I’m not a rap fan. In fact, I completely subscribe to Dave Barry’s view on rap:

“I hate rap music, which to me sounds like a bunch of angry men shouting, possibly because the person who was supposed to provide them with a melody never showed up”

But sometimes truth emanates from the strangest quarters,

Rap is not a music genre that is associated with orthodox religion. Most of it seems to dwell on a Holy Trinity of Sex, Money, and Fame. So it was a bit of a surprise when the rapper Juaquin James Malphurs, better known by his stage name (I am not making this up) of Waka Flocka Flame appeared Friday on a nationally syndicated radio show devoted to music, The Breakfast Club, and held forth on Bruce Jenner:

The rapper was on Charlamagne Tha God’s Breakfast Club Friday when he was asked about Caitlyn Jenner. Waka says what Caitlyn and others like her have done is “rebuking God,” and they’ve given in to “the devil playing tricks on” their minds.

He’s upset that Jenner and others send messages on TV to impressionable kids … and adults need to be more responsible.

We can probably have a spirited discussion over the example Malphurs is setting but the fact that his life is not the most orderly doesn’t take away from the Biblical truth of this statement.

People who labor under the illusion that they have somehow been assigned the wrong sex have a heavy cross to bear. But to take it upon one’s self to purposefully change the sexual role to which you have been assigned is the sin of Pride. It is the same sin that led to the downfall of Satan.

This comes back to Bruce Jenner. Jenner has alleged he is a Christian:

Ms. Jenner also revealed that he is a Christian and that he has struggled to reconcile his faith with his identity.

“I would sit in church and always wonder, ‘In God’s eyes, how does he see me?’” Mr. Jenner said in the interview, the Daily Caller reported.

But Mr. Jenner said he now believes that his transition to a woman is part of his purpose in life.

Jenner may very well believe himself to be a Christian. Hell, he believes he’s a woman after fathering children. But being Christian is a bit more nuanced that claiming you are.

As Christians, our essential Profession of Faith is “nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done.” It is this submission to the will of God, not as a slave or a servant but as a trusting child, that is the hallmark of Christianity. When someone says they disagree with God to such an extent that they reject the very form God has given them, the rebellion becomes open and unchecked.

I am not Protestant but a pastor at the non-denominational mega-church, Immanuel Bible Church named Jesse Johnson had this to say:

If a person is going to silence God, they have to sear their conscience, and sever any obvious ties they have to their creator. Because God is the one who designed the sexes (Matt 19:4;Gen 1:27), a full-throated rebellion against God is going to have to contain a rejection of God’s design for sex. “Who exactly does God think he is, if he thinks he can tell me that I’m a male or a female!?”

But the person who mutilates their body to bring it into conformity with their internal gender-identity still has one major obstacle in their quest to silence God: you. They need those around them to accept them, approve of them, and simply not remind them that what they are doing is sin. In fact, they demand that you approve of it (Rom 1:32). To that end they “glory in their shame” (Phil 3:19), while “casting up their own shame like foam” (Jude 13).

As Christians, we must at the very least refrain from the approval the person so desperately wants. We must be the few voices left that say, “You may not have noticed this, but God really did make males and females” (Matt 19:4).

While Pastor Johnson sees this as a logical progression from the heretical Gnostics, so beloved of Dan Brown and the fans of the Gospel of Thomas, I think Malphurs, or Waka Flocka Flame, actually has the better argument.

Jenner had a couple of choices to make. He could accept God’s will or rebel. Once he went into rebellion he had two further choices. He could either indulge his psycho-pathology privately or he could make a public spectacle of himself. He chose the latter and committed what, in Catholic theology, is called Scandal

Respect for the souls of others: scandal

2284 Scandal is an attitude or behavior which leads another to do evil. the person who gives scandal becomes his neighbor’s tempter. He damages virtue and integrity; he may even draw his brother into spiritual death. Scandal is a grave offense if by deed oromission another is deliberately led into a grave offense.

2285 Scandal takes on a particular gravity by reason of the authority of those who cause it or the weakness of those who are scandalized. It prompted our Lord to utter this curse: “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would bebetter for him to have a great millstone fastened round his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.”⁸⁵ Scandal is grave when given by those who by nature or office are obliged to teach and educate others. Jesus reproaches the scribes and Pharisees on this account: he likens them to wolves in sheep’s clothing.⁸⁶

2286 Scandal can be provoked by laws or institutions, by fashion or opinion.

 

Therefore, they are guilty of scandal who establish laws or social structures leading to the decline of morals and the corruption of religious practice, or to “social conditions that, intentionally or not, make Christian conduct and obedience to the Commandments difficult and practically impossible.”⁸⁷ This is also true of business leaders who make rules encouraging fraud, teachers who provoke their children to anger,⁸⁸ or manipulators of public opinion who turn it away from moral values.

2287 Anyone who uses the power at his disposal in such a way that it leads others to do wrong becomes guilty of scandal and responsible for the evil that he has directly or indirectly encouraged. “Temptations to sin are sure to come; but woe to him by whom they come!”⁸⁹

Jenner’s hyper-public conversion from man to man-who-pretends-to-be-a-woman not only convinced other persons with similar psychological problems that surrendering was a viable option he also made it much more difficult for weak Christians to speak out against this atrocity and for Christians of any flavor to minister to “transgenders” in anyway but affirming their rebellion.

This is evil. This is not only rejecting God but encouraging other to reject God. The fact that a man in an industry not associated with Godliness can see the truth with such clarity gives hope to us all.