Category: Wildman Journey (Page 51 of 87)

In a recent Wed Morning Prayer Meeting, I shared about the “birth pangs” people who are involved in intercessory prayer experience.  I referred to Romans 8:22-25 from the Message: “All around us we observe a pregnant creation.  The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs.  But it’s not only around us; it’s within us.  The Spirit of God is arousing us within.  We’re also feeling the birth pangs.  These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance.  That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother.  We are enlarged in the waiting.  We, of course, don’t see what is enlarging us.  But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.”

I acknowledged to the women in the prayer group that I could not identify with the birth pangs of a pregnant mother.  But I do have some sense of experiencing spiritual birth pangs and in the process being enlarged.  In this passage Paul locates our journey in the midst of a pregnant creation experiencing birth pangs.  This is a reference to the fallen nature of our world.  Our personal experience and the media make us aware of the suffering and pain in our world.  These birth pangs are in expectancy of  something greater to come. During this in-between time (the now and not yet) the Spirit is also being  aroused within us.  We feel the birth pangs as we live through a time of “great transition.”  This is an enlarging experience as we anticipate deliverance in the reign of  the kingdom of God.

Men, I experience the birth pangs of the human condition in my heart as I countenance what is happening around me.  I am being enlarged as I “grieve” in prayer.  I wonder  what will happen to our country, to my family, to loved ones.  I pray for those in leadership..  I pray that I might be an effective witness during the darkness that is descending.  Yes, I am having birth pangs.  But the encouraging aspect of this grieving is that I am being “enlarged,”  being prepared for something greater. I plan to finish strong.

How am I being enlarged?  First, in what I am beholding, the Spirit helps me carry the tension of my grieving by creating space within my soul. There is so much that is so wrong. The Holy Spirit helps give me a divine perspective, allowing me to be have a positive attitude in circumstances and with people. I  don’t want to become a negative, angry, complaining man.  Secondly, the enlarging give me the capacity to embrace the rancor, pain and negativity with a Christ like attitude.  “Put simply: we must speak with confidence and tranquility, with kindness and gentleness, so that people will begin to say of us that we speak with a ‘Galilean’ accent that sounds a lot like Jesus” (Michael Cromartie).

Furthermore, Paul reminds us of the work of the Holy Spirit during this time of enlarging.  “Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God’s Spirit is right alongside helping us along.  If we don’t know how or what to pray, it doesn’t matter.  He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans.  He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God.  That’s why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is working into something good” (Romans 8:22-25 – Message).

This name comes from church historian Carl R. Trueman.  “The sempiternal orgiast [is] the one who lives for the pleasure of the moment.”  Trueman goes on to say, “Once the end of human existence was identified with happiness and happiness came to be identified with pleasure and pleasure came to be identified primarily with sexual gratification, the game was up for history. For the sempiternal orgiast has no need for history for he has no time – no past and no future, just the intensify of the pleasure of the present moment.”

With the rise of the sempiternal orgiast mentality, Trueman  maintains we no longer have a culture, but rather an anti-culture.  “If we define [culture] as the elaborate structures and materials built into the very fabric of society for the refinement and transmission of its beliefs and its forms of life from generation to generation, connecting past, present, and future,” Trueman contends,” then we really have none.”  We no longer have a culture to engage with the hope of reform.  If the West is now an anti-culture, the church will need to provide the culture.

Why say all this in a blog for men?  Because if there is a real possibility that we have lost not only “the cultural wars” but also culture itself, then the wildmen of this blog will  need to become “a resistance movement” in our society.  Some observers now refer to a church being in “exile” in America or visualize a “Babylonian captivity.”  Peter when writing his first letter addressed the believers as “exiles” living in “Babylon.” I maintain that we are not to flee from our society but  rather infiltrate society with a “subversive spirituality.”  What is called for is a new perspective on how to live out the gospel in America.  What will be asked of men in our day?

Certainly we must prepare ourselves, our families and our churches for greater opposition to the kingdom reign of Jesus.  An anti-culture in which no God is allowed to reign supreme will revolt at the words of Jesus in Revelation 22:13, “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.”  Submission to such a God in America today will bring opposition resulting in suffering.

Near the end of his first letter Peter gave this encouragement, “You’re not the only ones plunged into these hard times. It’s the same with Christians all over the world.  So keep a firm grip on the faith.  The suffering won’t last forever.  It won’t be long before this generous God who has great plans for us in Christ – eternal and glorious plans they are! – will have you put together and on your feet for good.  He gets the last word; yes he does” (I Pet 5:11-12 – Message).  Men who have a deep sense of calling to follow Jesus are beginning  to prepare themselves to resist, while living within our fallen culture.  What are some characteristics of men in a resistance movement?

I  suggest three characteristics. First, they will be resistance fighters.  As “followers of the Lamb” they will be strong, courageous, but also loving and humble.  They will resist by being humble, loving followers of Jesus, no matter the cost.  Secondly, they will be defenders. They will fight with, “the praise of God in their mouths and a double-edged sword in their hands” (Ps 149:6).  And thirdly, they will be protectors.  Living a life of integrity they will protect their families and churches from the lies of the enemy.  “The Devil is poised to pounce, and would like nothing better than to catch you napping.  Keep your guard up” (I Peter 5:8 – Message).

We now know that it will be Donald against Hillary in a battle of the distorted masculine and feminine in the Presidential race. I am wading into the “muddy waters” of the presidential race, to offer the following observation.  The gender wars that will occur will be intense and down right disgraceful.  For the wild men of this blog, I want to purpose that the next six months can be a blessing rather than curse.  Why?  It will bring into sharp contrast the images of a broken masculine and feminine and the hope offered in a biblical view of a secure  masculine  that also embraces a healthy feminine.  Both candidates will display a deeply distorted  masculine or feminine, while attacking the other out of their brokenness.

Leanne Payne, (I have mentioned her often) both in her seminars and books has been instrumental in the healing of my masculine soul.  She made this prophetic statement in her book, “Crisis in Masculinity.”  “A crisis in masculinity is always a crisis in truth.  It is a crisis in powerlessness of the feminine virtues: the good, the beautiful, and the just, in a culture or in an individual.  A culture will never become decadent in the face of a healthy, balanced masculinity.  When a nation or an entire Western culture backslides, it is the masculine which is the first to decline.”  My suggestion –  remember this quote.

Mona Charen in her column said it well.  “The greatest failures of the past genearation concern men, women, and sex – and there could not be two more awful representatives of what has gone wrong than Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.”  Men, get ready for a distorted national conversation about  sex and gender. Without a biblical perspective the discussion is void of the truth.  Clinton will use accusations of sexism for her advantage  as the champion of radical feminism.  “The masculinity of Trump,” states David French, “is exactly the caricatured, counterfeit masculinity of the feminist fever dream.  It takes the full energy of manhood and devotes it to sex, money and power.  It’s posturing masquerading as toughness and anger drained of bravery.”

So how shall we as men respond in the coming days.  First and foremost, celebrate your God given gender identity as a man.  Receive these words from your heavenly Father, “You are my Son, chosen and marked by my love, pride of my life” (Mark 1:11 – Message). Your unique masculine soul is a gift from God. Don’t be a confused, angry man; rejoice in your maleness.

Secondly, don’t throw Mr. Trump or Mrs. Clinton “under the bus.”  They are only  products of our confused culture. It will take much grace and long suffering to see beyond what will be portrayed on TV, the internet, and social media so as to be able to embrace and  live out a healthy countercultural expression of the masculine.

Thirdly, be very intention about your witness to angry, confused men.  “The angry man needs to grow up, to put away childish things, and to see that every moment that Trump commands the national stage is another contribution to feminism’s ultimate triumph “(French).

Fourthly, weep for our nation.  I mean this literally.  “The family, the cradle of new life and the font of civil society, is in jeopardy in unprecedented ways, as our society increasingly disregards basic facts of human existence.” (George Weigel). Men need to be protector not predator.

Fifthly, use the gender war  as an opportunity to show men of all ages a better way.  Men are being told to shun their masculinity and live a “de-gendered life.”  Many….men are left confused, aimless, and of the angry.  They simply can’t and won’t conform to a genderless society” (French).

I have a passion for men live in the spiritual freedom  of “receiving the love of God.” It is similar to being held in our heavenly Father’s  loving arms.  I identify with the  Palmist, when he declares, “We’re not keeping this to ourselves, we’re passing it along to the next generation.”  Recently I have been reading a book by James K. A. Smith, which  explores persons  as lovers of God.  He makes reference to I John 4:19, “We love because he first loved us.”  “Even our disordered loves,” states Smith, “bear a backhanded witness to the fact that we are made in God’s image.”

He quotes Swiss theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar,  “After a mother has smiled at her child for many days and weeks, she finally receives her child’s smile in response.  She has awakened love in the heart of her child, and as the child awakens to love, it also awakens to knowledge…..the seeds of love lies dormant within us as the image of God.  But just as no child can be awakened to love without being loved, so too no human heart can come to an understanding of God without the free gift of his grace – in the image of his Son.”  The mother evoking a child’s smile models God’s initiative in the incarnation, smiling on us in love, allowing us to love him in return.

Our part is to move out of ourselves and look into the face of Jesus.  We prayer with the Palmist, “My heart says of you, “Seek his face!’  Your face, Lord, I will seek” (Ps 27:8).  “Jesus is the smile of God.” (Smith)  With Paul we can say, “All of us, without any veil on our faces, gaze at the glory of the Lord as in a mirror, and so are being changed into the same image, from glory to glory, just as you’d except from the Lord, the spirit.” (II Cor.  3:18).  We come to know that “the love of God has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us” (Rom 5: 8).  Gazing upon Jesus, we become aware of his presence within our hearts.

As a result, God’s spirit awakens love in our hearts.  As a mother radiates love to the child, so God radiates love to us allowing us to respond to his love. It is not the result of our effort or worthiness.  Rather it is God’s loving kindness.  “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ” (I Cor. 4:6).

Secondly, we gain knowledge of the love of God.  In coming to experience the love of God, we  come to the knowledge of God’s love for us.  But first we must receive this love, just as a child learns to respond to the loving gaze of the mother.  It is the gaze that bring the awareness of love, not our understanding or effort in being presentable.  What relief to know that God loves us in our guilt and shame.

Thirdly, God meets us in our incapacity, giving us the capacity to love. In God first loving us, we see the gracious initiative of God   granting the grace that allows us to love him in return.

Fourthly, our journey in Christ becomes one of surrender to the love  rather than the dutiful obligation.  Out heavenly Father desires that our intentions to serve him come from willing, joyful hearts.  Duty can be short lived, while willingness can endure because of the awareness of God’s favor.

A quote from my favorite feminist, Camille Paglia,  got me to thinking about masculine energy. “The more women succeed and rise up into positions of power, the more remote they become from actual masculine energy.” Reflecting on the present status of feminism, Paglia observed, “We don’t know what we want….My generation produced the sexual revolution and your generation is stuck figuring out how it’s going to work.”  Nicole Russell laments the lose of male energy, “Women have blindly followed the feminist mantra and now find themselves lonely and confused. It’s time to welcome back the patriarchy.”  She sees men, “slowly shriveled to mere shells of themselves in an effort to avoid the witchy brigade of feminist diehards.”  It is an indictment of men in our culture.

Like so many other issues regarding  gender, we have to go back to the order of creation (biblical reality).  “The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it” (Gen. 2:15).  These verbs can  be translated “serve” and “guard.”  The NIVZSB notes, “The man has a priestly role to protect the garden sanctuary” (Gen 1:26). When he failed in his task, he was expelled from Eden.  Productive work and guarding the garden were to be part of God’s good plan for man.  It was after his command to Adam that God created Eve as “a  helper suitable for him” (Gen 2:18).

This surely implies energy. Men, think of yourself as Adam, responsible for work in your garden.  Like God, Adam was to be a worker.  Without the taint of sin, work was an undiluted blessing.  The word “work” means “serve.” After the fall work became “painful toil” (Gen 3:17) being accomplished “by the sweat of your brow” (Gen 3:18). Without an understanding of our role as God’s worker in creation, our masculine energy can be distorted, misguided and even intimidated into passivity.

Like each of you, I live in my particular “patch of creation” (sphere of influence).  It has changed over the years from getting married, my vocation as a ordained pastor, raised a family of three and now living together with my wife in our “small monastery” on the lake in the northwoods.  Expressing and living out of godly masculine energy has consistently meant the following for me.  It has not been without its share of pain and disappointment.   I wonder how other readers have been challenged in a similar manner.

First and foremost is taking  initiative and being responsible. In my opinion one of the greatest tragedies among men in our culture today is the passive-aggressive man (the beta man).   The Genesis story tell us that we each have been put in charge of our patch of creation.  We get up every morning to tend our garden.

Second, provide direction and order.  God will show you how to do your work.  He wants you to work for his glory.  We do it grateful, without whining and complaining.

Third, being a  protector.  You are to spiritually fight and defend your patch creation.  God has placed you as a “watchmen” on the walls, alert to spiritual danger. Perceive the danger, name it, and cry out for God to come and do battle on your behalf.

Fourth,  being the priest.  Men, you are God’s priest in your garden.  You bring the presence of God.  Don’t depend on your wife and others in this task.  No one knows the condition of your garden like you do.  At times all you can do is cry out, “God be merciful to me, a sinner.” God hears the prayer of desperation.

In a major grammatical move, The Washington Post, The New York Times and a host of other mainstream media outlets are now instructing writers and editors that since deities don’t actually exist, they don’t deserve the deference of capitalization. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who purchased the Post in 2013, spearheaded the change.  “America will finally drop the whole “god” thing in this century and we wanted to be ahead of the curve.”  Bezos is very candid in his motives, “I take the militant advancement of liberalism under the guise of objective journalism very seriously.”  “To be clear about where we stand” states Mr. Bezos emphatically, ” anything vaguely religious will now be put in quotes to display our suspicion.” In an almost arrogant tone he promises, “While “christ” and “prophet” are out, the real people who historians agree actually existed, like Jesus and Muhammad, will continue to reap the rewards of capital letters. For the time being.”

So there you have it men –  the promise of the mainstream media to oppose the historic Christian tradition as expressed in the Apostles’ Creed, confessing God as Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  I thought immediately of Ps 2.  “The One enthroned in heaven laughs, the Lord scoff at them.  He rebukes them in his anger, and terrifies them in his wrath, saying, ‘I have installed my king on Zion, on my holy mountain” (4-6). My advice to followers of Jesus, who face such open opposition is to memorize the Apostles’ Creed.  In many church it is confessed every Sunday, as a reminder of the faith we profess.  Mr. Bezos and his cohorts are only the latest to want to silence the story of salvation.  But they like others before them will not succeed.

I have spent a lot of time in the prophets, especially Isaiah and Jeremiah, attempting to apply their message to our cultural context.  What follows is a prophetic response from passages in The Message to Mr. Bezos based on the prophets.

God sees the presumption. “But they were a proud and arrogant bunch.  They dismissed the message, saying, ‘Things aren’t that bad. We can handle anything that comes.  If our buildings are knocked down, we’ll rebuild them bigger and finer.  If our forests are cut down, we’ll replant them with finer trees” ( Isaiah 9:9-10)).

God sees the  pride.  “You were so confident and comfortable in your evil life, saying , ‘No one sees me.’  You thought you know so much, had everything figured out.  What delusion!  Smugly telling yourself, ‘I’m Number One.  There’s nobody but me'” (Isaiah 47:10).

God sees the arrogance.  “And yet you have the gall to say, ‘I’ve done nothing wrong.  God doesn’t mind. He hasn’t punished me, has he?’  Don’t look now, but judgment ‘s on the way, aimed at you who say, ‘I’ve done nothing wrong'” ( Jeremiah 2:35).

God sees the Band-Aids.  “Prophets and priests and everyone in between twist words and doctor truth.  My people are broken – shattered – and they put on Band-Aids, saying, ‘It’s not so bad.  You’ll be just fine.”  But things are not ‘just fine'”  (Jeremiah 6:14-15).

God sees false religion. “They’ve spread lies about God.  They’ve said, ‘There’s nothing to him.  Nothing bad will happen to us, neither famine nor war will come our way.  The prophets are all windbags.  They speak nothing but nonsense”  ( Jeremiah 5:14).

But God promises to be our guide. “I’ll be a personal guide to them, directing them through unknown country.  I’ll be right there to show them what roads to take, make sure they don’t fall into the ditch.  These are the things I’ll be doing for them – sticking with them, not leaving them for a minute” (Isaiah 42:15-16).

During Starbucks 2016 Annual Meeting of Shareholders, chairman and ceo Howard Schulz said he had “struggled for weeks to find the right words to express the pain I  feel in my heart about where America is headed and the cloud hanging over the American people. ” Viewing the American Dream as a “reservoir” that is replenished with the values, work ethic and integrity of the American people, Schultz said, “Sadly, our reservoir is running dry, depleted by cynicism, despair, division, exclusion, fear and indifference.”

He suggested citizens fill the reservoir of the American Dream back up, “not with cynicism, but with optimism. Not with despair, but with possibility.  Not with division, but with unity.  Not with exclusion, but with inclusion.  Not with fear, but with compassion.  Not with indifference, but with love.”  “It’s not about the choice we make every four years,” Schultz said, “This is about choices we are making every day.”  Based on this theme, Starbucks sponsored a two-page advertisement in the WSJ and NY Times,  sharing a message of optimism for the future through the choices individuals make every day.

I agree with Mr. Schultz’s angst regarding our lose of  civility.  To be civil is to be courteous and respectful.  Men, while we will be severely tested in expressing the virtues suggested by Mr. Schultz, we will have a significant opportunity to be a positive exemplar as Christian men in an increasing hostile environment. Titus 3:1-2 gives us our marching orders, “Remind the people to respect the government and be law-abiding always ready to lend a helping hand.  No insults, no fights, God’s people should be bighearted and courteous” ( Titus 3:1-2 – Message).  Hebrews reminds us, “Work at getting along with each other and with God.  Otherwise you’ll never get so much as a glimpse of God” (12:14 – Message).

While attempting to fill our  reservoir with these  commendable virtues is determined by our daily choices, we will fail.  Why?  We are already filled with  a self-referencing  false self, greatly handicapped in being virtuous.  This false self will needs to be surrendered through repentance and confession so that we can be filled with the fruit of the Spirit.  We cry out for God to be merciful to us as sinner living in the midst of a fallen society.  We then  invite the Holy Spirit to come and fill us with what is needed to navigate the entanglements of contemporary culture.  “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control” (Gal 5:23).  The fruit manifested through our true self in Christ gives us the capacity to be  other-centered, that is, civil.

Our  motivation in being civil is not the American dream, but seeing other persons as created in the image of God, even if they deeply oppose our viewpoint.  “I’m telling you to love your enemies,” Jesus tells us.  “Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves” (Matt 5:43 – Message).  The incarnation is a model for the practice of civility.  God did not wait for us to cry out  or act.  No, “God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8).

Remember God’s dealing with us is a matter of long-suffering (Rom 2:4).  We live “in the time of God’s patience.”  God has not chosen to rush to judgment, but rather allows us to make basic life choices, for good or evil.  God will do the final accounting.  In the meantime, we are to practice humility and long-suffering, which is the foundation of Christian civility.

While on a retreat not long ago, I was deeply convicted.  We all listened to a song entitled, “I hope you dance,” sung by LeaAnn Womack.  It hit me like a ton of bricks.  I wept, to the point of embarrassment, as I listened.  The song reflected on the choices in the journey of life.  “And when you get the choice to sit out or dance, I hope you dance. Time is a wheel in constant motion always rolling us along.  Tell me who wants to look back on their years and wonder where  those years have gone.”  I was convicted of my resistance in entering  a deeper spiritual dance with  my dear wife.

For Valentine’s day she gave me a card with a husband and a wife flying in a hot air balloon. I felt my resistance to the metaphor. She wrote, “This hot air balloon is the Spirit carrying us to new places we’ve never been before – new vistas!  New communication!  New ways of seeing things!  New ways of responding!  It will be good as we hang on to each other and let the wind of the Spirit carry us.  There is no one else I want to be with in the hot air balloon.”  I am still struggling with her invitation.  I am afraid of going into the unknown with my wife, knowing it requires a surrender at a deeper level.

We read that King David danced “with all his might,” unashamed in the midst of the people and  before the Lord. “David danced before the Lord with all his might; David was girded with a linen ephod.  So David and all the house of Israel brought up the ark of the Lord with shouting, and with the sound of the trumpet” (II Sam. 6:14-15).  Dancing in the Bible symbolizes praise, freedom and yielding to God.  In Ps 150: 4 we are encouraged to “praise him [God] with timbrel and dancing.”  The Psalmist exclaims that God, “turned my wailing into dancing” (Ps 30:11).

I am thankful that my wife is giving me  space to get into “the swing” of the Spirit.  The Lord has freed her for the next phase of our journey together.  While I still resist, I can sense I am getting to the place of “entering into” the dance.  While on that retreat, here are some of the issues I identified in my struggle.  I wonder if some of the men reading this blog don’t face some of same issues.

First, evidence of my selfishness.  My focus is on me rather than my bride.   I want to protect my “spiritual turf” as I have come to understand it.  I talk a good talk about being response to my wife, but I want things to be on my terms. This is hard to admit after 50 years of a marriage in which I thought I was a pretty sensitive guy.  Lord, help me to open my heart to my wife.

Secondly, while being known as an outgoing, friendly guy, I still lack spontaneity in my spirit.  I have a hard time being childlike; being free in the present moment.  My wife is waiting for me to “let go” and enjoy the next part of our journey.  As the song reminds me, “who wants to look back on their years and wonder where those years have gone.” Lord, help me to live without regret.

Thirdly, I am hurting my wife with my self-centeredness.  She has to pull back and wait for me to join her.  I know she is right, but I resist.  Lord, help me to “let go and enter into.”

We are in the midst of March Madness.  I was hoping that Tom Izzo’s Michigan State team would be playing Kansas in the championship game.  But MSU lost in dramatic fashion to 15th seed Middle Tennessee.  It was a crushing loss for Izzo and his heavily favored Spartans.  But what  impressive many was how coach Izzo conducted himself in the post game interview.  His concern was for his players, especially the three seniors.  He was not focused on the future.  His wanted to embrace his team in their defeat..  He praised them for taking defeat “like men.”  Two take-aways for men.  First, coach minimized his pain, while bearing  the pain of his players. It takes a strong heart to willingly bear the pain of others.  Second, taking defeat like men. Think of the lessons learned for life through this crushing defeat, especially for Denzel Valentine. It helped shape young men.

“March Madness” could be a metaphor for the race we are in following Jesus to the finish line.  Everyone makes prediction, but it is the players  we watch.  Part of the “madness” are the young men playing their hearts out, having no idea if they will advance.  Wisconsin moved on the sweet 16, when their guard shot a three pointer with two seconds left on the clock, while falling into the arms of his teammates on the bench.  Unbelievable!  We watch, while these young men compete with such passion and determination.  How about our journey?  Are we more a spectator or are we in the race?

There will certainly be “madness” as we run the race.   But like those young men, we need  a passion to compete. If we drop out and are disqualified, we forfeit the privilege of tell others about what we are learning as we race.  We become simply spectators with opinions, but no real  life experience. Paul like a good coach wants to motivate us. “You’ve all been to the stadium and seen the athletes race.  Everyone runs; one wins.  Run to win.  All good athletes train hard.  They do it for a gold medal that tarnishes and fades. You’re after one that’s gold eternally.  I don’t know about you, but I’m running hard for the finish line.  I’m giving it everything I’ve got.  No sloppy living for me!  I’m staying alert and in top condition.  I’m not going to get caught napping, telling everyone else all about it and then missing out myself” (I Cor. 9:24-27 – Message).

Paul encourages us to train hard.  No slopping living, but being in top condition.  The journey is a race that is worth the effort.  Just as an athlete goes through physical training that can be uncomfortable in order to cross the finish line, so Paul endures physical and emotional hardship   “I’m not going to nap” say Paul.  The spectator can talk about the race, but never experience the joy of the competition. How sad to get to the finish line, having spend life in the stands.  Men, the challenge is this – finish strong, especially in our day.

Eugene Peterson makes the point that we are in a race with others.  “You don’t have to understand or like or affirm the other runners to run with them.  It’s the goal that defines the race, and your act of running defines you as a runner.”  The church is not a group of spectators, but rather believers who are in a race.  In this race we don’t have time to talk things over and make plans.  We have little time.  So Peterson says Paul’s point to the Corinthians is this – “Quit complaining and start running.”  What a great insight.

“Brotailer” is the name for a new menswear retailer, appealing to a different breed of young men.  “He’s the id-driven, post-collegiate twentysomething bro….who hates shopping and would happily wear the same pair of sweatpants every day if society didn’t frown upon it.” The focus is on laid-back men’s clothing.  In the last five years, menswear has been the fastest-growing product category sold online.  53% is “basic bro” style vs. “practical,” professional,” or “rugged.”  “The brotailers have raided Dad’s and Granddad’s closets and jettisoned the pretense older brands relied on.”  I love this comment.  As a senior monk in the woods I could care less about fashion.

It is what Heidi Hackemer, founder of marketing agency Wolf &Wilhelmine, said about this retail phenomena that got my attention.  She observes, “It’s almost like these brands are creating safe spaces where dudes can be dudes….We’re in this really weird phase of masculinity, where all the rules are shifting.  Everyone is talking about women, and Beyoncé is, like, ‘Go kill it, ladies,’ and Sheryl Sandberg is leaning in, and guys don’t really know how to move forward.  You almost see this regression into a safe place, which is the bro cave.  I don’t think anyone has told the guys what they’re supposed to do now.”  This unflattering view of young men is certainly reflected in the TV ads that often portray young men as immature, irresponsible, pleasure-seeking and impulsive.

Remember men, the Ad business is about manipulating reality, enticing us to buy a product or even a particular lifestyle .  A key audience right now are all the men (including me) watching basketball during March Madness. All those ads help create an alternate reality to the one that we actually experience.   Ms. Hackemer’s observation reflects how successful women in our society view men – fragile, insecure, drifting, lacking in incentive and without mentors. I want to comment briefly on her observations..  This blog site, “The Wildman Journey” is an attempt to address these issues.

First,  the creating of and regression into a safe place called a “bro cave.”  Is there a safe place for men?  Is there a perception of  men looking for a “bro cave.”  My comment – Estranged men can come home to Jesus.  He is our “hiding place” (Ps 32:7) in the cultural storms.  A bro cave is an illusion.

Second, “this weird phase of masculinity.”  This bright lady sees men in a weird phase.  What does this mean?  Is this an expression of how men are viewed by competent women in culture.  My comment – The affirmation of our masculinity  comes from a transforming relationship in Jesus Christ, giving men a strong sense of identity.

Third, “all the rules are shifting.”  Is she referring to roles and responsibility, as reflected in the gender wars.  My comment – A man secure in his masculinity will know how to navigate the gender wars, taking the initiative, guided by the Holy Spirit.

Fourth, “everybody is talking about women,” while men don’t know how to move forward.  Is this how business women view men? My comment – Men find your strength and courage in the Lord Jesus and move forth in truth.  Don’t give in to the moral and spiritual passivity  of many “church” guys.

Fifth, no one has told men, “what they’re supposed to do now.”   Is this an expression of sympathy or sarcasm?     My comment – God has been forming godly older men, who are humble, loving followers of Jesus.  They are not found  in the limelight, but rather in the ordinariness of every day life.  They are male mentors. This blog is an example of such mentoring.

Finally, remember Jesus words, “I am the way, and the truth and the life” (John 14:6)