Month: November 2023 (Page 2 of 3)

This blog is very personal, but I believe it will speak to and encourage the hearts of some men. The last few days have been unsettling and stormy. My soul has experienced gray clouds and distracting thoughts. I haven’t been present for my wife.  Instead I’ve been nursing my selfish ego.  It’s difficult for me to acknowledge that I’ve been having one big pity party as I nurse self-pity and self-loathing.  I want to be a spiritual man, but I’m acting like a spoiled brat.  

A couple from church came over for some fellowship.  I decided to confess my sinful self-pity to my brother in Christ, Bruce.  After he and his wife left, I went for a walk alone, seeking some direction out of my inner storm.  Along the way, I met another friend, David, and shared my struggle with him as well.  He seemed to understand my situation.

Then, as I continued my solitary walk, this thought came me, clear as a bell: You need to think of your wife as a “blossoming flower.”  When I got home, I went to the Song of Songs, where the beloved says, “I am a rose of Sharon, a lily of the valleys.”  The lover responds,  “Like a lily among thorns is my darling among the maidens” (2:1-2).  Lilies were common in Israel.  “Perhaps the young woman was saying,  ‘I’m not so special,’ to which lover replied, ‘Oh, no, you are extraordinary – a lily among thorns.’  Solomon  used the language of love.  Nothing is more vital to a lasting relationship than encouraging and appreciating the person you love” (NLT Application Bible).   

So what does this mean for me?  

First,  I need to remember that my wife is a special lily among the rest.  As we grow older, she becomes ever more precious to me.  She has been by my side for 58 years.  She is the most consistent believer I know.  I am to continually let her know that she is a beautiful lily who continues to blossom.  I find joy and gratitude when she is able to express her natural beauty as a person.

Second,  it’s my task to create an environment in which she can flourish.  My wife has grown and matured into a beautiful, faith-filled woman.  Our life together in these senior apartments is what we call our monastic space.  We each have our own “cell” for time alone with the Lord.  We both consider this a gift.  I believe God has called me to be a watchman,  tuned into what the Lord is saying to my wife, to me, and to the church of Christ, and to be alert to danger. “Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel, so hear the word I speak, and give them warning from me” (Ezk. 33:7). 

Third, I am to provide spiritual  protection for my wife in our monastic space.  The enemy continues to tear at the very fabric of our culture as he demeans the sacredness of marriage. We are in a spiritual battle.  Nehemiah 4:14 speaks to me, “Don’t be afraid of them.  Remember the Lord, who is great and awesome, and fight for your brothers, your sons and your daughters, your wives and homes” (Neh. 4:14).  

Fourth, I need to nourish my lily of the valley with words of encouragement, support and delight.  My wife blogs each day, reaching countless people.  It takes an open heart and and listening ears to get a message each day from the Lord.  I call it a “gift from God.”  My wife need my encouragement to keep up the good work.

Since I began writing about masculinity roughly 15 years ago,  it now appears that the “gender wars” are really heating up.  As a “gray-haired” male, I have lived through the evolution of the gender discussion and have a kind of rearview mirror perspective.  It seems we are coming into some kind of “cultural clearing” where observers on both sides of the gender battles are calling for resolution, for the future of our divided nation.  

Recently, I was fascinated by an article in UnHerd written by Matthew Crawford.  It was entitled, “The sexual holy war is coming for you.”   I was struck by phrases like “smothering self consciousness,” “the feeling of suffocation,” “the minor civil servants of moral orthopaedics,” “the feminine mode of competition,” and “the therapeutic para-state.”  They all strike a chord with my own male perspective, which at times seems to be rather countercultural.   

Crawford is asking “what it means to be a man.”  At the end, Crawford states that “being a responsible man today would seem to involve a tricky double task: to be respectful and protective of women in private, and to confidently disregard women’s tears in public.  This would be made easier if women – the silent majority of them who probably value self-reliance – did likewise, forming an alliance with men against a metastasizing force of moral orthopedics that diminishes us all.” 

So what is Crawford espousing that grabbed me, possibly opening me up to criticism and misunderstanding in even attempting to write this blog?  Crawford sees the school system as a expansion of pedagogical authority, with “the dead hand of the educator reaching deep into childhood, redesigning life as a ‘learning experience.'” It means that “unsupervised domains of life [are now] subject to systematic study and control.”  Nothing is taken for granted since “the colonization of the life-world [is] organized, leaving little room for vitality. An administered life can lead to the feeling of suffocation, especially among boys.”  (I praise God for all the unsupervised time I had growing up as a young boy .)

Crawford sees this moral-therapeutic supervision as leading to a “hyper-vigilant concern for emasculation resulting in the smothering of the human spirit.”  Since the therapeutic para-state is staffed disproportionately be women, Crawford notes, “You may not be interested in a sexual holy war, but the sexual holy war is interested in you.”  The feminine perspective brings a different kind of conflict.  “…In this dynamic, a ‘hurt’ may be attributed, a victim identified, as an act of aggression against the putative offender.”  A feminine mode of competition results in conflict where, as Richard Hanaia notes, “Women’s tears win in the marketplace of ideas.” We are all in a position of victims.  We employ the rhetoric of rights to show the sense of violation.  

Our culture produces men who are fragile. How does a man become mature, responsible and courageous in our today? Moving from childhood into adulthood means a departure from the safety of parental protection and affirmation. How does a man face hard reality without feeling like the victim?  A man should not feel like a “fragile being afloat in a field of incipient traumas.”  What does it mean to be a man? 

For my part, I have struggled mightily!  Here are some tips:  1) Be a soulful man – get in touch with your wounded male soul;  2) Work hard at integrating your head and heart; 3) Learn to tell your story – the good, bad and the ugly to another man;  4) Learn to be tough and tender both in public and in private. 

I personally believe the day of the “tough and tender” man is coming – and he will carry a “velvet covered brick.”