What Should a Real Man Do?
/OK, I’ll admit it. I fret for months over which book to use in my church’s Iron Men class. I’ll also admit that it matters less that I make it out – our conversations are more important that any book. Not only that, but it also shouldn’t be hard to pick a book since the questions haunting men are universal and consistent: Do I have what it takes? Can I pull this off? Will I be found out? Am I enough?
Part of the problem is our cultural definition of what it means to be a real man. I found nearly 50 versions of the “50 Things A Real Man Should Be Able To Do” list, and they included things like:
Throw a punch
Chop down a tree
Jump-start a car
Change a flat tire
Build a campfire
Clean a paint brush
Point toward north
Avoid boredom
Tie a bowline knot
Change a diaper
Calculate square footage
… and on and on (a real man should know when to stop making lists!)
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Reading this week from 1 Chronicles 5:24, it says: “These were the heads of their families: Epher, Ishi, Eliel, Azriel, Jeremiah, Hodaviah and Jahdiel. They were brave warriors, famous men, and heads of their families.”
These are prime qualities for real men - brave warriors, well-known and influential men of importance, leaders, responsible decision-makers. Yet the Bible goes on to say these manly men failed at the most important thing.
Verse 25 says: “But they were unfaithful to the God of their ancestors and prostituted themselves to the gods of the peoples of the land, whom God had destroyed before them.”
Because of their unfaithfulness God allowed an enemy nation (Assyria) to swoop in and defeat these men and carry them off as captives, spoils of war. Their families, friends, and neighbors all suffered because these men failed to be faithful to God. Even courage, fame, and influence weren’t enough. They were like the foolish man who built his house on the sand: they were swept away. In the final accounting, they did not have what it takes. They couldn’t pull off their single most important task.
It’s too bad. Men who could’ve changed the world for good wasted their turn by being unfaithful to God. And not that they just drifted away from God, but they actively gave themselves over - “prostituted themselves” - to the gods of the world, even gods they knew had been defeated.
It happens too many times. Good men in leadership positions, even influential spiritual leaders, twist off, start believing their own press clippings, and sell out completely to the god of this world. It’s tragic.
* * *
So what things should a real man (or real woman, for that matter) be able to do? What should be at the top of the list?
The Old Testament prophet, Isaiah, gave this insight to King Ahaz when he asked for advice: “If you do not stand firm in your faith, you will not stand at all.” (Isaiah 7:9) It is our faith that gives us strength, gives us depth, and density. A person who professes no faith has little to stand on when the troubles come.
I once heard Erwin McManus challenge an arena full of Promise Keepers by saying: “The shape of your character is the shape of your future. Not skill, but character. Not influence, but faith.”
And there is the main point – if you don’t stand firm in your faith, it matters very little what else you do. In fact, you won’t stand at all.
Few people leave faith all at once, as an act of independence or defiance. More people simply drift away, a bit at a time, forgetting what matters, until one day it is gone, they are gone too far away to want to come back. In order for that NOT to happen we have to stay engaged. We have to be careful. We have to take care.
McMannus says, “God does not reject the sinful. He rejects the arrogant.” Being arrogant is the opposite of this passage. It’s leaning on self and smarts and skill, not God. Arrogance was the sinful failure of those heads of families in 1 Chronicles 5:24.
* * *
Here’s another story, from 2 Chronicles 20:12. King Jehoshaphat ended a long prayer for guidance with this phrase, “We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on You.”
He was a king who understood the limits of his own wisdom, courage, influence, and power, and knew to stand firm in his faith.
And so, my prayer, “Lord - I am asking you again to speak to my heart about teaching and writing and books and engineering and music and family cash flow and publishing and marketing and loving Cyndi and taking guys into the mountains and all that. I don’t know what to do, but teach me to keep my eyes on You.
“I run in the path of Your commands, for You have set my heart free.” Psalm 119:32
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