The story of transformation for Jackie Hill Perry is different than Caitlyn Jenner’s, but the Christian hip-hop and spoken-word artist identifies with the feelings that led Bruce to undergo gender transition.

“I get Bruce,” Hill-Perry told Rapzilla. “I don’t fully get it, but I get it because I dealt with gender confusion as a child and even growing up until I became a believer. I get and understand the feeling of, ‘If I lived my life as somebody else, I would be happier than I am now.’”

Today, Hill-Perry is married to a man, fellow poet Preston Perry, and has a daughter. Eight years ago, she dated women. Hill-Perry testifies that God changed her attraction, and her story has been endorsed by some of America’s most prominent pastors, including John Piper.

On June 1, Bruce Jenner, a personality on the television show Keeping Up with the Kardashians who had come out as a trans woman on 20/20 in April, revealed his transformation to Caitlyn.



The story has since dominated news coverage, as well as social media. Much of the public has voiced its opinion of Jenner’s change on Facebook and Twitter, and — positive or negative — many of the opinions are strong.

Christians’ reactions in general have not impressed Hill-Perry.

“I saw a lot of, I’m not going to say judgment,” Hill-Perry said, “but insensitivity — so like, ‘You’re a boy. I don’t care what anybody says.’ If you were having a conversation with him, I don’t know if that would be the wisest way to present truth.”



While the truth has not been wisely presented by one side, Hill-Perry says, the other has wrongly miscounted for it — the truth, being, that God’s will was for Jenner to be a man.

“The transgender, the lesbian, the homosexuality — all of this makes sense when God is not involved,” Hill-Perry said. “Yeah, somebody should be able to do what they want to do. Somebody should be able to love who they want to love. Somebody should be able to change their body to match what they feel they are on the inside.

“But, when God is involved, now we know, ‘Oh, there’s a creator, and we are creation.’ And if there’s a creator, then that means he has intentions for his creation, and his intentions are for us to glorify him in the way that he has prescribed. When God is involved, now it’s a bigger deal. He created your body. He sovereignly allows you to be male or female, so for you to go against him is an eternal issue. He created your body, so you don’t have the right to say, ‘I can do with it whatever I want.’ That’s the most prideful thing you can do because it’s an attack on the wisdom of God.

“It just reminds me of Genesis 3 with Eve, and Satan is saying, ‘Yo, if you ate this fruit, if you departed from the will of God, you will be happier. You will be wiser. You will be more satisfied.’ But the truth of that is, that’s a lie. I have to love God and be aware of God and all that he is to finally come to a place of being content with who I am. And when I become content with who I am, see that it’s actually good and that God is good in allowing it and sovereignly doing that for me, then there is joy. There’s only joy in the will of God — only. Outside of that, it could be perceived joy, but it’s really chasing the wind. You think you’ll find joy there. You think you’ll find happiness, but you won’t. I guarantee you’ll feel empty.”

The transgender community needs love. Not a love that glosses over truth. But a love that empathizes and warns. Christ is Savior and judge. — Jackie Hill Perry (@JackieHillPerry) June 1, 2015



Hill-Perry expressed her stance on social media after the Vanity Fair cover was revealed, and she said that not all agreed — some telling her to mind her own business and asking who she is to question what Jenner wants to do with her body. Hill-Perry disagrees with this reasoning.

“That wouldn’t apply if your daughter wanted to cut her foot off because she didn’t like her foot,” Hill-Perry said. “You would know that is an unwise decision. It’s hasty. It’s foolish. Your foot is a good thing. You actually need it. Naturally, you’re going warn her of the truth: ‘If you cut your foot off, this is what will happen. If you keep your foot, this is what will happen.’ You wouldn’t say, ‘Oh, it’s not my business if you want to cut your foot off,’ and that sounds silly, but it’s really the same.

“If I know the truth of God and his word and his intention for sexuality — for femaleness and maleness — then I have the right, and, out of love, I must speak about it. If eternity is at stake, I would be so unloving to never talk about that.”

Hill-Perry is not in favor of Christians keeping their beliefs to themselves, but she emphasized that any boldness should be equally complemented with love.

“I think how Bruce feels, how others feel and how I felt was sincere,” Hill-Perry said. “You really do feel like you should be somebody else or you are somebody else. It doesn’t seem like a lie to you. It doesn’t seem like another reality. It seems like that’s your reality, and I think Christians have to understand that.

“[Jenner] is in a place where this is real to him, and so because it’s real to him, don’t attack him, but come to his level, and identity places even in your own life and in your own heart where sin and wrong belief has just been okay. … I didn’t see a lot of that, and I wish I could have. I think just it comes from a lack of really seeking to understand how those in the transgender community feel. I think [Christians] automatically, because they don’t get it, they reject it and talk about it in a way that’s just not kind.”

After all, Hill-Perry said, love is the entire reason why Christians should share their beliefs.

“In Jesus coming to the earth, dying and resurrecting from the grave, God is creating a way for us to be restored, for us to heal from our brokenness, for us to find our true identity in Christ,” she said. “You know how in Genesis 1-3, God is saying, ‘This is good. This is good. This is good?’ When we come to Jesus, in Christ, we’re able to look at our bodies, see how we’re made and actually look at them, with faith, and say, ‘This is actually good because God says it is.’”