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I Don't Have Enough FAITH to Be an ATHEIST
How to Raise Gender Confident Kids with Dr. Jeff Myers and Dr. Kathy Koch
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- [00:03]
A
Ladies and gentlemen, we may have had a tipping point politically on the transgender issue, but not in the lives of young people. There are many young people who are still being enticed into the transgender world. They have rapid onset gender dysphoria, and they are deciding that they need puberty blockers and cross sex horror hormones, and some of them ultimately surgery. While about half of the states have decided they're not going to allow this gender mutilation, half of the states still do. Some of them are the sanctuary states, like California. Well, they will take a child who is a minor and try and transition the child, even against the wishes of the parents. Well, what can you do in your own home to ensure that your child does not get enticed into this psychological and physical dead end? Well, we've got a couple experts to help you through that. Today. We have Dr. Kathy Cook and Dr. Jeff Myers on the program because they've just put a very practical book together which we're going to give you for free today. So we're not selling books here. We're going to actually give you this resource for free called Raising Gender Confident Kids, Helping kids embrace their God given design. Now, you might not have someone in your family you're worried about, but you probably know a neighbor or you probably know somebody else in your extended family or even your school who is struggling with this. So please listen and take this resource because it is a great new and very practical resource that will help save a child's life from going down the wrong road. So some of you already know Dr. Jeff Myers. He's been on this program several times before. He, of course, is the president of Summit Ministries, which I go to every year and many other apologists do, to help kids with a Christian worldview. He's also written 19 books. This is just one of them. You may not know Kathy Cook. She also teaches at Summit. She also is the head of Celebrate Kids. She's the CEO of that. She's an expert in child development and biblical parenting. And so. So it's great to have them on the program. Here they are, ladies and gentlemen, Dr. Jeff and Dr. Kathy. How are you guys today?
- [02:29]
B
Great, Dr. Frank. We're doing great.
- [02:31]
A
I also have this sound effect, by the way, if you guys get out of line wrong. Okay. Watch out. If you say something wrong or if you don't give me your pronouns, you're fired. Okay.
- [02:44]
B
All right.
- [02:45]
A
That's total shame. All right, let me start with you, Dr. Jeff. This book, Raising Gender Confident Kids. First of all, why did you get Together with Kathy. And why did you decide to do this?
- [02:55]
B
Well, you know, Frank, you know, from speaking to students at Summit Ministries that we face issues before they come into the general culture with the students that we have, because they're leaders. They're really tuned in to what is happening in the culture. And about 10 years ago, we started to notice that many of them were saying things like, I think I've been born in the wrong body. And, you know, these are good kids from Christian families. It was a little shocking to hear that. We started to figure out how to work through it with them. And then all of a sudden this burst into the culture in a major way. And Dr. Kathy and I were speaking and I said, I heard that you're writing a book on this. I hope you do. We want to promote it. And she said, oh, I thought you were going to write a book on this. And we said, well, then let's do it. Let's write it together. And it turned out to be really great, Frank, because when you co author a book, you have to work through all of the ideas together and then they get elevated. And in this specific sense, I think this book is going to be a resource that will get parents past their feelings of guilt and shame and helplessness about what is happening in the culture and move them toward confident conversations with their children so that their boys can turn into godly men and their girls can turn into godly women.
- [04:04]
A
Amen to that. This is really needed, by the way. It's not a long book. It's about 150 pages, and we're going to show you how you can get it for free. Kathy, why did you decide to team up with Dr. Jeff on this and tell us a little bit about your background in parenting and bringing kids up?
- [04:19]
C
Well, first of all, thanks so much for having us on the show. This is a real privilege. I'm mostly known as a child advocate, a parent educator, go to conventions, churches, schools, events, have been a part of the summit faculty for 10 years, which I dearly love. And I have been wanting to write this book for a while. I hear the parents concerns. I've met with students who are confused, angry, suicidal, all those things. And I don't have the theology background of Dr. Jeff Myers. And so what a thrill for us to partner together where we were able to, you know, bring the parenting and the theology together. I think, in a way that's gonna be really encouraging to people. It's been a real joy to partner with him.
- [04:56]
A
Tell us about Celebrate Kids. What's that about? That's your website?
- [04:59]
C
Yeah. We want people to celebrate kids the way that Jesus did and still does. Like, he's our model. Right. When the learned men said, who among us is the greatest up a child? And I'm sure that they were wondering, you know, did he hear the question right? But, yes, he heard the question right. Children should be paid attention to and seen and known and not invisible. And that's actually relevant to this transgender issue, where they're feeling alone and they're feeling invisible, and they're looking for intimacy and popularity, and they're finding it in a really sick way. So, again, we're very interested in collaborating with people, organizations, as well as, you know, churches and schools that want to get better with their kids. It's real honored to do what we do.
- [05:37]
A
Dr. Jeff, I noticed that throughout the book, and it's in the title, too, about gender confidence. Confidence is a big deal. Why is it a big deal? And how do you instill confidence in terms of gender in a young person?
- [05:52]
B
Well, confidence is faith together. It's when people feel like they belong to a community, that they know they have a sense of purpose, they know their design is good, and you get to confidence, beginning with a sense of compassion. We look at our world and realize that people are lost. These young adults today, they're not stupid. They're deceived. And so we move from compassion. We help them get a sense of hope for the future. We want to ground them in biblical truth. And then ultimately, when they have confidence in their gender, what we mean by that is the boys understand that they were made by God to be a boy, and God wants them to grow into being godly. Men will stand for truth and fight against evil and injustice, that young women will grow into godly women who will bring life to those in their community and work to bring blessing and flourishing to the world. And when Christians actually talk that way, it gives even people outside of the church a sense of hope. But if we don't. If we don't talk about it, then it's very easy for the rising generation to think, oh, well, my pastor never talked about it. So therefore, Jesus doesn't care about stuff like this. I guess I just have to go along with whatever my culture says about the gender spectrum, all of that.
- [07:08]
A
Yeah, I know that. What does Facebook say? They have 68 genders or something like that.
- [07:17]
B
Right.
- [07:18]
A
What do we say to somebody who says there are 68 or 75 or an infinite number of genders? What would you say to someone like that Dr. Cook, two things.
- [07:31]
C
One would be, where did you find your information? Why do you believe that's true? What credibility does that person have in your life that would cause you to believe? And then I Love the question Dr. Jeff recommends, which is the question, what happens if you're wrong? So those questions, you know, what happens if you're wrong? How do you know that to be true? I also have a tendency to say, man, I'm so sorry you believe that it's a lie. Especially if I were in the right. It's a lie. Don't let yourself be confused. It's not gonna work well for you. Sometimes we just have to be that bold and say it's confusing. Like you're wrong.
- [08:06]
A
Yeah, well, too often people just want to kowtow to whatever the culture says. But look, it's normal to feel odd when you're going through puberty. It's normal. And we have to explain that to kids. And, Jeff, how does this book help parents? And by the way, could a teenager read this book and get the same kind of good advice from it?
- [08:27]
B
Well, I think so. We got a lot of teenagers reading it right now because we released the book about two weeks ago, and Summit ministry students have been going through it. Yes. So at the core of. I think we need to help them identify a couple of things. First of all, theologically, from Genesis 1, God made human beings in his image. The very next thing we know about them is that they're male and female. Those are the kinds of human beings that there are. The genus of humanity, the gender of humanity is male and female. Now, if you look at cats, there could be lions and tigers and house cats, but there are only two kinds of humans, males and females. There are not different, even races or nationalities. That doesn't make people different kinds of humans. They're males and females. This is also biologically True, Frank. There's 6,500 cataloged biological differences between males and females in humanity. The only way the transgender agenda can get traction is by trying to shame people into silence for not saying anything. And the way they do it is by proposing the idea of a gender spectrum. On one end, you have extreme masculinity. On the other end, you have extreme femininity. So you have GI Joe on one end and Barbie on the other side. And since nobody's really either GI Joe or Barbie, then we're all kind of in between. We're all non binary. We're all transgender. That's what the agenda says.
- [09:46]
A
Further, right after the break with Dr. Jeff and Dr. Kathy here on the I don't have enough HD radio program and podcast. Don't go anywhere. We're back right after the break. What's a man? What's a woman? How many genders are there? You may not be concerned, confused, but your kids might be. What do you do about that? How do you prevent that before it gets to the point that they think they're in the wrong body? That's what we're talking about today with Dr. Kathy Cook and Dr. Jeff Myers, the brand new book which we're going to give you for free if you hang around raising gender confident kids, helping kids embrace their God given design. How do we know there's only two genders?
- [10:30]
B
Dr. Jeff well, we, we know that there are male and female from Genesis chapter one. We also know that there are male and female only in humanity. There are 6,500 biological differences between males and females. Some people think it's just a matter of secondary sex characteristics, but it isn't. There are significant differences. And, you know, the transgender agenda says, look, that's not true. Everybody falls along a spectrum. And so there could be an infinite number of genders, from extreme masculinity to extreme femininity. And the way they promote that is by taking cultural stereotypes, enshrining them, and then trying to knock them down so that everybody gets really confused and people are confused. We talked to a grandmother. She said, I've got 13 grandkids. I sent them all to Christian camp growing up. Five of them now identify as transgender. I had a student who was a female announced that she wanted to become an engineer, and she was immediately told by her classmates, you must be a boy trapped in a girl's body. Had a middle school student tell me I had to switch to a new school. Really? Why? Because I was the only girl left in my class. I was the only girl left in my class. She said all the other girls in the class transitioned to become boys. So we might not understand, you know, people my age might not get that this is a huge conflict for young adults, but they are significantly confused because they have not really understood that there are truths such as male or female that can actually be known and that the whole idea of a gender spectrum is a complete lie.
- [11:58]
A
And Dr. Cook, in the book, you talk about how the people that advocate for this kind of thing use words in a deceptive way to try and get people to think this is a good thing. How do they go about doing that?
- [12:14]
C
Yeah, that's one of the causes for sure. So One of my favorites to talk about is gender affirming care. Like, when you hear that, well, of course I want to affirm gender. That's a good thing. But what the LBTQ liberal community wants us to say is liberal or is gender affirming care, and that's to affirm who they want to become. So a woman who wants to become a man, a man who wants to become a woman. We're gonna have gender affirming care, so we're going to help them with pronouns. We're gonna help them with hairstyles and makeup and clothing, and obviously then surgery or taking the medicine, if you will, that they think is gonna work for them, and it's just an outright lie.
- [12:53]
A
Dr. Jeff, let's set aside the Bible for just a second and just look at the medical data. What does the medical data show us? What happens to a young person that goes through the process of first, puberty blockers, then cross sex hormones, and then ultimately surgery? Does this solve any problems, or what does it create unintended consequences? What happens?
- [13:16]
B
Well, the transgender community says that the core problem is that you feel psychologically unfit. You feel an incompatibility between your body and the way you feel about yourself, and so that if you can manipulate your body somehow, then you'll start to feel better about yourself. So the. The. Usually people begin with puberty blocking drugs. Parents are scared into this, often by a general practitioner who will say things like, would you rather have a live son or a dead daughter? And they. They literally scare parents into thinking if they don't go along with this, the child will commit suicide. The. All of the evidence is.
- [13:52]
A
Can we just stop right there for just a second? Because I want to ask the question. Try not to lose your train of thought, but I haven't asked this question before. If a child is threatening suicide, doesn't that indicate there's a greater problem going on? I mean, wouldn't you just stop and say, hold on, it's not just that you feel like you're in the wrong body if you think you're in the wrong body and you have to commit suicide unless you try and change. There's a whole nother problem going on here, isn't there?
- [14:26]
B
Well, it's. It isn't just the child who thinks they might be feeling suicidal. It's the doctors threatening the parents that. That is what will happen to the child if they don't act to treat the child medically through puberty blocking drugs, cross sex hormones, ultimately surgery until the child gets to the point where he or she feels comfortable, and that that's the way the medical community approaches it. But, yes, I have never. I've worked with a lot of young adults who are thinking they might have been born in the wrong body. One of them have significant psychological comorbidities. Anxiety, depression, suicidal ideation. And the problem is that they get immediate affirmation if they say they're transgender, then they go down this medicalized path, and it leads them to such a dead end that they feel worse off than they were before. The data is now in. We have the receipts. Suicidal ideation goes up among people who stick with a transgender identity, not down, because the underlying issues, even sometimes significant childhood trauma, goes unaddressed.
- [15:34]
A
Yeah. Kathy, I notice in the book that one question you ask somebody who comes to you, whether it's your own child or someone else who says, you know, mom, dad, I'm trans, or whatever, the first question or one of the questions is, what happened that made you feel that way? Why do you ask that question?
- [15:51]
C
Right. Because gender dysphoria is a clinically distressed view of your body. Most people don't have that. That's actually very rare. What most people have is depression, stress, anxiety. I'm uncomfortable in my body. Well, let's teach our children that. Everybody's uncomfortable in their body here, there, and everywhere. We go through seasons in life. I was too tall as a kid. I'm so grateful my mom and dad didn't try to cut off inches between my knee and my ankle. You know, back then, it was, let's change her attitude. So they enrolled me in tap dance class. I got to be coordinated, and I was the center of the back row, a position of high honor. And all of a sudden, I was okay in my body. And now my height's one of my greatest advantages, because I sit when I speak because of my bad back. And people can see me from the back of the room because I'm 6:1. And I tell the Summit students and other students I work with that I had to live long enough to find out why I am the who I am. But when I see that God is a good creator, he's intentional and loving and personal when he makes us us. And he knows what he's doing because he has our whole life in front of him. It's a good thing to grow into that reality. So it's a dangerous thing to give up on yourself and to assume that it can be changed. It can't. And as you said, you know, it's dangerous because we're not going to deal with their mental health issues if they think that changing gender is the easy out. I think they think it's easy. You know, they can change their wardrobe, they can change their hair, they can change their name, they can again, take a pill. They think that's easy. Where therapy and working on depression, anxiety, or overcoming the brokenheartedness, if I can say it that way, from childhood trauma, that's hard work. They don't want to do the hard work. We have to help them do the hard work.
- [17:26]
A
Hey, that key point, you just word the words you just used there. Childhood trauma, according to Walt Heyer, who, as you know, was a man, tried to live as a woman for a while, became a Christian, and now runs or for a While Reigns, ran SexChangeRegret.com said that in the hundreds, maybe thousands of people he's interviewed, a hundred percent of the people that identified as trans, 100%, like you just said, Jeff, have experienced some sort of childhood trauma that made them feel that way. Did you find that in your research as well, Jeff?
- [17:58]
B
We, we certainly found that in our research. And again, I, I follow a lot of the statistical research that has been done, the medical research that has been done. We've looked at hundreds of studies on this. But I'm going off of the students I have worked with. I do find that they have experienced childhood trauma. I don't want to overstate the case because we certainly don't want young adults to get the impression that they need therapy. Not every young person does. And when we talk about childhood trauma, we're talking about events. Sometimes it's bullying. For example, there was one student, he went to a school, made some friends. He had a very hard time finding friends. Big ranch kid, not the kind of kid you would think would be lured into this agenda, but because in his school, school, in the sex ed classes, and, well, pretty much every single class, all they were doing is saying, you could be transgender, and we're going to find out your pronouns and all these kinds of things. There were young men in his class who took that as a license to try to prey on him. And so they began sending him texts, trying to sexually recruit him. In that case, the boy had to leave that school, be enrolled in a different school, go through a number of different things to become healthy again. But that would have, that would count as a traumatic event, even though it wasn't actual sexual abuse. Certainly he was being preyed on by people who thought that, well, we talk about this openly in class. We can do whatever we want. And unfortunately, in a lot of government schools today, that is the case. Half of the schools in the United States of America promote transgender ideology.
- [19:33]
A
I have a friend in Washington state who literally had to break his daughter out of the hospital because they were going to transition her and he had to use some misdirection in order to get her out of there. Because in half the states, and particularly states like Washington and California, they're very adamant that any child who says they're transgender, they must be transitioned. And it's going completely against what the data show. Kathy, why are people ignoring data that shows that this does not help them long term?
- [20:11]
C
What if I answered? Money, money, money.
- [20:14]
A
Go ahead, explain.
- [20:15]
C
As we talk about in the book. It's just sick to talk about. Sadly, it's about money. It's about who they know. It's popularity. I don't know. Jeff knows more than I think that I do. Are they getting paid under the table? Is that. Again, it's just sick. It is about money. It is about old data. Old data may. Hey, this is going to be okay. This is going to solve the problems. And if medical professionals don't stay up on the data, they're not going to know the truth. And of course, to detransition is so brave. I am so impressed with the men and women and even young people who are coming out saying this was wrong. Everything in my body hurts now. Nothing is the way that I was told it would be. They're filing lawsuits. But the medical professionals have to choose to believe those stories and not the other stories. And that takes real courage. They're going to be blackballed. They're going to lose their jobs and they're going to lose grant money. And that I feel for them. But let's stand up for the tooth. Let's stand up for our children.
- [21:10]
A
Jeff, why is Big Pharma a big supporter of transitioning kids?
- [21:16]
B
Well, Frank, this is a multi billion dollar line of profit for pharmaceutical companies. And I know people who disagree with us are probably throwing things right now if they're still listening. But the truth is, for example, puberty blocking drugs. The drug that's primarily used is Lupron. It's a drug that's used for endometriosis in women. It's used to treat certain kinds of prostate cancer in men. Very effective for that use. But when they give it to a child, it can cost $35,000 a year. That is pure profit for the pharmaceutical company. And that child will move from the, from those puberty blocking drugs into cross sex hormones, which are an additional profit center, ultimately into surgery, which is an additional profit cent. And I know, I believe the truth will eventually come out about this. And when it comes out, we're going to find that all along there was a carefully constructed school to clinic pipeline where children are taught about transgender in school to introduce them to the possibility that medicine can solve their problem. And then the pharmaceutical companies can make billions. The medical institutions, the hospitals and so forth can make billions of dollars. I hate to be so cynical as to say it's about profit, but essentially people are profiting off of severe confusion among kids.
- [22:39]
A
When we come back from the break, we're going to talk about what you can do as a parent. What kind of questions can you ask your child? What kind of things can you do to head this off before it actually becomes a big problem? If you're listening, I Don't have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist. With me, Frank Durk on the American Family Radio Network and other stuff stations around the country, Our website's cross examined.org don't go anywhere. Back after the break. Welcome to I Don't have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist. If you want really good evidence that Christianity is indeed true, you need to take Digging up the Bible, the brand new 22 hour archaeology course that I'm leading online. We'll also have Titus Kennedy, an archaeologist, on one of the live Zoom Q A sessions. I spent a lot of time gathering the top archaeological discoveries from Genesis all the way to maps, all the way to the end of the Bible. And by the way, we discovered 107 people in the Bible are found in the dirt. And that's not, that's not exhaustive list. That's just what we found. We found seven people associated with the crucifixion of Jesus found in the dirt, including Jesus's name himself. There's so much more. You want to take that course also, if you have a sixth to eighth grader, you want to teach them the evidence that Christianity is true. By the way, this new book, raising Gender Confident Kids, has some apologetics in it as well. But the course is called let's Get Real, is taught by Shanda Fulbright and myself. It's great for homeschoolers or even if your kids in public school, they want to know why Christianity is true. It's sixth to eighth grade. It starts early September, just like Digging up the Bible does. Check all that out on our website, crossexamine.org click on online courses. And don't forget, Lord willing, we're going to Israel and Jordan on October 3rd. You want to be a part of that trip? It's going to be fabulous. Go to our website, crossexamine.org, click on Events. You will see it there. We'll have the great Ellie Shukron, who is the archeologist who discover who discovered the Pool of Siloam and so many other discoveries in the City of David and around the country. You don't want to miss that if you can be a part of it. We're only taking one bus. You're not going to get lost in the crowd. And we're staying at the best hotels because it's not walk where Jesus walk, it's run where Jesus walked. You're going to be tired. You want to have a nice hotel to go to. So check it out@cross examine.org Let me go back to my guest, Dr. Jeff Myers and Dr. Kathy Cook. They've put together a new book that people can get for free. It's called Raising Gender Confident Kids. And the reason you can give it away for free, Dr. Jeff, is why?
- [25:23]
B
Because we had a donor who said, I want the message of this book out everywhere. And so we put it together in a way that we think will help parents. We go to gender confident kids.com you'll see the book there. And you also see videos that Kathy and I put together. You know, we took, for example, the 24 toughest questions that we've received on the issue of transgender. All the way from my child told me they're born in the wrong body all the way to Aren't you guys just being political? And we answer the questions very openly and honestly because as Christians, we don't ignore tough issues. We dive into them. We don't try to escape. Our posture should be leaning in with a sense of compassion, hope, truth and confidence to the things that are happening in the culture.
- [26:03]
A
Give that website again where they can download the book for free.
- [26:06]
B
Gender confident kids.com you can download it there if you want. You can get an audio version, you can get a version for your Kindle. And we'll send you the book in the mail if you would like to have it. A lot of people are ordering many copies to distribute in their church because they know or their school. Every parent is going to need this message, not just because they have a child who's struggling, but to prevent the struggle. We don't want everybody to have to go through this. This is a preemptive strike.
- [26:34]
A
Yeah, that's, that's absolutely critical. Kathy, what are some of the things that the book lays out that you can do as a parent right now when you have younger kids and you want to make sure they're kind of inoculated to this transgender craze, as Abigail Shrier put it in her seminal book back from about 2020, the transgender craze. What are some of the things that the book shows parents they can do to inoculate their kids from this?
- [27:00]
C
Yeah, to use scripture to explain to our children that God is a good creator. I don't think we talk about it enough. Do we live our lives vibrantly? Do we demonstrate to our kids and our grandkids and our students that, you know, I enjoy being a woman? Do you two guys demonstrate that you enjoy being men? And why do you enjoy being men? Why has it been good for you? I think we don't talk about sin enough with our kids. We don't talk about confusion enough. I think that we, we make, I think, a good push. I think Jeff would agree to the pastors who should be teaching tough stuff. It shouldn't just be summit and should just be cross examined. That's being willing to talk about the tough stuff. So I think parents need to be choosing churches correctly and need to be answering questions and talking about it. And it's Bible. It's gotta be the Bible. And we actually have a section in the book about what if your kids don't believe the scripture's true? Here are some ways that you can help kids believe the scriptures true. And I think, Frank, that even if a child you're talking to or a young adult you're talking to doesn't believe in God, but you believe in God, you still need to stand in that authority that God has given you to express what you believe is true. Then you ask your children, your grandkids, why do you think that you're right and what happens if you're wrong and I'm right? Let's be brave. We talk in the book about, you don't have to know everything. Parents today are not gonna have all the answers to the questions. That doesn't mean that they're not available to the kids to ask them. And you know, Jeff has a really good point about you can play ignorant. Like, you can say, I really don't understand this. Explain it to me. And we listen through the grid of truth and then we help them, you know, rearrange their thoughts or reorient their thoughts to truth.
- [28:32]
A
Jeff, you always hear Christians say, well, God doesn't make any mistakes yet. You look around the world, and obviously we live in a fallen world. Not everybody is born with the same capabilities. Not everybody has the same opportunities. But is that a good response when people say, I'm born in the wrong body? And the Christian says, well, God doesn't make any mistakes? How would you deal with that?
- [28:56]
B
Well, when somebody says they're born in the wrong body, you know that there's some very serious confusion going on. They probably have been manipulated. And it's horrifying because to say somebody's been born in the wrong body isn't to say there's something wrong with their body. It's to say that their body itself, as a matter of factual existence, is wrong. That is a manipulative, horrifying thing to say to a person. And yet children are being taught this in schools every single day. They're seeds of doubt that are being planted. You want to ask them what happened to you that caused you to see yourself the way you do? And then you want to begin affirming who they are as God made them, as God designed them. Try to find out what the source of discomfort is. You know, Kathy made an excellent point earlier that we really want to emphasize we need in this generation to help our kids learn to become comfortable being uncomfortable. You can be curious and ask questions. You can show that you understand. I don't know what you're going through, but I remember times in my life where I felt out of sorts. And so I feel like I understand that. But my vision for you is that you will grow into a godly man or a godly woman. And one young man asked this question in an open forum. And I said, look, I want you to know you're not crazy. You're not alone. You're going to be okay. One of the things I want. Two things I want you to do. I want you to start thinking of your primary identity as a follower of Jesus Christ and not primarily based in what your culture says about your sexual identity. The second thing is, I want you to move outside of yourself. You are obsessing about yourself. I want you to find people who are doing great things and watch them and be like them. Be the. Block yourself out of your house if you have to, go serve other people. The. The. You know, I hate to say it this way, but the self obsession that our culture leads us to is a huge part of why this is a big deal for young adults today.
- [30:56]
A
Why should I believe that, Dr. Jeff? What's in it for me?
- [31:00]
B
Why should. Why should I? You believe it.
- [31:05]
A
What'S in it for me? Dr. Jeff, come on.
- [31:07]
B
I know I'm always, I'm always telling you, I, I joke with our students and they laugh, but I tell them you're just a bunch of little narcissists and they all laugh, but they, they know that it's true. Yeah, yeah, we got to get over that. We got to get over our self obsession. You know, we got to get over this whole thing. I've got, I constantly got to take my pulse and, you know, be body conscious and all of this stuff. No, forget that. Forget all of the stereotypes. If you're a girl who likes to work on engines, work on engines. If you're a guy who plays the violin, play the violin. It does, you know, just get beyond the stereotypes. Because this idea of the gender spectrum that, you know, everybody's somewhere along the way of some male and some female, which is very common teaching. I mean, even Jordan Peterson teaches stuff like, stuff like that. It just isn't true. There's a male spectrum and there's a female spectrum. That's the way God designed us. That's what the biology says. Let's just learn to become comfortable with that.
- [31:57]
A
This is a first world wi fi obsessed problem. I remember when Matt Walsh went, did his what's a woman thing. I think he went over to Africa and he's asking people in Africa, do you feel like a woman? They're like, what? I've, I've got to go kill my next meal. What are you talking about? Right. I mean, it's only when we come become so inward focused do we come up with these problems quite frequently and we think we know the solution when in reality we're going down the wrong road. Kathy, what are some of the signs that a young person in a home might be moving in the direction of gender dysphoria? And what can parents do about it?
- [32:43]
C
Thanks for asking. Well, because we believe that gender dysphoria so often starts with mental health issues. It could be childhood trauma, it could be bullying, it could be being laughed at at school, and you don't know how to handle that. So I think we look for mental health shifts. We look for a child who makes a change. For instance, if a child is usually in the kitchen helping prepare dinner, and three nights in a row she's not there. I'd go to her room and I'd say, hey, darlin', I've missed you in the kitchen. What's up? Like, normally you help out and normally we have long conversations and you're Avoiding me. So something's happening. I believe that evidence doesn't lie. So when we talk about what we observe in our children, they cannot deny that. And then we just ask an open ended question. Because if I ask a child are you stressed or depressed? Then they panic because they know they're not supposed to be those things and now they know that we've caught them be those things and they don't know how to have that conversation. So I've noticed that normally you're generous with your younger brother and normally you teach him a new game and you let him win. And boy, you got so angry so quickly last night. And that's not like you. So what's up with that? And then you invite that conversation in the right way. That would work. Going for a walk, sitting in a dark room. Cause they don't like making eye contact with parents when they're gonna make the parents concerned. And we look opportunities to have those conversations. I think that's huge.
- [33:56]
A
Jeff, anything to add to that?
- [33:58]
B
No, I think that's, that's really terrific. In the book Raising Gender Confident Kids. And Again, Gender Confident Kids.com is where you had to go go to get that because I know some people are driving around right now, they don't have a pen. Genderconfidentkids.com in the book we have 200 conversation starter. So on every imaginable topic related to gender, we help you have the conversation. Here's how you can say that in a way that is both truthful and compassionate with your child.
- [34:26]
A
Give us just a couple. What are some of these conversation starters that you can use with your kid? Again, you can get the book Raising Gender Confident kids@gender confidentkids.com just, just give one or two of them.
- [34:39]
B
Well, just. I'll give you one example. You'll notice elementary children start to notice things that are strange in the culture that they, that seem out of sorts to them. Mommy, we were at the grocery store and there was a man with a beard, wearing a dress and high heels. What is going on with that? And you know, you can say in that situation, honey, one of the things that's so sad about living in a world where people don't they ignore God is that they get very confused about who they are. They don't have a sense of purpose that gives meaning to their lives. And some people get so confused that they even lose track of whether they're a boy or a girl or a male or a female. And it's very sad when that happens. We want to be kind toward those people. We want to recognize that they have dignity because God made them in his image. But at the same time, I want you to know, son, that you were made on purpose by God. He made your design good. And you don't have to go out and be a football player to be a man. You don't have to do ballet to be a man. You are just the way God designed you to be.
- [35:43]
A
How do you instill hope and a proper identity in a child rather than despair and confusion? We'll cover that in the next segment. Our final segment with Dr. Cook and Dr. Myers, the new book Raising Gender Confident Kids is free atgender confident kids.com go there and get it. We're back right after the break. Welcome back to I Don't have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist. How do you raise Jeff Gender Confident Kids in a very confused world, a world that tends to want to drag them away from what we all know is true, that there are men and there are women. What do we do about that? What can we do about it? We're talking to Dr. Kathy Koch. Actually, Koch, but it's spelled like Koch K O C H. And Dr. Jeff Myers. Their brand new book, Raising Gender Confident Kids is free at Gender Confident Kids. And the reason it's free is because a donor, not because it's not worth anything. It's worth a lot. A donor thought it was worth so much that the donor put in enough money so you could have it for free. So go there and pick it up. But I want to start with Dr. Cook here. Kathy, how do we as parents or as even as friends, how do we instill hope in kids who might be confused with their identity?
- [37:07]
C
Yeah. You know, sometimes our stories are the most powerful tool that we have. And when we root them in scripture, it's hard to debate. So you've heard I have a low voice. I am called sir more often than you might guess. And it can be frustrating and aggravating and even embarrassing. But because I know that God is a good creator, I know that he chose my voice for me and therefore it is a good voice. And I've been told by the best of the radio personalities that I have a perfect voice, I'll even ask the Summit students when I tell them my story. And how many of you in the back have no trouble hearing me? And everyone raises their hand that there can be somebody can have a coughing fit and they can still hear my voice because low voices go further in a room than high voices. I've been all over the world to countries that don't have sound systems. It doesn't matter. I can be in a gym with 500 kids and the sound system buzzes so bad, we turn it off and my voice carries to the back of the room. It's a glorious thing. And God creates us intentionally. Psalm 139, 13, 14 says that we're knit together. We've gotta teach our children that knitting is a precise skill. The knitter decides in advance what to make. Otherwise you have a scarf, afghan, you know, mitten sweater, non thing that has no purpose. My voice is my perfect voice because my creator is a perfect creator. In Psalm 139, 14, David writes, My soul knows it very well when he talks about being fearfully and wonderfully made and being knit together, and we're wonderful and God's works are wonderful. Then he says, my soul knows it very well. And transgenderism, like, being called sir, wasn't an issue until transgenderism raised its ugly head. I've always had a low voice, but it's only in the last 10 years or so that people will private message me, like, it's none of my business, but I don't mean this to be embarrassing, but, like, what are you? I'm like, oh, my goodness, go get a life. Like, you don't need to even ask me that question. But people think that they have a right to ask all the questions. And so my declaration of truth is that I woke up one day about five, six years ago, only where, like, David's words were just piercing my heart. Like, kathy, do you know very well or don't you know very well that your creator's good at what he does? And can you celebrate that you do have a perfect voice because your perfect creator chose it for you? So I stand up for myself and I'll tell people, like, you know, no, I'm a female with a low voice. I'm not embarrassed. You didn't know. Like, at a drive thru restaurant, they can't even see me. Why do I get mad when they say, that's 482@ the window, sir. They think I'm a guy. I know that I have a low voice. Don't live in denial. We gotta teach these things to our kids and teach them, you know, to stand up and say, God is good. Here's the evidence, here's how I know that. And Frank, one of the reasons that I can say my soul knows it very well is that I have a security in Christ and a security in God as creator and a security in The Holy Spirit to lead me down the right path. So are we teaching that and are we admiring that in our kids? Are we acknowledging man, you know, James, you followed Jesus well today. I saw you. I saw you stop and hesitate. And I think you were seeking God's best and you followed. I'm so proud of you. And are we delighted when a child gets greater maturity in the things of the Lord? And when you have security, then you have identity. We teach this in the book. We have an identity crisis because we have a security crisis. If kids don't know who to follow and who's a truth talker, wisdom walker, they don't know where to go. They're listening to this lyricist and they're watching that show, and they've got this person they're following, and we don't even know they're following. And then they're wondering, well, can we trust that podcast? And can we trust Celebrate kids? And can we trust Summit? What's their standard for trust? We're not teaching that. So without security, you can't find your identity. Without identity, you don't know who you belong to. So these are kids desperate for belonging. So they're making horrific decisions so that they'll be noticed and recognized. But we need belonging to find purpose, because our purpose is to serve others, to glorify God by making others better than ourselves. Right? So belonging is essential for purpose purposes, essential for competence. What do I do well? It's a cry of every person, what do I do well? Am I well? Am I doing well? Will I be well? And if I don't have a reason to live, I don't need to do anything. Well, if I have no people to serve, I don't need a purpose. If I don't have a healthy identity, I won't believe anybody will want me. And if I have no one to trust, I will not know who I am. So we have a whole chapter on laying that out, because we can do that. And you know, Frank, when we do that, we help with depression, we help with stress, we help with suicidal thinking, we help with depression, we help with apathy, we help with hate, we help with racism, we help with eating disorders and addiction, with everything. So this book is actually, I think, a guide to so many things. But, Jeff, you and I have talked so much about that. You allow me to teach that model at Summit. What would you add to that? If you don't mind, Frank, I'm gonna ask him, you know, the next question.
- [41:35]
B
Yeah, go ahead. No, I think it's perfect. Because at the end of the day, most of the young adults we work with wonder, do I belong to where do I belong and what am I good at? You know, why am I particular? Why am I here? Why is my life important? And, you know, it may sound a little bit self centered, but everybody wants to know they've got a place. I want to know that I belong. And if it is the transgender community that's making you feel belonging, then we should do better because our belonging should cause us to want to draw closer to our good, good creator.
- [42:11]
A
Jeff, what does it mean to be to have our identity in Christ? What does that mean? And then after that, talk about how God made men and women for not just procreation, but there's further benefits to the man woman dynamic.
- [42:28]
B
Well, Jesus said, if you follow my teachings, you'll be my disciples and you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. And the word for truth there in the original languages, aletheia, it means reality. Jesus offers that we can actually know reality. We don't have to be confused about what is true. So to say that I have my identity in Christ is to say when I am confused, Jesus is not confused, but I draw close to him and then I understand myself better and I actually understand reality better. Then I understand why I'm here, what my role is to bring blessing and flourishing to other people. And I think one key thing about a biblical worldview that's very distinctive from some of the counterfeit worldviews of our day is that it promotes harmony. Now, a secular worldview says only one thing exists, and it's the material world. It's only physical. You have no mind, no brain, there's no God, there's no Jesus. Another worldview is the new spiritualist worldview that says only spirit exists. The material world is an illusion. Everything is one. These worldviews go haywire because they promote this idea that everything is one. God's idea is that we have harmony and harmony. Things harmonizing is better than them being identical. So God made males and females to harmonize with one another. Let me just give you one quick example. The way we see things. Males have a preponderance of cells in their eyes that focus on contrast and motion. Females have a preponderance of cells in their eyes that focus on color and texture. If you want to accurately see the world, you have to see contrast, motion, color, and texture. You really need males and females to work together to accurately see the world. The stress is a similar thing. When men experience stress Their bodies upload dopamine causes them to immediately move into action. When females experience stress, their bodies automatically upload neopinephrine, which causes them to ruminate. To be more thoughtful and observant. You don't want to just observe in stress. You want to act, but you don't want to just act. You also need to observe. Males and females literally were designed by God to need each other to accurately respond to stressful situations. That's something that we can give to our children as a good reason why they're different as males and females.
- [44:45]
A
You just explained, Jeff, why my wife always thinks I'm going to run into the car in front you of of me.
- [44:50]
B
I think you are, Frank. I've ridden with you before. I think you're gonna. She's the one who observes it.
- [44:56]
A
I'm like, what?
- [44:57]
B
It's. That's plenty of room.
- [45:02]
A
So I think also there is a. There's a sanctification element to marriage that you don't get when you pair same sex couples up. Was it Gary Thomas who wrote the book Sacred Marriage? The subtitle is something like, what if God created marriage more for our holiness than our happiness? You know, where a man has to change himself and alter his behavior to take care of the emotional needs of the woman. The woman has to do the same to take care of the emotion or the physical desires of the man. So there's a coming together of the opposite sexes that leads to sanctification. It could also lead to obviously conflict, but it forces you to think of someone else other than yourself. If you're in a same sex kind of relationship, you're seeing a mirror and you're going into more narcissistic behavior in general. I don't know if that makes any sense, but it seems to be the.
- [46:04]
B
Way I think it makes sense. It makes sense in marriage, but it also makes sense with men and women working together together in the workplace, boys and girls working together in school with the students we work with at Summit Ministries, we try to help them understand you're brothers and sisters of each other. Your goal is to help lift each other up and we harmonize in that way. God has intentionally created us to be different on purpose so that we can glorify Him. It works in every kind of relationship.
- [46:32]
A
About a minute ago. How do you hope young people and parents especially use this new book?
- [46:40]
C
Okay, wait, say that again.
- [46:41]
A
How do you hope parents and young people use this new book, Raising Gender Confident Kids?
- [46:47]
C
I think we pray that it will be a resource, you know, certainly we want them to get it and get more than one and give them out. Not on the bus stop, you know, but to people who they really think are maybe ready to read it. But I think the discussion starters, I think they should bookmark those pages. I think what we've written about respecting both your gender and the other is something to reread annually to make make sure that you're raising up your kids to respect who they've been created, respect the other. Just as Jeff was saying, I think the information about the biblical worldview, I mean, there's so much in there that's so relevant for people who don't think they need it yet. But we want to prepare parents for the discussion. We don't want you to react to the fear when a kid comes to you and says, you know, my friend thinks she's a boy now, or I think I might be a boy. We want them to act based on wisdom that they've accrued from resources like your podcast and this book. That's what I hope.
- [47:38]
A
Thank you so much, folks. We're about out of time. Jeff, final word, 15 seconds.
- [47:43]
B
Gender confident kids.com and I'm thankful to a donor that's made it possible for us to just give this book to you. We want it in the hands of every parent. If you do want to help, pay it forward to others. You can do that, of course, but it's our gift to you@genderconfidentkids.com Very good book, very practical.
- [47:59]
A
As Kathy just said, you want to bookmark the conversation starter page, and there's a lot of resources in the book. Pick it up, friends. It's been great being with you. Don't forget about the courses Digging up the Bible and Let's Get Real and the Israel trip. Go to crossexamine.org for more. And Lord willing, we'll see you here next time. God bless.