I Begg your pardon?

Recently, in an interview, radio pastor Alistair Begg (host of the Truth for Life program) recounted a conversation he had had with a Christian lady, whose grandson was going to marry a transgender woman. She didn't know whether she ought to attend the wedding. Begg counseled her to attend the wedding and provide a wedding gift.¹ Social media blew up, as social media is wont to do, with Christians roundly condemning this advice. The American Family Radio network also announced that it was dropping his program.

I want to be fair to Begg. He isn't a chronic compromiser who has incrementally departed from the faith. He has had a faithful ministry for decades. In fact, he was a guest speaker at an event at my biblically conservative church last year. Cancelling Begg over one gaffe is an overreaction. One swallow does not make a summer, and one error does not make an apostate.

I want to be fair also to his argument. Begg isn't affirming or neutral on same-sex or transgender weddings. He and the grandmother in the scenario stipulate that this wedding is a moral wrong. Faithfulness to Jesus precludes approving of her grandson marrying a transgender person. "I, you, and your grandson all agree that Jesus forbids such a union," Begg is saying, "and he understands that you can't affirm his marriage. And therefore…"

But the and therefore is where we have to part company. Begg hasn't compromised on biblical sexual ethics, but he has on their application. He concludes that she should attend the wedding out of love for her grandson and to build bridges to people who don't follow Jesus. I submit that she should not attend. Let me explain.

A wedding is not a football match

If a wedding ceremony was something people attended merely to observe, like a ball game, I might be in general agreement with Begg. If wedding-goers were just spectators, then going to a transgender wedding doesn't make much of a difference one way or another. It's just one family member showing up for another family member's special event.

But wedding guests aren't merely spectators or well-wishers. They're witnesses. We're familiar with the traditional opening of a Christian wedding, as found, for example, in the Anglican Book of Common Prayer: "Dearly beloved, we are gathered together here in the sight of God, and in the face of this Congregation, to join together this man and this woman in holy Matrimony."² And a little further down in the order of service, we also see these familiar words: "If any man can show any just cause, why they may not lawfully be joined together, let him now speak, or else hereafter for ever hold his peace."³ This isn't an opportunity for an old flame to stand up and declare his undying love for the bride in the hope of stealing her away from the altar. It's to discover any legal impediment to the marriage: for example, the couple are brother and sister, one of them is an impostor, or the groom already has a mad wife locked in the attic. It has also been taken as a given—until about the beginning of this century, anyway—that by definition, two men or two women could not be married.

If wedding guests are witnesses who can attest that a lawful wedding has taken place, then when those words are spoken, a Christian would be duty-bound to speak up and say that (as the BCP itself says) marriage was instituted by God between the first man and the first woman, designed for mutual help and the procreation of children, and symbolizes the union between Christ and his church. Therefore, a man and a transgender woman (in reality, another man) may not be lawfully joined together in the sight of God, because such a union violates God's intent for human sexuality.

Is that what this lady's grandson wants to happen on his wedding day? I daresay that would give greater offence, and to more people, than simply declining to go at all.

Another alternative might be to attend the wedding anyway, and just hold her tongue. But that would be to tacitly attest that a lawful marriage is taking place, while knowing it is not. In other words, it is bearing false witness. So it's best not to go at all.

Male and female made he them

Genesis tells us: "God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, 'Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it'" (Gen. 1:27–28). And a little further on, it says, "‭‭Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh" (2:24).

That is the design for marriage and sexuality: a man and his wife are drawn closer together, and they make babies. The norm is a man and his wife: not two husbands or two wives. By design, two men or two women cannot be fruitful and multiply.

Jesus reaffirms this. Notwithstanding the progressive canard that Jesus taught nothing concerning homosexuality, when he gives his teaching on divorce (Matthew 19:3–12), he cites both Genesis 1:27 and 2:24. He makes no provision for same-sex relationships; it's just a given that a man and a woman are needed for a marriage. After all, as the incarnate God of creation, it was his design. Jesus concludes, ‭‭"What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate" (19:6). Conversely, let not man join what God has not. Two men or two women cannot become one flesh.

Transgenderism makes the matter a bit more complex, but the same general principles obtain. A transgender woman is a man imitating a woman. A marriage between a man and a trans woman is really a same-sex marriage between two men, which God forbids. On the other hand, an ostensibly same-sex wedding with a woman and a trans woman is technically a heterosexual one. However, it wants to be a same-sex wedding. The latter couple is still publicly flaunting their sin, advertising their rebellion against God's design for marriage, even if their sex life could still potentially result in children.

Genesis 1:27 ties the sexual binary to bearing the image of God. He created us male and female. There is no changing from one to the other, nor is there a spectrum between them, nor is there a third sex that is neither. The T and Q in LGBTQ are especially predicated upon lies. We are what we were made to be, not what we imagine ourselves to be. Rejecting the goodness of the body by which God has made us male or female rejects the goodness of God and demeans his image. A transgender man or woman is a parody of a real man or woman, and a same-sex or transgender wedding is a parody of God's design for marriage. This is not something that a Christian can participate in, in good conscience.

In conclusion

Alistair Begg is a faithful pastor with a track record of sound biblical teaching. I believe that in counseling someone to attend a transgender wedding, he is trying to speak the truth in love. However, he has erred too far on the side of love, and thereby compromised the truth. It appears that he has chosen to stand by his remarks since the controversy erupted. That's unfortunate. He really needs to admit his error, and walk it back.

Footnotes

¹ Owen Strachan has transcribed the relevant text in his post on this topic.

² "The Form of Solemnization of Matrimony," Prayer Book Society of Canada, accessed January 28, 2024, https://prayerbook.ca/bcp-online/matrimony/.

³ Ibid.