Danny's Men's Studies

I took my two sons and two friends to hear a talk by Tom Joyce a former Navy Pilot who flew during Iran tensions in the 80's and was at the Pentagon on 9/11 very near the explosions at Temple Baptist Church. He even was in the movie "Top Gun" flying some of the plane scenes.

We got the talk late and missed the intro and Joyce was in the middle of introducing other well known authors/speakers definitions of manhood like Robert Lewis

[he had two others listed but I didn't have time to write them down so I hope to listen to the tape and update this post].

Here are my notes:

1 sam 13:14 explains why was david different

real men are:

1. didn't start as giant killer: did small tasks faithfully, like delivering lunch to his brothers, practice music playing, shepherd,
2. don't try to be someone else: not wear someone's armor, be what God calls me to be, not what I wish. In sports, coaches can plug you in where you fit based on the skills you show and with their experience you'll be better off doing what they assigned you to.
   
3. don't lose heart in tough times. get trained in small things to move to bigger things (9/11 example was about a guy who got blown out of the Pentagon but went back to rescue 4 others in the same room and when asked why he helped, he mentioned what he was trained in the Navy: to protect the mission (i.e., his ship), his shipmate and lastly himself)
4. have higher power and purpose. God was with David when he faced Goliath.
   
5. are eager to succeed: excited to engage in action. can't wait to see God work: Iran tension example was that Joyce was on a combat patrol and they were warned about bogies and was ready to attack Iranian aircrafts (they trained for years for this moment) but the enemy turned north and away from Americans.
   
6. encourage others, to take other men to the next level. Touching part of was how Joyce described how his dad would always end with the words "atta boy" (along with "you can do it" and "that's my boy") and that was the last words he heard from his dad 90 minutes before he died.
   

He mentioned about Saul who said of David (1 Samuel 17:55): who was that man? So David became such a man that even king[s] inquired of him. However all that is meaningless unless one knows who Jesus is. We are incomplete as sinners as fallen being and can only be made complete through Jesus Christ.