Musings on Masculine Spirituality pt 4

If the workplace is a pear, then the women and sex department have to be cherries. I love my cherry, she is sweet and delicious and refreshing. There is nothing wrong with a cherry. God made cherries and they are a good thing. But again we find so many men trying to get their apple from a cherry tree.

In our culture, you are a man if you have rock hard abs and have an attractive woman that you are able to please sexually. Many men do not have the ability nor the opportunity to achieve in the workplace. We have turned the workplace into a very impersonal place where men know that they are just another cog in the machine. Some of us know that we may NEVER find our apple within the workplace. And we are correct. We skip the whole illusion of the boss being the keeper of the apples. This is a grace from God, light for our path. But instead we turn down another unlit path.

Our media tells men that cherries are apples. This is what sells things, and what drives the market is what sells. Sex sells. Sex is not an apple. It is a very good cherry. But again you can never find your apple from anything other than an apple tree. I believe this comes from a culture of under-fathered and over-mothered men. Most fathers are absent, and we are taught that we need to look to the feminine to bestow upon us the masculine. But cherries don’t bear apples, they are not designed to, nor are they capable of doing it. When men turn to the feminine for their fulfillment of the masculine, they are turning down the wrong path. This path is that of fear. We fear our women because they could withhold our masculinity as punishment. Let’s make one point loud and clear, YOUR WIFE IS NOT YOUR MOTHER! She does not have the power to withhold your masculinity because she is not the keeper of the apples. She needs your masculinity to shelter her femininity. She needs you to be the man that God called you to be so that she can have the security to be the woman God called her to be.

This path can turn into a secretive secluded addiction to pornography. You can have the cherry, all the while thinking it is an apple, without the danger of rejection. But this is a double killer. It kills your masculinity because it enhances and weakens your insecurity as a man.

By seeking apples in this fashion, you are actually poisoning the ground where your apple tree is to be planted, preventing the chance that any apples would have to grow, and you are partaking of a cheap imitation of a cherry, not the real thing. So you are killing your ability to recognize a true cherry from the imitation. So within the secretive world of pornography, you kill two fruit trees with one axe, leaving you with cheap imitations, and a truck load of insecurity.

Musings on Masculine Spirituality pt3

There are men who need to have a bigger and better trophy than the last. Men are warriors by nature, something that we will explore a bit later. We love… no…NEED to battle something, even if it is just a little white ball on a tee. And that is part of the apple we are seeking. Many men will search for this illusive apple within the arena of sports. We get to see concrete victory on a large screen with numbers on it. We did better than they did; we are better men than they are. We have the apples and they do not, the proof is in the stats/score/applause/praise. Maybe we don’t play, but we are fans of a team or a player. If we have the right labels (T-shirts, bumperstickers, Hats etc…) then the world will see that we have an apple.

Men can easily become addicted to the praise and affirmation they get from sports. Again, there is nothing wrong with a pear, a cherry, or even, in this case, a peach; they taste good. The mistake we make is confusing one fruit for another — a peach for an apple. So many men are convinced that a peach is an apple that even though they cannot perform in this area, they will identify with those who do and develop an unhealthy addiction to sports heroes or teams. I know many men who love the taste of peaches, eat peaches often, and do so in a healthy manner, knowing that they are not going to receive an apple from it. This is great. It is when we seek our apples in a peach orchard that problems arise.

There is a dark side to peaches as well, the addictive world of sports “fan-dom”. Sports aren’t bad. They can be a source of recreation, relaxation, and connection. But many men develop an unhealthy addiction to sports, thinking that they can receive an apple from them. Many guys cast aside their responsibilities to take care of their worlds that God has given them (stewardship). They trade their real world for a virtual one. There is nothing intrinsically evil about the peaches. It is the mistaking of an apple for a peach that gets men trapped.

The battle side of men can take us in one of two ways. One: it can fan our competitive natures in such a way that if we do not win we do not obtain our apple. Two: Our competitive natures can be rendered impotent because we know that a peach is not an apple, so we are very passive and do not battle for anything. Guess what, there are some things worth fighting for, and there are some things not worth fighting for. Wisdom to know the difference is critical, and the beginning of wisdom is...well, we’re coming to that soon enough.

Musings on Masculine Spirituality pt2

Far too many men think that they can draw their masculinity from something other than the masculine. Masculinity is the stamp of approval that says we have what it takes as a man to take on the world. You can only get this stamp of approval from those who have experienced it. You can only give away what you possess. Most men in the West do not possess this true, healthy form of masculinity, so they cannot instill it into the next generation. In short, masculinity bestows masculinity. Apples bear apples. If masculinity is an apple, and the men who can bestow it upon others are apple trees, then, many men are searching for an apple from a pear tree. What does this look like?

Work/Boss| For many men, they did not receive adequate “masculinity training”, so they search for that approval within an authority figure. If the boss can give a sales ring, a promotion, more vacation time, or a raise, then we feel as though, for a moment, we have been handed an apple from an apple tree, when, in reality, we were handed a pear from a pear tree. We believe that we have received the approval we have been looking for, but, in reality, it is only a pacifier. We know deep down that it is only fleeting. This may be what Jesus is referred to when he said, “What does it profit a man to gain the whole world, but lose his soul?” What would we gain from getting a pear tree when what we are searching for is apples?

The boss is probably in the same boat as the rest of us — looking for approval from someone higher up on the ladder. That is why they say it is lonely at the top. You have no one to receive your pears from anymore, and then you realize that you were not looking for pears in the first place. Maybe reaching the top is just as bad as reaching the bottom. Jesus said the first shall be last, and the last shall be first.

Pears are good. It is good to work, and get promotions and raises. It is good to have a boss you can look up to. It is good to receive praise and give praise in the workplace. Pears are good fruit, BUT it is not good to mistake a pear for an apple. It is a potentially fatal mistake that could cost you your soul and your masculinity.

Musings on Masculine Spirituality pt1

The Apple tree: Men are searching for an apple. Not only are we searching for an apple, but we are looking to plant an apple tree right in our own front yard so that we do not have to go looking all the time when we need an apple. I have decided to use this illustration to make an abstract idea a little more concrete. Put bluntly, men are searching for their masculinity; “the stamp of approval that we have what it takes to take on the world”, the inner confidence that we are indeed men to be reckoned with, strong, capable, and wise. This is the apple. Unfortunately, men are looking in all the wrong places. We are looking to the pear trees, cherry trees, peach trees, and orange trees to give us the apple we are searching for. But only apple trees bear apples. Masculinity only comes from masculinity.

Also, most men do not have a point of reference in which to draw their spirituality. Spirituality is the actions we take to settle or fill the inner madness, the unquiet, the built-in discontentment, the inner drive for something bigger, the “God shaped hole,” the search for our identity, to put it in one word; fulfillment. And since men are masculine, searching for the approval and bestowing of the masculine, men experience a masculine spirituality. Masculine spirituality then is: what men do to search for and fulfill their identity as men.

Everything that men do to find this identity is spiritual by nature. Whatever we do in search of our apple is our masculine spirituality. This can be a healthy spirituality leading to life, security, and health, or it can be an unhealthy spirituality leading to death, insecurity, and degradation. Searching for the apple is a healthy thing, a natural thing, something we were created to do. All men are involved in the search. Searching for the apple among other fruit trees, or mistaking other fruit for an apple is where many men fall flat on their faces in failure.

Far too many men think that they can draw their masculinity from something other than the masculine. If masculinity is the stamp of approval that you have what it takes as a man to take on the world, then you can only get this stamp of approval from those who have experienced it. You can only give away what you possess. Most men today do not possess masculinity, so they cannot instill it into the next generation. In short, masculinity bestows masculinity. Apples bear apples. If masculinity is an apple, and the men who can bestow it upon others are apple trees, then, unfortunately many men are searching for an apple from a pear tree, their work.

So, Here we go again

I am giving this blog thing a new try. Stay tuned for updates.

Let the resurrected Christ within you burst from the tomb! Let Christ live the resurrected life through you.

Community with unrealistic expectation will lead to pain.

I am off to a conference for my masters degree this week. I'll update periodically.

WARNING: you will cry

if a 6 year old can leave a legacy like this...
What are we capable of?

Verse of the Day

1 John 4:16-21
God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them. And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face him with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world. Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love. We love each other because he loved us first. If someone says, “I love God,” but hates a Christian brother or sister, that person is a liar; for if we don’t love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we cannot see? And he has given us this command: Those who love God must also love their Christian brothers and sisters.

So much for letting Jesus sort out all this mess after we die. Let's start sorting now.

Poetry Hour: The Calf Path

The Calf-Path
by Sam Walter Foss (1858-1911)

One day, through the primeval wood,
A calf walked home, as good calves should;
But made a trail all bent askew,
A crooked trail, as all calves do.

Since then three hundred years have fled,
And, I infer, the calf is dead.
But still he left behind his trail,
And thereby hangs my moral tale.

The trail was taken up next day
By a lone dog that passed that way;
And then a wise bellwether sheep
Pursued the trail o’er vale and steep,
And drew the flock behind him, too,
As good bellwethers always do.

And from that day, o’er hill and glade,
Through those old woods a path was made,
And many men wound in and out,
And dodged and turned and bent about,
And uttered words of righteous wrath
Because ’twas such a crooked path;
But still they followed — do not laugh —
The first migrations of that calf,
And through this winding wood-way stalked
Because he wobbled when he walked.

This forest path became a lane,
That bent, and turned, and turned again.
This crooked lane became a road,
Where many a poor horse with his load
Toiled on beneath the burning sun,
And traveled some three miles in one.

And thus a century and a half
They trod the footsteps of that calf.
The years passed on in swiftness fleet.
The road became a village street,
And this, before men were aware,
A city’s crowded thoroughfare,
And soon the central street was this
Of a renowned metropolis;
And men two centuries and a half
Trod in the footsteps of that calf.

Each day a hundred thousand rout
Followed that zigzag calf about,
And o’er his crooked journey went
The traffic of a continent.

A hundred thousand men were led
By one calf near three centuries dead.
They follow still his crooked way,
And lose one hundred years a day,
For thus such reverence is lent
To well-established precedent.

A moral lesson this might teach
Were I ordained and called to preach;
For men are prone to go it blind
Along the calf-paths of the mind,
And work away from sun to sun
To do what other men have done.

They follow in the beaten track,
And out and in, and forth and back,
And still their devious course pursue,
To keep the path that others do.

They keep the path a sacred groove,
Along which all their lives they move;
But how the wise old wood-gods laugh,
Who saw the first primeval calf!
Ah, many things this tale might teach —
But I am not ordained to preach.

From: http://holyjoe.org/poetry/foss3.htm

Quote of the Day

The contemplative mind has the humility and patience to think “both/and” instead of “all or nothing.” We call this non-dual thinking. It easily leads to a “Third Way” mentality, neither fight nor flight, but standing in between where I can hold what I do know together with what I don’t know. And then I let that wonderful mix lead me to wisdom instead of easy, quick knowledge which largely just creates opinionated people instead of wise people.

-Richard Rohr

Interesting

Very interesting interview on the difference between American Christians and Cultural Christians of Denmark, all from the standpoint of an atheist!

Busy Schedule

I have been a bit too busy to post much. Things going on:

1. Teaching on a weekly basis on the book of Ephesians
2. Playing guitar in worship band
3. Renovating our youth program
4. Preparing for Guatemala 2010
5. Writing sermon series for November
6. Hunting
7. Masters Degree in Spiritual Formation
8. Getting the home ready for winter

That is off the top of my head.

I am going to have to live what I teach here soon. I always ask, "Is this pace sustainable?" If the answer is no, then I have to ask a very important question, "How will it end?"

There are two options:
1. I choose to slow down to a pace I can sustain
2. Life slows my pace down for me i.e. sickness, burnout, etc...

I believe that there are seasons in which busyness will happen. But I also believe that busyness should not be the normal.

Just some thoughts before I go to bed.

Can You Pray This Prayer?

DANG!

nicely put

www.thisisindexed.com

Narcissism is alive and well

narcissism is alive and well in the church. Let me illustrate with a parable:

A dinner host invite someone over to their house for dinner, they talk and laugh and connect very well. Then the food is served. they have a salad appetizer, followed by a course of chicken, carrots, mashed potatoes, a roll, and 2% milk. they follow this up with cherry pie alamode for dessert. They laugh, talk, and connect some more.

The next time they are invited over, they refuse to come because the host served 2% milk, they instead like 1/2% milk.

They lose all of the fellowship and community that comes with the dinner experience because of a petty personal preference with milk.

The dinner host is God
The house is church
The dinner is the worship experience
appetizer = preparation for worship
dinner = worship experience: prayer, singing, message
dessert = fellowship after service is over
milk = worship music style

The purpose of the dinner experience is to get to know the host, the actual food is a vehicle for fellowship. When we make the dinner experience about the food, we lose sight of the purpose of the dinner experience and become irrelevant, unused, narcissistic Christians.

Paul wrote of this in Timothy, and includes an encouragement for the leaders who are over such people; and I like the message version best:
In a well-furnished kitchen there are not only crystal goblets and silver platters, but waste cans and compost buckets—some containers used to serve fine meals, others to take out the garbage. Become the kind of container God can use to present any and every kind of gift to his guests for their blessing.
Run away from infantile indulgence. Run after mature righteousness—faith, love, peace—joining those who are in honest and serious prayer before God. Refuse to get involved in inane discussions; they always end up in fights. God's servant must not be argumentative, but a gentle listener and a teacher who keeps cool, working firmly but patiently with those who refuse to obey. You never know how or when God might sober them up with a change of heart and a turning to the truth, enabling them to escape the Devil's trap, where they are caught and held captive, forced to run his errands.

Masters Degree

Today marks the day that I start my Masters Degree! I have been wanting to go back to school for some time now, and really since last years missions trip to Mississippi, it has been very strong.

I applied at Spring Arbor for the Masters in Spiritual Formation and Leadership and was accepted. Today marks the first day of school, which is all online! Here is a description of the program from their site:

"With interest in spiritual formation increasing over the last twenty years among Protestants, evangelical denominations have expanded the concept of discipleship to include an openness toward deeper transformation in the likeness of Christ.

Spring Arbor University’s Master of Arts in Spiritual Formation and Leadership (MSFL) program merges the longstanding principles of Christian spiritual formation and growth with an evangelical perspective on discipleship. The program provides instruction for pastors, lay persons and others intent on their own development and fostering the skills to lead others in formation.

The MSFL program follows a hybrid format (partially online, partially in person) and is based on Renovaré’s six streams of faith and practice. Your studies will include retreats, seminars and online coursework. Complete the first two years—31 credits—for the certificate in spiritual formation and leadership. Complete all three years—45 credits—for the master’s degree. The program is delivered through cohort groups of students who progress through the degree requirements sequentially.

It’s a program designed to fit into your life, but will require significant time in your weekly schedule. We say this unapologetically since anything worth doing usually requires prioritizing our time. Time with God is no exception. It is an online degree designed to ensure that you will get to know God, your classmates and have the support of your professors.

The learning outcomes of the program will provide a strong grounding in historical knowledge, in-depth instruction in the practice of spiritual formation, and preparation for leading others in these practices."

The Root of Disappointment with God

Ht Noel

Video of the Day

What is that? (Τι είναι αυτό;) 2007 from MovieTeller on Vimeo.