here, females in there, no exceptions, that still doesn't just wipe our hands clean of potential problems that could occur there. So, yeah, so that doesn't, I guess that doesn't add to the kind of solution to this question. It just kind of maybe points out or looks at it through a wider angle lens and say, don't think that you have just alleviated all potential problems if you make it, make bathrooms based strictly on biological sex. Next question from

Jason, he says, in my recent video with Sean McDowell, he said, I noticed increased tension. Do these disagreements impact your friendship? And you even say, feel free to ignore this if it's too personal. This is the all-general. I don't, I rarely ignore a question because it might be too personal. Now this is a great question. So for those of you who don't know, I actually went down to Biola University to film, actually two different podcasts.

One, and one of the longest one was with Sean McDowell. It was actually a three-hour conversation about some very touchy, complex, emotionally charged issues. We talked about whether Christians should use preferred pronouns of transgender identified individuals. We talked about whether a Christian should identify as gay. And we actually also, the last hour, we talked about whether same-sex attraction itself is a morally culpable sin. We actually decided not to release that hour. Part of it was because prior to that three-hour conversation with each other, both of us had an hour long interview podcast before that. Okay, so now by the time we got to the third hour

of our conversation, this was our fourth hour of talking straight and thinking through really tough stuff. And both of us kind of at the end of that last hour, like, I don't know if that was our best game. Like we probably shouldn't air that because we were, our, our brains were kind of mush and we both agreed that this probably wasn't the most helpful conversation for other people look in on, uh, to, to, you know, watch. Um, so we kind of tabled it and thought maybe we'll do it again at another time.

So anyway, I'm Sean or Jason, I I'm, uh, I'm, that's interesting that you said that you noticed increased tension. I don't remember that. So the great thing about Sean and I is both of us, I hope this is true. I could say it for me and I, for everything I could see, I see it in Sean that both of us are truly trying to understand

where this person's coming from. Both of us don't want to just be right. We actually want to get closer to the truth. I think both of us are willing to change our view if we are faced with, you know, holes in our argument or superior evidence against our view. Both of us are pretty well studied and thought out on the issue. So I don't suspect either of us will change. And again, not because we're not willing to, but it's just because if there was some major, serious, powerful argument that we haven't even thought of,

we probably would have come across it by now. And both Sean and I, we are both academics at heart. Like we enjoy pushing back and being forthright and even maybe getting passionate and saying, no, I think you're off there, dude, and here's why. And both of us don't mind. In fact, we kind of enjoy that. I enjoy it.

I truly enjoy it when Sean stops me and says, no, I think you're wrong here. And here's why. And I, you know, there might be a little bit like, ah, how could you do that? You know, and I'll jump in and, you know, push back, whatever. But at the end of the day, I think both of us actually enjoy that combination of a good faith conversation and not being afraid to push back even strongly with each other. So to answer your question, if there was, so I don't remember there being increased tension, but if there was, it didn't impact our friendship at all. In fact, I stayed at Sean's house, slept in a spare room.

Me and my son were actually down there. I'd brought my son down. We stayed at his house two nights in a row, had dinner together both nights. After the podcast conversation, I had a couple of other meetings I went to. Then we went back and we went out to a restaurant, awesome Mexican restaurant down in San Juan Capistrano, talked, hung out after dinner. Then we sat in a hot tub, hung out more. We talked about all kinds of things. I only think we talked about the conversation. We talked about all kinds of other things about life and church and the world and Jesus and family and evangelicalism. And it was a delightful conversation.

I didn't even think about like, wow, that was tense. This is weird or whatever. Like it didn't even cross my mind. So, and I'm going to assume Sean felt the same way. So to answer your question, Jason, no, it didn't at all impact our friendship. In fact, if anything, I probably made it stronger. Elena wants to know, knowing what you know, this is to me, how do you handle, how do you handle when you're around random outspoken Christians that are pro-Israel or are insensitive to what's going on in Palestine.

Elena, I mean, you've heard me talk offline about this, and I've talked online about a decent amount. Yeah, it's really hard, to be honest. It's really hard. It's been one of the more challenging things I faced in the last couple of years. The challenge isn't that there are disagreements around how Christians should think through the current conflict or say ongoing conflict in Israel-Palestine. I think the difficulty is that it becomes so, and I'll just say, I think, and people will accuse me of this too, I'm sure, it becomes so emotionally charged and un- or under-informed.

Like, you know, I often use the phrase, you know, let the strength of your passion match the depth of your study. And I've just seen that not be true in many cases in this conversation, where people are just so, so, so emotional, I would say almost at times irrational. And yet when you kind of see their logic, it's clear that they haven't really done a lot of thinking on it. Now, again, I'm not saying people that... Some people who are very pro-Israel and are very much against, I don't say Palestinians, but sometimes they equate like Hamas with Palestinians,

or they do show insensitivity to what's going on in Palestine. There are some people that are very informed. I'm not saying everybody who is in this case isn't informed. But as a Christian, to see the profound suffering of so many tens of thousands of people, and let me just say people, like on both sides of the border, whether they're Jewish or Palestinian. Numerically, I mean, obviously the suffering of Palestinians is far, far, far greater. Just statistically, with the people, the destruction, I mean, 80% of Gaza has been destroyed and tens of thousands of people have been killed, many innocent women and children. Who knows how many more deaths will occur from the aftermath of the war? I mean, there's like direct and indirect deaths, right? Direct death is like people shooting kids in the head in Gaza and whole buildings being

destroyed and 150 civilians being killed to get three members of Hamas. Those numbers add up. But then there's also indirect deaths. I mean, people that have arms and legs blown off who might live for a little bit and then die later or just all the diseases and malnutrition and lack of sanitation and lack of clean water and on and on it goes. Who knows what the death will be that's indirectly related to this war. And I'm gonna say all 1100 and what,

30 people that were killed on October 7th, I equally mourn those deaths. Like full stop period, that is horrible. So the 1100 plus people who are killed, what 900 civilians, I think 800 and something civilians, every one of those precious in the eyes of God should not have happened. So I put those 1100 alongside the 50 plus thousand civilians

that were killed in Gaza since then. With the ongoing, all the ongoing stuff in the West Bank, people often don't even realize, you know, all the horrific things that have been happening in the West Bank. So I, to just stop, you know, when I hear like, well, they deserved it, well, we need to get Hamas and they started it all.

It's like, okay, leave it aside. Those questions. Can't you just, just go online. Just look at the destruction. Look at the suffering on both sides. I get, I'm not saying I'm just saying yes. Yes. Be outraged over October 7th, more in the deaths of every single innocent civilian that was killed in October 7th and the numerically much far greater number of Palestinians. It doesn't mean it's like you mourn the suffering of Palestinians more simply because of the number, but it's like just mourn it all. This is just absolutely horrific. And like when you try to point that out or just say, I think Jesus is both angry and saddened over all the deaths.

And when Christians don't, I don't know, they just can't get there. It's just, it has thrown me for a loop. It's like, well, what are we doing here? Like, have we been so shaped by certain political allegiances or certain narratives that we've just believed without investigating, that we just can't just full stop say it is evil when women and children are killed as an attempt to accomplish justice. If your sense of justice is, I need to kill thousands and thousands and thousands of women and children to accomplish justice, then I would say that's just completely against anything in the New Testament. It's just extremely un-Jesus-like. That is a demonic definition of justice.

I still see that as being debatable. Yeah, but they voted for Harass. Yeah, but what are we doing here? What kind of ethical logic is it? That's like Osama bin Laden's ethical logic. Like, you know, there are no innocent civilians because you guys voted your government in office. So we're going to come and bomb a bunch of innocent civilians in 9-11.

You know, like that's not a Christian logic at all. So anyway, Elena, you ask a quick question, I can't give you a longer answer. So yeah, it's hard. It's super hard. So I have just learned, if I don't perceive a good faith, thoughtful, rational conversation about to happen, then I conversation about to happen, then I kind of avoid it now. I really do. If I just have all, every indicator that this is not going to be, it's just going to be a yelling match, it's going to be irrational, it's going to be accusations thrown around, then it's like, you know what? I would much rather focus my energies on the potential conversations that have the potential of being a good faith conversation that are going to lead to mutual

edification. Next question. In the new Bible, this is the study Bible, the upside down kingdom study Bible, your commentary on Genesis 9, 18 to 27 surprised me. The word rape is used clearly elsewhere. How do we know that rape versus mockery occurred here? So this is the famous incident, Genesis 9, where with Noah and his sons, I don't know, I'm just going to let you guys look it up. Okay, you might be familiar with it. Genesis chapter 9 verses 18 to 20. So, if you're not, just hit pause, go read it

real quick. I wrote the study note for this passage. So, I actually want to read it. It's not that long. Here's what I say in the study note. This passage is difficult to interpret. There are at least three possible sins committed by Ham. Okay, this is the question. Like, what did Ham, Noah's son, do to Noah? That's the question. And the text is not super clear, okay? So I say there's three possible interpretations. Number one, Ham saw Noah naked. Number two, Ham slept with Noah's wife. And number three, Ham saw Noah naked. 2. Ham slept with Noah's wife. 3. Ham raped Noah. The first interpretation is possible, especially if verse 22 implies that Ham is mocking his father, which isn't explicitly stated in the text. But seeing one's father naked doesn't

seem to warrant such a severe punishment. The punishment is Ham and his entire genealogical line will be cursed, according to Genesis 9.25. The first interpretation, therefore, seems unlikely. The second is better since the phrase in Hebrew, saw his father naked, can refer to sleeping with a person's spouse. And here I cross-reference verse 22 and Leviticus 18, 7, where we see the same phrase used. But Shem and Japheth, Noah's other two sons, took a garment and they literally covered Noah's naked body, which suggests that Noah's nakedness is not a metaphor for his wife, but refers to his literal nakedness. And Genesis 9, 24 says that when Noah sobered up, he realized what Ham had

quote, done to him. Therefore, the third interpretation, Ham raped Noah is probably the best. And I give a few thoughts on rape and incest and stuff. So yeah, I see say my interpretation is surprising because the word rape is clearly used elsewhere. And that's true. The typical word for rape is it, shikav. I forget what it is. I think it's shikav. Don't quote me on that. It's not used here.

But just because the typical word for rape isn't used doesn't mean rape couldn't be described by not using the specific word. And also, I mean, my interpretation here is admittedly tentative. I mean, I hope it came across that way. I'm not saying this is absolutely what happened. But because the other interpretive options, I think, carry less evidence, less textual evidence, this is where I lean towards the third view, rape being what happened, the severity of the punishment, the phrase that Ham did something to Noah. Like what did Ham do to his naked father that would warrant a severe punishment

of Ham's entire genealogical line? I think some kind of sexual assault is the most likely of the options, the most likely candidate. So yeah, hope that helps. You still, I guess, don't need to agree. I guess I would say whatever view you take on this passage, yeah, I would just say make sure you wrestle with the other options and show why your view has superior textual evidence compared to the other view. I will say the interpretation I take here is probably the most popular mainstream interpretation among scholars. I haven't surveyed every single commentary, but this is among, if not the most popular interpretation of this passage. Okay, next question.

If both sexes are called to be Christ-like and exhibit the fruit of the Spirit, does it make sense to talk about being a, quote, biblical man or biblical woman? This is a fantastic question. I love this question, and I've wrestled with this for several years now. And yeah, I don't love the phrases biblical man, biblical woman, or biblical manhood, or biblical womanhood, partly because there's a lot of modern baggage with those terms. In some cases, not every case, when people use those terms, they apply certain gender

or cultural stereotypes, modern Western stereotypes, to what a biblical man should be in contrast to what a biblical woman should be. So typically when they say biblical man, biblical woman, they're talking about distinct virtues that one sex is to live out and the other sex is not to live out, which I think you're hopefully at the edge of your seat because I think this is exactly what you're getting at. Like, are we all supposed to be godly and holy and kind and forgiving and love our enemies and turn the other cheek and, and be, uh, courageous and selfless and sacrificial and generous and hospitable. Like aren't these just virtues that Christians should live out?

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