Transgender golfer competes while players dispute LPGA policy

Transgender golfer Hailey Davidson recently attempted to qualify for the LPGA. Here’s why the story made headlines: reports surfaced of 275 female players signing a letter asking top golf organizations to repeal their policies allowing people assigned male at birth to compete in women’s events. Those policies currently allow players who have surgically transitioned after puberty and meet hormone therapy requirements to compete. 

Commissioner Mollie Marcoux Samaan said earlier this year that the tour would finish reviewing the policy by the end of the year. The goal is to implement any changes before the next season begins. As such, the players who signed the petition did so with the knowledge that their opportunity to influence that decision was likely drawing to a close. 

And while Davidson does not appear to be a threat to overwhelm the tour in the way Lia Thomas dominated women’s swimming—an opening round of 78 at the latest tournament put Davidson in a tie for 171st in the 194-player field—the fear is that going forward with the current rules would open the door for someone who would.

The key to consistent moral character

As I noted in a recent Daily Article, legislating morality does not necessarily make us more moral. To this, we can add the fact that legislating morality depends on the morality of those doing the legislating. Here’s why this is a problem:

It is human nature to want to believe what we want to believe, a fact that applies to us all.

For example, you and I can and should stand for biblical morality with regard to LGBTQ issues. However, a recent report showed that over half of practicing Christians consume pornography, despite Jesus’ clear prohibition of lust (Matthew 5:28). We can bemoan the rampant deceptions in the media and contemporary politics. However, studies indicate that religious people lie at least as often as less religious people, despite the Bible’s clear teaching, “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor” (Exodus 20:16).

The key to living with consistent biblical character is choosing to be moral even when we don’t want to.

How do we do this?

“I delight to do your will, O my God”

Scripture promises: “Delight yourself in the Lᴏʀᴅ, and he will give you the desires of your heart” (Psalm 37:4). This assurance can mean that if we delight ourselves in God, our hearts will be so fully right with him that he can then give us what we want. It can also mean that when we delight in the Lord, he will mold our desires until they are aligned with his best for us.

By either interpretation, delighting in God is the key to hearts that are so moral that they can receive what God wants to give his children.

So, how do we “delight” in the Lord?

David testified, “I delight to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart” (Psalm 40:8). This is an example of Hebrew poetry whereby the second phrase amplifies the first. David can “delight” to do what is moral because he already has God’s moral law “within” his heart.

How, then, do we get God’s law “within” our hearts?

“He will be blessed in his doing”

The first step, of course, is reading God’s word. The psalmist declared, “I will keep your law continually, forever and ever, and I shall walk in a wide place, for I have sought your precepts” (Psalm 119:44–45). It is because he “sought” God’s word that he was able to “keep” God’s word.

Unfortunately, less than one in three Protestants who attend church regularly say they read the Bible even once a day. We should not be shocked when Christians live like the world if we don’t spend enough time in God’s word to know the difference.

However, the psalmist not only “sought” God’s word—he also chose to “keep your law continually.” He chose to live by what he read.

James warned us: “If anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like” (James 1:23–24). By contrast, “The one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing” (v. 25, my emphasis).

So, we will be “blessed” by God if we read his word and obey what we read. His law is then “within” our heart, and we “delight” to do his will.

In other words, if we read and obey God’s word, we will be moral people who live lives God can bless.

“I believe; help my unbelief!”

But isn’t this begging the question? As I noted earlier, our problem is that, as fallen humans, we want to believe what we want to believe. What if we simply don’t want to do what we know God wants us to do?

I doubt that most Christians who view pornography or commit adultery are ignorant of the biblical prohibitions they are violating. Nor are many believers who lie simply uninformed regarding the Eighth Commandment.

Clearly, when we face temptation, we must choose to obey God’s word when we don’t want to. In that moment, two spiritual practices can help us.

One: Remember who God is and what God has done, and we will be more able to trust him for what he will do.

We know that “God is love” (1 John 4:8), which means his will for us must be best for us, even if it doesn’t seem so at the time. And when we recall ways our Father has blessed our obedience in the past, we are encouraged to believe that he will bless our obedience again today.

Two: Ask the Holy Spirit to help us want what God wants.

My favorite prayer in Scripture comes from a father who heard Jesus say, “All things are possible for one who believes,” and then responded, “I believe; help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:23–24). Similarly, we can ask God to help us be more moral than we are. We can ask his Spirit to defeat the Enemy’s attacks and to empower our obedience. We can claim this promise:

No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it (1 Corinthians 10:13).

“Not as I will, but as you will”

Here’s the good news: the more we choose to think and act biblically in the face of temptation, the more we are empowered to think and act biblically. Like Jesus, who chose to submit to his earthly parents out of obedience to his heavenly Father (Luke 2:51), we increase “in wisdom and in stature, and in favor with God and man” (v. 52).

And when the test comes, we can say to our Lord, “Not as I will, but as you will” (Matthew 26:39).

Dwight Moody noted in giving a copy of God’s word to a friend, “The Bible will keep you from sin, or sin will keep you from the Bible.”

Which will be true for you today?