PE teacher Tanner Cross refused to lie to his students and it almost cost him his job. “I love all of my students, but I will never lie to them regardless of the consequences,” Cross told the local school board. “I’m a teacher, but I serve God first —and I will not affirm that a biological boy can be a girl and vice versa, because it’s against my religion, it’s lying to a child, it’s abuse to a child and it’s sinning against our God.”

His stand was against a couple of school policies requiring teachers to use pronouns for students that did not match their biological sex, sometimes without parental notification or consent. But he stood his ground even when placed on administrative leave.

The Christian legal defense group, Alliance Defending Freedom, took up the case and was able to get a ruling by the Twelfth Circuit judge that Cross' First Amendment rights had been violated by the suspension. Attorney Tyson Langhofer of ADF declared that it was a clear message to the school that it was not above the law and had no right to punish teachers for expressing their views in a public forum.

Cross has been reinstated as a teacher, grateful for organizations like ADF to back Christians who stand firm on their convictions. All across the country, these dramas are playing out with believers resisting the push of illegal and godless policies.

When we feel helpless against the faraway Federal bureaucracy, the local school boards are often a fruitful place to stand for Biblical truth and religious freedom.

And, seeding a community with gospel tracts that present God’s point of view is vital.