I was recently in a group where a man was talking about being under some pressure at work to participate in a charity fundraiser that would require him to run a mile in high heels. He wasn’t excited about this.
For starters, he seriously doubted he could find a pair of women’s shoes big enough for his man feet. A valid concern, for sure. But even more, he dreaded the pain he was sure to experience if he had to hobble around on the darn things for a mile.
“And this is exactly why,” I chimed in, “I can’t understand this whole transgender thing, especially men wanting to ‘become’ women.”
“Who in their right mind would want to wear what we have to wear?” I continued.
I sensed I could quickly become a runaway train barreling down this conversational track, so I wisely applied the emergency brakes, but my thoughts and questions on this subject lingered for days.
Why would a man want to become a woman? What man of sound mind would sign up to wear uncomfortable shoes, or stuff all his fat into Spanx, or pluck his eyebrows, or shave his legs, or live with our crazy roller-coaster hormones?
I think there’s a secret most women believe, but seldom speak out loud: Most men aren’t tough enough to survive as a woman. There it is. I’ve said it.
Need I bring up childbirth? Don’t make me go into my labor and delivery stories. Let’s just say that when God pronounced that one of the consequences of Adam and Eve’s rebellion would be increased pain in childbirth, He wasn’t kidding.
Obviously, most men wouldn’t choose to trade places with us, and don’t try. In fact, an ancient, traditional Jewish prayer went something like this: “Blessed are You, God, who has not created me a Gentile, a slave or a woman.”
Well, I’m definitely two out of three on that list, and even if that bothered me, which it really doesn’t, no amount of wishing or surgery or legislation would change that.
I know this is brazenly politically incorrect, but I think all this stuff about being “a woman trapped in a man’s body,” or vice versa, is rooted in a denial of the reality of a sovereign Creator God, or rebellion against Him.
It’s basically a fist-shaking defiance of the truth expressed in Psalm 139: God knits each of us together in our mother’s wombs, creating us to be what He’s ordained us to be.
I was a pretty serious “tomboy” growing up and would still rather watch ESPN than the Home Shopping Network, but not once have I ever thought for even a millisecond that I was a “man trapped in a woman’s body.” I’m thankful that lie had not yet been broadcast and accepted by the masses when I was growing up.
I may not like everything that comes with being female, but I’m certainly not trading in the girl badge God gave me because, well, He is God and I am not.
Our deluded culture presents courage awards to those who defy the God who made them, but I think it takes far more courage to humbly bow before our Creator and honor His will for us. He doesn’t make mistakes and I believe true, bone-deep contentment is never found outside His will.
Our feelings make lousy, fickle compasses for our lives. When we try to bend God’s truth to suit our feelings instead of bending our lives to the truth, we become very, very lost.
“But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? Shall what is formed say to Him who formed it, ‘Why have you made me like this?’” (Romans 9:20)