Hearts of Compassion, Backbones of Steel: How to Discuss Controversial Topics with Love and Kindness

HEARTS of COMPASSION, BACKBONES of STEEL

Books by Michael L. Brown

Has God Failed You?

Not Afraid of the Antichrist

60 Questions Christians Ask About Jewish Beliefs and Practices

Answering Jewish Objections to Jesus (vols. 1–4)

HEARTS

of

COMPASSION, BACKBONES

of

STEEL

HOW TO DISCUSS

CONTROVERSIAL TOPICS WITH

LOVE AND KINDNESS

MICHAEL L. BROWN

G

© 2024 by Michael L. Brown

Published by Chosen Books

Minneapolis, Minnesota

ChosenBooks.com

Chosen Books is a division of

Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan

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Identifiers: LCCN 2024002213 | ISBN 9780800772475 (paper) | ISBN 9780800773090 (casebound) | ISBN 9781493447312 (ebook)

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com. The NIV and New International Version are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.®

Scripture quotations marked CJB are from the Complete Jewish Bible by David H. Stern. Copyright © 1998. All rights reserved. Used by permission of Messianic Jewish Publishers, 6120 Day Long Lane, Clarksville, MD 21029. www.messianicjewish.net.

Scripture quotations marked ISV are taken from The Holy Bible: International Standard Version. Release 2.0, Build 2015.02.09. Copyright © 1995-2014 by ISV Foundation. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INTERNATIONALLY. Used by permission of Davidson Press, LLC.

Scripture quotations marked as The Message are taken from The Message, copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress. All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.

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Contents

Cover

Half Title Page

Books by Michael L. Brown

Title Page

Copyright Page

1. They Sound Just Like Us

2. Recognize That We All Have Blind Spots

3. Reach Out and Resist

4. Even When Total Honesty Hurts, Love Tells the Truth

5. Overcome Evil with Good

6. Enrolling in Shared Humanity 101

7. Hijacked by Demonic Forces

8. How to Cope with Rejection for the Gospel

9. The Lord’s Servant Must Not Be Quarrelsome

10. Let’s Have a Difficult Conversation: Abortion

11. Let’s Have a Difficult Conversation: LGBTQ+

12. Let’s Have a Difficult Conversation: Race Relations

Conclusion: An Unstoppable Formula

Helpful Resources

Notes

About the Author

Back Cover

one

They Sound Just Like Us

They sound just like us. This comment by the pastor of a large and influential church in Texas was as striking as it was surprising, yet it was totally accurate. But whom did he mean by they and by us, and what was the context of his remark? The story I’m about to tell you is the story of the Church in the midst of the culture wars, giving us a perspective on how the Lord would have us live in these volatile and difficult times.

The pastor I just mentioned was almost forty years old, and I had been a mentor in his life since 2014. His congregation had grown dramatically in just four years, and they were active on every front, giving out tens of millions of meals during COVID, rescuing victims of human trafficking, sharing the Gospel with the lost, standing up for the unborn, and creating a vibrant culture of worship and prayer. They were also active politically. They called on elected officials to keep their commitments, stood with candidates who were committed to acting and voting rightly, and even raised up some of their own congregants to run for office.

In 2023, one of those congregants was directly involved in the fight to pass Senate Bill 14 in Texas, a bill designed to protect gender-confused children from receiving life-altering, irreversible surgeries or hormone treatments, procedures that conservatives often refer to as chemical castration and gender mutilation.1

But before the bill passed, there was a drawn-out, very intense battle in the Senate, during which the pastor would post daily updates, sometimes calling me and asking for prayer.

This, all of us believed and emphasized, was about the children. This was about saving lives. Emotions were running deep.

After the bill passed, many were thrilled to hear the news. There was great rejoicing, with gratitude to the Lord for His help. This really was about preventing children and young teens from making tragic, life-altering decisions. It was a great win for both parents and kids.

But that was not the end of the story. Shortly after the bill passed, this pastor called and said to me, "I went to the social media pages of those who were fighting against the bill, and they sounded just like us. They were saying the exact same things we had been saying: ‘This is about the children! This is about saving lives!’"

Our Side, Their Side

What a surprise! They—the political opponents who wanted to harm children, and who had a godless agenda—sounded as if they actually cared about the children and really wanted to help them. They sounded just like us!

I said to him, You’re exactly right, and it is essential that we understand this. That’s how we can minister to them as well.

This pastor had discovered something that many of us have missed in the intensity of the culture wars, something that can be unnerving and disturbing. He realized that many of the people on the other side—those whom we see as our enemies, those who appear to be evil as they push a destructive agenda—are caring human beings too, also fighting for what they believe is right. Some of them are even people of faith.

In their eyes, withholding treatments from trans-identified children is criminal, while in our eyes, allowing children to receive these treatments is criminal.

Our side says, These kids have no clue what they’re doing at such young ages. If they want to make these decisions as adults, that’s up to them. But by all means, we can’t let them do this now. How many young women today deeply regret getting full mastectomies at thirteen or fourteen, simply because they were going through a period of confusion? How many young men today can’t believe they won’t be able to have children because of the hormone blockers they took to stop the onset of puberty? This is about saving the children!

Their side says, These kids have been tormented for years, some of them since they were very little. They know they’re trapped in the wrong body, and this doesn’t just go away. My friend’s child has already tried to harm himself, and hardly a day goes by without more young people taking their lives because they can’t get the treatments they need and deserve. And the earlier we get them started, the easier their transition will be. Really now, do you want to have the blood of these children on your hands because you withheld the very treatment that could save their lives? This is about saving the children!

Our side says, The medical profession is committed to do no harm. Transitioning children is the most harmful thing you can do. It’s medical malpractice!

Their side says, The medical profession is committed to do no harm. By blocking these doctors from doing their jobs, you are harming the children. It’s medical malpractice by default!

Yes, they sound just like us.

To be sure, we have valid responses to each and every concern raised by these kids’ parents, along with their friends and allies—starting with the fact that the vast majority of kids suffering from gender identity confusion outgrow those feelings after puberty, even if many of them will end up identifying as gay. I stand by our side heart and soul, without the slightest hesitation or doubt. We must not participate in the transitioning of children.

But what we must grasp here is that most of those on the other side are motivated by love, not hate, by genuine (albeit misinformed) concern for the well-being of their son or daughter, not by their adherence to a social agenda. And for every horror story we share with them—including the heartrending stories of the detransitioners—they will tell us of someone who found peace after hormone therapy and sex-change surgery (what they call gender-affirming surgery). And they would have their tragic suicide stories to share as well.

The questions for us are these: Can we hold firmly to our convictions without demonizing our opponents? Conversely, can we see things through their eyes without weakening our resolve?

Two Core Principles for Effective Apologetics

I have been involved in apologetics—meaning the defense of the Christian faith—almost as long as I have been a believer. That’s because I am Jewish, and I grew up not believing in Jesus. And even though my family members were not very observant in their faith, we still went to synagogue on the High Holidays, we still celebrated Hanukkah in the home, I did have a few years of Hebrew school, and I was bar mitzvahed at the age of thirteen. And so, after I came to faith in Jesus at the age of sixteen as a heroin-shooting, LSD-using hippie rock drummer, my father said to me, Michael, I’m glad that you’re off drugs, but we’re Jews. We don’t believe in Jesus. I want you to talk to the rabbi.

This began my journey of interacting with rabbis and Jewish leaders, a journey that continues to this day, roughly fifty-two years later. But make no mistake about it—I was thrown into deep waters and had to learn to swim the hard way, since I had no one to go to for guidance and I had forgotten the little Hebrew I had learned a few years earlier. Without question, I knew that Jesus was real, since He had dramatically changed my life. But how could I answer these learned rabbis who asked such excellent, probing questions?

Over the decades, I have engaged in many public and private debates and dialogues, not just with rabbis but with Christians from different backgrounds, along with atheists and agnostics, gay activists, Muslims, cult members, and more. The most obvious prerequisite for doing effective apologetics is that we are solid in our faith and understanding. But beyond that, out of all this interaction I have developed my two most foundational principles for effective apologetics:

Principle 1: Rightly understand what the other person is saying before responding.

Principle 2: Feel the weight of the other person’s objection.

The first principle is the easy one: Be sure you rightly understand what the other person is saying before responding. The best way to do this is to repeat a person’s position back in his or her own words, as in, So, if I understand you correctly, you are saying this . . . ? If the person says yes, at least you know you’re on the same page. Unfortunately, all too often we speak past each other, because of which we end up passing like ships in the night, without any substantive or fruitful interaction.

The second principle is quite costly: If we are to engage in effective apologetics, we must feel the weight of the other person’s objection. This is easier said than done! It requires that we do our best to see things through the eyes of our opponents, getting into their shoes, attempting to grasp the force of their arguments, feeling the weight of their words. Are we really willing to do this? Will we take the time to put on a different pair of glasses? Will we risk the safety of our (often too narrow, hyperdogmatic) world to consider another position?

As I’ll explain further in chapter 3, this is something I determined to do when the Lord called me onto the front lines of the culture wars in 2004. I started making appointments with local gay activists to hear their stories, and I started reading everything I could from their perspective. On my end, I was 100 percent sure of what Scripture said about homosexual practice, and I was certain that the gay agenda was destructive in many ways. Still, if I was to have God’s heart and perspective, I needed to develop sensitivity, compassion, and understanding. After all, grace and truth go hand in hand!

To give you a less controversial example of this second principle, let’s say someone comes to you in real distress and says, I’ve been struggling with this question for more than twenty years, and it’s driving me mad. I’ve read the Bible through over fifty times, trying to find an answer. I’ve gone from seminary to seminary and from university to university to speak to the world’s greatest biblical scholars and theologians, and none of them can answer my question. I was told that you’re a real student of the Word, so now I’m coming to you. Is there any way that you can help me?

This distraught