Hello and thank you for downloading episode 445 of the Speak Life Podcast. My name's Thomas Thoroughgood, media producer at Speak Life, and today on the podcast we bring you an interview that Glenn Scrivener recorded with Paul Blackham. And he brings an incredibly rich Christ focus to the co the whole conversation of gender and sexuality, which is obviously very live at the moment. In fact, as I'm recording this right now, I believe the issue is being discussed at General Synod in the Church of England. And that's one of many conversations that are happening and have happened in different denominations of the church. So without further ado, I will hand over to Glenn and Paul.
SPEAKER_01Hello, I'm Glenn from Speak Life. I'm joined today by the Reverend Dr. Paul Blackham, who uh was ordained in the Church of England just as uh I have been, and has recently been exercised by uh a statement made by the bishops in response to the Living in Love and Fellowship. Living in love and faith, uh process that the Church of England has been going through for the last uh six years and counting. Um they came to the conclusion that the Church of England would not be marrying same-sex people, but they could bless same-sex couples in church, and this exercised Paul to some degree. And uh, Paul, we've got you on the line. Um I I came across uh a number of things that you were saying, especially on Facebook, and one of the things that struck me about your response to the Living in Love and Faith um statement by the bishops was you seem to say the bishops are in this weird sort of middle ground area. They haven't pleased the progressives, they certainly haven't pleased the conservatives. But what they haven't done is just protected local church leaders on the ground from the opprobrium of the culture who won't understand Christian teaching. They haven't taken the hit from the culture and they've just let Christians, ordinary Christians in the pew, and ordinary ordinary church leaders face off against the sort of the anger of a culture that does not understand why we're not in step with them. Can you explain a little bit about your initial reactions to the living in love and faith, the statement by the bishop?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, because in that sense, it sort of makes me think um we always like in our family, we're always looking back into church history and this sense that bishops often um when persecutions came, they kill the bishops first, because the bishops were almost like the cutting edge of the Christian vision. The most passionate for Jesus, the most like they're the ones who are the troublemakers and hitting the culture hardest. And so, in a way, the bishops would get martyred, and then it would almost protect all the lit the the vicars, the little church ministers, because the bishop almost absorbed the cultural anger kind of thing. Um and I felt what was really saddened me about this process was that was the opposite of what had happened, really. That what the bishops had done is kind of not done that at all. No, like you what you'd want them to have done is say confronted something. Like either, you know, they could have they could have, I suppose, uh done the progressive thing and said we're confronting what we think is the problem with the church and we're gonna we want to bless marriage, and then then they'd have got And married Yeah, gay marriage that they would have taken then they'd have like been a focus for they'd have had to have had the courage of their convictions kind of almost in that way. Or, and this is what I would really want them to have done, is them to have come up with such a compelling revolutionary vision of Christ and church and and human sexuality and identity that's like in Bible and church around the world and so and then the the the the culture would have gone, oh that's outrageous, and the bishops are like, here we stand, we can do no other, so help me God, and then all the all the like local church ministers would have gone, wow, and then when the little local church ministers can say, No, no, look, I'm just standing on what the bishops are saying, then the culture's like that's right, the bishops are the problem. Wouldn't that have been awesome if instead of adding to the trouble of local church because as it is, as it stands now, what it's as if to say, Oh, you the all the weight of decision about this issue is on the parish priest. So everyone now goes, so the bishops can go, well, we we provided an option for blessings, and then then what and then people go, Well, why aren't you using them? And then it's like, well, we just didn't think that was absolutely the way of G. Oh, you know better than the bishops then, right? And that so you're the problem. So it's so it that was why to me it was almost like the maximally disappointing option just in terms of cultural uh focus, because the whole weight of decision now collapses, you know, crushed down onto the par each of the individual parish ministers. And I was like, oh yeah, that that's that's really unhelpful, just pastorally speaking, for all the and that's what's happened. That's why when I'm talking to people, there's just that sense that so we have got to make the decision and bear the weight of it.
SPEAKER_01Right, right. Which makes me question like, why did you ever join the Church of England? I mean, you grew up Methodist, but uh you've ended up being uh ordained at at least about 25 plus years ago, you were ordained in the Church of England. Uh how did that happen?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I was um Methodism, it's that's still like deep in me. I can't have a daily quiet time really without the Methodist hymn book. It's uh yeah, it's kind of Bible part two almost for Methodists. Um but it's um yeah, it was I was candidating to be a Methodist minister. Um and then um it was and I I that was uh that was what ministry was for me, but then we um when we were going to Speaker's Corner back in the mid nineties, really, or early ninety no early nineties, and then we uh used to just like go along to All Souls, Langham Place, because we'd be doing it until we were absolutely exhausted, or the light failed or something, and then we're like, oh, there's a that church is fairly close, we can get to it in quarter of an hour, and uh people say it's okay. So we went down and there was Richard Views, and uh literally within about two weeks of us going, he said, Oh, you're at Speaker's Corner, you're like sort of John Wesley people or things like that. You must come and talk to me, and so I did, and he'd only put us down to have like 20 minutes quick chat, but we ended up being chatting for about two or three hours, and the outcome was he was like, That's it, you're gonna be in the Church of England, I've decided.
SPEAKER_01Um it's Richard Buser's fault. Okay, yeah, that makes sense. So that was that Richard loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life, so that's that's good. Yeah, what a wonderful saint. Um and so uh have you had any regrets uh joining the Church of England?
SPEAKER_02Um this is hard because um if it's that choice, like Methodism around these sorts of issues um with were that with thinking about to do with uh human sexuality and things like that, um has is is has been deeper into that m that for longer in a way, because I remember even in the 1970s they had a report that's similar to the one that has been recent for the Church of England, but that was in the 70s, and as I grew up, um the church I was in was in that process of protesting about it, uh withholding money, trying to make alternative statements about it. And uh Methodism has kind of didn't ever slow down it really, and as kind of just said, oh no, we're we we will uh bless same-sex marriages and a whole thing across the board. And um my home church, the outcome of all that was that they felt they couldn't stay, and they just closed down the whole church. So my home church that was like a place where we sort of experienced revival in a way in the 80s, and there was a time when I remember we tried to start up a young people's group, my dad and my two older sisters, and they just prayed, and nothing more than that, just prayed. I remember because I was a little boy at the well, say little, I was probably like 11 or 12 or something, and then they would just sit at the back of the church, pray, and read the scriptures, and they just had a name. They'd just say, Let's pray for this person, and it was a girl called Karen at first, and she just became a Christian, so then they just kept doing that and adding more and more names, and then that youth group in that village church, I don't know, it must have been 50 or 60 people uh over the course of a year or two. So things amazing things happen. It was uh incredible time, and yet that's they just close they had to close down in the end because of all this uh controversy. So, in a way, Methodism if it's Methodism or Anglicanism, Anglicanism's still going in a way that I think British Methodism is really, really not. I mean, global Methodism, there's like a whole new form of it begun, and they've started like a new denomination of global Methodism that's trying to be Orthodox, and that is exciting. But um so no, I kind of think the Anglican Church of England and my dad actually, when I was little, always said you'd be better to be a Church of England minister, actually. He said this to me even when I was little, um, because he said there's a kind of the liturgy and the stability of it, and the influence that a vicar can have in a parish is much greater that he said than a than a Methodist minister. So his advice to me even when I was very small was oh, don't write off the Church of England kind of thing. Anyway, there we go.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. But even from that story, um, people get the sense that you are a Jesus man, you want to see people come to faith. Um, you are Christ-centered in your theology, Christ-centered in your passions, Christ-centered in all of church life, um, and yet you, along with many of us, have gotten quite exercised by Church of England bishops uh who, in the last week or two, uh, have drawn the living in love and faith process to a sort of a conclusion as far as they're concerned, and have published a document which says that uh same-sex marriages can be blessed, though uh they rejected same-sex marriage within the church. And uh you you've seen this as a bit of a watershed moment, haven't you? Um can you explain why a Jesus guy, who loves to put Jesus front and centre in all things, is dealing with or commenting upon an issue to do with human sexuality. Isn't that just a secondary issue that we should just leave to one side?
SPEAKER_02In a sense, yeah, and and and I kind of have often been really exercised about this through my life, that the issue that has become the big kind of uh moment for modern church life is something like this. Because you think I want it to be like the Council of Nicaea, is Jesus truly God or not? And then it's like, oh, it's absolutely about the identity of Jesus. Or you could even say something like at the Reformation where it's to do with the work of Jesus, and we're saying, you know, is it completely sufficient in and of itself? And I can just trust in his work on my behalf, and you think, oh, that's another nice big chunky Jesus one. And then this one, uh, it's very easy to think, well, is this really anything to do with Jesus? Can't we just everyone be really good on who Jesus is, what he's done, but we're not totally agreed on the and that's often the way it's pitched, as if it isn't really about the identity of Jesus or his work. It's really um a sort, yeah, as you said, like a secondary issue. And I kind of want to think that. I do, I want to think that, and I just can't, because the opening words of Jesus in his ministry uh were where he said, repent because the kingdom or the empire of the heavens is here. Which and that notion that there's this kind of totally different order of life and being that is the empire of the heavens, and there's like you know, and and that's enormously important for Jesus. That the the there's the Father in heaven with this throne room and hundreds of millions of angels and archangels, and all the company of heaven, and all the saints who've gone before died, they're in paradise waiting for the end of all things, and there's this way in which all all meaning and life and goodness and truth flows out from this throne and everything me and that the kingdoms of this world seem really important, and their agenda seems like obvious, it's obviously that's the reality. The kingdoms of this world with with money, sex, power, f uh human flourishing, pro pleasure, treasure, you know, money makes the world go round, might is right, all those, all of that seems utterly compellingly obvious until you see this thing, the the the Empire of the Heavens, and it's a totally opposite kind of view of everything, everything. Now, I a reason I say that is when he says turn around, change your mind because that is the show that's in town. I'm here, I'm the king of that kingdom, and if you get that, if you get me, you ha you will walk away from those kingdoms and all that they represent, and you'll follow me. That's what it means to follow him, that's what it means to trust him. It's to like I often when people say, Oh, we turn to Jesus, I think it's also, or sometimes people emphasize the repentance thing, and they're like, You gotta you gotta turn away from all your sin and evil, and they rage, you know, really massive on that. Or sometimes people just go, let's turn to Jesus. But I'm saying there's two things that you turn from that, and the turning from the old is turning to the new, and both elements are that are critical to this, and that to repent the reason Jesus puts that there is because it's so easy to make him small and of only limited relevance in life to sort the gr I think the great temptation actually, all the way through, is to go. I can fit him into the kingdoms of this world, and I want him because I want his fire insurance, maybe eternal fire insurance, or maybe I want him, you know, to make me feel better, or whatever it is. I say I want this thing that I think he's got, and I that is compatible with the the old the compa kingdoms of this world, and it isn't, and so I think the reason it's become so massive, this issue, is it's all it really orbits around this issue of what it means to repent, what it means to say these things pleasure, treasure, sexual fulfillment, sexual identity, marriage. Because it's not just the same sex business, it it's actually this has been coming for a lot longer than this. This is just the moment at which it's as if to go, oh whoa, where have we arrived at? What what's going on? Like though the the prophets, the real holy prophets of the modern age have for a long time been saying, hang on, the entire view of sexuality, marriage, the worship of marriage, the worship of sexual fulfillment, the worship of like going within yourself to your own pleasure and for fulfillment. All of that, some have been ringing the alarm bells for decades. I mean, this stuff goes right back, and then but it's like now, and so now people go, Oh, why have you suddenly got a problem with same-sex things? No, like the really holy prophets and the really orthodox people uh have been saying for a long time, whoa, hang on, the whole of this modern Western approach to sexuality and marriage stinks. And it's as if people are saying, hang on, you're not you believe that true human fulfillment is in marriage, say, and sex. Why, if that's true, you can't deny that to us. And I'm like, yeah, absolutely that's a justice issue. If that is true, then that's it's outrageous to deny that arbitrarily to certain people. What the what's that's impossible? So it's really down to that. This issue of actually the issue of repentance has been has been lost for a long time, and that money, sex, and power have been held on to as like that's how we feel secure. That's how we feel uh, you know, uh we I know who I am, I my life I I've got what I need in life, I'm flourishing, I'm you know, all that I want to be. I only get one life, and that that life needs money, sex, and power and popularity, perhaps, as well. Um, in that those things. And it's like I I don't need to let those go. I in fact, Jesus will enhance those things. Give me more money, give me more power, give me more of these things. He'll make you know, the greatest sexual intimacy ever is all available if you just he'll show and I'm like, oh my goodness, this is ludicrous. This is ludicrous.
SPEAKER_01Which is an error that can happen, like whatever side of the political aisle you're on, and whatever side of the culture wars you're on. There are there are people who can um fetishize sexual intimacy and as part of the purity movement kind of preach a gospel, a prosperity gospel of save yourself for marriage, and then you'll have mind-blowing sex for the rest of your life and and fetishize that kind of um nuclear family type thing. Which when you look at the Bible, like it's there's not it's not a nuclear family that it's preaching at all. Yeah. Um but then on the other side of things, there is the fetishization of sexual expression, such that it is a human right for me to express my sexual appetites, my sexual desires. Which is an extraordinary thing to say, because if I think if I acted on all my sexual appetites, you know, I'd be in prison at some point, right? And and so would anybody if they if they simply uh if if their human rights were about self-expression, um, then everybody suffers, including the person. And so it's it's a problem on both sides, but I guess it's it's been coming for a long time. You know, uh Carl Truman talked about the rise and triumph of the modern self, um, and and tracing things back for centuries in terms of this sexualization of our identity. And as soon as my identity is bound up as it is in the modern world with sexual self-expression, um then it it goes right to the heart of my my identity. And when a church comes along and says, Well, yes, and Jesus baptizes that and Jesus enhances that, come to Jesus in order to express yourself further in that way, I guess that's that's when we find the watershed moment.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it is. And that's where again that rep repent word um is so critical about what is Jesus about. He's not come in order to make the kingdoms of this world better. Actually, you know the stone that becomes a mountain, the Daniel vision, revelation, he's just getting rid of them all, you know, he replaces them, he doesn't enhance them. And I think like when you describe those two things that almost like uh church is you know the key to or or the the the thing that church is really into is like nuclear families, you know, and there's been a massive tradition of chur in the modern age, church and family, heterosexual family with kids kind of thing. That and and then you then over on the right on the other side, sexual revolution, same sex. All that kind of stuff. To me, they're both exactly the same. They're both exact or it's really both are idolizing something that they're replacing G in the place of Jesus. Because it's like you'll probably know like John Chrysostom, this you know, amazing guy, Constantinople, Bishop of Goldenmout preacher. There he is. They know people couldn't hear what he was saying. Stop it! We're gonna you know, it's amazing. But um he got in in the end, he was exiled and basically killed in exile because they made him walk to into Russia basically without proper clothing or everything in exile, and then he was so depleted by that, he died. But the reason for that was because his preaching of Jesus meant that people in Constantinople were saying, I'm gonna give sell all I've got, give all my money away to the poor, and I'm not gonna get married. I want to be utterly devoted to Jesus and to church, and I'm gonna get this much bigger family in church and all this kind of thing. So, particularly money and sex, he he was like taking those away, like destroying them, all what you would say are traditional values in a way, and he was perceived as so dangerous that they had to get rid of him. Because if people start because the members of the royal family were listening and the princesses and things like that, selling up, going, being celibate, single, devoted to Jesus, and they thought, oh, I'm Jesus, I've got the ultimate romance kind of thing that we're all divine designed for. And you think now, Chrysostom, that is what it looks like, this collision between the kingdom of heaven and kings of this world. It should be that traditionalists who are like trying, you know, believing that the future is the nuclear family or things, they should be as much outraged by church as everybody else is. But it that the with the fact of this there's been a sort of sell out to say, no, no, look, traditionalism, that's okay. That's a that's a rel a form of paganism that we can make peace with. Okay. But this mess now is the consequence of the syncretism that's happened for a long time of finding a way to make peace with money, sex and power and forming a syncretistic form of Christianity. And then now this is what's happened. This total mess where you know people are very upset, hurt, damaged because of that, because the truth in making that form of syncretistic Christianity with money, sex and power and traditionalism and all that sort of thing, that meant excluding people who had an who were welcomed in and had an easy place. If you didn't fit the money, sex and power model, you're out and you're despised and looked down on, and you're you don't you know, and that had massive casualties. And so Church being a great place for everybody wasn't in this period of syncretism.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I I I go back to like in the early centuries. I mean, Roman the Roman Empire made it illegal for women, for instance, to be widowed for more than six months. If you were widowed for more than six months, you had to start paying a tax until you got married again. Wow. Because matrimony was all about fan finding a a mater, a a mother for your offspring, your progeny. Because, you know, I I guess the your your form of immortality was in your progeny, was in your line, and and and therefore the nuclear family was incredibly important in in Roman civilization. And therefore, Paul going around the single man kind of urging on people's singleness, Jesus saying be a eunuch for the kingdom, and that's better, is a radical sort of strike against um against that Roman. I mean, it it was a radical strike also against the Roman world in which there are 25 words for prostitute, and there's no there's no Latin way of referring to an adult male virgin, because that's just not a thing. Wow. So the so the the Jesus Revolution strikes hard against, you might say, the progressives of the Roman Empire, it strikes hard against the the traditionalists of the Roman Empire as well. And it's it's not one thing or another, but all that to say, isn't it therefore difficult to now come down on what might be seen as a more traditional side of things? So now we're in 2023, and Paul Blackham says, um, you know, the the Bible is neither one kind of falling off the horse and not the other kind of falling off the horse. But on this at on this issue, Paul, you're pretty much siding with the traditionalists, and doesn't that mean you're okaying all the nonsense that traditionalists have have done that has been anti-gospel?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, no, I I I don't don't c feel I'm coming down with the traditionalists, really. Um you know, is it um that thing is it when it's like choose who you're gonna serve? Are you gonna serve the old gods or the new gods? But he doesn't even give the option of serving the living god. He's like, you're either gonna go back and serve ancient pagan traditionalisms, or you'll invent some new gods of your own. So make your choice. But of course, we're like, but neither, neither the new gods nor the old gods, but the living gods. Jesus. Yeah, Jesus, who's the ancient, ever new one. He's eight, you know, ancient before the worlds began, you know, of the father's love begotten and all that. Um you know, and that it that's the family. That's the family that we're called to be part of part of. So if it's focused on the family, I'm okay. Oh yeah, the family, the Trinitarian family. But otherwise, it's nah, it's really dodgy because people I think in postmodernism, like uh and and you know, all that that means that sense that noticing how fragile the boundaries and foundations of modernism are, and deconstructing them and pouring the acids of postmodernity onto the whole modern, and then they all crumble, they all crumble because they were always ludicrous. Um but you know, Christianity in some ways, modern Western Christianity, again, it was part of this syncretism and gone, oh no, but we quite like some of these things. No, and what has happened is with the acids of postmodernity and the crumbling of what people called certainties, what that were never actual certainties, they were always false gods. So, what happens is people in the panic of this sudden sense of like what we're gonna hold on to? There's only one answer to that question, and that is the big man. You've got it, it's gotta be Jesus. He is the rock, the only foundation that has been laid is him. But that choice is not the one that people make. What they tend to do is panic and grasp onto forms of traditionalism, uh, the ancestors or patterns of life, even if they know the that they're deliberately creating a nostalgia almost, or deliberately doing it out of a kind of um existential panic. Because that's what's good about postmodernism, in a way, it exposes, it rips away and says, Look, there's nothing to this stuff, it's social construct, kind of, and that the power, I mean, we're all like, oh yeah, but not everything is yeah, but what feel the force of it, feel the force of it, that it's ripped away from you, the I idols, that's why you're panicked by it, and instead of going back to fake things, there is only one, you know, Psalm 90, Isaiah 40, we are just grass, we're smoke, everything is only one thing, does not mean one person, it is Christ the Lord, the Father's Word, full of the Spirit. He is the only one who does not perish, does not move away. And in that way, if you're anchoring yourself or trying to anchor to anything other than the rock, or build your life on anything other than the rock, it is all gonna be you're gonna get washed away. I mean, that's Jesus' big conclusion of the Sermon on the Mount. You will be washed away.
SPEAKER_01So, but how do you anchor um that theology in the everyday of, okay, we're in church life. Um, there are all sorts of voices saying that we need to have LGBT inclusion. Um, there is living in love and faith, this six-year plus sort of program of listening to one another and trying to disagree well, trying to figure out where we're going to go. At some stage, the bishops come and make a pronouncement, this is where we're gonna go. We're not gonna marry uh gay people, but we are are going to offer the opportunity for those relationships to be blessed. And at that stage, Paul comes down from the glorious exaltation of Christ to say, no, that contradicts that. Yeah. And I I guess I I just want to press you again on why is this a line that has been crossed? Yes. And and why why is now a time to to to speak on this issue?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I do think the the fact that it's come to it's this issue that has created the human cry of it all is disappointing.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Like, because uh it the like that's why I said there have been people who did not wait till this point, and they were shouting about things for a long time. Even actually, if you go back to Spurgeon in the 19th century, and I've been reading him with more kind of a cultural ear, and see listening to how he saw life and what he was saying, what what was going on? What are you building on? And he's attacking things like the the s some of these syncretisms and traditional he's do so there were people sounding this bell, ringing it, but it wasn't heard because I think there was just generally this sense in uh in in church life. I don't know about then, I don't know. I won't spit maybe they were better and I don't know, but I don't I think it was almost as if like no no, we're okay, we're okay. This looks Christiany. The kind of we we've come up with a syncretism that looks and feels Christiany. And then it's really like to those who could who were really listening to the kingdom, and that they were like, this isn't Christiany, this is appalling. What are you doing? But what is like I think there was for in particularly traditionalists and and and the word conservative, g the reason why that's not a good word, and we we've always been a bit nervous of it, because it's like, what are we conserving? Like it's possible to conserve like the Bible and good things, but it it's a word that it's not it's like, aren't we naturally revolutionaries? You know, and all that.
SPEAKER_01I want to conserve the Jesus Revolution. That's what I want to conserve.
SPEAKER_02Conserve the Jesus Revolution, brilliant, that's what we'll go with then. I'm a conservative revolutionary around Jesus.
SPEAKER_01Radical conservative, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02And it's that, but it's that sort of thing that it's a it is a tragedy that it's only it's when it gets to this issue that it's like, oh whoa, hang on, what's going on? And it's like, whoa, this this is no surprise. This has been going on in your work, you know, for a long time. And the fact that you get so alar I'm just saying you, not you, I'm saying you, as in the cultural moment of, say, traditional Western Christianity or something, means that it's probably that you w you were fairly comfortable with heterosexual immorality and sexual activity outside of marriage, even, because you felt, well, yeah, but you know, it's not so bad, is it? Because, you know, it's on the you know, I don't know what but the I there was I'm as a t even as a teenager back in the early eighties and things, I noticed this. That there was sex there was heterosexual immorality that was not cons not did not create a a a tr uh a like terror. It was it was kind of like, well, you know, what can you do?
SPEAKER_01And I I remember you know marital rape was not even a category until the nineteen seventies. Okay. You know the Apostle Paul in in 1 Corinthians 7 is like rules rules it out 1900 years earlier. Yes. And it takes nine nineteen hundred years before that even shows up on the statute book books.
SPEAKER_02There we have it.
SPEAKER_01As as an example.
SPEAKER_02That's another great example. That there was a kind and it's as if so when sometimes people say don't there is homophobia, I'm like, oh yeah, totally, totally, like it's that, like it's as if, oh my goodness, what's going on? It's like what what why is it now that you are suddenly panicked? Where all kinds of things uh should have caused panic long ago, but they didn't because there was this feeling of, well, it's sort of Christiany. Sort of Christiany to me. And it isn't, it wasn't like Chrysostom would have gone, you know, obviously Jesus would have gone ballistic, but um even people like Chrysostom would have done, you know, these early churches who were, you know, genuinely saying to people like causing a revolution. And that thing that like my dad would alwa often say, you know, in Acts when is it when they go to Thessalonica? Is it? I think so. Those that have turned the world upside down have come here. Right, yeah, except those that turn the world upside down have come here. And then then they have emergency council meeting because Christians have arrived and they're start they're talking about Jesus. Now I I my little thing is we know that we've got serious about Jesus to go back to your point. Why this on Jesus? We know we're serious about Jesus when the local councils have emergency meetings about us. But they don't need to. They don't need to. We're as good as gold. We're as good as gold, basically. And it's only now that it's like now it's like, oh well we're actually well I'm saying, okay, look, if this is the moment when it's a wake up time, fair enough, but I agree. Why should it have been now? Why shouldn't it have been? Certainly in the sixties. Um where with when the sec I mean in truth, the destruction of marriage and of a Christian view of marriage anyway, uh goes back way before that, but that sense of the crisis in pot in the popular culture, certainly it should the this level of crisis should have been provoked, say, in the 50s and 60s, but it hasn't. It's now, but this is where we are, this is where we are, and that sense of repent. And that's why for me, I don't when I talk about this, I only probably the minority of me of what I say is actually about same-sex things. The but the when I'm talking about this subject, even as we've done now, the majority of what I want to say about it is not just on same-sex, it's all sexuality and identity, and in fact, money money and power and pop it's all I want to bring all those things in so that if the church's church is going to repent, it's gonna really repent instead of just trying to manage one thing like, oh, we're really worried about this thing. Nah, no, the that thing is telling you that the there's a rottenness that's all over, all over. That you can't solve that without solving it all.
SPEAKER_01Yes. Uh you mentioned in their homophobia um as a reality, as a as a horrible reality in um in church life, in cultural life, here and around the world, uh, within the bishop's statements about uh the living in love and and and faith documents, uh they identify that and call for repentance, uh repentance over homophobia, that's important, isn't it?
SPEAKER_02Oh, it's huge. Like like I was saying, like in the history of Christianity as a whole, like if you don't want to if you for most most of Christianity globally speaking, if you didn't if you weren't didn't fancy getting married, it's like brilliant, yeah, no problem at all. We've got loads of opportunities, we celebrate that, it's a good thing. That would never have been any problem at all in healthy Christianity all over the world for a long time. And as you know, it it was almost like church would have been like traditional cultures might have been hostile to homosexual homosexual, but church wouldn't. It's like, well, no, brilliant, we we celebrate this, celebrate single life, you don't need to get married, don't worry about that. In fact, you can sort of be the cutting edge of our life. You can but you know, there was all way loads of ways and forms. I uh you know, it's there's a lot globally speaking, it's taken lots of different forms and things like that, but nevertheless, right and nuns, but you're talking about more than that? Oh, yeah, not just monks and nuns, but I mean the monks and nuns thing from the Western point of view, it's almost like if you f when I say to people, what comes into your mind if I say like medieval Christianity? And in the top three things, monks and nuns, so it's like a huge feature of kind of medieval Christianity. It's like monks and nuns, celebrate single people. It's like so I'd say that, but also other forms of it were just people would live in sort of communities, like commun live communally, uh in in all sorts of forms that's happened all over the the world, or they just want to live more isolated, or all kinds of things. I won't go into them all now, but it's just that way right, and then you come into this more modern period where that syncretism has happened, where it's like actually, actually, these tr we are now traditionalists, we worship the old gods. Fertility. We're a we want to become a almost a fertility cult around family and children and things. And as that has happened, inevitably there's less and less and less place of honour. Certainly, first of all, no less and less honour for singleness, such that churches will be places where if you're single, oh what what's going on? Are you not getting married? Do you need us to set you up with somebody? And then constant pressure on that, and literally preaching this this fertility cult of the family stuff, as if that is what you really need to set your sights on. So and then, like, ever more hostility until if you then like not, like, there's no place at all, really, in some s some cultural settings of Christianity in the modern world, for being single and honoured, and patterns of life to support that and celebrate that. So, yeah, it has it's not trad it's not classical Christianity that's homophobic at all. I don't I mean, in the Bible, it's like if you've got same-sex attraction, the Bible's like, yeah, sure. You know, who doesn't? No, it doesn't quite say that, but it's like it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. The Bible just takes it for granted we have all kinds of attractions. It's like, yes, so, of course, whatever. What that's not even on the it's not really on the radar in the Bible, because it doesn't matter, we're not bothered about it. Out that sort of thing. What we are, by the way, is what we're gonna do with all this. How we're gonna live. How we gonna live? Like, and then it focuses on that sort of thing. The the fact that like if you're if you have been in in in a lot of modern Western Christianity, if you're a same-sex attracted person, say exclusively same-sex attracted, I just don't know where there's any where there has been any real support, encouragement, celebration, patterns of life offered, anything. It's like so this the bit that I did think was right is this sense of like massive apology. But not near apology though, and this is why just apologizing isn't enough. It has to be repentant. Like people say an apology doesn't mean anything unless it's got repentance attached to it, like a change, really. And I think that's important. Like it's no point saying, oh, we're really sorry, we've made a we've been really horrible to same-sex attracted people for a long time. Um okay.
SPEAKER_01Not friends now, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Friends now, no, and and and rightly people are like, no, we're not friends now. We're not friends now because what's the difference? What you're gonna do differently? Now, some people say the you gotta go for you've gotta have same-sex marriages, bless all that. I'm saying, no, that's never gonna be an option if you're gonna go from the Bible and all. That's not that's and in fact, that's still buying into the same old fertility cult stuff. It's just extending it further. I'm like, no, I can see why you would want to do that. Say, but if you're enjoying the fertility cult, why can't we all enjoy the fertility cult? No, you see, that would be that would be selling people's short. That's because it's wrecked the lives of those who have been had access to the fertility cult, and it's been disastrous for them. And it's no point saying, well, why can't we be part of the disaster too? No, that's rubbish. Actually, the repentance has to go right to the heart of the rot. The rot, and we have to get rid of the fertility cult completely and actually say, Why can't let's go back to Jesus, let's fall in love with him, let's find out what we were designed for, why we have these powerful attractions and desires and this like yearning for romance, why we get thirsty, and it's funny that word is used for being thirst traps.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's it.
SPEAKER_02And yet that's Jesus at the well, and he's like, You're thirsty, and he invented that whole category that you people being thirsty for intimacy, and he says to her, Look, you're not that ain't gonna that going nowhere. You you have to drink r something that really quenches that thirst. And the fact that Church has tried to sell people a fertility cult and therefore been hostile to same-sex people, and not just same-sex, but people who just don't fit with the the fertility cult paradigms of this is what a man is, plain rugby, let's just what a woman is, right, embroidery.
SPEAKER_01Right, right, right, right, right, right, right. I mean, let's let's get into gender critical theories as well. Let's get let's get let's talk about sex and gender for a little bit, because um w one of the things that's that's often said, certainly um from a trans point of view, is that you know that they will say, look, there's there's uh male and female sex, sure, but there are different gender expressions, and um and therefore, no, you cannot alter your genetic code. You know, if you're a man, you're encoded male all the way down to the cellular level, but there are j different gender expressions, and at that stage they're kind of tapping into something that's biblical as well in one sense, aren't they? That the way in which to express your the the way of being a man in your culture is incredibly culturally defined and is incredibly fluid in lots of in lots of senses. Yeah, no.
SPEAKER_02I mean that's loads of that kind of critical stuff is just like should be lot I say lo a a good portion of that should be just like yeah, that's what we as church have been saying for a long time pulling down ludicrous gender stereotypes. Because I literally have had conversations with people who uh believe themselves to be trans, who will say things like um, well, I'm biologically female, but I really enjoy sport and science. So I think I might be a man, or I might be a boy or something, and it's like what you can't really have said that, and and not making that making that up at all. Like, I think it was Helen Mirren said in an interview, I I may be trans because I'm good at reading maps. Wow, yeah, that's literal that you can search that one, yeah.
SPEAKER_01And I'm like, and she was posting what her betray her entire sex in a single sentence.
SPEAKER_02Isn't that crazy though? Like, in other words, there's cult return your feminist card instantly. There's that that's right, it's a funny thing, like a lot of the 80s feminists, you're just like, yeah, you know, like you were raging against stereotypes, and now you're the enemy. You're the enemy, because of the. And that sense that so it's like chur this again, healthy church, healthy church down the centuries all over the world, has raged against the stereotypes and torn them down. And that's why I always say in the Bible, it's like when per like embroidery they go, Oh, all the women I remember there was a sort of Christian cult that used to operate in London in the 80s. And when I first came down, I sort of remember having discussed it, and the guy said, Oh, would you like to come for a Bible study? And at the time I was like, Oh yeah, maybe. Uh I forget what the name of this cult thing was, but they said, Oh, yeah, what we do is all the guys go to play rugby and all the girls go to do embroidery, and then after that, the guys do Bible study and the women do Bible study or something. And I was like, Well, hang on, hang on, what was that thing about the rugby and embroidery? They're like, Oh, it's really important you understand what it means to be a man, and even like then I was like, What are you talking about? Can the guys go to embroidery and the girls go to rugby? No, no, absolutely but and and of course we all think what a ridiculous thing. Yeah, it is ridiculous, and yet those very things are what create this sense of crisis. Because, like in the Bible, all the embroiderers are guys, for example. Um just for example, cooks, you know, generals, you've got a woman general, you've got and all these the stereotypes take them to the Bible. They don't work, they don't work. Poet warriors, uh songwriters, danceers, who dances? Dudes dance, you know, lots of things. It's it just that none of them work in the Bible, and in fact, the Bible kind of is kind of putting deliberately out to tear them down, and it what happens then is so we should have been like, oh yeah, of course, yeah, these are rubbish things. Like, what it means to be a man in is in in your biology, the Bible has almost nothing to say about what that might look like. And let that sink in for a minute, like for people. Same with a woman. There's like certain things around fertility and menstruation that are sort of built in.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. But in terms of 1 Corinthians 16, isn't there? Act like men in the older translations. When does it still preserve that, do they? Uh end of 1 Corinthians 16. Oh, yeah, that's right. And in modern yeah, yeah, act like men.
SPEAKER_02Act like men, in other words, you know, what? Um what does that mean? So the only thing I can see is that in combat, in the old testament, when they listed who was available for combat, they listed males of like adult males only.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02So that's about the only thing.
SPEAKER_01So maybe in that one that is the that is that context. Yeah, in that context.
SPEAKER_02So in that's the one Corinthians thing, isn't it? Really, sort of like if you be like a man, be ready for combat in this sense, spiritually. Be a soldier. Yeah, be a soldier. Yeah. So I can see that, but other than that, there's nothing really, and same for women, and that so that's why again, it's part of the syncretism. Church sh should have been the prophetic voice arguing against these ludicrous stereotypes. And then, like, it's funny, I I so I was seeing a uh I don't know whether it was a caricature or a or an accurate thing, but it was a a a picture from a 1950s poster where they had this dude uh like in a sharp suit uh with his in his car and he's got his briefcase and he's embodying a particular kind of that's what a man's like and then he's got this woman next to him who's his wife, I guess, and she's dressed in this kind of um knee length light, bright dress, and she's got some cleaning implements and she's happy because she's got uh you know, and all this and I was like, okay, like I can see that they were wanting to go, that's what they were really saying to people, that's what you should be. Now, of course, church would go, nah, nah, like here's a p here's a monk, here's a nun, why not have those uh or something or so whatever it is, like something totally different. But it's instead it was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, we agree, that's right, there you go, that's what it looks like. So of course, if that if if the culture and church are aligned with that's what a man's really like, this is what a woman's really like, and you uh you know, or me feels I don't fit with that. Because I I as a kid growing up, I definitely didn't fit with that. And I was like, Whoa, hang on, I just don't, I don't want, I don't fit that at all. So what happens then? If you like for me, you've got you know, you've got Jesus, and you look at him and look at the scriptures and you feed on the scriptures, and so you're like, it's okay, I don't need to panic because here I'm seeing something much better, more refreshing, more fluid, more flexible, that can ha Jesus can handle all of us, whatever we're like, whatever our passions and and and characteristics and personalities, he can handle that. But but that sense of like where we go, no, I uh uh that is what a man is, and therefore I must conform to it. And if I even if I'm a woman or whatever, like the biologic, that is to me awful. It's still operating around the this these kind of polarities. It's almost as if that 50s poster is still operating for people.
SPEAKER_01Yes, yes, and therefore you're not saying the Bible is kind of a proto-trans ideology. No. Um what you are saying is um you you simply do not need to transition to another another gender, another sex, in in in order to be fulfilled, in order to act out your your true identity. Because actually you won't find that identity by evermore descending within the hall of mirrors that is you, but to look out to Christ. And as you die to self, as we keep on talking about, as you as you repent and believe and die to self, turn from self, Jesus says, if you lose your life, you will find it. Yeah. And and and that's that's the beautiful and and if you try to save your life, you'll lose it. And don't we see that with the proliferation of gender identities, for instance, yeah, as just one symptom of this malaise that we're constantly trying to save our lives. You know, we're constantly trying to find ourselves. And of course, if you're lost, you know, you shouldn't try and find yourself because finding a lost person is never much help. And you know, when you're when you're lost, you need to find home, and Christ is the one who's come to come to bring us home. Um, Paul, I'm gonna finish with three questions. Okay. Um I'll give you the three questions up uh up front. Um, what are you going to say to uh a gay person within the church? Um, you know, and they're not living in medieval times. So what have you got for them? What do you what have you got someone for who's who's exclusively same-sex attracted? And they they they want to have the the dream of that poster, or they they want to get married, they want to find somebody in their life and settle down and and have that sense and and and should they be denied that thing? You've got that thing, Paul. Why can't they have that thing within a committed, monogamous relationship? Why can't they have that? Talk talk to me about what you'd say to that that gay person within the church. Talk to me about what you'd say to somebody, a gay person outside the church who just looks on and is just baffled by a doctrine that seems so um so out of step with modern culture. And then talk to me about uh next week we've got General Synod, we've got five hours of debate about this very topic. Uh, whoever gets up to speak in this five-hour debate uh will not be given very long to speak. If you are on the floor, what would you say? Those are the three questions that are coming at you. Okay. Question number one The gay person within the church, what do you say to them?
SPEAKER_02In a way, I the problem, as you said, is that yearning for the romantic married dream. And the in a way, what I try to do in church is dismantle that, not just for that gay Christian, but for everybody. Because in a way, what I don't think is helpful is if the gay Christian gets site of sort of focused on, like you need to let go of that dream because Jesus, Jesus is the is our is our true lover, our fulfillment. There's the divine romance. I want to talk about all those things, the divine romance were all designed for marriage, and the wedding preparations are the most extensive and vast there's ever been. The you know, the biggest bridezilla ever is uh nothing compared to this, you know, the Ephesians, uh the the there is a woman, you know, a bride at the center of the universe and all this that thing. Uh all that. But what I don't want to do is go, no, you need to let go of those worldly, you know, like seeing those fulfillments in this way, uh, but others don't need to. I'm like, the uh what needs to happen is that that is that's everyone does. So I I have two. I have two. We all need to say, no, no, no. That yearning is not ever gonna be fulfilled. Or if it what if I did feel fulfilled by this worldly things, that's a tragedy. That would be a tragedy, not a not a blessing. If I was like, oh now my heart is satisfied because of human beings, yikes, that in the Bible would look as if God has sort of abandoned me or something. I should you know the desires and passions we have are made to feast on nothing less than the than God. You know, um participate in the divine nature, drink of the fountain of life. So what I'm wanting to say is church needs to have that culture where of for not just for gay Christians, but for all Christians. All Christians. Because only when it's all Christians buy it can church be a happy, healthy place in which the gay Christian is celebrated and enjoyed and appreciated. So that's why Peter Volk stuff, I know you know that, I've I've sort of been sort of uh enthusiastically really supporting him for as long as I've known about his approach because he's trying to do that and say to churches there is a way to be and he and it's by uh getting at these bigger things that hit everybody. So it's okay, yeah. I'm saying it's like I I I mean I I want the help of people who can speak critically to pe to us all who to every you know, because the the there's this massive repentance of the fertility cult needs to happen. So yeah, and then the people looking in from outside, it's that sense too. That it's sound I want them to think when they hear what we're describing about men and women and the divine romance and all, I want them to think that is ridiculous. That's insane. Whoa, totally unrealistic. The withered arm kind of guy with the withered arm, and it's like stretch it out. That's leave him alone, he can't do it. That's the worst thing you can say to that guy. The worst thing you could say to that guy is stretch out your arm. I want that feel the message, it's not like oh yeah, yeah, that sounds totally fine and reasonable. I could do that, that would be a failure of communication. I'm wanting to communicate the idea that that what we're describing, like sell everything we've got, live live with everything in common, find, you know, love Jesus so much that we hate everybody else in comparison to it, and such that uh we can say the eunuchs for the kingdom stuff and mean it, and the 1 Corinthians 7 stuff and all of that. That the the that we almost we envy the single Christian because they can be so they can be more wholeheartedly 100% in on it, and then the married person's like, oh, I'm missing out, I'm missing out. Whereas as it is, it's almost the other way around. It's like the the same people are going, oh, I'm missing out on the heterosexual marriage. Paul's like, no, no, they're missing out. The people who are married are missing out on that like premium package almost, like of 100% devotion to Jesus and church and every that's going on. So I want to give the impression that a per and I sometimes say this when I talk to the person who's outside and say, What I'm gonna say, I promise you, you're gonna think is just ridiculous. But when you fall in love with Jesus, you'll understand why we speak like this. What difference like a person who's fallen in love seems mad seems mad. But wait, but when you fall in love with Jesus, you'll go, Oh that oh yeah, I get it, I get it. So I want that message, I want to give a message that's not that doesn't seem the easy and it's that to humanities business. The old humanity is, you know, you well man, that's your message, the uh, you know, three, two, one.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. The old the old Adam with its its desires and really, yeah, the the old Adam lives by the flesh and the desires of the flesh. Um and yeah, the whole the whole thing is turning from Adam to be united to to Christ. And it's not a it's not a synthesizing of Adam and Christ. And it's not a you know little bit of yeah, a little bit of the flesh, little bit of the spirit, mix it all in. See how you go. No, it's new creation, isn't it?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it is. So uh and then that third thing is like what what if if I had like two minutes or something?
SPEAKER_01So you could you could either either tell me what you would say or just tell me what your tactics would be. What what what would you be? Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I think it's that um that sense that uh is that repentance uh across the board. The strategy would be not to say the problem is same-sex attraction. It isn't. The problem is fundamentally being unfaithful to Christ across the whole board of sexuality, gender identity, marriage, and the shape of life that we have as church together, instead of showing life together, instead of church being my actual family, you know, water is thicker than blood in the Bible. Right. And yet it hasn't been. It's like, oh, see you next week.
SPEAKER_01And you mean by that the water of the water of baptism binds us far more than than familial ties.
SPEAKER_02And instead, church is all too often, and I'm gonna carry to us slightly, but it's just that sense of, oh, see you next week for another another long lecture. Lovely, see you next week for another lecture. Jesus will be like, What are you doing? Oh, this is church. Whatever that is, that ain't church. Church Which is all day, every day. It's how we live all day, every day, and yet we get together sometimes to remind ourselves of the words of Christ and feast on his body and blood and things. But we're always just we're always supposed to be sharing life, sharing the joys and sorrows and being there for each other. How can a person who is locked out of a heterosexual marriage have family if it's sitting next week for another uh long lecture? It's ludicrous. That's where the repentance has to happen. There's a rottenness and a sickness that's meant that that has been acceptable and tolerated. And then we wonder why we're a lunatic fringe at the edge of society and nobody believes it. Nobody believes we have the answer to life. Of course we don't have the answer to life. That is absurd. We're we're like, we're you know, anyone looking at me, they don't know how to live. Like to get together once a week for a long lecture. Like loads of communities are better than that. Pub. Go to your puppies that has a better family life than that. And and and obviously gay and lesbian people have often had much better communities than that. And sometimes when people have become a Christian, they find they stick with their old family because it's there for them. You know, and that's true. People with all kinds of addictions. The addiction group is a much better family there for you, sharing life that joys us around and church, and now go, I will get together for a lecture once a week. What's that? This look, I'm I'm rambling on, but you get my point. No, no, no.
SPEAKER_01But but okay, that addiction group begins with saying, hello, I'm Glenn, and I'm I'm an alcoholic, or whatever it is, right? It's and and it begins with repentance. Yes, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_02Brilliant.
SPEAKER_01Which is where we where we begin our talk with. It's and and you've given us a message of repentance to chew on that is for all people, wherever people land on uh this particular issue of the day, and it is a relevant message no matter what happens to the Church of England. Um it's something that we will still have to wrestle with no matter which way general sinner goes. Um and so, yes, you've given us uh an evergreen message and uh an yeah, all of life is repentance. So, Paul, we have a lot of processing to do, and I'm sure lots of people will do it down below in the comments. So uh if you've got uh comments, please uh please direct them to uh Paul Blackham at Gmail. Whatever his that's not his actual email address. But um yeah, no, I think I think you've stirred stirred us in uh really helpful ways, uh Paul. If there are ways that people uh can keep up with you online, uh what's the best thing that people can do?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, um there's a thing we run every Sunday called the Bible School Show. And there's a website just called Bible School.show, and we do an hour of um church history, and I teach a bit of theology, little spots, and then we do some Bible study. The whole thing's about 50 minutes, and we do it every Sunday. That's a good place to connect to us, and uh, you know, we we try to take the take all these things quite seriously as vested as we can. We like the church history spots, particularly my son PJ, does that he has this global church history thing um because it that reminds us, we love all that because it puts us in touch with Christians who've done this and lived in these radical, mad revolutionary ways before, and it makes us think we could do that again. Why can't we do that? And how did they do it and all that? That's why we love all that. So, yeah, that's a good way, and then there's biblicalframeworks.com with the whole book by book project stuff.
SPEAKER_01Brilliant, and I highly recommend uh getting into as much Paul Blackham as you can. So uh do check out those links, we'll put them uh downstairs in the description. Paul Blackham, thanks so much for joining us.
SPEAKER_02Hey, thank you.
SPEAKER_00Well, there we go. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you found that episode helpful. If you'd like to watch this conversation or uh other conversations that you hear on the Speak Life Podcast, you can go to our main Speak Life YouTube channel, youtube.com forward slash speaklife media. We've done a bit of uh uh rejig, and so originally we had a a YouTube channel for our short content, and then we had a speaklife uh podcast YouTube channel for our long form content. That was something we tried for a few weeks, but now we're changing tack, and so actually all the podcast content will be available on our main channel, speaklife youtube.com forward slash speaklifemedia. So this conversation and many others. And our additional channel is instead going to be called Reformed Mythologist, and this is where Nate is going to do his theology of storytelling stuff. So if you've enjoyed any of our discussions about popular culture, art from a Christian perspective, uh the franchise storytelling series that Nate did looking at Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, all the big franchises and the theology of them. If you're interested in that sort of content, the home for that kind of thing is going to be the Reformed Mythologist YouTube channel. You can find it by going to youtube.com forward slash at Reformed Mythologist. And that's the title that Nate is always using of himself. He's a Reformed Christian who's obsessed with story and narrative, and how that can point us to the great story, the story which we are part of, the story which God Himself has entered into. So apologies if that's confusing that we're changing tack again, but I promise once we found a system, we will stick with it, and I think this is going to be really effective. The vast majority of Glenn's stuff, you know, engaging with the meaning crisis, interviews with people like Tom Holland, Louise Perry, all that long form content, engaging with the culture, responding to current affairs in Glen's signature style, um, that will all be available on youtube.com forward slash speaklifemedia, the speaklife YouTube channel, and then all things storytelling, theology of storytelling, with primarily led by Nate Morgan Locke. That will happen on the Reformed Mythologist YouTube channel. As for the podcast, the podcast is going to be pulling conversations from both channels, probably. Uh, the vast majority of the episodes released on this podcast will be episodes that you can watch on our main YouTube channel. They're mainly uh conversations that Glenn has. But we're gonna be releasing more stuff on our podcast. Maybe some of our shorter reaction videos will also make those available as podcasts. Uh, so it might feel overwhelming, it might feel like uh we're bringing a lot of stuff out, and there is you're under no obligation to uh watch slash listen to it all. But it might be, for instance, that you find one stream of our content especially helpful or interesting, and so you want to stick to that. So, anyway, that's a little overview of some of the things that are going on at Speak Life. Uh, thank you so much for listening. God bless, and I will see you next week.