Focus on the Family with Jim Daly

Dr. Rosaria Champagne Butterfield: Real Christian hospitality is having enough time together so that you can with respect and in privacy ask and answer hard questions and where you can show yourself to be a lover of his soul.

John Fuller: What a wonderful reminder of how we as Christians have opportunities to love others well. This is Focus on the Family with Jim Daly and that was Rosaria Butterfield and we’re returning for a second day with her. Uh, what a great conversation, Jim, you had with Rosaria in North Carolina.

Jim Daly: I always enjoy visiting with Rosaria. She unpacks truths from scripture in such a unique way and with great clarity. Uh, I could talk to her for hours. In fact, to hear an extended and much deeper conversation with her about the culture and LGBT issues. Uh, listen to my podcast, ReFOCUS with Jim Daly. I think you’ll really enjoy that conversation with her.

John: Yeah. That show gives you an opportunity to go deep and long and not be constrained by the clock-

Jim: (laughs)

John: … and, uh, it’s really good stuff. Let me encourage you again, refocuswithjimdaly.com.

Jim: And, uh, last time on Focus on the Family, Rosaria shared her testimony of coming to Christ through the love and kindness of a pastor and his wife. If you didn’t hear it, uh, you need to go back and listen to it because it’s such a beautiful portrayal of how to reach the lost with the spirit of Christ.

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: Uh, we also looked at the first two lies of the culture which she wrote about in her book. The first lie is that homosexuality is normal. Uh, we know that God has created us as male and female and His design for marriage is between a man and a woman. That is not meant to sound mean. It is God’s holy design of, uh, human sexuality. And, uh, the second lie is being a spiritual person is kinder than being a Biblical Christian. And today we’ll get into feminism and transgenderism, uh, two huge issues that have shaped our culture. So stay tuned for this helpful discussion.

John: Indeed, uh, Rosaria Butterfield is a former tenured professor at Syracuse University and, uh, she’s got such a great story of God’s redemptive hand in her life. She’s an excellent author and, uh, much of what we’re talking about today comes from her book, Five Lies of Our Anti-Christian Age. And, uh, Jim, you’ve mentioned two of those lies. We’re gonna hit, uh, lie three now as we jump back in on today’s episode of Focus on the Family with Jim Daly.

Jim: Okay. Number three.

Rosaria: Three.

Jim: Feminism is good for the world and the church.

Rosaria: That is a lie.

Jim: (laughs)

Rosaria: Yeah. And, and, and I know-

Jim: Okay. Everybody went, “What?”

Rosaria: I know. I know. And, you know, it, it took me… I, I was raised by a feminist, right? I, my dissertation was on Mary Shelley who’s the founder of Western feminism and I, I mean, I, this was probably the hardest chapter to write.

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: But I think that the issue, the reason that this has become such a sticking point for the church is because, um, of a fear, again, of an Old Testament of the creation ordinance of what you see in the creation ordinance, which is that men are made to be the providers and the leaders and women are made to be the nurturers and the supporters-

Jim: That help mate. Yeah.

Rosaria: … and that is how our, that’s how we’re built. Now we can add all kinds of like garbage to our lives so that we don’t feel that, we don’t like it, we resist it, but that’s how we’re built. And, you know, that’s called biblical patriarchy, but what biblical patriarchy says, and I would just put it to our listeners like this. If you don’t like the idea of godly men protecting and leading, how do you feel about Drag Queen Story Hour?

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: I mean, what, what do you think about what’s currently the men who are currently leading? You see what I’m saying?

Jim: I do.

Rosaria: It’s nature has a way of… So, so, no, you don’t need feminism. What you do need, and, you know, everyone needs this, what you need… If you’re especially single, like, “What about single women, Rosaria? What about women who don’t have a wonderful husband like you do?” This is what you need. You need to be a member of a God-fearing Bible believing church because then you have pastors and elders who are covering you and who are protecting you.

Jim: Well, and don’t you think, uh, because I’ve heard this argument. Women who have suffered through abuse by their husbands or from men tend to be the framework of this ideology. And some of it’s born out of compassion-

Rosaria: Yeah.

Jim: … that these women have suffered-

Rosaria: Yeah.

Jim: … and men have been brutal-

Rosaria: Yeah.

Jim: … and Christian men have misused-

Rosaria: Oh, yeah.

Jim: … their leadership role.

Rosaria: Oh, absolutely. This-

Jim: And so that’s something we have to talk about.

Rosaria: Right. But that doesn’t mean we change the rules.

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: So, yes. We definitely wanna hold both men and women to the high calling that our created order gives to us, but we won’t combat the problem of sin by changing God’s rule.

Jim: Yeah. In the book, you mentioned your, your church reading aloud Psalm 113, which would rankle you. So-

Rosaria: Oh, no. Not just reading it aloud, singing it.

Jim: They would sing it. Okay. (laughs)

Rosaria: Yeah. Yeah. We would. We would-

Jim: And so you’d go, “Hmm. I don’t know about that.”

Rosaria: We would sing. No. It was even worse. Let see if I… Yeah. No. It was way worse than being rankled. See, I am a trained singer.

Jim: (laughing)

Rosaria: I can’t be in the context of music.

Jim: I am not.

Rosaria: Okay.

Jim: (laughing)

Rosaria: I can’t be in the context of music and not sing. So it wasn’t just that those other people were singing it. I was singing it. And then I’m thinking, “What did I just…” I just sung condemnation unto my… Seriously, uh, this is how desperate it felt to me. I have just sung condemnation unto myself, and somehow I’m in tune enough with the (laughs) Holy Spirit to feel that.

Jim: Yeah. Yeah.

Rosaria: And meanwhile, I have piercings in my ears, a boy wife beater t-shirt on, and I just left the bed of my lesbian lover.

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: You know what I mean? (laughing) Like, and I’m not old enough to be having like memory issues so… (laughing)

Jim: Right. Right. But what is 113? What grabs you that-

Rosaria: Yeah.

Jim: … that way?

Rosaria: Yeah. Yeah. You want me to read it or sing it?

Jim: Yeah. (laughs) Whatever you’d prefer.

Rosaria: Okay. (Singing) From the dust he lifts the poor, makes the needy grief no more. Those he raised up from the pit. With his people princess sit. With his people princess sit. I love that but I just didn’t know if it was true.

Jim: Hmm.

Rosaria: Like I love the thought because I, I’m a social justice activist.

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: I, I’m trying of my own accord to make the world a better place but I’m not succeeding but here’s where, of course, you’re singing the loudest ’cause it’s the crescendo that just did me in. He the barren woman takes and a joyful mother makes, in her home she finds reward. What? (laughs)

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: Hallelujah. Praise the Lord. And I immediately shout the psalter and I went to the pastor’s wife. And some of the other women in the church that I knew from, uh, you know, I mean, it, one was married to a colleague of mine and I just kind of like, (laughing) “What is going on here?”

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: I’m, I’m supposed to find reward in my home? And they were, they were wonderful. I mean, to each woman, they said, “Well, you know, scripture references scripture, right? You can’t just pull this and this is connected to this thing called the creation ordinance, Rosaria.” What in the world is that? Well, it, it goes all the way back to Genesis. But I thought you guys were Christians. Well, yeah, but you don’t have the gospel without the law.

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Rosaria: I, I, I mean, it was my first lesson in hermeneutics. And so, and it was a good lesson because I found myself saying two things. One is I don’t believe this at all.

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: But I understand why you do.

Jim: Hmm.

Rosaria: Well, can you imagine a world where we could do that?

Jim: Hmm. Very different.

Rosaria: Very different than the world we have.

Jim: All right. Number four, transgenderism-

Rosaria: Transgenderism-

Jim: … is normal.

Rosaria: … is normal for some people and this is interesting because this-

Jim: How can you really believe that?

Rosaria: It’s so crazy. And you know what?

Jim: I mean, think, just think of the surface of that.

Rosaria: It is so crazy.

Jim: Now isn’t there quite a conflict, at least some of the people I talked to within… You look at Bill Maher, the comedian in HBO. I think he has in a very creative way recognized this conflict between the Ts-

Rosaria: Yeah. And, and-

Jim: … the L, and the Gs.

Rosaria: … and there are many, quote-unquote, “Gay conservatives.” I don’t like that expression gay.

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: I don’t think you can be conservative and gay-

Jim: But it’s the T’s are kind of undoing it.

Rosaria: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But-

Jim: So describe that since you know it.

Rosaria: But here’s how, here’s how that came about. Where would you get transgenderism? Like just the whole, just ethically speaking, where would you get this? Well, well, you get this from a feminist watchword, like, what is at the center of feminism is a position that sex, biological sex and cultural gender are different.

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Rosaria: Now as a Christian, I’m here to tell you, there’s no difference. And there’s no difference because God is not some crazy engineer that builds a bridge that falls into a lake. Okay? He makes the pattern of male and female for the purpose of heterosexuality and biblical marriage. The pattern and the purpose go together, even when some of us have not fulfilled that purpose. I have four children by adoption. I have got married late in life, was never been able to be pregnant, but, but you see what I’m saying?

Jim: Yeah. Yeah.

Rosaria: So I’m not saying that we are all perfect examples of that-

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: … but that is the pattern for the purpose. And what feminism wanted to say is, “No. No. No. No. You do have this biological sex but don’t worry, it’s not gonna hold you back.” Because-

Jim: Right. We’re gonna empower you.

Rosaria: … it’s not the really important thing.

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: What’s really important is, you know, that cultural gender thing. And then transgenderism took it and said, “This is fantastic. We’ll just get rid of biological sex altogether, all we want is cultural gender.”

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: And so feminism is what created the roots of transgenderism, and transgenderism is the sin of envy.

Jim: It… Yes. Wow.

Rosaria: It is the coveting of not just your neighbor’s wife but your neighbor’s sexual anatomy. And this is where you really have to just… We need to hover over this for a minute because there are a lot of Christians who falsely believe that sin is only sin if you act on it. That sin is not sin if you don’t act on it and sin is not sin if you didn’t choose it, and yet we have two places in the Bible that just speak powerfully against that, that become relevant in our discussion about transgenderism.

Jim: What are they?

Rosaria: Well, the first is, uh, Exodus 20:17. “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife.” It doesn’t say thou shalt not take thy neighbor’s wife. No. Don’t take your neighbor’s wife, but the commandment, the prohibition is against coveting.

Jim: Hmm.

Rosaria: Envy. And then the second is in, uh, Romans 7 verses 17 to about 24. In that passage Paul is, the Apostle Paul is writing about indwelling sin, that’s the sin that comes unbidden from the heart. And he says, “Why do I do what I don’t wanna do. It is not I, it is sin in me.” So these people, they say, “Oh, I’m, I’m gay. This is who I am. I know ’cause I feel it.” Well, Paul is saying, “It’s not you, it’s sin in you.”

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Rosaria: And it’s sin. He doesn’t say, “It’s not I, it’s, you know, trauma in me or it’s not I, it’s, you know…” And, and, and let me say, I shouldn’t say it like that because people… There are many, many examples of sexual perversions that are kind of launched, instigated by child sexual trauma.

Jim: Correct.

Rosaria: And if that is the case, if you have been traumatized, if your sexual acting out is coming from trauma, you need to deal with that trauma and you deal with that in counseling and therapy and I’m completely in support of you doing that, but you can be a sinner and a victim at the same time, and that’s what we’re dealing with here. You know, Paul is not talking about trauma. Talk- Paul is talking about indwelling sin. Indwelling sin is, um, if sin is like a robber and your one way, your one shtick, the one way that you deal with sin is to lock the doors.

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Rosaria: That’s not gonna help you if the robber’s in your closet in the master bedroom.

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: Okay. So we have to figure out what to do with the sin that is part of our fallen atom, our original sin that doesn’t go away entirely upon regeneration by the Holy Spirit. We fight that sin until-

Jim: Well, in keeping that metaphor. It’s much like learning to close and lock that door of the closet.

Rosaria: Yeah.

Jim: I mean, that’s what Jesus has come to do and deal with it-

Rosaria: Well, actually, actually, no. We don’t close and lock the door. We open the door-

Jim: Clean it out.

Rosaria: We open the door and we shoot it dead.

Jim: Yeah. (laughs)

Rosaria: See, that’s what we need to do with our sin.

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: We need to kill it dead. And then tomorrow morning we probably have to get up and do the same thing. But transgenderism has two sides to it. One is something that people would consider, you know, at least the DSM-IV for as much as we wanna go there-

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: … would call a medical diagnosis of dysphoria-

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: … gender dysphoria. The medical analog to that is anorexia. Now that’s an important analog because nobody thinks that if you have a daughter who’s anorexic that you should affirm her in her delusion that she’s fat.

Jim: Hmm.

Rosaria: So even in a situation where you believe you are dealing with a dysphoric person, lying doesn’t help, but predominantly the issue that we’re facing today is an activist motivated envy that has just unleashed itself in a satanic form on the world and that the foolish broad evangelical church has failed to say, “Not on my watch.”

Jim: Uh, before we go to point five-

Rosaria: Mm-hmm

Jim: … or lie five.

Rosaria: Yeah.

Jim: I think it’s important for us to talk about that. What can the church respond with-

Rosaria: Right. Well, first of all-

Jim: … in a culture that is… I mean, if you step up and say something, you might even get arrested-

Rosaria: Yeah.

Jim: … at the school board meeting-

Rosaria: Well, and, you know- (laughing)

Jim: … like the dad-

Rosaria: I haven’t. I haven’t been arrested yet. I’ve said all kinds of things at a school board, but you know what? You have to be willing to.

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: You have to be willing to be arrested. You have to be willing to lose your job. You have to be willing to die for Christ. It’s very simple. This is gonna clear out the fake Christians from this conversation. You have got to be willing, this is real. Okay? We are-

Jim: So confront it is what you’re saying.

Rosaria: You’ve got… You have to-

Jim: Like Ken, your pastor friend.

Rosaria: You ha- you go to it. You see that problem, instead of retreating from it, you move into it. So I speak at school boards. I haven’t been arrested yet. I, uh-

Jim: (laughs)

Rosaria: … yeah. I must tell you that speaking at a Durham County School Board is a little bit like, uh, doing rounds at the psych ward during a full moon, but, you know? I-

Jim: (laughing)

Rosaria: Somebody’s got to do it. Right? But I think this is very, very important because one of the people you’re gonna meet at these school board meetings are parents who are facilitating the problem.

Jim: Because their children are experiencing it?

Rosaria: Well, a couple of reasons. I mean, you, you know, Brandon Showlter from Christian Post has done a fantastic, you know, study of this in his Generation and Indoctrination Podcast, but some of it is a kind of Munchausen by proxy syndrome.

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Rosaria: Um, and some of it is parents who are being manipulated by therapists and by Side B gay Christianity, by Andy Stanley, by the unchanged conference, by these kinds of movements that say, “Well, look, would you rather have a dead daughter or a living son?”

Jim: Well, and that connection I wanna make sure we capture what you said a moment ago when it comes to the analog of anorexia-

Rosaria: Yeah.

Jim: … that when you look at gender dysphoria, it’s a mental illness.

Rosaria: Yeah. It’s a mental illness. It is a mental illness.

Jim: And we’re no longer recognizing it.

Rosaria: Right.

Jim: And, and think about it for a moment-

Rosaria: Right.

Jim: … step back and think of a man who wants to dress and act like a woman.

Rosaria: Right.

Jim: That is not natural.

Rosaria: No. And we are barbarians if we pretend that a mental illness doesn’t need to be treated, and envy is a serious sin. So I understand there could be a medical… There can be… Certainly, there’s a mental health component-

Jim: But there’s an issue or multiple issues.

Rosaria: … but envy is rottenness to the bones-

Jim: Hmm.

Rosaria: … and what we’re seeing, especially right now with the way parents are having to deal with the situation is like a kind of twisting of the scriptures about what it means to obey God and not man. You see if we, uh, you know, I think it’s Proverbs 29 that talks about the-

Jim: Hmm.

Rosaria: … fear of man is a snare. And a snare is an instrument of execution from which you can’t extract yourself.

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: And when I go to school board meetings I see a lot of parents who are snared by the fear of their children. And what’s really interesting right now 20 years ago, 30 years ago, the rite of passage for a, an adult child is to go to mom and dad and say, “Mom and dad, I’m gay.” That coming out was your rite of passage. Today the rite of passage is cutting them off.

Jim: Hmm.

Rosaria: And so it is really important that the church know how rough this is for the parents who have children who are casualties to what is the idol of our day. And I’m using the word idol like a good reformed presbyterian here. Here’s what you do with your idols. You don’t go sing kumbaya next to Moloch-

Jim: (laughs)

Rosaria: … while babies are dropping in.

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: And that-

Jim: And, and Moloch is?

Rosaria: Uh, and Moloch is, uh, you know, the idol of child sacrifice during the Old Testament.

Jim: Yeah. They used to burn children-

Rosaria: Yes.

Jim: … at the feet of Moloch.

Rosaria: Absolutely. You do not-

Jim: For crops, for yields, for prosperity.

Rosaria: … you do not do that. You destroy-

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: … the idol-

Jim: Hmm.

Rosaria: … and you proclaim the word of God. And so what I’m seeing is a lot of Christians, especially in broad evangelicalism, needing to, trying to make peace with the world so that they don’t lose a job.

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: Well, that’s appalling.

Jim: You know, Rosaria, let’s end where we started.

Rosaria: Okay.

Jim: And that was how we deal with people that don’t think the way we do.

Rosaria: Yeah.

Jim: And your first encounter that was with Pastor Ken-

Rosaria: Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Jim: … and his wife, Floy. Um, but it’s an art. I, I like to say it that way-

Rosaria: Yeah.

Jim: … because it’s learnable.

Rosaria: Yeah. Uh, yeah.

Jim: And you need to engage people where they’re at-

Rosaria: Right.

Jim: … and then bring them along. One of the things you said about Pastor Ken is that he didn’t hit you with salvation right at the get-go. You need to be saved.

Rosaria: Right.

Jim: He started to talk to you and feed a hunger in you.

Rosaria: Right. He talked to me about what it means to be-

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: … an image bear of a holy God.

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: Like, uh, we had to start way before salvation. (laughs)

Jim: So he was laying the breadcrumbs-

Rosaria: Yeah. Yeah.

Jim: … um, articulately with you.

Rosaria: Right. Right.

Jim: And, and I, I just think-

Rosaria: Right.

Jim: … that’s… Because so often we can respond out of our flesh-

Rosaria: Yeah. Yeah.

Jim: … as Christians, to fight with the fruit of the other guy, the enemy of our soul.

Rosaria: Yeah. Yeah.

Jim: You know, with harshness and-

Rosaria: Yeah.

Jim: … you know, being direct does not have to be harsh.

Rosaria: No. But being direct does require presence, and this is where, this is where real hospitality comes in. Okay? Real Christian hospitality is where you actually know your neighbor, not because of what he said on Twitter last night but because what his lawn looks like today and you know he needs some help.

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: Real Christian hospitality is having enough time together so that you can, with respect and in privacy, ask and answer hard questions-

Jim: Hmm.

Rosaria: … and where you can show yourself to be a lover of his soul-

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: … a lover of her soul. We live in a world that so values the flesh. Everything’s about the flesh. I noticed this when I had the privilege of seeing my mother come to Christ, literally on her deathbed. And I noticed that as the flesh becomes weaker the soul becomes… Well, it’s kind of gets like, like sloughed off. Like you kind of see it.

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: But we live in a world that doesn’t wanna talk about the soul at all. And so, so, and this is… I’m not talking about church programs. Like I, I, I don’t care about church programs. I, I… In fact, I think sometimes Church programs become a way that Christians just try to avoid the awkwardness of hospitality.

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: Hospitality is awkward. You’re gonna have people in your home and they’re probably gonna violate some of the rules of your home. They’re gonna make-

Jim: Or break something. (laughing)

Rosaria: They might, they’re gonna break something, they’re gonna say a bad word, um, it, it’s gonna be, uh, you know what? Embrace the awkwardness.

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: Um-

Jim: I just broke something in someone’s home last night. (laughing)

Rosaria: (laughs) You know, uh-

Jim: That’s a true story.

Rosaria: And, and then you’re going… You know, at the end of the, the meal, dad is going to read the Bible-

Jim: Hmm.

Rosaria: … and dad is going to say, “You know, I’m so glad you’re at my home. In my home, at the end of a meal we read the Bible and we pray.” And you know what? We have done this with our pagan friends and neighbors for decades and we… No one’s ever thrown a tomato at my face.

Jim: (laughs)

Rosaria: Nobody’s ever… Uh, I mean, often the people at the table will ask the question that all the kids wanna know anyway, how long will it take and do I have to pray out loud? (laughs)

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: Okay?

Jim: Exactly. How long? (laughs)

Rosaria: But, you know, my, our children, our youngest children, um, you know, they’ve come to Christ and they have spent their childhood listening to their parents beg their neighbors to put their faith in Christ. I mean, you know-

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Rosaria: … like we would do the good parent thing. We’d like put them to bed-

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Rosaria: … and then we’d realize, oh, there’s that, they’ve got their blankies-

Jim: Right. (laughs)

Rosaria: … and their, (laughs) and their snugglies and they’re under the table listening to… Like, that’s, they-

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: … they were like kind of steeped in that.

Jim: Yeah.

Rosaria: And so I think what, you know, and here’s how you know it’s hospitality. It’s not entertainment. It’s gonna cost you money. Somebody’s gonna break something and it’s gonna take a lot of time. But what it does is it allows you to at least in good conscience speak the truth to your neighbors. Now in a post-Obergefell world, does that mean that they won’t hate you, they won’t fire you, and they won’t, um, malign you? No. It doesn’t.

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Rosaria: No. It doesn’t. It just means that your conscience is clear-

Jim: Right.

Rosaria: … as you say, “I’m a lover of your soul and the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords knows you better than you know yourself. And this book, the Bible, it knows you better than you know yourself too. And you’re gonna be okay. I mean, you may lose these things, but you’re gonna gain things as well. But there’s a reality to the Christian life that you don’t understand and I would love to spend some time talking to you about it.”

Jim: That would be good. We’ll come back and do that again.

Rosaria: (laughing)

Jim: But Rosaria, this has been terrific. And once again, I mean, I’m just in awe of what God has done in your life. Seriously, it is-

Rosaria: Thanks be to God. Yes.

Jim: … you are a female version-

Rosaria: Mm-hmm.

Jim: … of the Apostle Paul in what journey you have had. Going from lesbian to lover of God-

Rosaria: Mm-hmm.

Jim: … in the truest biblical form. And then trying to shout from the mountain tops how we’re made-

Rosaria: Mm-hmm.

Jim: … whose image we’re made in and, uh, where we need to go. So thank you. Thank you for all the effort to think these things through.

Rosaria: All the glory goes to God.

Jim: Amen.

John: What a wonderful rich conversation today on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly and Rosaria Butterfield has such a testimony of what God’s done in her life. And, uh, she’s really thought these things through and shares them with such clarity. Now we didn’t get to the fifth lie that she details in her book, uh, that is Modesty is Outdated. So, uh, get a copy of Rosaria’s book from us to read more about that and the other four lies that have been discussed.

Jim: John, it’s incredible to see how God changed Rosaria’s heart and each of us needs God to transform our hearts and make us new. That’s His plan for all of creation. Another part of his great plan is His design for marriage and family. American culture is suffering today with the breakdown of the family. Uh, the fallout is literally everywhere and the social science is beginning to back that up.

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: You know, the most, uh, successful and healthy children are coming from two parent, intact, mom and dad families and there’s no denying it now. Secular researchers are recognizing it. It’s, uh, in academia, everywhere right now, and yet, uh, the culture is fighting tooth and nail and we need to model strong Christian families to help people better see God’s plan. Uh, the culture reinforces messages every day that life is about serving yourself, living for yourself, and being a consumer of what the world has to offer, but that leads to emptiness and we’re also seeing that on the rise-

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: … that loneliness and emptiness. Folks, all of this is why Focus on the Family exists, to share God’s sovereign design for the family and the fulfilling meaningful life that comes from knowing and serving Jesus Christ. He’s much bigger and better than anything the world can offer. Uh, with all of that, please ask for a copy of Rosaria’s book, Five Lies of Our Anti-Christian Age. There’s so much more to learn from her. And as we often say, if you can make a, a monthly pledge to support the work here at Focus, not to be a business transaction but be part of the ministry. Let’s help others find their identity in Christ like Rosaria did. Um, be a part of the ministry monthly, help us so that we can plan and do more with the content God has given us. If you can’t do that, we get it. Uh, a one-time gift will work and we’ll send you a copy of Rosaria’s book for that as well. The bottom line is help us help others. Let’s do this together.

John: Mm-hmm. Make a monthly pledge or one-time gift and request that book by Rosario Butterfield when you call 800-232-6459. 800, the letter A and the word FAMILY, or stop by focusonthefamily.com/broadcast. And if you like what you heard today, there’s a more comprehensive conversation with Rosaria that Jim had, uh, on his podcast. So you can check out the extended version, if you will, at refocuswithjimdaly.com. Well, I’m John Fuller and on behalf of the entire team, thanks for listening today to Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. Join us next time as we once again help you and your family thrive in Christ.