The following article is from Desiring God, a John Piper Ministry
Pastor John, what would you say to a man or to a woman who is considering a sex change operation? These are not amorphous folks, they are clearly and obviously genetically and physically a man or a woman, and he or she wants a gender change. What would you say to someone considering a transgender option?
Front-Burner Relevance
The first thing I want to say is that anybody listening to this who is about to switch this off saying, “Good night. Transgender. That is so irrelevant to me. I don’t need to listen to this today.” Give me a minute before you turn this off. Consider this: The cover of Time magazine for June 9, if you haven’t seen it, has Laverne Cox, born a boy, now living with a different sexual identification, acting on TV in “Orange is the New Black” as a woman. He is featured as an admirable person and pictured as a woman with a painful story in the hope that we, the readers, would all affirm this way of life. The article and the interview with Laverne are all about transgender experience. Like it or not—this is what I am saying to me and to us—like it or not it is following right behind homosexual behavior in our culture in its aim to be mainstream and celebrated. Not to do so will be, as the interview makes crystal clear, to be seen as hung up with our own sexual insecurities and, at worst, as hateful. So it is relevant — really front-burner relevant.
Let me give you another couple of scenarios. What will you do, what will you say — either clergy or layman — if a family visits your church whose fifteen year old son attends your youth group wearing a dress, long, curly hair, painted fingernails, shaved legs, and lipstick, and claims to be a girl? Are your young people ready for that? Have they been taught anything about that? That will come. And by, Are they ready? I mean, Do they have a biblical understanding of sexuality that may help them form a sound judgment about that? And do they have a good grasp of grace and truth so that they can have conviction and compassion in those relationships?
See the remainder of the article at https://www.desiringgod.org/interviews/is-sexual-identity-my-choice