Fighting the Word War

Dannah Gresh: Elizabeth Urbanowicz offers a helpful reminder.

Elizabeth Urbanowicz: The narrative nowadays is that every single issue that we have as an adult stems back to something our parents did wrong. Now, have all of our parents made mistakes? Yes. Are all of our sinful tendencies and weaknesses and insecurities because of our parents? No. It's because we live in a fallen world.

Dannah: It’s the Revive Our Hearts podcast for September 19, 2025. I’m Dannah Gresh. Our host is the author of Lies Women Believe, Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: In Lewis Carroll’s classic children’s story Through the Looking-Glass, Alice has a humorous (though somewhat confusing) conversation with Humpty Dumpty. She’s just done some arithmetic to show him that, of the 365 days in the year, 364 of them were non-birthdays, or as Humpty puts it, UN-birthdays. Let me read.

Humpty said, "That sum shows that there are three hundred and sixty-four days when you might get un-birthday presents—"

"Certainly," said Alice.

"And only one for birthday presents, you know. There's glory for you!'

"I don't know what you mean by 'glory," Alice said.

Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. "Of course you don't — till I tell you. I meant, 'There's a nice knock-down argument for you!'"

"But 'glory' doesn't mean 'a nice knock-down argument.'" Alice objected.

"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less."

"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things."

Well, as you know if you’ve read the story, Alice has lots of these kinds of confusing exchanges with many of the characters she runs into. It’s kind of funny, but it’s also a little bizarre. 

Sometimes you and I may feel like we’ve stepped through a mirror into a different world where the meanings are all jumbled up. Well, thankfully, the Lord has defined many important words and concepts for us in His Word, the Bible. And that’s what our guest is going to talk about today. 

Over the last couple of days here on Revive Our Hearts, we’ve been listening to a conversation between my co-host, Dannah Gresh, and Elizabeth Urbanowicz. If you missed it, you will want to go back and listen at ReviveOurHearts.com or on the Revive Our Hearts app. 

Now, here’s Dannah and Elizabeth with helpful counsel for parents, grandparents, and teachers—anyone who spends time with young people. 

Dannah: Elizabeth, welcome back! We are so grateful. I was just so encouraged by our conversation the last couple days.

Elizabeth: Thanks so much for having me on for a third day, Dannah. It’s just a joy to be with you.

Dannah: Yesterday we talked about some really important topics. We talked about transgenderism. We talked about pornography. These are just words. So, we shouldn’t really be afraid of them, but in a way, they’re not just words. They’re weapons, because I think we’re living in a time when we’re having a war of words.

I heard one Christian writer call it “linguistic theft.” That, if you can be the one to steal and own a word, a word like “male,” a word like “female,” a word like “woman,” a word like “man,” you can really rearrange and change the way a young child sees the world.

What do you say to that?

Elizabeth: Yes. I think you’re spot on there. Nowadays words are really used as weapons. I think that concept of linguistic theft, again, is spot on. So this is, again, where we’re going to need to train our children to not only think well but to ask good questions.

When we think about what’s going on in our culture, we are told that if we stand on God’s Word, and if we say that sex is just reserved for marriage, that marriage is just one man and one woman, that gender is not assigned at birth, that it’s actually biological, it’s actually God-given; we’re told that we are hateful, that we are bigoted, that we lack compassion and empathy.

We need to take a step back for ourselves and for our children and ask, “What is that word that was just used, and how is the person using that word?

And so, if we can train our kids to do that . . . Like anytime we hear the word “love” used, if it’s on the air, if we can click the pause button, or if we’re reading a book, and we can pause and say, “Hold on a second. What word did that person just use? That’s right. They used the word 'love.' Interesting." 

Well, when we read God’s Word, what do we hear about love? We hear that God is love. We hear that love is patient and kind, it doesn’t envy or boast. It is not proud. It isn’t rude. It isn’t self-seeking. It’s not easily angered. We hear all these things about love. So it seems from God’s Word that love is doing what is best for another person— even if it hurts us. And then we hear that, "For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son." Jesus did what was best for us, even though it cost Him everything.

“Okay, how did that person just use that word love?”

Well, they said, that person just said that if this person didn’t do what they want, they didn’t love them. Is that what love is? Is love just doing whatever somebody wants? No. Interesting.

So if we can just ask our children these questions and train them to ask these questions, they’re going to be a lot less confused about this war of the words, where words are just being twisted, and our children’s God-given sense of compassion and empathy are really being manipulated.

Dannah: You’re stirring my heart already, Elizabeth!

So, this is important, because the word “love,” as you just described it, is completely selfless.

Elizabeth: Absolutely.

Dannah: But, the way the world is using it is very much the opposite. It’s what I want. If I want love this way, then I’m going to get love this way. And, obviously, we talked a couple days ago about the word “consent.” That’s kind of the theology of the culture right now. I’m going to get the love I want and, as long as there's consent, any way I want. That’s very selfish. It’s the opposite of love as we understand it to be defined by the Scriptures.

What are some other words that are being stolen that we really need to prepare our children to understand, "This is what is true, this is what God says about this word?"

Elizabeth: There are so many words that we could choose from. I think ones that really relate to what we’ve been talking about for the past three days, the words “male” and “female.” What does it mean to be a man? What does it mean to be a woman?

And to ask, “According to the Bible, what does it mean to be a man?” And then take them back to Genesis 1, and then taking them to Ephesians 5, talking about the role of husbands and wives, and what has Scripture revealed about what it means to be male or female? And what did that person mean?

Well, that person meant that being a woman is just feeling, like, you like glitter and sparkles. Is that the same thing what Scripture has revealed? No. It’s not the same thing Scripture has revealed at all.

Also, thinking about terms like . . .

Dannah: Can I just say this? Okay, one of the things you see in the culture right now is double-mindedness. The Bible talks about being double-minded. When you’re double-minded, you’re unstable in all your ways—not just the way you’re double-minded, but all your ways. There have been so many books written and marches had to take the whole stereotype of female, femininity, the glitter and the high heels and everything away from the word woman. But now we have transgenders saying, “Oh, but that’s so important to me to have the glitter and the high heels.”

What you’re seeing there is what I would call the definition of double-mindedness and instability. So which way is it? It can’t be both of those ways. So, go ahead. I had to jump on that soap box there.

Elizabeth: No. It is so important because I think you hit the nail right on the head. We are seeing this double-mindedness and this instability in our culture. This is why we want to ask our children questions.

If anybody’s watching or listening who has older children (my wheelhouse is very much children under the age of twelve), but if you have a teenager who’s just like, “Oh, gender is just a social concept,” or this or that. Then talking about, “Okay, let’s watch this TikTok video where this man is claiming that he’s a woman because he just loves sparkle, and he loves glitter, and he loves to dress this way.”

Then say, “So what is he saying that it means to be a woman? What is he saying? He’s saying it means to love sparkles and glitter. Do you believe that’s what it means to be a woman? Do you believe that that’s all there is?”

And just to try to start our kids toward reality to see how hollow and how empty that is.

Dannah: Yes. That’s a very superficial view of it. I would also say that there are those who are born with true gender dysphoria. It wasn’t about glitter and dresses and high heels for them. It was about extreme psychological and emotional pain from a very, very young age. Right?

Elizabeth: Yes.

Dannah: So, it’s very complex. We’re not trying to minimize it. We’re not trying to make this a superficial issue. We understand it’s complicated. But we are also saying, as for me, Elizabeth, I am finished being politically correct. We have girls cutting off their body parts because they don’t feel like they like them. I don’t know any girls who felt they liked their body very much in seventh, eighth, or ninth grade.

Elizabeth: Yes. Definitely not me!

Dannah: Right. We’ve got to start to call a spade a spade and a muddy shovel a muddy shovel. And that’s what you’re doing here today.

Elizabeth: Yes. And not just calling that out, but bringing our children to the truth of God’s Word because, if our child is drawn towards transgender, or if they’re drawn towards homosexuality, or if they’re drawn towards any other form of sexual sin—sex outside of marriage, pornography, anything—our ultimate goal is not that our child would just drop that sin.

Because, if our child drops their sin pattern, but they’re still estranged from Jesus, then their problem has not been solved. We want to help our children understand how Jesus offers redemption, and how God’s Word offers hope and healing. And so that is our ultimate goal in all of this.

Dannah: Yes. I love, as we talked yesterday (yesterday was a must-hear program), you focused so much on the positive truth of God’s Word when it relates to image, being image bearers, maleness and femaleness. We didn’t really talk about the counterfeits when you were explaining how we educate a younger child about these topics.

I think we want to spend the majority of our conversation on what God says is good and what God says is true. We don’t need to overly expose them to the counterfeit. We just want it to be so clear to them what is truth and what is genuine so that when they do see a counterfeit, they run to us and say, “I sniffed out a counterfeit.” “I felt really weird about this.” Or, “I heard this, and it seemed really wrong.” They know it! They recognize it as this is not what God’s Word says is true.

Elizabeth: Absolutely. Yes. And so, again, like you said, we want to focus on the positive. Focus on the biblical and then ground them in that. Expose them in developmentally appropriate ways so then they are prepared when they do encounter that counterfeit.

Dannah: We’re going to spend some time praying for our children and the counterfeits that they face. But before we do that, I do want to just kind of really raise the standard of inviting women to talk to their children about these topics.

In addition to my role of supporting Nancy here at Revive Our Hearts, I run a ministry called True Girl. It’s twenty years old. We’ve been teaching girls biblical truth about being a girl for two decades. And in the last year I’ve been getting the same letter, with different words in it, but the same question. And it goes something like this:

“I’ve been using your tools, or I read Elisabeth Elliot’s book on purity when I was in high school, or I did 'True Love Waits' when I was in college . . .whatever it is . . . and now everybody is saying they got it all wrong." They made mistakes. Dannah Gresh made mistakes, whoever it is they’re criticizing.

And I’ll just say, “Yes. We didn’t get every sentence right. We were learning. We were growing. We were discovering how to have an authentic conversation about sex because, if you go back a decade or so before all of those things were happening, the Church was not talking about it.”

So we were learning. We were making mistakes. But these moms are saying, “Everyone around me is telling me that if I talk to my daughter or my son about sexual integrity, about purity, about God’s good design—whatever the topic is—that I might create shame in them by establishing boundaries and clearly telling them what is sinful.”

What would you say to that?

Elizabeth: I think there’s a few parts to this. The first part is, I feel a lot of young parents have a lot of anxiety over not doing things right because the narrative nowadays is that every single issue that we have as an adult stems back to something our parents did wrong. 

Now, have all of our parents made mistakes? Yep. Are all of our sinful tendencies and weaknesses and insecurities because of our parents? No.

Dannah: Right.

Elizabeth: Because we live in a fallen world. So I just want to speak to parents. First, you need to take that pressure off of yourself. You cannot be a perfect parent. You can’t be and that’s not what God has called you to be.

And then, in that, I think a way to walk forward in biblical confidence is to make sure that as you are parenting, you are going to be convicted at times by the Holy Spirit that you’ve sinned against your child. And, of course, you confess and repent of that to the Lord. You also need to confess and repent of that to your child because we want to make sure that that relationship is fueled and is growing, and sin always cuts down relationships. So that’s really important.

And then, it’s also important for establishing this foundation that mom’s not perfect. “I’m not. I’m a sinner just like you, and I need Jesus’ grace every day just like you do.”

I think if we have that kind of relationship with our children, where they are either on a weekly, sometimes even daily basis, seeing us ask, confess, and repent when we blow it, when we sin against them, they’re going to understand, “Okay, it’s not like my mom or my dad is perfect. They’re a sinner, too, and they’re humble, and they’re modeling for me what it looks like to walk forward with a biblical lifestyle of repentance.”

So I think we need to have that foundation. And then for anyone who’s thinking, If I teach my child the biblical view of sex, that sex is only for marriage, it’s only for one man and one woman, I’m just going to be inducing this guilt and this shame in my child.

The first thing I think we need to think through are the words “guilt” and “shame.” When we think through what guilt is, guilt is what we all inherently feel when we break God’s moral law. And guilt is actually a good thing because it should ultimately lead us towards repentance, towards reconciliation with God. And so we don’t want to keep our children from ever feeling any guilt. That is actually this God-given conviction.

And then when we think of shame, I think shame can easily become a tool that Satan uses. If we’re talking about God-given shame, similar to guilt, it’s something that should drive us to God. Where Satan very easily can take shame as a tool to tell us that our identity is actually our sin, that it’s not just something that we did, but it’s who we are.

So I think we need to distinguish these two things. That when we sin, and when our children sin, it’s a gift when we feel guilt, when we feel this conviction. But we want to save our children from the shame that Satan can use to draw them away from God and tell them that that’s their identity.

Actually this is similar to what our culture is doing. Our culture is saying, “You are your desires.” So if anyone tells you that your desires are not good, what are they telling you? They’re telling you that you are not good. So we want to help our children understand the difference between their identity and their desires. I think it’s really important for us to speak biblical truth to our children, and the entire biblical narrative speaks to the fact that we are fallen and in need of redemption.

I think where we might go into error is if we are presenting to our children, “This is God’s good design. God designed sex for the marriage covenant. Marriage is one man and one woman. And any form of sexual expression outside of that covenant, that is sin.” And we present it to our children that, “If you just work hard enough, you can follow God’s good design exactly.” 

What we want to present them with is, “We need to ask that God would give us the grace to follow His commands. We need to pray. We need to ask that when we have a desire that doesn’t align with God’s good design, that He would convict us quickly so that we can turn, and we can repent of that sin.”

So I think it’s important how we present this to our children. If we don’t present God’s good design, what are we doing? We are leaving our children open to the path of the enemy, to alienation from God. What we need to do is teach them the truth. And the whole truth involves the fact that we cannot be pure outside of the righteousness of Christ.

Dannah: That’s right.

Elizabeth: And when we do sin, that’s when we need to confess and repent of that sin. I would encourage any parents who are wrestling with this struggle to remember what the truth is.

Dannah: Well, you said something really important there, and that is we can’t do it without Christ. And there is a passage in the New Testament where Jesus said, “If you love Me, you’ll keep My commandments.” Our ability to love Him depends on how we nurture our love relationship with Him. 

I think it’s easy to hear that verse and say, “He’s saying, ‘If you love Me, you’re going to obey Me.’” But I think what He’s saying is, “If you love Me, you’re going to obey Me. It just happens.”

And I’ve had two what I would call dramatic encounters with Christ. One was at a retreat, a prayer retreat, in the Dominican Republic. I was just slowed down from the pace of life enough to really be in the presence of the Lord. And the other was at a prayer retreat for Revive Our Hearts staff just weeks ago.

Something I noticed after those encounters, where you’re just more aware of the presence of Christ . . . It’s not that He’s not there other times—He’s everywhere all the time—but I was so aware of His presence in both of these set-aside, focused prayer times. I noticed that when I got on the plane from the Dominican Republic, and I went to pick a movie to watch, the first thought in my heart was, “I need to be really careful. I don’t want to lose this sweet, sweet, sweet presence of the Lord in my life.” It wasn’t even like a shameful . . . it was like an invitation. And I felt that same thing just a few weeks ago after my encounter at my prayer event for the staff.

It is about introducing our children to such a sweet, exciting, intimate relationship with Jesus that they don’t have to try to hate sin. They love God so much that they just have a distaste for it. Does that make sense?

Elizabeth: Yes. It’s making me think of Psalm 34 where it says, “Taste and see that the Lord is good” (v. 8). That’s what we want for our children.

Dannah: Well, I promised that we were going to pray today, and it’s time. We need to do that. I beg you as you’re listening to Elizabeth and I, would you stop what you’re doing? We need to go to war. There is a war of words happening in our world right now. Our children are the victims, and we’ve got to raise up as prayer warriors, as prayer generals, and we’ve got to do it in cadence. We’ve got to do it together.

So, could you just pause for a moment? Elizabeth, I’m going to ask you, “Would you just pray? Let’s not pray against the evil. Let’s pray for what you just said, a sweet, tender love relationship with Jesus in our children and our grandchildren.”

Elizabeth: Absolutely.

Father, we come before You, and just thank You for who You are. God, we thank You for redeeming us, for reconciling us to Yourself. We thank You for how good You are. And we thank You for the fact that not only are You good, but Your design is good.

And Lord, I just lift up the women who are listening to this recording. Lord, I thank You for them. I ask that You would just continue to ground them in Your Word, that as they spend time in Your Word, that as Psalm 34 says, they would “taste and see that You are good.”
I ask that You would give all of us a deeper hunger for You. We know, Lord, that only You can take a heart of stone and turn it into a heart of flesh. And we ask, Lord, that You would continue drawing us deeper into Your Word and closer to Your heart. 

Lord, I also list all of the children that are represented by the women who are listening. Father, we thank You for these children. We know that children are a gift from You. We know that Jesus welcomed the children. He said, “Let the little children come unto Me, and do not hinder them.” And we thank You for Your love for the children, for our children.

And, Lord, we ask that You would guide us as we are guiding these children. Lord, we ask that we would be so immersed in Your Word that it would just come out as we talk with our children every day, as we prepare breakfast and lunch and dinner, as we make trips to soccer practice, as we do everything throughout the day, that Your Word, Lord, would be front and center.

We ask that through that, Lord, You would develop in these children a heart for You and a hunger for You. Lord, the children who have not yet repented of their sin and been reconciled in their relationship with You, we ask that You would continue to pursue them, that You would convict them of their sin and of the goodness of who You are.

And we just thank You, God, for the gift of Jesus and for the hope that we have of an eternity with You.

Dannah: Yes, Lord, we just thank You for the hope that You give us. And for the mom who is watching a child go down a pathway of confusion and double-mindedness and instability, renew the hope in her heart today for that child. We never walk too far to be out of God’s grace. Lord, send her to her knees again. Send her to her knees for that precious one, but don’t let her give up. In the mighty, precious name of Jesus, amen.

Nancy: Amen! Such an encouraging prayer time there with Dannah Gresh and Elizabeth Urbanowicz leading us. Both Dannah and Elizabeth share a heart for children and young people to fall more in love with Jesus and His Word.

Elizabeth has a new book coming out next month. It’s titled Helping Your Kids Know God's Good Design: 40 Questions and Answers on Sexuality and Gender. I had the privilege of endorsing this book, and here’s what I wrote: 

Helping your child navigate the landmines related to sexuality and gender is a daunting task in today’s world. Elizabeth tackles tough topics with humility, relying on the timeless, trustworthy Word of God. She gives parents practical tools to point their children to the truth and beauty of His perfect wisdom and design.

This is a book that is so needed today, and I hope you’ll get a copy, read it, digest it, and share it with others.

Elizabeth is also graciously offering you as a Revive Our Hearts listener a discount [discount code hearts10] on any of the licenses for the various family curriculum resources that Foundation Worldview offers. All the information can be found in links within the transcript of this program at ReviveOurHearts.com. 

I’m also thankful that Elizabeth will be participating in a breakout session at True Woman, which is just around the corner. She’ll be part of a panel that will be discussing how to give your children a heart of love for God’s Word. It’s so important.

During the conference, we’ll be focusing on the wonder, the power, and the sufficiency of the Word of God. You won’t want to miss it. For all the information or to get yourself registered, check out TrueWoman25.com.

Well, next week on Revive Our Hearts, we’re going to be looking at Psalm 57 in a series called “Storm Shelter.” So here’s your homework for this weekend: Take some time to read through Psalm 57 and begin meditating on it. It’s only eleven verses, so it doesn’t take you long to read through it, and we’ll be diving into it on Monday. Sound good?

I hope you have a great weekend and Lord’s day. Worship the Lord with all your heart as you gather with His people, and then be back for Revive Our Hearts.

This program is a listener-supported production of Revive Our Hearts in Niles, Michigan, calling women to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

*Offers available only during the broadcast of the podcast season.