Danny's Men's Studies

Reading 1 Peter 2:13-17, one's initial impression is that the Founding Fathers of America was wrong to rebel against the British Crown. But then there is verse 16:

Live as free men, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as servants of God. 1 Pet 2:16

So I suppose there is room for the 1776 Revolution. The fact is, we live in a nation where "we the people" rebelled to start anew. Yet I have my doubts, ever since I've read (and I am still chewing over) "The Most Successful Fraud in American History" by Gary North and I'm about to start reading his "Conspiracy in Philadelphia: Origins of the United States Constitution". I was taught (brainwashed?) that U.S. Constitution was the best thing about America but now I have my foundation shaken a bit...

My friend Roy pointed this out before but it didn't sink in until today: Abraham in Gen 14 was able to muster 314 trained men to rescue his nephew Lot. In verse 15, Abraham "attacked them and he routed them."

Not only did Abraham train, but he fought and killed as needed to defend even his extended relatives (Lot and his family).

I certainly don't have such training (yet) nor the current mental fortitude to act (in a lethal way) but it is a mental process I'm going through of getting ready to take such actions (to protect my family) as well as recognizing the seriousness and the finality of any such action.

There was a local homicide this past weekend near our home where a 44 year old man was shot and killed in front of a pizza store. Apparently today's news pointed out how it may have been due to conflicts with friends or business partners. Nonetheless, it brings home the reality of the danger of this world even in Central Texas.

I also found out about a combat training [both armed and unarmed] available if minimum of ten men are willing to sign up! I know when I move to L.A. I'll have a better change being in harms way, so the training is very appealing. However, since they offer it in SoCal, I may have to wait until I move there first.

In living here on earth, it is easy for us to be consumed by here and now, be it busy making money or distracted by selfish things like computer gaming, drugs, music, sex, gluttony, etc.

With the schools focus on self-esteem and other forms of meism, people have lost the long term (and even eternal) focus, or a vision of how things should be or want things to be.

My eyes were opened not when I became a Christian nor when I understood Christianity to be not just spiritual/religious beliefs but the truth about all of life. No, my eyes and my vision start to clear as I understood the meaning of education and took over the ownership of my own education as well as my children's education (via homeschooling). The last year or two has been the most empowering for me, by going through the J2M (journey to manhood) with my son and 2 other father-son families, where we dads had to own it and do it. I'm only disappointed that it is, so far, a point process (rite of passage) rather than the beginning of fathers taking the lead in spiritual life [and all of life] at home and church.

Now, keep in mind that my eyes aren't fully seeing yet nor is the vision completely clear: I'm still trying to figure out what it all means and how it's to apply to my family and how I can get other men to see similarly. I too have plenty of meism-deprogramming to go through... Sigh...

From today's sermon that let me with an impression:

From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. [Act 26:7]

Each person, especially men, are placed in specific place and specific culture, today -- I'm assuming you're alive as you read this (grin). So, our roles as men are to listen to His call and then live it! [If it only was as simple as that -- there would be no need for this blog, I guess....]

I'm still slowly reading "The Life You've Always Wanted" -- I just finished chapter one and the story of Mabel is very inspiring -- you'll have to get the book and read it. It probably means more for me than for most people since I've volunteered at two nursing homes, once during high school and once when I was working in Ann Arbor, Michigan. And I'll be moving to L.A. to see to it that I'm around my parents as they age.

Anyway, I want to leave with you the poem of Elizabeth Barrett Browning that stuck with me:

Earth's crammed with Heaven.
And every common bush afire with God.
But only he who sees takes off his shoes --
The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries.

I've started reading "The Life You've Always Wanted" by John Ortberg. [I realize that I've got too many books in the fire but that's another story (grin).]

The following kicked in my head:
The possibility of transformation is the essence of hope.

We humans are creatures of habits ("practice makes permanent") and we can develop both good and bad habits. However, we each have a language driven soul, a part of us which transcends the physical reality [you can get a hint of language and transcendance on my "language doesn't exist" post]. Which can be changed or "morphed" as Ortberg calls it (he references the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers in the book). And hence we get all kinds of self help books, therapy, etc.

But as Walker Percy pointed out in "Lost in the Cosmos" it's not easy to do on your own. You can try to escape via drugs, sex, music ("rock and roll"), and even pretend suicide. But as long as you're trying on your own, things always go back to what it was before. Unless transformation takes place via outside force: Jesus Christ touching one's heart to show us the hopelessness of our own effort and the new life He promises and to take up on His offer. Anyway, I'm looking forward to reading the book.

Vox Day has "On Jesus and Leadership" which has a lot of good insight into Jesus and leadership and contrasting the churches today and how sports understands leadership better. Here's my comment and I hope to expand on it later:

It is sad to see that the world of sports understands truth better than the church: you need leadership, you need goals both strategic and tactical, and the results have to be visual and clear cut (winner vs. loser, be it one inning/play or one game or one season or a string of seasons under one coach).

As much as people love to talk about moral relativism and world being gray, men prefer winners and losers, good vs evil, black and white. The feminized churches instead talk only about gray mush.

No wonder men are sucked into (and stuck in) sports and abandoning (abandonded?) sissy churches....

Doug Giles's "Where are God's Warriors and Wild Men?" was pointed out by Elusive Wapiti at VoxDay and found it to be really good. He's most recent article "Raising Boys That Feminists will Hate" has good points, too.

Is "servant leader" another way to neuter the Christian men and ensure that the Church remain a sissy one? Vox Day's "The myth of the servant leader" points out:

The doctrine of the servant leader is little more than the attempt of the American Christian church to accommodate feminism within its body, in much the same way that its predecessor once transubstantiated pagan gods into Catholic saints. It is neither rational nor biblical, and the poverty of its fruit can be seen in the continued fraying of the bonds that hold Christian marriages together. Christian husbands, wives and their so-called leaders alike would do well to honestly consider a variant of Joshua's great question: Who do you serve, your culture or your God?

I'll blog on this more as I chew on it this week (already 12:50AM for me).

I noticed a comment by a post at VoxDay about how someone who is dependent on another person isn't a leader. I was going to reply but I decided to blog about it:

Jesus Christ was the biggest dependent around:

Jesus replied, "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head." Matt 8:20.

As much as He was a descendent of Judah, He had no property much like the priestly line of Levi. Yet, He was and still is the Son of God. The King of Kings.

So being dependent on the Father ("Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?" Matt 6:26) doesn't make one less of a leader: just the opposite, a true leader depends on others (and delegates responsiblities, too).

When I took a handgun training class earlier this week, I learned that it was important to repeatedly go through with the correct moves (start slowly and then speed up) in pulling it out, aim and shoot such that my muscles would memorize them ("muscle memory"). Long ago, I recall a teacher rephrasing "practice makes perfect" into "practice makes permanent."

Anyway, this morning I read:

Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil. Heb 5:13,14

Righteousness requires training, too, and "constant use" makes one better to "distinguish good from evil." Practice makes permanent.