To Be a Human

A response in part to “Hold Fast to Sound Doctrine” by Archbishop Steven Wood.

There is not one square inch of the entire creation about which Jesus Christ does not cry out,
“This is mine! This belongs to me!”

~Abraham Kuyper

The devolution of Western society is no surprise as it lacks a foundation in understanding Biblical anthropology. The chief virtue of the post-modern West is fulfilling one desire: what makes one feel “happy.” This false idol of happiness at any cost is why abortion on demand, euthanasia, the redefining of marriage, gender dysphoria, and other heresies of the body will only continue multiplying. There is a lack of understanding as to humanity’s identity and purpose. The world minimizes the purpose of humanity to fleeting personal self-satisfaction and gratification. This inability to recognize what makes us human is unfortunately not limited to society but has infected Christianity as the great heresy of our time.

After all, it has been over a decade since Americans changed their minds on Biblical anthropology. According to a 2013 Barna study, practicing Christians are also guilty of changing their minds from how God defines to how man redefines humanity. This past decade has seen even more capitulation by Western Christians who yield Biblical anthropology in the name of “relevance” or “acceptance” from an indifferent world.

For example, the sexual union of two same-sex persons has been normalized not only in society, but also in so-called churches within and without the Anglican Communion. This past week, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, bent the knee to Baal and essentially blessed what God has cursed. Fortunately, the majority of Anglicans, represented by the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON), quickly rebuked Archbishop Welby’s false teaching. Archbishop Welby’s inability to simply teach that same-sex relationships are inherently sinful follows the path many Western denominations are trailblazing by denying Holy Scripture and the catholic tradition. Although the ordination of a practicing homosexual is what led to many leaving the Episcopal Church and ultimately to the creation of the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA), the seeds for dissolution were sown much earlier due to the West fundamentally forgetting what it means to be a human created in the image of God. What it means to be an image-bearer is the essential issue of our age, as much as whether Jesus is both fully God and fully man. This is an Athanasian moment in an Arian world.

Therefore, it is confusing at best for Archbishop Steve Wood to inform not only the ACNA, but also the Global South Fellowship of Anglicans (GSFA) that “what it means to be human” is an issue of “secondary” importance.

This could not be further from the truth.

This recent claim is especially perplexing, considering Archbishop Wood is a member of the GAFCON Primates Council, which issued the statement rebuking Archbishop Welby. Hence, I pray our Archbishop clarifies his statement that “what it means to be human” is of “secondary” importance.

It is impossible for this to be a secondary issue when it has Gospel implications. After all, God the Son became man to save His image-bearers from their outward rebellion and inward degeneracy. As the New Adam, the perfect man, the only one who truly reflects the Father and whose image we are called to bear, Jesus redeemed humanity from following the Prince of Lies in order that we may be conformed to His image. We can no longer walk in our own pursuits or the lusts of the flesh since we are called and gifted the transformative Holy Spirit for the renewing of our minds.

The Church, Christ’s body and Christ’s bride, lives in a world where her own newly confirmed children are presented the lie that their God-given gender is indeterminate. Our youth and young adults are being pressured to conform to the world. The Church cannot afford to let the world catechize her children with the lies of the devil, thereby resulting in the least of these being sexually mutilated and abandoned to a far worse mental state. The Church’s own children, their parents, and inquirers to the faith are facing this war over what it means to be human. Therefore, the Church needs to protect, guide, teach, and catechize within, while simultaneously proclaiming the truth to a deaf world, i.e., God made us male and female in His image and it is good.

The doctrine of humanity bearing God’s image goes back to Genesis 1:27 and is echoed in Jesus’ own ministry in Matthew 19:4. If we do not know who we are – broken, sinful creatures – then we cannot comprehend the Creator’s Gospel. The Gospel redeems us from the twisted desire to “play God” by marring and scarring our bodies in a vain attempt to redefine our gender and our humanity. While sin scars our humanity, Christ cleanses and sanctifies our humanity.

This truth is manifest throughout ACNA’s own founding. If what it means to be human is merely “secondary” then why ever separate from the false teachers found within the Episcopal Church, the Anglican Church of Canada, and the Church of England? But it is not a secondary issue. God saved humanity – our body, our spirit, all of us. How we understand what it means to be human not only addresses the current cultural moment – gender dysphoria – but should also impact the way the Church addresses the upcoming issues of artificial intelligence, transhumanism, and more.

Wisely, the ACNA catechism, To Be A Christian, concurs that this question is important and is a primary issue. The collect that greets the catechumen before Part I (page 17) is the same collect we pray at the Second Sunday of Christmas:

O God, who wonderfully created, and yet more wonderfully restored, the dignity of human nature: Grant that we may share the divine life of him who humbled himself to share our humanity, your Son Jesus Christ our Lord; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen (emphasis added).

How can we know what God has saved us from and for unless we know what it means to be human? Indeed, Part I of the ACNA Catechism tells us in the first paragraph entitled “The Gospel” (page 20) the following:

God created the world and made us to be in loving relationship with him. Though created good, human nature became fatally flawed, and we are now all out of step with God. In Bible language, we are sinners, guilty before God and separated from him (emphasis added).

Lest the wider ACNA forgets, our Catechism then powerfully teaches us in question 1, under the topic “Salvation”:

1. What is the human condition? Though created good and made for fellowship with our Creator, humanity has been cut off from God by self-centered rebellion against him, leading to lawless living, guilt, shame, death, and the fear of judgment. This is the state of sin. (Genesis 3:1–13; Psalm 14:1–3; Matthew 15:10–20; Romans 1:18–23; 3:9–23) (emphasis added)

Our fallenness must be taught so our salvation might be received. We cannot trust our feelings nor our hearts’ desires as they are rooted in separation from God. However, we also must remain steadfast on the truth espoused in question 43, that teaches us God “created human beings, male and female, in his image and appointed us stewards of creation.” Though we are sinners this side of Eden, this does not negate God’s purposeful creation of us as humans in His image and with His preferred pronouns. Our gender and pronouns were never ours to choose, just as we do not get to update, modernize, or redefine the Triune God, who has revealed Himself as the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost. This is a central issue, and must be maintained, taught, and held fast as doctrine because it comes from Christ Himself, who is fully God and fully man. Heretical anthropology will result in Christological heresy.

Alas, but we live in an age of distrust. Society whispers into the itching ears of clergy and laity alike, “Did God really say there are two genders?” The world tells the flesh to join in Satan’s rebellion and deny God created us as we are for a purpose: to glorify the Creator. But we, the Church, are without excuse. For we were baptized and professed before God and man in our baptism and confirmation that we reject the world, the flesh, and the devil. Christ has redeemed us to forsake the lies and deceits of sin, therefore let us hold fast to what Christ has saved us from and stand firm upon His promise to redeem and glorify us as resurrected humans. My fellow brethren in Christ, “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12:1-2, ESV).

The irony has not escaped me that Archbishop Wood’s speech is entitled, “Hold Fast to Sound Doctrine.” Yet, we cannot hold fast to the Gospel, we cannot define the sacredness of life, we cannot preach the extensive nature of our salvation, unless we know, defend, and explain what it means to be human. It is a fundamental doctrine, and is why the Jerusalem Declaration, included in our own 2019 Book of Common Prayer’s Documentary Foundations (pages 792-793), states:

8. We acknowledge God’s creation of humankind as male and female and the unchangeable standard of Christian marriage between one man and one woman as the proper place for sexual intimacy and the basis of the family. We repent of our failures to maintain this standard and call for a renewed commitment to lifelong fidelity in marriage and abstinence for those who are not married.

We cannot know what it means “To Be A Christian,” without knowing what it means to be a human. One cannot understand why God the Son became human without understanding what being human is. Likewise, understanding our humanity means to understand that God made us male and female, and those roles cannot be deformed nor rearranged. The Church cannot be Christ’s Body and His bride if we fail to know these roles cannot be exchanged. Only Christ is the groom and only the Church is his bride. Christ and His bride shall be united in the great marriage supper of the Lamb; therefore, marriage reflects this union of Christ and the Church. The two become one flesh only when those two are male and female. Therefore, in order to perfectly represent Christ (the groom) and His Church (the bride), marriage only exists between man and woman for this represents the Divine union that God planned for His Church and Himself.

We do a disservice to our own children and to those who we disciple and to whom we proclaim the Gospel by downplaying the key question the Western world is grappling with, and answering wrongly, “What does it mean to be human?”

We do our Lord, our God, the Almighty One, a severe and great dishonor if, while the world sits in denial, we deny His revelation of the truth which He has entrusted to us to proclaim.

The bishops of the ACNA took an oath to Almighty God to “faithfully study the Holy Scriptures, and call upon God by prayer for the true understanding of them, so that you may be able by them to teach and exhort with wholesome doctrine, and to withstand and convince those who contradict it.” (The Ordinal, 2019 Book of Common Prayer, page 503). The time has come for the College of Bishops to teach and exhort what it means to be human rather than ignoring the slippery slope this confused age slides towards by denying the Creator of His very image.

The College of Bishops and the diocesan synods and convocations must articulate clear resolutions, statements, and teachings of the faith once delivered regarding what it means to be human. We must teach and guide that so-called gender reassignment and falsely bearing witness about one’s God-given gender is sin that stems from the fall and deceits of the evil one. We cannot “play God” on our own bodies and defy His will in a vain attempt to alter our gender. We do not know better than the One who created us. This sin, as with all sin, necessitated salvation which comes by no other Name than Jesus, the One who poured Himself out like a drink offering and became man so that all of humanity may become like Him.

Advent draws near. Christ draws ever nearer. Let us faithfully and boldly “not be ashamed to confess the faith of Christ crucified, and manfully to fight under his Banner against sin, the world, and the devil, and to continue Christ’s faithful soldier, and servant unto [our] lives end. Amen.” (1662 Book of Common Prayer, The Public Baptism of Infants, page 269). Though the world be Arian, let us stand with Athanasius.

Athanasius contra mundum.

Originally published at www.anglican.training