A Masculine Crisis answered by a Masculine Calling (Part 1)
By Jay Wegter
I. The Crisis
Is “Crisis” too strong of a word for the leadership challenge facing the church?
No, our churches today are filled with spiritually immature, weak men who are not fulfilling their proper role in the Body. They have handed over their scriptural responsibilities to a professional minister. So, the very process of sanctification in the lives of our leading men is hindered. The hyper-structuralism (which accompanies professionalism) makes it hard for people to discover their gifts or to exercise loving service (Alexander Strauch, Biblical Eldership, p. 9).
Perhaps the greatest weakness in the body of Christ today is that we have relinquished and surrendered our responsibility to discipline (disciple) one another (Prov 9:8) (Rom 15:14). (Walt Hendrichsen, Disciples are made not Born, p. 74). While evangelical churches are filling up with spectators, they are emptying out of disciple-makers. Bill Hull (The Disciple-making Pastor) elaborates: “I believe the crisis of the church is one of product, the kind of people being produced.” What can we do to improve the quality of the product? “I propose the solution to be the obedience to Christ’s commission to ‘make disciples,’ to teach Christians to obey everything Christ commanded” (Bill Hull in Mark Shaw, 10 Great Ideas from Church History, p. 135).
The church is painfully in need of leaders. The overriding need of the church is to discharge its obligation to the rising generation for a leadership that is authoritative, spiritual, and sacrificial. The natural or carnal view of leadership is often viewed as a product of natural endowments or traits of personality accompanied by intellectual capacity, force of will, and enthusiasm. Such talents and scholastic attainments may greatly enhance leadership, but those are not the factors of paramount importance in the spiritual leader.
Spiritual leadership is a unique form of hard work. It is unlike other forms of labor such as construction, accounting, sales management, or engineering. The man who leads spiritually is likened to a shepherd. He will have to learn to deal with sheep who are rebellious, self-willed, divisive, prone to straying, vulnerable, deceived, back-biters, and stuck. What a high calling this is, for our Lord has given us His own life as an example to follow—a life which perfectly blends encouragement, patience, love, truth, grace and firmness (1 Pet 2:20-25). These qualities are best learned in a relational space of discipleship and mentoring.
Without this personal training in practical theology, Christian men have little experience or practice in turning doctrine into life. What is most common is for men to aspire to a truncated form of masculinity defined solely by cultural standards. Thus, we find that most Christian men measure their manhood solely by their ability to protect, to provide covering, shelter and so on—all the while abdicating their God-given calling to be spiritual influencers of others. The consequences are immense. When men abandon that role of influencing others spiritually, the vacuum tends to be filled by women. The male abdication of the role of spiritual influencer sets up the church for a feminized spirituality in which women step into the void, assuming spiritual leadership (but, it is most commonly a spiritual leadership without theology). We see this problem in our churches—it has become pandemic. Without men engaged in ‘theologizing’, the church becomes weak and essentially harmless to the powers of darkness, and the sacrifices necessary to fulfill the Great Commission become scarce, if not altogether absent.
‘Theologizing’ is defined as the diligent study and discussion of sound doctrine in order to apply it to all of life. Theologizing involves developing ‘first-hand’ biblical convictions and articulating them to others. Men are called to be ‘truth-brokers’; to be truth speakers as a lifestyle. When men theologize, they are declaring who God is and they are explaining how life works in God’s world. Theologizing is absolutely essential in learning to live wisely unto God in a fallen world.
There are inherent soul-destroying dangers to men who are living in a culture which has made a peace treaty with sin. It is all too common for professing Christian men to have allowed patterns of unresolved sin, sustained guilt, and ruling lusts to slay their God-given ‘internal warriors’ of masculinity. The result is that we are seeing generations of cowed, subdued, passive males who are not paragons of righteousness. God intends that masculinity function in a thrusting, commanding way—demonstrating moral authority accompanied by loving servant leadership. He has given men what we can designate ‘internal warriors’. These warriors are designed to carry out a man’s masculine function of protection, provision, and influence. But, for most Christian men, the internal warriors which are meant to take initiative in the activity of spiritual influence lie prostrate in a useless comatose condition.
The good news is that as we feed on doctrine, loving the truth, and responding in repentance, our internal warriors are ‘resurrected’ (a metaphor describing the recovery of godly masculinity). As that takes place, all of the masculine aspects of godliness can come forth and be expressed. Then believing men will begin taking risks for the sake of Christ and making hard, sacrificial choices for the sake of the Kingdom. Godly manhood is essential if men are to be defenders of principle, contending earnestly for the truth (Jude 3). Godly manhood makes men willing to speak into the lives of others in life on life soul care (and when necessary, also speak to those in the body who living in compromise with sin—see Romans 15:14; 2 Timothy 4:2; 2 Thessalonians 3:14-15).
II. The Calling
How are men to be called to spiritual leadership?
One of the most critical needs in churches today is for more men to take seriously their God-ordained responsibility to lead and serve in the church (Strauch, Biblical Eldership, pp. 4-5). The call to spiritual leadership is to all believing men, not just to pastors; every believing man needs this perspective. When calling men to spiritual leadership, we seek to persuade them that every Christian man needs to develop the following mindset in order to find his rightful role in the church. “I am gifted to be a spiritual blessing to my brethren. I will abandon the sidelines and risk entering the center of the fray, even if it costs me my pride and comfort. My brethren need the ministry that Christ died to accomplish through me. My willingness to assume leadership in the church is a gender-specific command that is obligatory upon all believing men.”
Christ’s calling is upon ordinary working men: In Acts chapter 20 Luke writes that the Spirit of God placed ordinary working men in the local church as overseers to pastor the flock of God. If this God-given work is taken away from qualified men because of false ideas about ministry (as if it were reserved for professionals), then they will never take their rightful place in God’s program. Nor will they mature as they ought or bear their yoke of responsibility given by God, or enter the spiritual battle as they ought to enter (Strauch, p. 9).
Where are churches to find enough qualified shepherds? Every church is called to develop a ‘pool’ of spiritual leaders.
In the book of Acts we have the story or account of the birth, growth, and re-duplication of the church at Antioch (Acts 11:19-30; 13:1-4; 14:21-28). It shows us how a church is transformed from being a mission field into a mission’s board. And that transformation hinges on two phases of the maturing church raising up a godly pool of men who are functioning pastors/shepherds out from whom God can send new missionaries. God uses men who are already serving in a church to be the well-attested representatives of that church in mission’s ventures (Bruce Stabbert, The Team Concept, pp. 63-64).
Our Lord is issuing a call to all believing men to embrace the vision for spiritual leadership. It is a misinformed assumption to imagine every elder as a seminary graduate. So how can qualified elders/shepherds/lay pastors be obtained? It starts by envisioning indigenous leaders as the primary source for elders, then we begin to see the potential of discipling the men who are already in our churches. Such men have formerly never been taught or challenged to grow into the responsibilities of eldership—that must change (Stabbert, pp. 87-89).
The NT model is the raising up of indigenous shepherds—discipling men to be elders/lay shepherds. Remember, when men are discipled from the congregation there will be no need to ‘capture’ a number of seminary graduates. The church becomes in itself a training ground for future missionaries who in turn can be sent out by the Spirit from that place to serve elsewhere. Men can be prepared in their congregations for the ministry functions required of Timothy. Remember elders were appointed after these congregations had existed only a very short time. It did not seem a liability to Paul that these men had not gone to seminary in Jerusalem before they were elders. Through Bible training and discipleship men can receive the tools which are requisite to the deepest Bible teaching.
The man who is maturing toward becoming an elder will be an expositor of the Word, an example to others, and an equipper of the saints (Steven Van Horn, “What it means to be an Ephesians 4 Pastor”). We reiterate that when it comes to being an example, the man of God is always about the business of ‘closing the gap’ between what he believes, and how he lives. He guards against hypocrisy by frequent repentance—by which he seeks to match truth and life in his walk. He is well aware that his aspiration to be a faithful man is not primarily a goal of personal improvement, but actually a function of obedience to Christ Himself.
Central to empowering men is casting the vision for mature godly manhood. Christian men must develop into champions of the Word, into ‘truth-brokers’.
Adam’s original calling was not only to subdue the earth and make it fruitful by bringing order to it; he also was to raise-up God-revering communities by consistently proclaiming, and modeling obedience to God’s Word. So, a huge part of our masculine calling is turning theology into life. But, because this biblical vision is so often neglected, the majority of men in our churches today are only capable of a spiritual diet of milk. Without a commitment to theologizing, one cannot develop the ‘spiritual enzymes’ needed to digest spiritual meat:
Concerning Him we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is an infant. But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil (Heb 5:11-14).
Men have a unique calling to be teachers in their homes and in their churches. There is no other way to have strong churches. Doing theology is a uniquely masculine endeavor because theology is the life-transforming content of spiritual leadership. “Holding fast the faithful word which is in accordance with the teaching, so that he will be able both to exhort in sound doctrine and to refute those who contradict” (Titus 1:9). “But as for you, speak the things which are fitting for sound doctrine” (Titus 2:1). “Contend earnestly. . .” (Jude 3).
The real issue is that Christian men have a transcendent calling—a calling from God which transcends the temporal issues, cares, and responsibilities of life. We can refer to this transcendent cause as God’s call upon their lives to major in divine truth so that that the Word of God is brought to bear on all of life. Thus, men are to be stewards of the great truths (entrusted with) by which they are to order their lives and consequently, live wisely unto God.
This masculine transcendent calling is not merely private piety; it is to be public in every sense of the word.
Theology is the heart of worldview, and men, in their theologizing are to be stewards of biblical worldview. God’s truth is to be pressed down upon the things which matter most so that one’s life and the lives of those around us are transformed by the principles of Scripture.
So, men, you need to study doctrine. You need to systematically study theology, because it is the power of doctrine applied that will empower you to take every thought captive in obedience to Christ (2 Cor 10:3-5). It is the power of doctrine spoken that will enable you to bring others closer to Christ. This is the only way biblical manhood is going to grow to that proper place of expression in all of a man’s relationships (1 Tim 4:16).
So, as men apply themselves to theology, their full-orbed godly masculinity increases. By reasoning our way through biblical doctrine, and applying that doctrine to life, we are theologizing—we are bringing big thoughts of God to the world around us. We are majoring in the ‘big picture’—and as a result our lives will possess an attraction which draws other men into this transcendent vision for life. This is what it means to fulfill our biblical calling as men. In the process, we become able to spiritually influence others for the sake of Christ.
III. The Cost
Who is the ‘faithful man’ spoken of in 2 Timothy 2:2? Every Christian man ought to aspire to being the kind of man who is a disciple, and who shepherds. There is a cost to being a ‘faithful man’, the following qualities must be present.
The first quality of a faithful man is stewarding the sacred trust of Scripture. “Retain the standard of sound words which you have heard from me, in the faith and love which are in Christ Jesus. Guard, through the Holy Spirit who dwells in us, the treasure which has been entrusted to you” (2 Tim 1:13-14). This quality addresses your relationship to God through Scripture and your handling of the Word in your ministry. In this quality, there is an attitude of heart which ought to characterize every Christian man: “I cannot live without the Bible. I have to know what it means. I have committed myself to study it and understand it because I can’t live without it—my life is utterly dependent upon it.”
That’s called building upon the Rock (Mt 7:24ff.). The faithful man’s attitude is: “My relationship to the Word is my lifeline in my walk with God. The Word feeds my faith and worship; the Word gets me to God in communion and fellowship. I have to apply the Bible to my life and allow it to define and order every area of my life, prioritizing my world, and controlling my affections and decisions. I will walk by the Spirit so as to make it my ambition to be pleasing to the Lord (2 Cor 5:9). I will see myself as living in the presence of God, presenting myself back to Him daily because He bought me and I am not my own, He has taken possession of me” (Rom 6:11-13; 1 Cor 6:19-20).
As a man continues to grow, navigating and plotting his course by the Word of God, there will be countless course corrections. Thus, the godly man practices ongoing repentance as he frequently adjusts his heading to the imperatives of Scripture. He seeks the Lord in the Word and in prayer and he is constantly aware of the grace of God restoring, renewing, and rectifying his life. Out of gospel promises believed and lived, comes an ethical lifestyle of sanctification characterized by conformity to the truth and Christian service (Rom 12:1-2).
Many believing men are merely brushing up against Scripture, but not preaching its truth to their own souls. Permit an illustration: you can admire a hot juicy steak, have your appetite stimulated by its smell, but in order to gain nutritional value from it, you must chew it very finely. In order for its proteins to benefit the human body, a complex series of digestive steps take place. Once swallowed it is mixed with a host of enzymes which break down its components until at last it is reduced to the molecular level so that it can be assimilated into the bloodstream via the small intestine. So also, there is ‘digestive’ work to be done in order to have Scripture become a part of us: observation, interpretation, correlation, and application. All four are involved in believing, knowing, understanding, and loving the truth in order to do the truth.
The second quality of a faithful man is to have a life that is dominated by Christ’s grace (gospel-driven, gospel-saturated). Paul commands Timothy to “be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus” (2 Tim 2:1). This is the foundation for an effective ministry. “Our sufficiency is of God” (2 Cor 3:5). We receive this ongoing grace through Christ from the throne of grace— we obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need (Heb 4:16). The faithful man is conversant with his gracious resources in the gospel.
Grace also comes from getting to know Christ experientially (His faithfulness, love, and lordship). “Grace and peace be multiplied to you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord” (2 Pet 1:2). Our knowledge of the Lord increases as we appropriate and take advantage of His grace through prayer, worship, devotion to His Word, and communion with Him. Grace also comes to the humble (1 Pet 5:5-6).
The third quality of a faithful man is that he must also be committed to the ministry of multiplication as illustrated in 2 Timothy 2:2: “The things which you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, entrust these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.” Commit is in the imperative. The NT Greek, paratithami, means to place to another’s trust, entrust, to deposit, to commit for safe keeping. Commit to ‘faithful men’—men who are in the Word of God, for faith comes by hearing (Rom 10:17). Select men who can be trusted. Paul also stresses in this verse that they should be able to teach others also. First, teachable, then able and desirous to teach others—that is part and parcel of multiplication.
Many (the majority of men) men who are ‘faithful’ in church attendance and in helping at special functions are NOT passing on what they have heard and learned. When selecting faithful men, you must find a man who is both teachable, AND holding a strong heart’s desire to share the Scriptures. In other words, he has the vision for multiplication. In every church, there are men (perhaps the majority) who have never been challenged or shown how to transmit biblical truths to other effectively. The disciple-maker first learns how to do this; then he learns how to teach others to do it (Wayne Moore, Multiplying Disciples, pp. 52-53).
The fourth quality needed by a multiplier/discipler is the discipline for a life that pleases God. For, we are on earth for His pleasure (Rev 4:11). “Suffer hardship with me, as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No soldier in active service entangles himself in the affairs of everyday life, so that he may please the one who enlisted him as a soldier” (2 Tim 2:3-4). Discipleship is not an easy, laid back, go with the flow, or ‘let’s just hang out’ endeavor. It is a demanding life—in four verses (2:3-6) there are three metaphors which signal what is needed to finish well and bring to harvest. The soldier depicts undistracted focus; absolute dedication (vv. 3-4). The athlete pictures disciplined training and an adherence to the rules of competition (v. 5). The farmer image reveals that diligence is accompanied by patience and trust that God will enable our labors to be fruitful (v. 6).
The discipler is to expect hardness, and to successfully endure it, he must not complain or seek to escape into illicit pleasure when the going gets tough. A soldier of Christ is under orders, goal-oriented, and obedient to his Supreme Commander. We need discipline in order to live this kind of life; for the ‘faithful man’ is not a quitter no matter how tough things become.
The fifth quality needed is a clean, available life (vessel). “Now in a large house there are not only gold and silver vessels, but also vessels of wood and of earthenware, and some to honor and some to dishonor. Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from these things, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified, useful to the Master, prepared for every good work. Now flee from youthful lusts and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart” (2 Tim 2:20-23).
God commands that we pursue Christian character with all of their might: “Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness, and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Pet 1:5-8). We must have the lives to back up what we speak; proving to be the examples to the flock of godly manhood (1 Pet 5:1-5).