Building new Gauges

Morning everyone. May you all have a blessed week ahead,move from strength to strength and conquer the challenges of this world!!!

Rom.12:2

We men love to measure things. And we have, at our disposal, highly accurate gauges for measuring just about anything, including the progress of our lives. I mean, we never have to wonder which careers are most prestigious; which jobs are most coveted; which neighborhoods are most exclusive; which vacations are most glamorous; which cars are most luxurious. Our culture makes sure its gauges remain well calibrated.

“Listen carefully . . . and be wary of the shrewd advice that tells you how to get ahead in the world . . .” (Mark 4:24 MSG)

The problem is, such things are not proper for measuring the progress of any life. There’s nothing wrong with careers or communities or cars, in-and-of themselves. They’re just not appropriate gauges in this context. Using them is like using a thermometer to measure the weight of a steel beam. It doesn’t work. Likewise, improper gauges won’t work for us, for measuring our lives as men. We must create and calibrate new gauges, ones that can properly measure our lives, because they measure the right stuff—like how we’re doing as husbands, as fathers, as friends, as neighbors; and how we’re doing toward becoming the men God intends us to become.

Okay, so what do we do?

Build new gauges for yourself, brother, ones that measure things like . . . how many nights you are home for dinner; or how often you sit down and pray with your wife or girlfriend; or how often you have conversations with your sons or daughters about their dreams or their fears; or how often you meet with brothers in community; or how often you drop what you’re doing to spend time with friends in need. Get practical. Build a simple spreadsheet, for example. Or create a calendar. Do what makes sense for you, but start measuring, today.

Emerging from Isolation

Mathew 18:20

Imagine, for a moment, a man, ever isolated, living alone in the mountains perhaps. Imagine him living a vigorous, adventurous, spiritual life, but lacking community. The knowledge this man would have of God, the knowledge he’d have of himself, would be modest compared to the knowledge he’d have of both, were he to have full access to relationships, friendships, brotherhood.

You see, the isolated man may know about God. But, no matter how much he might read and study, he cannot know God. That takes community. We get to know God by seeing his Holy Spirit moving in others. We encounter God, we experience Him, we understand Him when He works through the love and sacrifice of other people. In brotherhood, we get to show God to one another. And, the more we’re in community with brothers, the deeper our understanding becomes.

The isolated man may also know about himself—his talents, his likes, his dislikes. But, he cannot know himself. He cannot know the man God intends him to become. That too takes community. It takes others around him, who know his story, who spend time with him, who watch him, to discern and affirm and call forth things true and eternal in him, things God longs for to emerge. It takes brotherhood to call forth the true man.

Okay, so what do we do?

Though we live in cities and towns, many of us are yet like the man isolated in the mountains. We know about God, but we don’t know Him. We know the men we’d like to be, but we don’t know the men He created us to be. This message, right now, is another call for brotherhood. It’s a call for you, brother, to get into community with other men. Find some brothers; find your place.

Words of Honour

Rom.12:10

To honour someone is to build them up, to give them a sense of their worth. Prevailing culture teaches us our worth is weighed by worldly measures. And so, “honouring” becomes hero worship—elevating those good at projecting worldly success and marginalizing those of us with flawed lives, with failures in our past, or who are simply unable or unwilling to devote enough effort to convincing the world of our success. This type of “honouring” is not what God intends. We lead each other astray when we engage in it, because the focus is so wrong.

“Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.” (Colossians 3:2)

To honour someone as God intends is to build them up and give them a sense of their true worth. It’s trying to see them as God sees them. It’s pushing right through the confusion of worldly measures—successes, failures, talents, faults, wealth, poverty, titles, appearances—looking for evidence of what God has done in and through them, and what He’s doing currently. And, finally, most importantly, it’s telling them what we see. Our edifying, encouraging words to one another are gifts from God. He allows us to give them to one another . . . and we must.

Okay, so what do we do?

Ask God to help you see those around you as He sees them. Look for how He’s working in and through them. And . . . then . . . tell . . . them. Tell them what you see. We men tend to struggle with the telling. We can be married for years, or in community with other men for years, and never simply tell those closest to us what we see in them. So, pick someone this week and tell them what you see. Honour them with a glimpse of his/her true worth.

Danger is your business

Ps.56:4

Our King, Jesus Christ, calls us to a new kind of life, His kind of life. “Follow me” is quoted more than fifteen times in the Gospels. Following Him, however, goes against prevailing culture—for which safety and security are utmost priorities. The kind of life to which Jesus calls us is not safe, nor secure. Here’s a report from a man, the Apostle Paul, who lived it:

“Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure.” (2 Corinthians 11:24-27)

God didn’t design Paul for safe or secure; nor did He us. We’re all designed for big, dangerous lives: “. . . for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control” (2 Timothy 1:7).

Okay, so what do we do?

Insert your name into 2 Timothy 1:7:

“. . . for God gave [ . . . you . . . ] a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.”

Read it through again. Now, fast-forward to the end of your life, imagine friends and family saying that of you: “He was fearless. He had power and love and self-control.” What do you need to begin now, to ensure those words then? What bold changes will you make? Remember, your days are numbered (Psalm 90:12). Commit, brother, to make at least one change this week.

Blessed to Bless

Luke 6:38

Have you been blessed? [Pause for a moment to consider.] What’s your reaction to that question? Is it easy to see how and how much you’ve been blessed? Or is it difficult, especially with so many people around who’ve been blessed more? Well, make no mistake; all of us have been blessed (Genesis 1:28). I mean, do you have a job, some money, enough to eat, a safe place to live, family, some friends, a church, or an education? It may be in unique ways and in varying degrees, but we’ve all been blessed . . . abundantly.

So how then should we think about these blessings? I mean, how can we reconcile the fact that we’ve been blessed with so much—so much more than countless men and women alive right now in other parts of this country and around the world?

The only way to think about our blessings, brother, is to view them as means to bless others. And the only way to view ourselves, then, is blessed to bless others. You see, knowing what we do about God and about his intentions for us (Matthew 22:36-39), how could we ever conclude otherwise? How could we ever conclude that we’ve been blessed simply so that we may live in comfort and security and isolation? What kind of story would that be, anyway? No, we must view these blessings as personal invitations into God’s much greater story of blessing other people.

Okay, so what do we do?

Take a few minutes to note the specific ways you’ve been blessed this year. Focus your mind on seeing the true blessings, especially the ones that you might have gotten used to and begun taking for granted. Write them down and spend some time in prayer, thanking God for what he’s given you.

Go Small to Go Big

Gal.6:10

Once we’ve decided to do something, we men often like to “go big.” We think to ourselves: if we’re going to do this thing, let’s really do it. We can bring this kind of thinking, this “go big” mentality, to all kinds of work, even the work God calls us into—that is, the work of loving and serving others. Great things can result, of course. But the mentality can backfire, too—for example, when we set our ambitions too high, get overwhelmed, and can’t follow through. It’s interesting that, knowing us as he does, our King, Jesus Christ, suggests an opposite approach:

“This is a large work I’ve called you into, but don’t be overwhelmed by it. It’s best to start small. Give a cool cup of water to someone who is thirsty, for instance. The smallest act of giving or receiving makes you a true apprentice.” (Matthew 10:40-42 MSG)

Start small! Why does something rise up in our hearts against that approach? Well, it’s mostly because by “going big” we hope to grab a little glory for ourselves. We want others to see us and think well of us. And if we don’t “go big,” they might not actually see our accomplishments. But, Jesus reassures us: “You won’t lose out on a thing” (Matthew 10:42 MSG). We must trust his words and trust that God the Holy Spirit can do amazing things within even our smallest, most ordinary acts of love and service. And that’s plenty big for any of us.

Okay, so what do we do?

Look around, today and tomorrow, for people in need. People are hurting, people right around you. “Go to the lost, confused people right here in the neighborhood” (Matthew 10:5-8 MSG). Pick one person and blow them away with some help.

The 2m radius challenge

Haggai 1:5

What if the measure of a man’s life, in the end, isn’t how many hours he’d logged in pews on Sundays? What if it isn’t how many times he’d read through the Gospels? What if the measure is, rather, only how he’d treated people around him? What if it’s how well he’d noticed and met the needs of people who came into close proximity? Well, brother, if those aren’t the only things measured, they’ll certainly be among the most consequential.

“When the Son of Man comes in his glory . . . he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left.” (Matthew 25:31-33)

Our King, Jesus Christ, in his sheep-and-goats discourse, teaches that our lives will indeed be measured—and he tells us how. By doing that, ahead of time, before we’re actually gathered before him, he gives us a decision framework, one we can use during our lifetimes. On that day, he won’t ask for a church attendance record. He will ask how much we’ve used our lives for other people, especially those in need (Matthew 25:34-40).

Okay, so what do we do?

Throughout your day, today, imagine a circle—one with a 2-meter radius, you at the center. Notice who comes into that circle. Log their names. Notice and write down their needs—friendship, mercy, love, tough love, hope—and how you might help meet them.

(There’s nothing special about 2m. What matters is increasing intentionality. And, truly, a man could spend his entire lifetime just trying to meet the needs of people who’d come into his 2m circle—so, it’s a good place to start.)

Messing with your Heroes

Eph.5:1

Really? Is it so wrong for us to emulate the life of another man or woman? Is it so wrong to hold another person up, as a role model? Well, the answer is (as it often is) . . . it depends. It depends on what exactly, in the person, we long to emulate. If it’s Christlikeness only—if it’s only how the person demonstrates Jesus Christ to us and to others—then, no, it’s not so wrong. We’re meant to be, for one another, physical examples of how to follow Jesus ever more closely. Watching another person move further into the character of Christ helps us move further, too. That’s how it’s supposed to work. The Apostle Paul wrote: “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ” (1 Corinthians 11:1).

Too often, though, that’s not the way it actually works. Too often, we look up to men and women—and strive to emulate them—for the purpose of becoming more like them, and not more like Jesus. Too often, it’s worldly things that draw us in: a person’s success, their achievements, their talent, their career, their money, their power, their possessions. We men fall into this a lot. And the problem is the same whether the things coveted are secular or ecclesiastical in nature. We can lift any person too high: magnate or minister, entrepreneur or entertainer, priest or professor. We can lift them so high they begin to obscure Jesus.

Okay, so what do we do?

Hero worship is a sensitive subject. We men like our heroes. And we don’t like people to mess with them. We must be careful, though, that no person (great though they may be) gets between us and the ultimate hero. Examine your heart. Wrestle with the issue. Discuss it openly with some brothers—and with God, in prayer.

Who are your Heroes?

Mathew 4:10

We men like heroes. We like to look upward. We start early, as boys, looking up to men and women who do amazing things on grass and turf and hardwood and ice. As we get older, we shift our “looking up” to those who do amazing things in classrooms, board rooms, laboratories, legislatures . . . to those who speak and create and negotiate, to those who research and discover and write.

There’s nothing wrong with honoring and admiring other people. Something is wrong, though, when honoring or admiration becomes worship—when we devote our lives to becoming just like our heroes. You see, heroic images are false. They are false because they’re incomplete. Heroic images portray the good and obscure the bad. We think, “he’s got it together”—“great job, great wife, great bank account, great house” . . . “must be nice.” What we don’t see is what’s broken. Something always is: “For we all stumble in many ways” (James 3:2). Maybe it’s what was sacrificed in order to achieve the heroic image. Not realizing we’re misled, though, we decide to chase their images, to model our lives after theirs. Not realizing we’re misled, we end up imitating their brokenness.

When we worship heroes, we do like the ancient pagans who “exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator” (Romans 1:25). The truth is, no person, past or present, is worthy of our worship . . . except one.

Okay, so what do we do?

Who are your heroes? Have you ever walked the line between admiration and hero worship? Have you ever held another (broken) person in too high esteem? If you’ve crossed that line, simply confess it to God in prayer. And commit to worshiping no man but our worthy King, Jesus Christ.

With friends like these

James 2:1

We men tend toward partiality. Sometimes with forethought, many times with no thought, we give or withhold based upon characteristics of the potential recipients. We can, therefore, find ourselves directing all our time and attention, our kindness and generosity, toward only those who live, look, sound, spend, sin . . . like we do. This plays out in many areas of life and, therefore, many areas of faith—in service, giving, worship, and certainly in brotherhood. 

But James, brother of our King, Jesus Christ, cautioned us to oppose this tendency:

“For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in, and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, ‘You sit here in a good place,’ while you say to the poor man, ‘You stand over there,’ or, ‘Sit down at my feet,’ have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?” (James 2:2-4)

So, what’s wrong with partiality? Well, intending to or not, we harm people. We harm them by disregarding them, those whom God wants us to impact or serve or befriend, but who don’t quite make our cut (Proverbs 28:21). God put us here for one another (Matthew 22:39). Partiality means we forsake people who need us. And if that’s not bad enough, we harm ourselves. We cut ourselves off from relationships—and often the weightiest. You see, those we’re meant to impact are meant to impact us, right back.

Okay, so what do we do?

How’re you doing with this, brother? The test is simple—look around. Who are you spending time with? Whom are you serving? There should be people in your life who’re nothing like you. Are there?

Gotta get humble

Phil.2:3

Let’s first get straight on what “becoming humble” is not. It’s not trying to think poorly of ourselves or denigrating ourselves or anything like that. It actually involves taking the focus off ourselves. Becoming humble is checking our tendency to think ourselves better than others, or more important, valuable, worthy of time or mindshare or respect. Becoming humble is shutting down our tendency to "size people up” and position them on some scale—based on money, title, education, geography, whatever. Becoming humble is recognizing all people as the careful works of God, equally worthy of love and sacrifice.

Becoming humble is counterintuitive, and it moves against prevailing culture. You see, we men want to feel successful, important—and have others consider us so. Culture trains us, therefore, to promote ourselves; to be strategic with our time and attention; to let positions determine our treatment of others. This training is foolish. It misses the sense and strength of humbleness. 

Imagine someone humble. They’re often fearless, able to act on convictions, rather than trying to impress. Their decision-making is often sound, unclouded by insecurity or prejudice. They listen and welcome honest differences. They abide critics, crushed not by their criticism. They’re often magnetic, treating all people with respect. They engender loyalty, camaraderie. King Solomon wrote, “with the humble is wisdom” (Proverbs 11:2). We want to work with humble people. We want to work for them and have them work for us. We want them as spouses, friends. But, mostly, we should want to get humble ourselves.

Okay, so what do we do?

Practice humility. Choose something this week: initiate a conversation and listen more than you talk; serve in a way that’s mundane or difficult (unpleasant, even); help someone anonymously; give someone the credit they deserve (even if you deserve some too).

What's the bold move?

Morning everyone!!!! This is sooooo powerful!!!

Ps.118;6

James 2:14-18

“What’s the bold move?” It’s a question that should be asked often, in one form or another, when men gather in Christian community. It’s a question that challenges us to press our intellectual understanding of the truth of our King, Jesus Christ, into clear, practical action. It dares us to form Gospel words into living, breathing reality.

“What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? . . . Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works.” (James 2:14, 18)

When we men move boldly in faith it demonstrates—with our actions, with our lives—that we do indeed trust Jesus. It confirms that we’ll actually live our lives like we trust him. Maybe it’s finally deciding to draw clear work/home boundaries, despite ambition or difficulty; maybe it’s confessing some sin, despite embarrassment or awkwardness; maybe it’s giving money or time, despite greed or inconvenience; maybe it’s sharing our faith, despite discomfort or fear; or maybe it’s something else entirely. For each of us, there comes a time when we just must take action, must take risk. There comes a time when our faith mandates that action and risk are the only real options. And that’s when things begin to happen—big, breathtaking things—not because we seek them out necessarily, but because they’re the byproduct of lives that reflect faith.

Okay, so what do we do?

How might you live out your faith with a bold move? Choose something simple, near-term (i.e., this week), and achievable. If you’re in community with other men (and you should be), formulate your bold moves together, customized to each individual and circumstance. Then, keep one another accountable for executing them. This is one way communities of men must work.

Ready to go? Let's go!

Acts 21:11

Acts.19:21

When we follow him, God will—sooner or later—ask us to do something we don’t want to do, to go someplace we don’t want to go. Maybe his “ask” will come through a nudge or as a thought in prayer. Maybe it will come as a prompt while reading Scripture. Maybe through the encouraging or challenging words of a friend. However it comes, it will come.

After visiting Ephesus and Macedonia, the Apostle Paul got an “ask” from God the Holy Spirit to go on to Jerusalem (Acts 19:21). The Spirit warned him, however: if he went there, he’d be arrested. Paul’s friends begged him not to go. Paul answered: “What are you doing, weeping and breaking my heart? For I am ready not only to be imprisoned but even to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus” (Acts 21:13).

For us to become the men we were created to become, for us to become the men the world needs us to become, we must act with the same boldness and confidence. Paul was bold and confident because he trusted two things: God’s in charge and God’s good. We must trust those too. For they allow us, like Paul, to trust one thing more: our affirmative answers to God’s “asks” are ultimately good for us, good for others, and good for God’s Kingdom . . . and will very likely become the proudest moments of our lives. Indeed, these “asks” lead us into the very adventures for which we were created.

Okay, so what do we do?

What do you feel God might be asking of you, right now? Is there anything you just know he’s  prompting you, quietly, to do? If so, resolve to trust him. And today take a practical and measurable step—bold and confident—toward that thing.