The Quest For Authentic Manhood 2 - The Four Faces

THE QUEST FOR AUTHENTIC MANHOOD 2 - The Four Faces of Manhood

To start, I want you to listen to the words of Garrison Keeler, the humorist. He writes this: “Plato, St. Francis, Leonardo daVinci, Vince Lombardi, Yogi Berra -You don’t find guys of that caliber today. What you find is terrible gender anxiety. Guys desperately trying to be Mr. Right: the man who can bake a cherry pie; go shoot skeet; come back, toss the salad, converse intimately about intimate matters; cry if need by, laugh, hug, be vulnerable, perform passionately that night, and then the next day, go off and lift them bales and tote that barge. You know, trying to be Mr. Perfect, is a terrible way to spend your life.” I think what the world is needing from men today is a life of balance. A real man is a balance of 4 expressions. Today I’m going to give you four faces of manhood, each complementing the other; each synchronizing with the other; each balancing the other. And I think this is what the world is looking for, and I think in some ways, this is what we’re looking for. So let me give you the four faces of manhood. Here’s the first face: 1.

It is called the King Face. The face of the King.

The love of right over comfort and circumstances. It’s the face a man shows when he’s asked to cheat on a business deal. It’s the face a man shows when it comes time to keep his promise, although now keeping his promise is going to be extremely difficult. It’s the face a man shows when he makes good on his debt. The face shows when he risks his own life to save another person, or when he’s on a business trip and he’s propositioned by a female companion. It’s the face he shows when he could take advantage of someone else, but he chooses not to. Or he stands up to a good friend whose life is out of control, and risks the friendship in order to call the friend back to what is noble, and what is just. In the Bible you see that face reflected in the prophet Nathan who comes to King David to confront him about his secret adultery. Knowing that when he confronts the king, he’s laying it all on the line, and the king with just a word could either banish him from the kingdom forever, or have him put to death. And yet, he looks into the face of a king and says, “You are the man! And you’re wrong.”

Authentic Manhood - 2 Four Faces of Manhood

It’s also the face that King David who, in hearing the words of a righteous man, instead of saying ‘I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Ms. Bathsheba.’ In the midst of being confronted with the wrong, he put on the King Face. And he says, “I’ve sinned. You’re right; I’ve done wrong.” This face is characterized by a number of things. It’s characterized by strong convictions, courageous moral choices, a servant spirit, righteous leadership. And as I said, it doesn’t come easily. It is forged in the crucible of life. Now every guy here is in the process of developing or snuffing out the King Face in your life. Because it comes with those decisions – sometimes, like climbing a mountain, the small hills at the beginning of your life – and sometimes the issues get much greater and grander, but each time you scale the summit, the King Face grows stronger and brighter. You see that King Face in Scripture in verses like this: Proverbs 4:18, it says: “But the path of the righteous is like the light of the dawn that shines brighter and brighter until the full day.” Now I know when you read that verse, it’s a little bit poetic, but look at it for a moment. You know when you walk out of here the day’s going to dawning. We’ll have a beautiful day today. The sun will come up and it will grow stronger and stronger, and brighter, and brighter in its intensity through the day. The writer of Proverbs tells us that’s what righteousness is like in life. It grows stronger through life. A man who puts on the King Face grows stronger through his life. His life doesn’t fade. A lot of us, who have a little of age to us, know that – you know, there are a lot of exploits of guys in the early days who did a lot of things that were wrong. They thought it was cool to sleep around on their wife, or to party all night, or whatever. But you know, that kind of lifestyle over a period of time grows weaker through the years, doesn’t it? But not the righteous, they start with small light, and as life goes on, their manhood gets brighter and brighter until the full day. And that’s what the writer is saying here. He also says in Proverbs 20:7 these words; “A righteous man who walks in his integrity, how blessed are his sons after him.” Now for those of us who have sons, that should mean a lot. Because there are a lot of things you can give your sons: trips, gear, time with dad, showing up at his ballgame, big hugs, but what the writer of Proverbs is the thing that you can give your son the most is your integrity. This is what the King Face is all about; it’s a man who reflects righteous energy all through his life, and he grows brighter through the years. And you know what? By the time you get to be 50 and 60, and you look around, you don’t compare wealth and

Authentic Manhood - 2 Four Faces of Manhood

houses and cars so much anymore; you compare character. And your good name – if you still have one. That’s what the King Face is all about. 2

Then there’s a second face that a man wears. It’s called the Warrior Face.

It’s the warrior face that says, ‘We can take the company national! Let’s do it!’ It’s the Warrior Face that says ‘you know, I’m going to lose weight.’ And then it does. It’s the Warrior Face that says ‘I’m going to repay that debt, even though I don’t know how I’m going to get out of debt.’ We love warriors, don’t we? We love to celebrate men who are warriors. We celebrate the warriors in legendary figures like George Patton or Teddy Roosevelt or Alexander the Great, or William Wallace. We love to celebrate the warriors in business leaders like Ted Turner or Bill Gates or Donald Trump, or Sam Walton. Or sports warriors like Michael Jordan or Lance Armstrong, Tiger Woods. We go the movies and we enjoy seeing fictional warriors, like a gladiator, or even a real-life replay of real warriors, like Saving Private Ryan. All that stirs the soul of a man because there’s something within us that enjoys a good fight. And that’s the Warrior Face Now sometimes the Warrior Face can get out of control. Sometimes we can enjoy that in a humorous way and you guys know I love Dave Barry, or at least you will know before the year is over. And here’s an illustration of the Warrior Face kind of gone to the extreme. Dave Barry writes this column that says: “Guys aren’t stupid – just act that way.” He says this: “One recent morning I was driving in Miami on Interstate 95, which should have a sign that says ‘warning: high testosterone levels next 15 miles.’ In the left lane – one behind the other – were two well-dressed, middle-aged men both driving luxury, telephone equipped German automobiles. They looked like responsible business executives, probably both named ‘Roger,’ with good jobs and nice families, and male pattern baldness. The kind of guys whose most violent physical activity on an average day is stapling. “They were driving normally except that the guy in front – Roger 1 – was thoughtlessly going only about 65 miles an hour, which in Miami is the speed limit normally observed inside car washes. So Roger 2 pulled up behind until the two cars were about one electron apart, and honked his horn. Of course, Roger 1 would not stand for that. You let a guy honk at you and you are basically admitting that he has a bigger Authentic Manhood - 2 Four Faces of Manhood

stapler. So Roger 1 stomped on his brakes, forcing Roger 2 to swerve onto the shoulder where showing amazing presence of mind in an emergency, he was able to make obscene gestures with both hands. At this point, both Rogers accelerated to about 147 miles an hour and began weaving violently through dense rush-hour traffic, each risking numerous lives, in an effort to get in front of the other, screaming and getting spit all over their walnut dashboards.

I quickly lost sight of

them, but I bet neither one backed down. Their co-workers probably wondered what had happened to them: ‘Where the heck is Roger?’ they probably said later that morning, unaware that even as they spoke the dueling Rogers, still only inches apart, were probably approaching the Canadian border.” Well, sometimes the warrior comes out in us in an extreme like that, and we get out of control, but here’s what I want you to know about the warrior. This is a face reflecting conquering energy. Conquering energy. This is the face characterized by initiative. The warrior goes out after. It’s the face characterized by protecting. The warrior is the one who shields and defends. It provides. It goes out and gets and says, ‘I’m going to take care of you. No matter what it takes.’ It’s the face that perseveres in the midst of all kinds of adversity. It goes on. It’s the face that fights. And the true Warrior Face is not a destructive force. It’s a very positive energy force. “I’m not going to quit! I’m going to finish!” “ I’m going to pay it back.” “I’m going to get the job done!” “We’re going to make this work!” All that comes from an energy within. It’s called the Warrior. You see that in Scripture where in 1 Timothy, it says these words. Paul is writing to a young man and I think as he writes to the young man, he’s calling – and this is what men need to do – he’s calling the warrior out of this younger man. So he says to Timothy: “Pursue righteousness and godliness and faith, and love and perseverance and gentleness. Fight the good fight of faith and take hold [the word really means ‘to seize.’] seize the eternal life for which you were called.” Now I want you to look at just those terms for a moment, because those are what I call noble upturns. Godliness, righteousness, faith. Those things are not easily seized in any man’s life. Love, perseverance. Those are the kinds of things that you have to work hard for – you have to fight for. And it takes a while to take hold of those things. But here’s an older man, looking into a young man’s face and calling the warrior out, Authentic Manhood - 2 Four Faces of Manhood

saying, ‘Take up the sword and make these things work for your life. Bring them into your life.” But it comes through the warrior. 3. Here’s a third face, the face of the Lover. Now, the Lover is a face that is as unnatural to man as the Warrior is natural, because love is more difficult for most of us as men.

It’s the Lover that picks up his wife’s real needs; it’s the Lover who is willing to let

go of another good business deal in order to spend more time at home. It’s the Lover who can open his heart and share the things that he really feels, rather than hide those because he feels like he has to have a front for strength. But he can crack open the door and share the hurt in his life and the pain, and he can connect around that kind of sensitivity of feelings … in a world of emotion. This is the face, by the way, reflecting romantic energy. Romantic energy. This is the face characterized by tenderness, by sensitivity, by sacrificial care, by emotional openness, by physical affection. Want to hear a warrior suddenly put on the face of a lover? This is the letter of a major in the Civil War, 1861. Major Sullivan Ballou, who wrote to his wife Sara, before the battle of Bull Run. Here’s what he said to her; now this is a Warrior speaking, but suddenly, because he’s got that balance in his life, he can put on the face of the lover. He says to her these words: “The indications, my dearest Sarah, are very strong that we shall move in a few days, perhaps tomorrow. And lest I should not be able to write you again, I feel impelled to write a few lines that may fall under your eye when I am no more. I have no misgivings about or lack of confidence in the cause in which I am engaged, and my courage does not halt or falter. I know how great a debt we owe to those who went before us through the blood and suffering of the Revolution, and I am willing – perfectly willing – to lay down all my joys in this life to help pay that debt. But, Sarah, my love for you is deathless. It seems to bind me with mighty cables that nothing but omnipotence can break. The memory of all the blissful moments I have enjoyed with you comes crawling over me and I feel most deeply grateful to God and to you that I’ve enjoyed them for so long, but how hard it is for me to give them up, and burn to ashes the hopes of future years when, God-willing, we might have lived and loved together, and seen our boys grow up to be honorable men around us. If I do not return, my dear Sarah, never forget how much I loved you. Know that when my last breath escapes me on the battlefield, it will whisper your Authentic Manhood - 2 Four Faces of Manhood

name. Forgive my many faults and the many pains I’ve caused you. How thoughtless, how foolish I’ve sometimes been, but oh, Sarah, if the dead can come back to this earth to flit unseen among those they love, I shall always be with you – in the brightest day and in the darkest night. Always with you. And when the soft breeze fans your cheek, it shall be my breath – or the cool air on your throbbing temple, it shall be my spirit passing by. Sarah, do not mourn me dead. Think I am gone, and then wait for me, for we shall meet again.” A few days later, Sullivan Ballou was killed at the battle of Bull Run. He was a warrior, but he was also a lover. He had the balance of both faces. Well, this face is seen in Scripture in such verses as Ephesians 5:25, when the Apostle Paul gives a tall order to men in every generation. He says, “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church.” And he says – here’s how He loved the church. Here’s how you are to put on the face of the Lover.

Jesus Christ gave Himself up for the

church, and if you are a husband who knows how to love, you’ll give yourselves up for your wives, as well. The face of the Lover. 4. Then finally there is the face of what I call the Friend. And can I say this to this large group: you know, many men don’t have friends. I’m talking about real friends, and part of the reason we don’t have friends, at least in the world we’re living – the kind of friends that connect with us at a soul level -- is quite frankly, we don’t have time for friends, do we? We want a friend – we want that person to give us his time; to invest in us, and talk to us, and support us, but we just don’t have the time. And so, we live in these very superficial relationships, where no one around us do we feel close enough to, to really trust with the secret things of our life. And no one that we’ll let talk tough to us when someone needs to get in our face. That requires time. This last summer, I took my son and we went on a mountain climbing expedition in the Teton Mountains. And I’d never climbed a significant mountain before, but this summer, we climbed a very significant mountain. One of the first things we did – we had a guide and he pulled out this rope and we all put the rope over us and connected with one another to climb this mountain. We hook up together. And then, for awhile it was clumsy because you had to hold – you had the rope around you -- but you had to hold the rope and one of the first things we did is we began to scale a 200-foot sheer cliff. And I remember about half-way up looking down and I was glad I was connected. And then, I remember as we got towards the top, we had to go around a little curve in the – on the mountainside – and it was a smooth rock about 10 yards wide with a little lip on it about Authentic Manhood - 2 Four Faces of Manhood

this wide. And our guide got to the other side and then called us out. It was 2,000 feet straight down. And I remember stepping and I was glad I was connected. How foolish it would have been of me if at that moment to say, “I don’t need the rope and I’ll just cut it. I can step there on my own.” But you’d never do that when you knew that kind of danger was around you. Because when you do that, this rope becomes your hangman’s noose when it’s not connected. And what’s true of mountain climbing is true of manhood. You can’t climb the mountain of manhood disconnected from other men. It’s almost a universal principle that if you’re going to be – well, it is a universal principle – if you’re going to be the kind of man you’re supposed to be – you have to be connected with other men who can speak into your life; who can call out the best in you; who can cheer for your successes; admire your efforts and be your friend, because that’s what a real friend is. This a face reflecting connecting energy – the Friend face. And it’s characterized by things like loyalty, and accountability and challenge; and fun. It’s also a friend who comes around who has noticed in your life the good things where no one else is noticing – and compliments you on it. It’s the Friend who comes up along side you when he sees you beginning to stray from the path and because of the deep relationship that you have, he can call you back. But a lot of guys don’t have friends because they themselves are not friend-worthy. Are you friend-worthy? To be friend-worthy means you have to – you have to have connecting energy to other men. You have to be willing to risk and to reach out, and to spend time with and cultivate another relationship. Here’s the way the Scripture says it. In Proverbs 17:17, it says, “A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.” I bet for some of you – and where you are in life – even as I speak those things, because of the adversity that you’re in, you say, “I’d love to have a guy like that next to me right now.” But a friend loves at all times. Scripture also says in Proverbs 27:17 “As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.” We need another man rubbing up against us to rub off some of the hard spots in our life. That takes friendships. So these four faces are the four faces of manhood. Hopefully, synchronized and balanced together. The King Face; the Warrior Face; the Lover Face; the Friend Face. Often the honorable faces become ugly caricatures.

And then the world reacts

to men and it says, “See! All men are brutes! All men are insensitive!” Have you heard

Authentic Manhood - 2 Four Faces of Manhood

those words before? “All men are loners! They just use people.” Oftentimes, those are the faces, but they’re just caricatures of the real deal. Because of our morally compromised culture, many men today lack the King in their life. And without a King the Warrior becomes unrestrained.

If you don’t have a King

in your life, the Warrior can become unrestrained, hurting lives, including your own in the process. You see, if what a man has in his life is a strong Warrior but a weak King, the Warrior gets out of control. It begins to rob and pillage and cheat and fornicate, and beat and abuse, and over-indulge, because there is no King riding the Warrior, and helping the Warrior live for the right things. The Warrior without a King is a destroyer.

And oftentimes

that’s happened today in our world where our world kind of honors a dumbed-down immoral masculinity. Our increasing feminized culture has emasculated the Warrior in many young men. The result has been the creation of what I call the soft male, indecisive as to direction, and weak as to leadership. We talked last week about a culture that increasingly disconnects father from sons and really, in the last 30 years, has really spurred on the Warrior spirit in women. And as men have grown quiet in that environment, and as young men are raised primarily in overly dominated female environments, what it’s done is it’s stolen the Warrior out of a lot of young men’s lives. They’ve grown up where the Warrior has been suppressed because the right spirit of a Warrior is usually called out of a young man by older men, calling him to become that kind of Warrior.

But oftentimes, in a female

environment the Warrior is downplayed or suppressed. “Don’t hit Johnny! Stop!” And what you get is what I call the ‘feminized man.’ Not the effeminate man who has feminine characteristics – the feminized man who can be strong and tough-looking on the outside, but when it comes to initiative, they wait. When it comes to leadership, they’re soft. When it comes for the moment of decision, they defer – often to a woman. And the reason they do is because the Warrior is gone – instead it’s the ‘soft male.’ Here’s what I want you to know and this is the last point today, and we’ll close. Our world today is desperate to see in men this four-faced balance of manhood. That’s what our world wants to see, North, South, East and West. Those are the four points on a compass. Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall – those are four seasons in the year. Earth, wind, fire, water – those are four elements on the earth. King, Warrior, Lover, Friend – those are the four faces of manhood. And guys, here’s the question for you this morning: mirror, what kind of man do you see?

Authentic Manhood - 2 Four Faces of Manhood

When you look in the