A DOXOLOGY seminar with Dr. Ryan T. Anderson and Rev. Dr. Lucas Woodford on Saturday, August 27, 2021 at Trinity Lutheran Church, Davenport, Iowa.
There is wide spread confusion in American culture regarding sex, marriage and gender which greatly complicates Christian life and witness. This Seminar prepares Christians to advocate confidently, purposefully and positively for the biblical vision of human sexuality within their families and in the public square not merely on religious freedom grounds, but as a matter of common sense, compassion and human flourishing.
1. Making the Case for Man-Woman Marriage
Ryan Anderson, president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, argues the case for man-woman marriage on philosophical rather than strictly theological grounds, aiming to equip listeners to speak with people who don’t share their scriptural starting points. He first diagnoses the revisionist view that reduces marriage to an intense emotional bond with one’s “number one person,” showing it cannot account for why marriage is monogamous, exclusive, permanent, or a concern of the state. Drawing on Aristotle’s analysis of a community by its acts, goods, and norms, he presents marriage as a comprehensive union of a man and a woman ordered toward children and family life, sealed by permanent and exclusive commitment. He marshals social-science evidence that children fare better with both a mother and a father, and traces how the sexual revolution’s separation of sex from marriage and childbearing paved the way for redefining marriage. He closes by naming likely consequences: the loss of any public norm that children deserve a mother and father, further redefinition toward polyamory and temporary marriage, threats to unborn life through reproductive technology, and intentional pressure on religious liberty and conscience. Watch the lecture and read the transcript →
2. Biology Isn’t Bigotry: Responding to the Transgender Moment
Ryan Anderson examines the transgender movement in three movements: its underlying worldview, its medicine, and its public policy, then evaluates each. He shows that the claim “a person is whoever they identify as” is a metaphysical assertion dressed up as medical science, citing expert testimony that gender identity should override chromosomes, hormones, and anatomy. He traces how the four-step pediatric protocol of social transition, puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgery is driven by that worldview, and notes that most children left alone reconcile their identity with their bodies while the medicalized path carries grave risks, including elevated suicide after surgery. Anderson answers appeals to disorders of sexual development, explaining that these are not a third sex but developmental disorders, and that sex remains a binary rooted in how the body is organized for reproduction. He argues that sound medicine helps a person’s thoughts and feelings line up with bodily reality, as with anorexia, rather than damaging a healthy body, and he warns pastors about schools, pronoun mandates, and policies that sideline parents. Watch the lecture and read the transcript →
3. Beyond Religious Liberty: Being Heard Today
Ryan Anderson contends that religious liberty, while a real and God-given right, is necessary but not sufficient for a well-ordered society, and cautions against making it the only line of defense. He surveys four recent Supreme Court wins (Espinoza, Little Sisters of the Poor, Our Lady of Guadalupe, and Fulton), explaining why each matters and why none reaches the underlying questions of abortion, marriage, or gender. Religious liberty, he notes, does not protect non-religious people who share the same convictions, does not defend the other goods a bad law threatens, and never engages the merits of the disputed issue itself. Turning to the role of government, he draws on Martin Luther King’s letter from the Birmingham jail and Aquinas to argue that just human law must square with the natural and eternal law, and that there is no neutral position on questions like double mastectomies for minors or the definition of marriage. He calls for engagement across all branches of government alongside sound preaching, catechesis, and Christian families living out the truth as their strongest long-term witness. Watch the lecture and read the transcript →
4. Speak up! Promoting Sexual Virtue and Biblical identity from Generation to Generation
Lucas Woodford, president of the LCMS Minnesota South District, frames the passing on of sexual virtue and biblical identity within baptism, opening with Ephesians 5 to show that Paul uses the gospel to clarify marriage rather than the reverse. He grounds a “baptismal virtue ethic” in which whose you are determines who you are and what you do, so that a Christian’s identity rests on being named and claimed by Christ in the water and word, not on feelings or sexual orientation, and he stresses that sins of the body defile the temple of the Holy Spirit and need the regular cleansing of absolution, baptismal return, and the Lord’s Supper. From Genesis 1 and 2 he draws seven created realities including the goodness of male and female bodies, marriage as one man and one woman, and the vocations of husband, wife, father, and mother. He then names cultural challenges, from the sexual revolution and no-fault divorce to declining fertility, same-sex marriage, and transgender ideology reaching even into rural neighborhoods, and offers concrete counsel for parents: intentional caring conversations, age-appropriate teaching about the body, modesty, guarding against pornography, and coming alongside single parents. Throughout he urges the church to be positively for the family and to speak confidently because Christ is the light no darkness overcomes. Watch the lecture and read the transcript →
5. Round Table Discussion
In this roundtable, Ryan Anderson and Lucas Woodford field questions from pastors on applying the day’s teaching in families and congregations. Asked for their greatest source of hope, both point to knowing how the story ends in Christ, with Anderson adding that many secular voices, feminists, and even LGB groups now object to transgender medicine for children, opening room for common cause. They address family dynamics behind gender confusion, social contagion spreading through peer groups and online communities, and the reality that faithful parents can still have children who reject the truth, offering comfort that God’s promises outlast parental weakness and that the freedom to reject grace is a sobering mystery. Woodford counsels compassion toward those in same-sex relationships or gender confusion while holding to God’s word, and grounds pastoral care in baptismal identity. The conversation turns to contraception, where Woodford commends Catholic consistency and urges Lutherans to examine what Scripture says about separating sex from procreation, and closes with pastoral comfort for a father grieving an estranged gay son, recalling that Christ bears our shame and cleanses sins done against us as well as those we commit. Watch the lecture and read the transcript →
6. Opening Matins
This opening Matins service centers on a homily by Pastor Fleming preaching Revelation 12 alongside the Genesis 1 reading that God made humanity male and female in his image. Fleming lays out five points from Revelation 12: Christ’s decisive victory as the incarnate Son born of the Virgin Mary, Satan’s failed attempt to destroy him, the banishment of the accuser from heaven by Christ’s death and resurrection so he can no longer accuse believers before God, the dragon’s resulting fury, and his war against the faithful church who keep God’s commandments and hold the testimony of Jesus. Fleming explains that keeping the commandments means treasuring them as the unbending standard of truth, not living them perfectly, since all fall short and only Christ fulfills them, and he ties this to the Genesis confession that God made us male and female. He assures the weary that those who confess Christ are the targets of Satan’s hatred precisely because they already stand on the winning side, and that victory comes by the blood of the Lamb applied in baptism, preaching, and the chalice, and by the word of their testimony. Watch the lecture and read the transcript →
7. Closing Prayer Office
This closing prayer office is built around Psalm 4 and a brief meditation on the created goodness of the body. Praying David’s cry, “how long will you turn my glory into shame,” the preacher borrows Bruce Wolfmiller’s image of Satan’s “snicker strategy,” recalling a chapel demonstration in which a student is mocked for correctly answering that one plus one is two. The point is that the world does not so much argue against the truth that God made humanity male and female as it simply laughs at it, and the Christian answer is to pray the psalm and rest in the joy the Lord gives, a gladness greater than abundant grain and wine that cannot be taken away. The office includes prayers for travelers, the Lord’s Prayer, the Apostles’ Creed, and Psalm 51, commending travelers to God’s protection and closing in the confidence that our Lord who took on flesh, died, and rose keeps his people even when they are mocked. Watch the lecture and read the transcript →