Theology in the Raw - Sexuality, Celibacy, Marriage, and Gay Identity with Dr. David Bennett

Episode Date: June 22, 2026

To listen to the extra innings portion of this episode, where David discusses why it's okay for faithful Christians to identify as gay, head over to https://patreon.com/theologyintheraw to become a member of the Theology in the Raw community.Dr. David Bennett (DPhil, Oxford) is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Systematic Theology and Christian Ethics at the University of Oxford and Associate Research Fellow at Wycliffe Hall. He is the author of the bestselling memoir A War of Loves --the story of his journey from atheistic gay activist in Sydney to celibate gay Christian—and a member of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s College of Evangelists. His Oxford doctoral thesis, Queering the Queer in Contemporary Theology: An Augustinian Ethics of Same-Sex Desire and Gay Celibacy, is in press with T&T Clark/Bloomsbury (2027), as is his second popular-level book, Beyond Compromise: Reclaiming a Biblical Vision of Love, Sexuality, and the Kingdom of God (Tyndale House). See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

When I think of Jesus, you know, in his life, in a way, his struggle was that he was never really understood. He was always other as the incarnate son of God. He was born of a virgin. He didn't have a biological father. A new creation doesn't fit. And so there's this fascinating overlap between the way that like sexual and gender minorities, the eunuch, all of this stuff in the Bible, they don't fit. And then that's precisely where Jesus chooses to most intensely place his glory. Hey friends, welcome back to another episode of Theology Around. My guest today is my friend, Dr. David Bennett, who is a post-doctoral research fellow in systematic theology and Christian ethics at the University of Oxford. Yes, that Oxford. And Associate Research Fellow at Wecliffe Hall, he is the author of the bestselling memoir, A War of Loves, which chronicles his journey from being an atheistic, gay activist in Sydney, Australia, to a cell.

of it gay Christian in Oxford, England. His second popular level book, Beyond Compromise, reclaiming a biblical vision of love, sexuality, and the kingdom of God comes out soon with Tendale House. Really enjoyed this conversation with David, as always, he is incredibly intelligent, winsome, wise, and sometimes a little provocative, which I really appreciate. Be sure to stay tuned to our extra innings portion of this conversation where David and I talk about gay identity, should Christians who are walking faithfully at Jesus identify as gay? And David gives some pretty, well, I don't know, you'll just have to listen to it. He gives some really thoughtful responses to those who say, no, Christians should not use the term

gay. If you want to check out the extra innings portion of this podcast, you have to head over to Patreon.com forward slash theology into raw to become part of the theology in the Rock Committee. Okay, without further ado, please welcome back to the show, the one or only Dr. David Bennett. David Bennett, it is so good to see your face. It's been, I think, a few years since we've even talked online or on Zoom chat or, I don't know, when's last time we've seen each other in person? It's been several years. It's been way too long. But then it feels like things should swing around, shouldn't they? Like, we should have just seen each other. But it's just, I think there's been like a few churches where you're speaking and I was going to be there and then something changed

and but here we are finally so you're still you're in oxford uh finish your phd phd or defil and you're doing a postdoc right now is that what does that look at postdoc i'm sitting in my office in the schwartzman center for the humanities so it's like this 180 million pound building that was just constructed for the humanities in oxford and so here in the thing theology and religion faculty where I have like a project focusing on Augustine. And big reason for that for me was just when I wrote my doctorate many years ago, he became very important in terms of desire and love theology and the body and Christian views of human anthropology, like what makes up the human being.

So all sorts of things. And so that project has formed and is growing. And I'm really enjoying it. Just getting some time to be a scholar, not just an itinerant person preaching. So that's been amazing. And I think, you know, hopefully I'd like to be able to do something similar to figures like, you know, NT Ride or, you know, various scholars who kind of straddle that line between the church and the academy. Because I think that just, I hold you accountable on both fronts, you know.

Yeah. Like the best theology and the best kind of worship should speak to everybody and be universal. But it should also be deep and like, you know, listening to the forefront of research and what's happening. So you get paid to research, read books, write books, and hang out with Tom Wright in Oxford. What is this? Is there a thing? Is there a sweet or gig? I wish I wish it were that romantic. Okay. But it involves a little bit. more backwork in terms of raising funds and, you know, I think the days are gone where you just sit in an ivory tower and research. You have to get out there to impact. You've got to raise funds for the project that, you know, pays for things here. So unfortunately, the days of like the state

funding academia are dwindling away. But I do get, I do get to catch my breath and see Tom every now and then, and that's great, and others here in Oxford, who are just formidable people. And that makes the place worth it. You've been in Oxford. How many years you've been there? 10 years? 13 years. Is this like a permanent? Would you love to spend the rest of your life in ministry in Oxford? Or who knows? It's such a good question. I think I've spent like maybe, so in the 13 years, I think I've fallen in love and out of love with Oxford about three times. And each time, you know, there are similar difficulties and frustrations and similar gifts, but they, I think this third time, you know, it kind of settled in as I have a community here, friends. We've suffered together through the lockdown, through the last kind of five years, being difficult years.

But I think, you know, what you realize is that when you suffer together, there's a bond of love that, like, nothing. else can produce when you suffer together in faith. So I've got that community here and that's super rich for me. And then there's just very few places that have the kind of resources that Oxford provides to keep growing. So I think, yeah, I do think it's a life, potential life calling, but you never, I've stopped trying to predict what the Lord will do. I just remain kind of radically open. But one thing I have been doing, which I've really loved, is doing theological residencies with churches. So going for three weeks, four weeks, five weeks, sitting in the pews with the people, preaching in the pulpit, doing lectures in San Francisco, in New York, in L.A. and around the U.S., and then also in the U.K., so that's been really lovely. I really enjoy, like, coming alongside and being in the local church as a theologian who can learn from, you know, the everyday Christian in those communities.

There's so much exchange that's super rich. So, yeah, I love it. I love the model. It really is a dream. That's not easy, and it can be exhausting, and it's a super intense place. Like, for instance, we just had some big AI tech companies come here and kind of engage all of us as humanity scholars and open up lectures in some of the spaces here that we were invited in the Schwarzenman Center to attend and was packed. and talking about the future of humanity, all kind of bewildering, but super fascinating questions. So it's amazing to just be like the pulse of that happening here.

Yeah, there's something Oxford provides as well as you can get away from the countryside and you can just relax. And so, yeah, it's great. Such a beautiful city. I was just there for a few hours. When was this last year? Last summer, I think. I didn't

been to Oxford for years but yeah just such a gorgeous city. I mean I love you know I go to Cambridge quite a bit

I'll be there in August and I just love those British cities that are just like universities just like the city is like the university

scattered everywhere you know and it's just like the whole city has this like intellectual vibe I just love that feel

but yeah it is amazing you're so I mean people that recognize your name probably know you by, you know, your work on sexuality, your book War of Love's outstanding book.

How have you been thinking through the sexuality conversation and its intersection with the church in the last, I don't know, five years or so? Have you seen, are you thinking through different things? Have you seen changes? How have you, how would you? Yeah. Yeah. Some up your It's a really, it's a really good question. It's a funny thing because like I go and I do all this ministry and it's one thing after another and you know a person says this there's these difficult things that happened and you know and i think as i've pulled back a little bit just to have space here in oxford i think what's happened for me even just personally is i've become more deeply secure with you know the theological truth of a kind of side be position that i take now and

I think that means there's less of a need to auto-justify and say, you know, you are wrong. This is not the way of the Lord, you know, whilst also an intensity of like the prophetic voice of this kind of minority within minority position. And so writing the doctrine, querying the queer in contemporary theology, you know, an Augustinian ethics of same-sex desire and gay celibacy. Like that title is just... That was your, that's your title. of your doctorate? That's the title of the book that comes from my doctrine. The doctorate's similarly controversial, but was more within Anglicanism.

But this is like broader, the one that I'm publishing now, with T&T, Clark, Bloomsbury, in the kind of top theological ethics series. And so it's kind of this really interesting, I think I've become more convinced of the potency of the otherness and queerness of being a gay celibate Christian and how this is like very much in line with how the church has subverted a culture around it, particularly like in early Christian years,

you know, back in Augustine's time of Holy Virgins, that like kind of proto-queer, all that stuff. I think, but then the queerness itself is like fallen apart a little bit in kind of queer theology and queer spaces because it became collapsed to gay marriage apologetics. and by queer theology's own view, that's not very queer. So Lynn Marie Tonstad, who's a prominent queer theologian at Yale, has said, you know, actually queer theology has lost its queerness, and the other of queer theology is now the queer.

Can you, because the term queer is probably throwing some people off for various reasons. for some older people my age and older, it's, you know, we grew up with that as a derogatory term. And then other people who are maybe more academically minded might correlate it with queer theology. And that's queer theology is bad. How are you like, can you talk to us about what queering the queer means and what does it mean? What does the word queer even mean? Well, I think the word queer is purpose. purposefully non-definable without some kind of context.

It was a word that was used to kind of subvert culture and to criticize culture or to destabilize it and to stabilize norms. And so, like, there's three main meanings, I suppose, that you could freight that are the mainstream meetings. The first is just a replacement for gay and lesbian. and part of resisting commodification of gay lesbian culture by capitalism and by kind of oppressive forces. And this is a hypersexualization, I think, as well, of gay culture. And then, so that's kind of like second definition, a resistance word, within gay culture itself.

Which I think often is lost in like the media, But that was a really important move in 1980s, 1990s. And then the third meaning is just simply like an academic term, which means to kind of subvert a normative structure of power, which is covered over people who are oppressed by it. So you could think of all sorts of state powers, how they might delete certain kinds of people because they don't fit within their agenda. You could think of heterosexual pastors trying to cover over gay people because they don't fit

within a nice easy pastoral strategy for a church. Quering is to kind of unsettle that and actually open up space for those groups that haven't been seen or catered for or loved. And then you know, we've got like the Judith Butler layer, which is all about kind of postmodern views of language and can we get back to a sense of the physical body, the sex difference of the body. No, we can't because it's always a performance. It's always a text on the body. It's not actually something that we can't get back to the body in its pure form because of the, and so because of the fall, I think is actually not what Judith Butler would say. But I would say, basically, queer theory and Augustinian Christianity have this fascinating moment of intersection where they both say everything's kind of radically fallen and we can't quite get back to what is. And if we try to redefine the narrative of what it means to be human in the beginning, we end up killing all these people because they don't fit within it.

So this kind of lore of Adam and Eve where straight, heterosexual people are the norm and everyone else who isn't like that. If we try to get back to the garden, we end up crushing all those people. And even the people who are like that don't live up to that ideal. So that's why Jesus had to come, you know. And this is where I would disagree with queer theory, which would say there is no way to reconstruct or restore or redeem that. It's just broken. And so we have to construct ourselves from within. I would say no, it's through Jesus Christ that then we're able to regain sexual difference in marriage and these norms in ways that don't actually harm the people who kind of easily live within them.

And so I found that to be really fascinating. And like, just, I know it's probably hard for some of your listeners to gain traction with me. It's a little fuzzy, but I think that's because we haven't had that conversation. Yeah. And I think it needs, it's a conversation that needs to happen. Did you know that 30% of Americans grind their teeth at night, whether it's a nervous habit or something you do in your sleep? It's time to join over 350,000 Americans, including yours truly, and get yourself a custom-fitted Remy Nightguard. I wear mine literally every single night. Remi night guards are the only FDA cleared and clinically tested at-home impression kit night guards on the market. Not only do they help prevent teeth damage from grinding, they also help reduce jaw tension

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So if anybody said like, oh, queer, yeah, I'm not on board at that. Like, any kind of negative reaction to queer as a word or concept is almost doesn't make sense because the term is very malleable, flexible,

capable meaning several different things. So you would have to really, first of all, define exactly what you are mean by queer and then kind of agree or disagree with aspects of what that term is trying to convey. Would that be? Yeah, well, I think I came to this point where queer just did mean a kind of otherness that isn't seen or witness to. When I think of Jesus, you know, in his life, in a way, his struggle was that he was never

really understood. He was always other as the incarnate son of God. He was born of a virgin. He, like, didn't have a biological. father, he didn't fit. A new creation doesn't fit. And so there's this fascinating overlap between the way that sexual and gender minorities, the eunuch, all of this stuff in the Bible, doesn't, they don't fit. And that's precisely where Jesus chooses to most intensely place his glory to give a name better than sons and daughters to that group. And that narrative, which is very

scriptural. I mean, it's all over scripture, has been totally covered over by like a bite-sized compressed. Say, like, you know, I believe in the Bible. Yeah, and I was like, have you ever read it? Like, I believe what the Bible says about gender and sexuality is still like, have you read it? You know, and I think this is where I've become quite disappointed with biblical scholarship recently because it feels like in the biblical scholarly world, you can't actually talk about this topic at all unless you affirm a certain kind of normative progressive view. So like seeing this happen with Richard B. Hayes in such like a strange way and various other kind of biblical scholars to kind of tick publishers boxes so that they can sell academic books. And it just feels like

we're losing our capacity as the academy to also represent alternative views. So one of the things I think I came, you know, after all of this, I came to the realization. I was like, yeah, actually being a celibate gay Christian in a non-repressive way is more intensely queer in queer theological terminology than being in a gay marriage. And another thing that happened in the academic literature was this new word, we went from this word called heteronormative, you know, to homo-normative. So, you know, I'm a gay married man with my partner and my adopted children, that now is an oppressive conceptuality. That's like homonormitivity.

And gay celibacy also challenges that. So it's a fascinating thing that's happening. And I've done a conversation with Matthew Vines, who's one of the foremost kind of affirming authors, very focused on trying to focus on biblical exegesis. And he says, I absolutely repudiate the kind of queer, because he recognizes in some way that it does lead to where I'm saying it leads. But the thing I think where I disagree with Matthew, and I think this was interesting because I said,

Matthew, are you saying I'm too queer for you or too liberal? I was like, I don't know, I'm not the liberal. Like, what? And like this kind of reversal of this whole schema that this whole conversation has been in is fascinating. I think we're getting back to radical discipleship, to the kingdom that shakes our understanding and our easy categories.

And so I think that's really exciting. And whilst I do agree with the criticism of the queer kind of literature, queer theory, queer theology, I think what I want to do is try to help our post-modern or late modern culture take that queerness in all its kind of brokenness and its continual self-deconstruction that is so unhealthy and is breaking down our humanity and causing the kind of Romans one human deconstruction,

you know, to say, hey, actually come rest that in God's holiness. Let's find a path back to kingdom discipleship, obedience to Jesus that comes from grace, that isn't about striving, that isn't about being killed by the letter of the law, the law of Adam and Eve, but about becoming eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom, married couples who radically lay down their lives in a cross-shaped way that totally upends like gender norms and doesn't fit in a stable culture, whatever culture that is, you know,

that is kind of pointing to this new creation that is broken out in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Like, let's do that. I want to be a gay man who makes space for that kingdom and who has, you know, repented from same-sex activity because that is not. no longer compatible with a new creation. One quick story and then maybe jump to another question. I was on my Instagram the other day and this lovely gentleman message me and he said, David, I've been following you.

Every time I read your posts, I just get filled with the Holy Spirit really deeply. And I came to the kind of conclusion that I need to basically end my gay marriage with my husband who has nursed me back to life from terminal cancer or like really bad cancer twice. And he's been my main carer. He's loved me so deeply. But yet, I know somehow this is misaligned with the created order. And I have to kind of end it.

I'm just thinking, oh, Lord, this is so above my pay grade. Like, I don't know. This is so mysterious. Like, I'm sure that the love this couple shares is very special to you in some ways, even though it is misaligned with your created order. Like, help. Like, how do you even begin to speak into that, you know, in a way that honors, but also doesn't, you know, undo the ways of the Lord or that's where the rubber

hits the road. You know, it's nice to be about. I'm curious your response. What did you say? How is that? Well, I prayed because I didn't have words. I didn't, you know, this big academic, you know, person, this is like, and I think that's when academia serves its best purpose, when your words

are taken from you and you just rely on the Lord and the Holy Spirit. And I felt the Lord say, David, he's simply making himself ready for my new creation. It's time for that old creation life to pass away. Wow. And I broke into tears when the Lord said that to me, and I wrote that to him and I said, remember, be careful. You know, don't just break up this relationship super quickly. And remember, there's also a friendship there and self-sacrificial love that God honors, as well as a part of this relationship that is sinful and needs to pass away because it's an old creation way of living, you know. Wow. Jeez. Are you, I'm curious, that's, first of all, that's a fascinating story. I've, yeah, had not that exact one, but have heard similar,

similar stories to that. I'm curious, what's your thought on, I'm trying to think about the West best way to word. The presence or growth of affirming theology within Christianity, specifically more of an evangelical-ish kind of Christianity. And, you know, back in the late 20 teens, there was kind of a flourishing, lots of books. And, you know, flourishing, lots of books, lots of people, even within evangelical spaces, you know, promoting an affirming theology and affirming reading of scripture. From my very anecdotal kind of sense, it seems to have not taken the kind of route that people were expecting.

I heard somebody say a decade ago, like in the next few years, basically the church is going to be primarily affirming. It's just a matter of time. And yet in every case that I know that an evangelical, not a mainline church, well, they have their own concerns. But like if an evangelical church changes to an affirming view in almost, I mean, maybe a case that I know, and I can think of Ted off the top of my head, it's dwindled the church has or even kind of passed out of existence or gone to a full on kind of like, you know,

embracing every heresy known to man. But I don't know. That's just my anecdotal kind of view that it kind of caught on for a little bit, but then hasn't carried on. Have you, has that been your sense? Or what's been your sense? Because you do a lot of, I mean, you interact with a lot of people from different theological traditions when it comes to sexuality.

Absolutely. Yeah, I think what happened in the mainline church is it basically got secularized. they became spaces where you could just be a secular person that had some kind of lose faith and of course like let's just move on with these things and that for me would never be you know and this is what's fascinating about the Church of England is that it's a combination of both mainline and evangelical and high Catholic kind of you know traditionalism all wrapped into one so that's a lot of fun a difficult but kind of beautiful at the same time But I would say, I totally agree with you.

I think that when you cross that line on marriage and you reform, you know, in this kind of non-faithful way to kind of collapse with the culture, what ends up happening is the Holy Spirit is grieved. And the Holy Spirit will not pour himself out on a church that has turned its back on God's own created order with inscribed within the human body of male and female in marriage like this is so sacred to the lord it's so part of his identity it's so part of the way that he has inscribed that unity within diversity of his nature the majestic plural and the unit unit you know the oneness of his nature so if you do that you also undermine the structure of the

the gospel, you instill a break between the creator and the Redeemer. What the Creator intended for human sexuality is not what the Redeemer intends, and then you get end up with two gods. I mean, it's just so many problems. But I think at the base, you become untethered from the real God who exists. I think it starts to do that to you. Even if you have some knowledge of that God, I don't think being side A or, you know, revisionist on this question initially removes all of that.

But there's some fundamental break that is pretty serious that happens. And yeah, I just in agreement with you. On the other hand, I think this is where I'm quite different to a lot of other voices who are quite convicted on this and hold a strong conviction around what I believe to be historically biblical view of marriage, is that we need to read Romans 1, you know, through the lens of Romans 8. And I think Paul's central theological thrust comes in Romans 8, where he says, God, the creator, subjects creation to decay. So it's not just human idolatry, it's not just sin. it's actually God in his agency is doing something by allowing creation to fall.

So God is allowed there to be same-sex desire, gender dysphoria, all sorts of different things that there's no perfect analogy for, that he wants to somehow bring a greater glory through. And I think that's the response to those people in Romans 1 to 3 that he's targeting who are using the Torah to exclude the Gentiles and say they need to be circumcised. And they're misusing the truth of Torah, the law, which teaches us what sin is but can't justify us, right? They're using that to try to block the inclusion of those people. But Paul modifies that with this kind of other view that God is doing this, that God is allowing this. So we need to ask the question, why has God allowed these differences? What is he trying to do? And we can have more generosity to people who are wrestling with that and maybe getting it wrong,

not making the right synthesis of law and grace. Because I think that's fundamentally my problem as well with side A or affirming theology is that it gets the law and grace wrong. It gets the gospel wrong that way. So I think that there's more generosity there to me to someone who's affirming or the mainline tradition, even if we disagree. So I can have solidarity with that person on the things we do agree on, but I can't have complete fellowship. So that's been a huge paradigm for me, navigating. Like, I want to be in the gay community. I want to be speaking to affirming people. I want to be witnessing to a different way, but also it's hard when you're in those contexts, and there's a

different witness of a different way that isn't, in my opinion, the gospel, you know, but still to be there and to witness. That helps me. You know, scripture also has a lot about sexual immorality, if someone's engaged in sexual immorality, have nothing to do with them. You know, what fellowship it does light have with darkness. And so without that kind of layer of what I call quote-unquote theodicy or the problem of evil and suffering that people didn't choose to be same-sex attracted or gay or gender dysphoric or trans, this is a problem of evil and suffering, not just ethics and what I choose to do. Yes, it is still an ethical question.

It's still moral, but it's understood in light of the the odyssey problem of the fall. and therefore I can have more generosity to an affirming person without, this is something I think on my side of the aisle of side B that we have a problem with where we haven't carefully found that way through, where we said, well, it's just an option. You can either be side A or side B, take your pick. They're theologically equivalent. Like, absolutely not.

You know, like, I really disagree with that. I think that is just a total, ends up in a total deconstruction of Side B. And that has actually done Side B disrepute. But I think what that is trying to articulate and doesn't have the language is, this is a problem of evil and suffering. The fact God has allowed people to have desires, not change them, and do nothing, you know, to ultimately alleviate that situation. Like, that's a problem for God.

like he needs to respond to that. It's a Job situation, not just a Genesis situation. And so we need to go Job first, Genesis, second, or, you know, actually Job, Jesus, then Genesis. So I think that's basically how I'm understanding, and that's really helped me have so much more generosity to side eight people without compromising biblical conviction on marriage and obedience. That's an interesting way of framing it. Yeah, really thoughtful. You mentioned in passing, you know, the kind of side A, side B, kind of like these are two equally compatible Theologies, I just happened to pick this one over the other. I mean, the very language of A and B, I think is problematic. And even Justin Lee pointing this out years ago when he, he didn't come up with side A, side B, but he kind of popularized it. You know, he said, if anything, the traditional view should be side A, came first, you know, like, and even A, B just. A, B just sounds like, yeah, just kind of like pick which. What you like, do you like door number A, door number B or letter B? So I've actually, I don't, I actually don't typically use those categories for myself. People often call me a side B theologian or promoting side B theology, whatever that means.

And it's like, I actually don't use any more that language. It's fine. It's, you know, it's convenient sometimes for clarity. If you just want a quick shorthand, you know, your view. but yeah, I don't, I find it to be problematic as well. I think if I'm really honest, it's also really nice when you're in an LGBTQ plus space where everyone has quite developed language that they throw around, and sometimes it becomes about power to actually have your own language, you know, to kind of

power back and say, well, you don't understand everything. There's things here you don't understand progressive LGBT. BTQ plus people. Like, you know, yeah, you might have been raised in an evangelical family, and that was super traumatizing, and I'm sorry for all the failure there. That is terrible. But, like, I'm a convert to Christianity that didn't grow up in a Christian home, and I'm trying to find my way with Jesus, and I want to live my life.

I want the gay right to follow Jesus, according to Scripture. And not in an oppressive, harmful way, but in a beautifully, like, colorful and, you know, glorious way. And so being able to say, well, I'm side B, you know, sometimes that can help just cut in different, oh, what? There's gay Christian language. Yeah. Oh, there's a whole gay Christian world. Wow, really. I mean, in the LGBTQ plus world, they don't even know gay Christians exist half the time, you know, there might be like one progressive gay Christian they've ever seen somewhere on a show somewhere. You know, like, somewhere like on the media. And that's it. They don't. And then you say there's a X and Y, and they're like, what?

And I was like, well, I have this principle that I try not to harm anyone on that spectrum. I won't attack aside X Christian. I won't attack aside Y Christian. I won't attack a side A. I can challenge. I can critically pick at things. I can say, I don't think this is the way. But I don't want to increase the trauma of my other people in these, you know, trying to wrestle with this mysterious territory.

I want to be a person that brings life and that loves, you know, my neighbor and my enemy not. So I think that's the thing that I sit there sometimes Preston and I think, Lord, I have so much grief because where we need to be on these questions is so far away as the

rarefied Orthodox Church that actually wants to love LGBTQI plus people but remain absolutely faithful to the Lord and the teaching of his word. But I have seen also so many beautiful signs of that change. And I know you and I have had some very quick exchanges. I think you said to me once, like, hey, David, I know it's really hard and you're full of grief. But remember, like, everyday evangelical pastors in the U.S. who are not giving into the political idolatry, who are not just, you know, hardening up or deconstructing.

like they're really decent, wonderful people who love LGBTI2i plus and beyond. So like, be careful. And I think that's a good moderation as well to say, yes, well, it is really far away. I think in some sense, for me, I've realized that is a hankering after Jesus. Because really he's the only one that gets, we'll get this and has got this right. Like, I think it's kind of like, Lord will do. do our best, but we'll never be like fully like you until we're raised from the dead. Do you know? It's a craving for that new Jerusalem marries earth reality.

Yeah. Where the eunuch does get a name better than sons and daughters and the Gentiles do come into a house of prayer, where there's no racism. There's no discrimination. Everyone is fully embraced in love. So I think we're always going to experience that not yet. But the more we push in and stretch towards that other reality, we then get to foretaste it. And it's so amazing when we do. And I think that's why it's so worth not deconstructing and staying. It's so worth going through the pain and suffering and holding on because you do then get to taste the glory.

And I think that's what I find so sad about people who harden to the right and hardened to the left. Is they miss it. They miss that glory. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, there is obviously people hardening to the right and to the left. But like you said, so much of our perception of that comes from what we pay attention to online. You know, like it's just we have this really distorted two-dimensional view of where the church is at and stuff. And yeah, I just, you know, yeah, I've been to, there's so many churches of many different denominations and they're not that. And that's anecdotal, but it's based on, you know,

many hundreds of thousands of people cumulatively across all kinds of denominations. There's a lot, I think, of solid churches and leaders and people who sometimes are mega churches and the pastors are actually really humble and are not just trying to create an environment where it's all about them and they actually are incredibly generous. And they're, you know, they're, they're, they whole traditional theology of marriage, but also are trying to find ways. How can I truly love and care for LGBTQ people? Like, that's, that's not a small percentage of the church. There's a lot of, they just don't make the head. When you're doing things relatively well, you don't make the headlines, right? It's, it's the extremes that make the headlines. And then you think like, oh, the whole

church is, you know, a bunch of, you know, hyper, maga, racist, you know, whatever. It's like, yet they are out there and they make the headlines. They're the loud minority. But that's, I don't, I don't think it's as dominant as people think it is, you know. I agree. I mean, for instance, the two churches I've most deeply worked with have been reality SF, you know, East Coast, West Coast, RealitySF, California. They've been so generous, so loving, so wanting to love LGBTQI plus people, started with their first kind of camp, like, school that they rented out in the Castro, like, right in the middle.

of the thick of it. And then, you know, Church at the City with John Tyson and Sam Gibson. Just the table there is such an amazing sign of, you know, movement forward. But, I mean, well, I don't want to over exaggerate. Like, there's still a need for so much more resource and so much more momentum. But there are signs of really good change. And, yeah, I mean, just, like, individual stories of people, too, is what I love. just like sitting with the young, you know, San Francisco, who's like, I'm side A. Then going, oh, wait, there might be this other way. What the, that isn't repressive and isn't harming myself.

And yeah, it's sacrificial. That is what faith should be. Like, yeah. And being like, oh, wow, maybe I could be, so I'd be, you know, or whatever, sioux, celibate gay Christian, et cetera. And then other people, you know, who come from like really trumped. traumatized backgrounds on left and right, finding a deeper way through. So I just am in love with that narrow path of radical discipleship.

And one of the things I've been talking about a lot, Preston, is I'm not going to teach you a position. I'm going to teach you a posture and a tension. And that is, I want to find Jesus. That's the posture. Where is he? And he is found in the tension of radical inclusion. Anyone could be justified by faith in Jesus Christ through grace. And yet, that the only way to honor that grace is to be radically holy and give up everything for Jesus.

And we think that tension will crush us and we're better off compromising. But I've actually found the opposite. The deeper you run into that tension, you follow that posture, then you find true flourishing. And so this isn't just about a debate about sexual ethics or what you think about transgender or whatever. This is actually about what does true human flourishing look like? You know, that's the question of ancient philosophy. Yeah, it's so good. So, yeah.

You're working on a couple books or worked on and they're coming out, I think. Tell me about beyond compromise. Is that one already done and it's coming out soon? Yeah, so I went through this crazy year where I wrote three books. Like, when does that happen? I mean, to be fair, there was a preamble of like many, like five or six years. But a doctorate that I was able to, but I've basically thought two popular level books coming beyond compromise, reclaiming a biblical vision of love, sexuality in the kingdom of God.

And then Holy Strange, Beautiful, which would be the popular translation of my doctorate and academic book. And then I've already talked about my academic book. So you've got all those three. Give me the elevator pitch of Beyond Compromise. So basically it's the theological backup for War of Love's. I think it's the kind of like, okay, where do we go from now? That was a beautiful testimony and some theology at the end. Like, what's the bigger picture for actually the kingdom, love, sexuality?

I'm like the everyday person in a church. Like, I am trying to work this out. Where's some meteor theology? It has like a Q&R at the end. And that's one third of the book where I just go through everything I can within that space, try to give the deepest kind of applicable, sorry, and yet kind of impractical, but also deeply theological answers to all the questions you would expect. But really, like, with the freshest possible revelation and academic kind of work through.

So in a way that's accessible. And then the first part of the book is like a theology of love. and my story from a war of loves and landing it. And then the second part is everything I've learned going through some of the biblical texts in a fresh way that takes them out of culture war and gives them really space to breathe and become the jewels and gems that they are. And, yeah, kind of then with a lot of the theological learning and practical learning that I've gone through as I've lived this out.

So it's the backup after I were at a war of loves nine years ago. you know yeah um and then it released in 2018 and that like now like what now so it's the what now book it's the book for the pastors for the everyday lay people

for people curious um who aren't necessarily Christian but want a fresher take so yeah and it's really excited for that to come out with Tyndale and then holy strange beautiful I think it is all about this kind of

queer territory of trying to like what do we do with that as Christians? We can't just delete it and say, ignore it, and like say, or act as if it was never there. We need to learn from it. And this comes from Augustine's kind of way of working with the philosophies of his time. Queer theory is a philosophy.

Like, Platonism was a philosophy, or stoicism was a philosophy. Like, queer theory is a philosophy. And what does Augustine do with those? What does Paul do with those? What does Jesus ultimately do with those? He kind of speaks to the true. within them, but subverts the falsehood within them. So, I mean, so, so obviously queer theory post-dates Augustine by over 1,500 years.

Of course. But you're saying his, the stuff he was interacting with overlaps conceptually with queer theory. Like he can, his voice is not irrelevant for speaking into some of the themes of career. Well, no, I think, I think obviously there's a huge gap in terms of history, but the methodology is the same because he's just imitating Paul. Paul comes not that long after Jesus, but is in a Gentile context.

Jesus is in mainly a Jewish context and is subverting all sorts of things in the Jewish context, you know, pretty powerfully. I mean, I'm blown away by how subversive Jesus is. I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, like, you're going to say all these scribes and Pharisees, their lives starting Torah are just a brute of vipers and sons of hell. Like, who, you know, like, that's some subversion. You know, that's not.

He even, I mean, he also relevant to this topic, he subverts gender norms as well. I mean, for a single, for a Jewish male of marital age to be single, unmarried, did not have kids. That was, that was offending the gender expectations. I mean, significantly. And also for a man to weep over Jerusalem, to turn the other cheek, to wash the feet of those who have, you know, are about to betray you. I mean, he was constantly challenging the expectations of what it meant to be a real man according to cultural expectations.

And I think it was intentional, too. I don't think it just, he happened to do these things that were outside the box, you know. To have safe intimacy with women, to allow women to annoy his feet, to let a woman. and sit at his feet and teach her. Like, it's wild. And, like, to say, some will become eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom, kind of self-referentially, you know,

because he's going to die on the cross and become a unique, in a sense. There's just so much more subversion. Can you tease that out real quick? He's going to die on the cross and become a eunuch in some extent? I can't let that just pass over. Look, I can't go into the text in Matthew where he says some become uniques for the sake of the kingdom.

Some are born, some are made. Some become. Born, made, become. Yes. But get this. Jesus isn't just single or a eunuch or a celibate. You could put it in that terminology, because he has to die on the cross. Jesus is celibate, a eunuch, single because he's the new Adam.

And in the new creation, there won't be marriage or sexuality in the way we imagine it or procreation. Right. So he is by necessity like the eunuch or a eunuch because he represents the future. He is the new Adam. He is heaven on earth, like fully accomplished. So he isn't just doing that because it would be cruel to the kids to die on a cross. Like he's doing this because he's a whole new creation of humanity.

You know, taking the old and making it. into something new. And so you see, Isaiah 55, I will give an eternal sign to Israel. I'll take the thorn bush and the briar of Genesis 3 and the curse and full effects on the physical creation. And I will make them, what does he say, a juniper and a myrtle, an evergreen tree. This is a resurrection metaphor. And then straight after that, Isaiah 56, says, I will give a name better than sons and daughters.

Don't let the eunuch, the person who can't procreate, the person outside the norm of marriage between male and female. Don't let them say, I'm a dry tree. In other words, I have no kids. I have no progeny. I'm dead. Like, who really cares about me? No legacy for me.

He says, no, I will give within my house and its walls. If you obey my commands, like, you can't just undo the law and live according to my Sabbaths. Hello, side A. The law still teaches us what soon is. That's right.

And then I will give you a name. better than having children or marriage, sons and daughters. And you get to Acts 8 with the Ethiopian eunuch. And you'd think he'd be reading Isaiah 56 and being like, hey, I'm the eunuch. Like, I get a name better than sons and daughters, but he's not reading Isaiah 56 on that chariot. He's reading Isaiah 53.8. Why? Why would you go to the suffering servant, Isaiah 53?

We're in like new creation time, baby, like. I think Jesus has died. We don't need to read that one. We're like, it's time for that new temple to come where the Gentiles are there and the Unix get a name better than sons and daughters. Well, he's reading that because he knows it's about the Messiah. And what does the Messiah go through? It says, who has heard of his generation?

And if you go into the Masoretic text and the Greek text, the Hebrew and Greek text, it's really strongly about where are his kids? where is his legacy? Who's heard of his generation? And the eunuch identifies without suffering. And then Philip says, and what's stopping you from being baptized now? Because you're now able to receive a name better than sons and daughters.

We're now in the new creation. Let's get baptized. So this is an amazing. So I think that text in the way that it's read and placed with the eunuch is a sign that we should read that Jesus will. a eunuch that Jesus didn't have. And I'm not talking physically saying Jesus didn't have, you know, physical progeny didn't get married, was single. So yeah, so yeah, the three categories of eunuch, Matthew 1912, born, made, chosen, born, born to some kind of physical abnormality

in their, in their sexual anatomy, what would you call today intersex, most likely? made eunuch is somebody probably is castrated for a particular reason by somebody else. But then the chosen eunuch, right? People say this is more symbolic, not the origin or out of literally castrating yourself, but like somebody choosing a way of singleness for the sake of the kingdom, which is what Jesus did. So is that, first of all, is that an accurate summary of what you're saying? And in that sense, he's choosing to be. Can I ratchet it up even more?

Sure. Yeah. So then you go to Revelation 14, you get the 144,000 virgins. Or not Jehovah's Witnesses, sorry. I always make that joke. But yeah, holy virgin men. What? Why is it not holy virgin women and men?

This is such a sexist text. That's what I thought. I was like when I first read it. I was like, excuse me? Like, what about women being celibate? Like, fourth century? it's all the celibate women, not the men, you know? Yeah, yeah.

And I thought, Lord, like, I don't get this. And I remember with my Old Testament scholar friend, and he was like, oh, you don't get it. This is all about the law in the Old Testament. And it's about how Israel's armies couldn't go in and rape and pillage and use this imperial sexuality to kind of win through procreate, you know, kind of this horrible, rapacious sexuality. And what this represents is both celibate and. but also warfare that isn't violent, that doesn't use sexual immorality as a way to win.

It's an undoing of imperial sexuality where men would use their sexuality as a weapon. And I was like, whoa, that's amazing. And it joins it together with the eunuchs. So there's a name. They have a song they sing. They have a Davidic harp. Like, it's really, if I sing this song,

which is very warfare-like. like you would sing before you went into. So celibacy in this sense is also spiritual warfare. It's a form of living in a countercultural, anti-imperial, not using your sexuality as a weapon kind of way. Like, it's a sign of that. So I just love that text because it gives it a bigger, and then it says this is the first fruits of the lamb.

So the eunuch or the single or the celibate becomes a first fruits of Jesus. So if you reject the celibate or you reject, you know, this gift in the church, you are rejecting Jesus. These are his first fruits. This is his name better than sons and daughters. Like, this is his equivalent of firstborn son or, you know, the sacrificial life of worship in Israel. So it's just, I mean, it's very deep and maybe we don't have time to break that. down very much, we'll just leave it there. But I just think there's so much to be found here. That's really beautiful and something we're craving in our current culture because we've seen the way that obsessing and making marriage and sex and idol has just totally destroyed us and put

us back where the pagan world was before Christianity came. Maybe not that bad. But there's a tinge of that returning and we're going, something's not right. Gen Z's wearing the bag and clothes and saying we don't want sexualization. Like, you know, something's going on at the base. Just like hungering for this holy otherness of the church of new creation, humanity. Well, so, I mean, if we're all going to be single on a humid level, I mean, married in a sense, experiencing a full marriage to God, marriage supper of the lamb. But on a human level, there's no marriage in the new creation. I mean, single people have one step, right? One foot already. in the new creation, they are participating in the kind of eternal life that we will all be experiencing.

It's just they have a head start from a theological perspective. That's right. Well, I think this is where Augustine says something beautiful. Do not privilege the sign over the signified or do not privilege the sign over what it signifies. In other words, marriage is a sign of the new creation reality that celibates and the Unix and, you know, consecrated LGBTQI-plus people are bringing. So they need each other. If there's no signified, the sign has no value.

If there's no sign that you don't get to peek and know about the signified. So you need a sign to refer to what's coming. We aren't there yet. And so the single celibate person doesn't undermine marriage. No, we elevate it and say, amen, because that's what we're. it's a sign of what we're embodying. We're starting the party early and married people are the wedding invitation.

So like, we need each other and these are interdependent vocations. And so I just think, though, the way that Christians truly live those out is so strange even to our culture. That it's not about me, myself, and my desire. It's not about my fulfillment. So even about my sexual pleasure, ultimately, That might be a byproduct. It's actually about embodying this sacrificial faithfulness of Jesus,

whether it's through celibacy or through marriage. And that becomes more pleasurable than the immediate pleasure that we are addicted to in our society. And I think that's something like, I find it so hard, Preston, because I love the Holy Spirit. I just love the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit is the one who quenches that thirst of intimacy and need that we often go to sacks to fulfill.

And he's there. And the church just seems to think that's a weird, extra special thing for some kind of 1% mystical person. Absolutely not. That's for all of us as the body of Christ. And even if you're not a Christian, the Holy Spirit's still there, beckoning you to Christ, calling you to this new creation, humanity where you'll find true fulfillment and satisfaction.

And so I just long for a day where we can get rid of this, like, pseudo-charismatic American Christianity and find, like, this true Holy Spirit life that can fulfill. Can I share one other thing in the relation to that? And this was, I think, really important for me. And it's a huge development in my thinking as being around the Eucharist, that when I was in a deep form of suffering and really struggling also, because in that I was tempted, you know, we're tempted towards sexuality as a way to show. the pain. And I went in and took Eucharist at a church in Oxford and I had this incredible

miraculous encounter with Jesus where he came by my side and touched my hand and I felt the glory of God go through my arm and the death of all those really hard experiences of lockdown and all sorts of other things kind of coming out of me into him and he was destroying it. And I would feel like literally like the scar tissue of his hand against this part of my hand where I had the host or the bread. And as I took it and ate it, like my whole body was just filled with the presence and power of God. And I walked out of that chapel, like a totally different person in terms of how I was able to cope with that suffering and how I found glory in that suffering actually with Jesus. And that became a spiritual food to me. That

meant I lost the desire for lust for many months. It just was not there. And we have this weapon of intimacy with Jesus, this kind of upside down weapon that can just help us with that need. And I think it's such a shame in evangelical traditions that we don't, even though the Reformation is very strong on the fact, we have the real presence in the Eucharist. We don't talk about how Jesus can actually give us a full. form of physical touch that isn't sexual, but it's deeply intimate, and it can fulfill that

deeper place even than sex itself. And that can free us, you know, to really live a life of love for others, not just for our own satisfaction and gratification. So, yeah, I love the Eucharist in that way. Yeah, anyway. That's incredible. Oh, my gosh. Do you have a few more minutes? I would love to talk you about one more question. Yeah. We're going to move to an extra innings portion of our conversation here. If you would like to listen to the extra innings portion of this episode where David Bennett offers some pretty challenging and wise thoughts about gay identity and all the debates that surround that concept, head over to patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw become part of the theology in the raw community.