Men's ministry

When I was serving my former churches (a yoked parish of two congregations) an hour north of Madison, Wisconsin, a young man working toward a graduate degree at UW(Madison) served the congregations as a pastoral intern and we became close. As time went by, he decided to enter the ministry and to train at the Christian Reformed Church's Calvin Seminary.

Even then, back in the eighties, Calvin Seminary was going down the tube. Turning our backs on God's Order of Creation, Adam first then Eve, was all the rage and Calvin was drowning in this rebellion. Dutchmen were reaping the fruit of their diffident-to-cold relationships with their wives and children and, having sown the wind, they were about to reap the whirlwind.

Ortega y Gasset pointed out that true thinking begins with exaggeration, you understand.

Another pastor in the area was on the board of Calvin and he told us the school was going liberal and it was only a matter of time before the Christian Reformed Church would follow...

This past October 1st, we were blessed with a fly-by visit from Father Bill Mouser and his wife, Barbara. On sexuality, if would be hard to do better than taking our churches through the Mousers' Five Aspects curriculum--Five Aspects of Man/Woman. My closest friend, Pastor Robert Woodyard, is using Five Aspects with men in his church and has found it excellent. Here at Clearnote Church, Bloomington we have a Saturday morning program...

Under another post, a longtime reader named Jay asks a question that seems worth answering on the main page.

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Dear Jay,

Answering a question like this by writing rather than in person is very difficult, pastorally. How can I show you I love you and am very concerned that you know the mercy of God for your particular set of temptations, especially in a time and place when any condemnation of sodomy is seen as at least shrill, and likely smug, insensitive, and grounded in self-righteousness, to boot?

Still, I will work to answer you because you say others are unwilling to do so, and because you are a precious soul belonging to the Lord of us all Who bought us each with His Own Blood and has called us to be holy as He is holy. If you want, I can put you in touch with those struggling with your particular set of temptations who are a part of our church here in Bloomington and you may ask them if what I write here is from love or censoriousness? You may ask whether you’d find our church to be loving of all regardless of their particular besetting sin, or loving only of those with more acceptable besetting sins?

So on to the difficult work others have avoided.

You wrote, “I would not consider myself heterosexual at all. Is being straight a requirement?”

Let’s clarify the question. The opposite of straight is gay, so another way of asking the question would be, “My psychological and emotional identity and inclinations are completely homosexual, so can I be give in to them as long as I don’t go all the way?” Or another way of saying it would be, “May I give myself to gayness rather than straightness in everything but physical intercourse, and will this please God?”

The answer is...

"...it's indie or classic rock that moves our spirit."

(Tim) You all know ClearNote Church is filled with classical musicians but we worship mostly under the leadership of amplified instruments. This EP just released by our worship musicians gives you a good feel for how we're led. What distinguishes our worship leaders is that they use instrumentation and tunes and rhythms that are familiar to those who attend. We're not asked to go back into genres of previous centuries when we sing God's praises and pray.

Then too, we believe our music should be characterized by masculine zeal. The congregation should have men pushing us to express our joy and firm commitment and worship for the majesty and glory of God. Faint spirits and cold hearts are challenged when singing God's praises, here.

So you'll notice how well-matched the music and instrumentation and beat are to our goal. If you were to worship with us one Lord's Day morning, you'd notice this is how we pray and preach, also--we don't give people space for unbelief and ambivalence...

(Tim, w/thanks to Scott) Some of Church of the Good Shepherd's work is a Saturday men's class called David's Mighty Men. Stephen Baker and I teach, then the men meet in smaller groups for accountability and recitation of their Scripture memory. It's a two-year course of study and as practical as true godliness will always be. We teach male and female, courting, marriage, childbearing, work, authority and submission, fatherhood, church, doctrine...

Right from the beginning, we tell the men that we're out to kill "guyland." What's guyland?

Particularly for young men, guyland's almost always pornography, sports, or video games. Do you know how many men in your church are flunking out of life because...

(Since publishing this post, I've realized some of our readers may never have heard that John Eldredge opposes Scripture at key points in his writing. So, I'm adding several links here (one, two, three, four, five, six, seven) as a warning to our readers not to be snookered into buying Eldredge's books or listening to his false teaching. Many have been harmed by him and there's no need for any others to fall into the trap.)

Eldredge is likely the most popular proponent of the heresy known as

open theism. (He) is not a trustworthy teacher of the Word

of God. While he presents an attractive message and often does so in an

attractive way, much of the content simply does not line up with

Scripture. He denies many of the truths orthodox believers have long

held to. I do not recommend his books and encourage you to exercise

extreme caution when dealing with his teachings.  -Tim Challies

(Tim) Speaking of the perversion of Biblical male sexuality sold in books like Wild at Heart (see final comment under "Sacred Swooning" post), the most recent New Yorker has a piece on the murderous drug cartels displacing the rule of law in much of Mexico. The article delves deeply into one relatively recent cartel known as La Familia, reporting that La Familia's leader, El Chayo or El Mas Loco (the Craziest), "is inspired... it has been reported, by the muscular Christianity of John Eldredge...

(Tim) These wise words were made as a comment under the recent post, Stats on internet pornography, by Alex McNeilly, a young sax student in Church of the Good Shepherd. Thank you, Alex.

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Regardless

of how guarded any home is against sin, particularly the sexual sin of the media, in the world opportunities to indulge in it will abound. But even as we build larger and stronger walls against these sins

in the home, worldly access to them becomes ever more

available as we see in the stats in this post. As a result, I agree

with Kevin that the strongest defense against these things lies in the

spiritual battle.

We must teach our children the dangers of sexual sin and

pornography, so that when they go into the world (a friend's house, a

computer lab, a video store, etc.), where there are no guards, their

hearts will already be fortified against these iniquities...

Greet all the brethren with a holy kiss. -1Thessalonians 5:26

(Tim) Not to express the slightest opinion on any part of the Brett Favre debacle... And yet, pastors and elders would do well to learn from this statement at the end of the NYTimes' article on Favre's welcome to NYC by Mayor Bloomberg, and his statement about how he plans to win the support of the men who are his new Jets teammates:

I want these guys to know me, know what I’m about. I’m
not going to call team meetings. I’m not going to rah-rah. I’m going to
do what I have to do, pat guys on the back, hug them, pick them up off
the ground and hope they do the same for me and hope that’s enough to
win.

Women and children first?

July 6-24, the Scripps Survey Research Center at Ohio University put the following question to 1,010 men and women:

You may recall that male passengers on the Titanic agreed to give up their places on the lifeboats for women and children. If there were a similar situation today, do you think men should be expected to die and allow women to live, or is this an old fashioned idea?

Among men, 63% of men agreed to die for women; 23% thought the idea was old fashioned; and 14% couldn't make up their minds. "Quick, the boat's sinking, Mr. Bayly: What'll it be--you or your wife?"

"Well um... Ahem... On the one hand..."

Among women, though, 43% said men shouldn't bother sacrificing for them while only 39% still thought it was good for men to give up their spots in the lifeboats for women; 18% were undecided. "Quick, the boat's sinking, Mrs. Bayly: What'll it be--you or your husband?"

"Well um... Ahem... I don't know--Tim's the man of the house; let him decide."

We all know the world has lost its way on the meaning of sexuality, but what about the church? I'm reminded of two experiences in my own denomination, the PCA, where the state of affairs became clear.

Several years ago, I served on a study committee of our general assembly assigned to produce a study paper on women in combat. As you might guess, I was agin' it but there were a number of pastors and elders on the committee who would have fit right into this poll. Some were military officers (chaplains, sadly), while others were pastors of local churches. Just short of half our committee believed..