Is it possible to dress in drag and confess Christ? Can a man who dresses as a woman be a born again Christian? This can be quite debatable by religious standards and church doctrine. Anyone can look at a person and instantaneously make a self-righteous decision casting them into hell. But man looks on the outward appearance and judges what he sees. Only God knows the heart.

Holiness and Sanctification

Before we can answer these questions rightly, we have to understand the ongoing work of holiness and sanctification in a new believer’s life. Ask yourself, “Did I instantly leave every sin and addiction when I came to Christ? Or was there an ongoing work of freedom that the Holy Spirit began in me when I accepted Christ?”

Yes, we are immediately made righteous by the blood of Christ, but there is a process of mind renewal that must subsequently take place. We must never compromise the truth of God’s Word, yet we need to use wisdom and grace towards a new believer in their walk with Christ. This is compassion without compromise.

Is There a Hierarchy of Sin?

People too often have preconceived hierarchies of sins. Too often we instantaneously determine the eternal destination of those who do not align with our religious convictions, church ethics, cultural foundations or just their interpretation of scripture. So, too often we create an unwelcoming atmosphere for people who show up at their services looking different than them.

A masculine looking woman who walks into a Bible Study dressed in men’s clothes may often sense a very negative response from people who have already determined her spiritual status. Their negativity could turn her away from Christianity rather than draw her in.

When Jesus sat with the publicans and sinners (Matthew 9:10-17), the hypocritical Pharisees were angered. They thought it was a complete travesty for Jesus to associate Himself with them. Jesus had to remind them that them that those who are whole do not need a physician.

How We Can Show Love to Others

That’s why we must examine ourselves. If a person identified as a drag queen walks into your church, can he find love? Some may ask whether he should find love in church, but that’s not a question Jesus would ask. “Should we love them?” is an easy question for Christians: The answer is yes. “How can we show them love?” is a harder question.

We Need Wisdom

Here are two more questions of the easy variety: “Are we all sinners in need of God’s grace?” and “Is the church a place for sinners who want to know Christ?” The answer both times is yes. So when someone enters church as openly gay or trans, wanting to know Christ, the church is a place for them.

But this leads us toward harder questions, too. “The church is a place for sinners, but is it a place for open display of sin?” and “How does wisdom tell the difference if a person has come seeking Christ or for some other reason?”

There are some who seek Christ, some who oppose him, and we need not treat them the same way. We need not give people freedom to sin openly in church, or to disrupt our worship and teaching. We do need to use wisdom to avoid rushing to conclusions.

Will You Seek to Love Them?

Isn’t it interesting though, how that leads back to our first two questions? First, should we love them regardless? Yes! That one’s still easy. The harder one still follows after that one: How can we show them love?

To answer that requires humility, wisdom, faith, and prayer. But even those virtues won’t help you answer the hard question, if you haven’t already answered the easy one in your heart. Will you seek to love them? Your answer must be yes.

Timing is God’s Business

We must be open to God’s patient work in their lives. He’s been patient with you and me, remember. Jesus did not come into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved (John 3:17).

If the drag queen confesses Christ, can we honestly tell them scripturally that God won’t accept him until he changes his clothes? The same God who helped us to align our lives with His Word has the power to help the drag queen become all that God created him to be.

We cannot determine what God’s clock will be for this process. How and when they change is God’s business, not ours. We still must love them and continue to walk before them in truth.

We Must Take Up Our Cross

Godliness comes through surrender to the Word of God. It is a daily walk of sanctification, not an instantaneous event. Every day, each one of us must take up our cross and follow Jesus. Every day, we have to make choices that deny this flesh and follow Him.

What good is it to change the outward man and never allow God to change our hearts? God is able to turn the worst of us into the best of us. No matter how we lived life, God has been faithful and able to bring us to a place where He is pleased.

We All Have Sinned

None of us can stand on the pedestal of righteousness. We all have sinned and come short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). It is the grace of God that has brought us to where we are. God in His infinite wisdom and unconditional love is able to touch everyone in His own way and in His own time.

If the man dressed in drag confesses Christ from his heart, he stands accepted into the kingdom of God. He has been birthed into the kingdom of God at that moment. He stands justified before God at that moment. It is not the work of a church or organization and cannot be determined by anyone’s doctrine. It is by the Word of God according to Romans 10:9-10.

God Will Change Their Heart

As for the drag queen who stands and confesses with his mouth the Lord Jesus, and believes in his heart that God has raised Him from the dead, the Bible says he is saved. We cannot “unsave” him because we don’t agree with what he is wearing. We can counsel and offer the Word of God, but we cannot change that person. We must allow God to work and do the change.

When God changes him, no one can reverse those changes in him. That is the power of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Our responsibility as the church family is to pray faithfully for those who come into our fold and believe God that He is able to complete the good work which He began in us. (Phil. 1:6)

Choose to Love

So, some questions are easier than others. Are we all saved by grace? Is the church a place for sinners seeking to follow Christ? Should we love the person who looks different from us? All those have one easy answer: Yes!

It gets harder when we try figuring out how to love them. In a way that should be harder, because everyone is different everyone needs different things from us.

There’s no easy automatic way to get the question of love right. There’s one easy automatic way to get it wrong, though: By not deciding in your heart that you will choose to love. Will you?

Janet Boynes founded Janet Boynes Ministries in Maple Grove, Minnesota, in 2006. She authored the books Called Out: A Former Lesbian’s Discovery of Freedom, God & Sexuality, and her latest: God & The LGBT Community. Janet is an ordained minister under the Assemblies of God and travels the U.S. and overseas sharing a message of redemption and hope through the power of Jesus Christ.