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The Holy Spirit: Making Us Alive
On Monday night (yes, last Monday night) we began an exploration of what the Scriptures teach us about the Holy Spirit. Here are the notes:
The Holy Spirit: Making Us Alive
Introduction: See Genesis 2:7. God breathed into the first man’s nostrils “the breath of live,” and he became a living being. Then … in Genesis 2:15-17 God gives Adam his work, and brings him into relationship with Himself with a command—“don’t eat of this one tree; I’ve given you the whole earth, but I’m putting this tree under My personal authority, as the creator and king over the whole creation.” So just by keeping that command Adam acknowledged God’s authority and protected himself from whatever it was about the tree God wanted him shielded from, at least for then. And if he kept the command, he could avoid the result of eating from the tree which God says is death.
These two passages set up our first study on the Holy Spirit, because if you’re familiar with what happens, literally on the next page of the bible, Adam and his wife Eve—the first couple—they eat the fruit from the tree, and some interesting (I think we could say tragic) things happen. But one things we might have expected to happen doesn’t happen. What doesn’t happen is that Adam and Eve’s eyes go blank and they drop to the grass as corpses, and end of story. No…life seems to continue right along, except that now everything seems to have been fundamentally changed in terms of how they experience the world. Whereas before this it’s hard for us to even imagine what things were like, because everything seems pretty peaceful, no suffering, and no hint of death or anything like that, and afterwards there’s this immediate anxiety, running from God, lying, passing the blame—and God is telling them that now the world is going to be a difficult place—and he pretty much just describes the world we know and live in every day.
So you’re left to wonder and think about it, right from the beginning of how the bible describes the world—what did happen when they ate that fruit? We know they immediately were in a world where death is a reality, and all the processes that cause it had begun, so that we could say—that was the day they died, meaning, it all started then. But as you keep reading the bible, you start to realize that something else must have happened; something even bigger and more fundamental; something closer to what men and women really are. Because as the story progresses, the problem’s not just that people physically die.
There’s clearly a much bigger problem here—something has been altered about humanity. God told the first couple that they were to rule over the whole creation, and it implies that they’re going to take a wild creation and make it great. But by just the second generation—their kids are killing each other. And it keeps going from there—the bible records humanity’s story of generation after generation of difficulty and violence and oppression and let down, and finally, death. Of course there’s beauty and victory in there too, but when the story started out sounding like we’d have only beauty and victory, and instead you get war and suffering, you have to just be asking yourself, what’s up with people? And asking that question leads us to some deeper insights—it’s not just that people mess with each other, it’s something else too—it’s this really pronounced separation from God too. Whereas at first it seems like Adam and Eve had a total sense of who God was—they were like him, and they were near to him, now there’s all this distance—and people are totally not like God. All the horribleness we do to each other is just nothing like the God who made us and gave us the earth as a gift and wants to walk with us in the cool of the day.
…and maybe that starts to get us closer to the other important thing we need to hear when we read God’s warning to Adam that, “when you eat the fruit, you’ll die.” Maybe God’s saying something like—if you turn your back on me and deny what I’ve said and make your own rules, it’s going to change our relationship, and it’s going to put separation between us, and that will do lasting damage to who and what you are. And so when we see humans treating each other in horrible ways, it’s just the most obvious outworking of that fact that humans are separated from God, we’re ignorant of who he is, so we don’t even know who we are, and we don’t know him, and we’re not like him. And for a human being, the bible calls that death. Physical death is just the inevitable physical conclusion to this state of separation and estrangement from God. We were never created to live independently from him.
What Jesus said about all this: (See John 3:1-17)
Now, it’s into this mix that Jesus came, walking around, doing his miracles, gathering crowds and a following, and teaching. And I wanted to start with all this background because I think it throws immediate light onto the passages we’re going to read. One of the things Jesus did when he taught was to, sort of out of the blue, drop these truths on people, where he was telling them about the Holy Spirit.
A lot of times it seems to come from left field and catch them off guard, and they might not really even get what he’s saying unless he explains himself. But one of the major things he wanted to get across to us has to do with God’s solution to this state of death that exists for humanity.
So we’re just going to look at three passages where Jesus spoke about the Holy Spirit, and we’re going to concentrate on one key aspect of what he was saying, and what it tells us about the Holy Spirit.
What do we learn about the Holy Spirit in John 3:1-17?
- The Spirit brings life. In other words, the Spirit makes human beings alive.
And, the Spirit makes them alive with the kind of life you need to have in order to see, and enter, the kingdom of God. (v. 3, 5) - This life is everlasting. (v.16) In other words, the problem of physical death, and how it seems to be the boundary of our life, is taken away with this life Jesus gives—this life goes on forever.
- And then you have this language about being born again—Jesus says experiencing this life for the first time is a new birth. Jesus is clearly at pains to try to get this across to Nicodemus, and it’s right where Nicodemus is struggling to follow him, but it seems like Jesus is letting him know that, this life that the Spirit brings is so new, and so different from the kind of life Nicodemus and you and I are used to, so much fuller and bigger and better and…more alive to everything eternal and spiritual and real and significant—even to the world of matter and humanity, that it’s like a whole new birth. It’s such an upgrade, such a life upgrade, that Jesus says, it’s really like being born all over again, or really, it’s that you weren’t actually alive yet, and then, you are. So, you had a kind of birth once, that brought you into this world as human being, but, if you want to do anything more than live in a body and die one day, if you want to live the eternal life of the kingdom of God, if you want to be alive to spiritual things, you need this
- Or, as he says in verses 5 and 6 and 8, You need to be born of the Spirit. The way Jesus speaks about the Holy Spirit in this conversation tells us the Spirit’s place in all this. This new birth is the birth of the Spirit. In other words, it is the new life a man or woman experiences when the Holy Spirit gives them life. And in verse 16, Jesus tells us that the Holy Spirit gives this life to everyone who trusts in Jesus to get it.
So to sum up, here in John 3 we’re seeing that Jesus taught that God’s way of solving the death problem is the Holy Spirit—he comes and gives God’s life, real life, to everyone who believes. So we can only be alive in this sense when we know and trust Christ, when we’re in relation with him, when we’re actually indwelt by the Spirit—and what that’s like is a whole new birth, which makes you alive to eternal things, and God’s eternal kingdom.
What do we learn about the Holy Spirit in John 4:10-14 and 7:37-39?
- God likes to give people this experience of new life.
- And we get some more description of what it’s like to come alive to God this way. Having the Holy Spirit give you God’s life is like taking a drink of water. It’s like taking a drink of water that’s so refreshing, so satisfying, that you’re so fulfilled, in the deepest part of who you are, (7:38), that not only are you satisfied, but you have so much life, so much satisfaction, it overflows on all the people in your life—everyone you meet. It’s like taking a drink of water, and then that water is coming out of you and taking care of everyone else’s thirst too.
- John wants us to know in 7:39—he was speaking about the Holy Spirt.
- Now if you ask, “ok but how do I drink?” we can get some answers by listening to how Jesus plays his verbs off each other. Here in chapter 7 we’ve got “come,” “drink,” and “believe.” (v.37-8)
If you work through it, I think you end up seeing something like: “Drinking” is simply “coming” to Jesus and “believing.” And you could say, “believing” is “coming” and “drinking”—trusting Jesus to be the only one who can satisfy the thirst of your soul.
- When you “drink,” when you come to Jesus to be the one who takes care of your soul thirst, you know, you start out with that thirst in your soul that’s there in all of us—but after you drink this water, you’ll never have that thirst again. (In John 6, he says it’s like eating a meal that makes you never hungry again.)
So in the Gospel of John, we find that Jesus taught that the Holy Spirit is God’s answer to one of the greatest issues that plagues us—that spiritual death that makes our physical death inevitable. By his Holy Spirit, God gives new, eternal life to everyone who relies on Jesus. So if we want to understand who the Holy Spirit is, I think this is a great place to start, I think it’s profound that it seems to be where Jesus started when he began to teach about the Holy Spirit—The Holy Spirit is God’s way of overcoming death, and making us alive.
Some Thoughts and Challenges:
When we read these things, we should just ask ourselves—In general, do people have this today? Do they have this kind of life? Do we have satisfied, overflowing souls—or is thirst the dominant vibe today? Do we have life that stretches out beyond physical death? Does our vision even extends that far—or is death the final boundary for them? Can we see the kingdom of God—or is it hidden behind the casket?
Jesus says, no one is originally born with this life. Only people who are born a second time have it. How do you know if you have it? I struggle with really getting in there and defining this sometimes, because to be honest, I myself had a very abrupt, pretty intense experience with God’s Spirit when I was 16 years old—and when I looked back on it, a little later, I realized it was then that I came alive, and then that I came to know God, God’s Spirit, and it was then that I was filled with his Spirit. And I don’t know that everyone has that exact experience. The bible gives me no reason to think I should define it like that and expect everyone to have the same story. It seems like maybe some people have an experience that’s a little more gradual.
So how do you know if you’ve drunk, if you’ve been born again? It’s very simple. According to what Jesus teaches here, you just have to ask some basic questions:
- Am I alive to Spiritual things? Do I care only about material things, or am I passionate about Spiritual things? Am I aware of them, and motivated by them, moved by them, and drawn towards Spiritual things? And when I say “Spiritual,” Jesus is very careful to define it—He means Spiritual as in, what “the scriptures said”—how the bible describes God—Spiritual as defined by the God of the bible and what He’s written—in other words, when Jesus says “spiritual,” he really just means, “having to do with the Holy Spirit.”
- Am I alive to eternal things? Do I care only about things that have to do with my lifespan, or the history of my culture, or am I passionate about, aware of, motivated by, moved by, and drawn towards the things God says will last forever things?
- Am I alive to the kingdom of God? Does it factor in to my thinking? Does it shape my plans, my desires? Do I care only about things that have to do with my personal world, or the world of politics and culture and human efforts, or am I passionate about, aware of, motivated by, moved by, and drawn towards the kingdom God will set up when Jesus returns?
- Do I depend on Jesus, and come to him, to satisfy the thirst at the center of my soul? Or do I count on other things to take care of my inner hunger?
- Has the thirst in my soul been satisfied? Or, am I still thirsty? At the core of my being has there always been this hunger, this space that’s never been filled—and I’m still just trying to find things to satisfy it?
Now if you’re answering yes to all these questions, it might mean that you had an obvious point in your life when you remember experiencing this kind of transition—and you can say, “that’s when I was born again,” or for you it might have been slower and more gradual, but in that case there’s been some time when you looked up and realized that you were different than you had been. In either case you should recognize—I once was dead to all these things, and now I’m alive to them. And they’re alive to me.
Or your story might be a little different. Maybe it happened when you were so young, that you don’t really remember a time before. That’s cool too. But then, if you think that’s the case for you, these questions are still important. If you never remember being dead to these things, and you read these passages of scripture and think, “yeah—I’m not perfect, but man, I love the Holy Spirit, I love eternal things, I want to live my life shaped around the kingdom of God, and—yeah, I don’t have a gnawing hunger at the core of my soul—Jesus is there! He’s enough,” then even though you can’t remember the change, clearly, according to what Jesus teaches here, he would tell you that you’re alive by his standards.
But, please consider: If you just have kind of always thought, “yeah, I got saved when I was like 3,”and that’s what it’s all about for you, and you’re not really sure about those questions, you should stop and think—are you really alive to Spiritual things? Do they matter to you? What about eternal things? Do they have weight in your life? Do have gravity—do you orbit around them? Do they move you? And what about that space in the center of your soul—what do you find there? Is there the same gnawing hunger and thirst, never really satisfied, just like everyone else you doesn’t know anything about Jesus? If Jesus isn’t there, right at the center of your life, giving you what you need inside, so that you aren’t driven like other people to fill the void, then you need the Holy Spirit. He’s the water Jesus gives.
And when he comes into your life. You come alive—to all the most important things.
Love and Social Media and Friends Overseas
A few Mondays ago we took the evening to consider social media, and four major concerns a Christian should have when they consider if and how to use it. Soon after I posted the notes, a friend who is serving the Lord overseas sent me this reaction:
I just read the blog about social media and it hit on a few things I have struggled with.
I loved my life without social media.
But I was encouraged to open accounts in order to share about what I am doing here on platforms where people will actually read. So I opened accounts a little over a year ago, and I was excited to get to keep up with what my friends and family are doing and what is going on in their lives, because the truth is not many people take the time to communicate to me personally.
But since opening accounts, I struggle with a lot of what people post. And it usually makes me discontent with where I live.
I don’t have access to most of the food that people post pictures of, but their pictures make me want to eat it. I can’t hang out with my friends, but I see them all hanging out and having fun and becoming seemingly closer with each other and moving on with their lives without me, and it makes me wish I was there. It’s kind of like I am showing myself what I gave up, all over again, everyday, and it makes it a whole lot harder.
I think missionaries fifty years ago had it a lot easier in some ways. They said goodbye and wrote letters, instead of having a constant window into what their loved ones are doing everyday, without being able to be part of it, or even invited to be part of it in anyway.
Social Media can be a great tool for the Kingdom, but I am not sure if it is worth the struggles it brings.
Agreed, my friend. Agreed.
Friends and young adults–shouldn’t we consider these things?
Truly alive…to everything.
A lot of people know other quotes from Jim Elliot.
But how about this one?
“I walked out to the hill just now. It is exalting, delicious, to stand embraced by the shadows of a friendly tree with the wind tugging at your coattail and the heavens hailing your heart, to gaze and glory and give oneself again to God – what more could a man ask? Oh, the fullness, pleasure, sheer excitement of knowing God on earth!”
…right?
Stay Alert. Satan Wants You Asleep.
Last night on the front field, while Jake grilled, I offered some encouragement for the Fall ahead. Here are the notes:
Staying Alert // Labor Day 2017
What Jesus Said:
Matthew 24:42-43
“Watch therefore, for you do not know what hour your Lord is coming. But know this, that if the master of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched and not allowed his house to be broken into.”
Matthew 25:13
“Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour in which the Son of Man is coming.”
Matthew 26:41
“Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
Mark 13:34-35, 37 34
“It is like a man going to a far country, who left his house and gave authority to his servants, and to each his work, and commanded the doorkeeper to watch. Watch therefore, for you do not know when the master of the house is coming–in the evening, at midnight, at the crowing of the rooster, or in the morning… And what I say to you, I say to all: Watch!”
Luke 12:37, 39 37
“Blessed are those servants whom the master, when he comes, will find watching. Assuredly, I say to you that he will gird himself and have them sit down to eat, and will come and serve them. … But know this, that if the master of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched and not allowed his house to be broken into.”
Jesus’ point: The fact that he has already come, died and rose again, and the fact that he told us he’d be returning, soon, and quickly, and that we need to be alert for it, changes life for a Christian—it changes the whole world. We experience everything differently—we think differently, we plan differently, we love and endure differently, because Jesus is coming soon. Most of all, Jesus tells us to resist the huge push of our age, all the energy that comes at us that’s trying to make us spiritually asleep, inattentive and unaware of the spiritual things that give everything meaning and power. So, because Jesus is coming soon, he says, “if you’re my follower, don’t let all the noise and stress and temptation put you to sleep, so that you stop living with my coming in mind—be alert! Stay awake!”
What Paul Wrote:
Acts 20:29-31
“For I know this, that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock. Also from among yourselves men will rise up, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after themselves. Therefore watch, and remember that for three years I did not cease to warn everyone night and day with tears.”
1 Corinthians 16:13-14
Watch, stand fast in the faith, be brave, be strong. Let all that you do be done with love.
Colossians 4:2
Continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving;
1 Thessalonians 5:6-8
Therefore let us not sleep, as others do, but let us watch and be sober. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk are drunk at night. But let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet the hope of salvation.
What Peter Wrote:
1 Peter 5:6-9
Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you. Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Resist him, steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are experienced by your brotherhood in the world.
Peter added another element to motivate us to spiritual alertness—he pointed out that not only is Jesus coming soon, and not only is there cultural pressure in the world to fall asleep spiritually, but there is a personal, spiritual power active in the world too—through all his spiritual allies, and all the avenues he uses in the world of humans, Satan himself is working to ruin and destroy the present lives of people who follow Jesus. He’s alert. He’s on his game 24/7—watching, planning, scheming every possible way to mess up what Jesus is doing in and through his people. So Peter says, “be heads up, never forget he’s out there, never let your guard down—every form of cultural shame, and the discouragement from daily regular life, the fear and depression that comes from catastrophe, and all the temptation that comes through society and technology and our own eyes and ears—all these things are spiritually energized, and personally aimed at you to make you go to sleep spiritually, so that then you get devoured by it all.” Let’s lift up our eyes, if we’ve stopped looking around—a lot of our friends are getting devoured, right now.
Peter and Paul both bring out one of the major ways we can actually stay alert—they say we stay alert by prayer. It’s like sentry duty—getting up and getting to prayer so we can hold specific situations, and specific people, maybe whole groups of people, up before God in prayer. A sentry is the perfect picture here; it’s connected to what this idea of alertness implies when it gets translated with the world “Watch.”
A sentry is only worth anything if he vigilantly watches his area, and constantly looks for what he’s supposed to look for, and does it all to guard and protect what he cares about. So whether it’s the ever present danger of spiritual darkness, or the danger of human opposition in the church like Paul warns the Ephesians about, or the pressures of our age to forget Jesus’s coming (that Jesus himself warns us about), Peter and Paul teach us that one of the major ways we do this sentry duty is by faithfully praying in a focused way for God to guard those we love, to promote his work around the world, and to work in the areas that he’s given us to live in and think about.
What Jesus said to John:
Revelation 3:2-3
“Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to die, for I have not found your works perfect before God. 3 “Remember therefore how you have received and heard; hold fast and repent. Therefore if you will not watch, I will come upon you as a thief, and you will not know what hour I will come upon you.
Revelation 16:15
“Behold, I am coming as a thief. Blessed is he who watches, and keeps his garments, lest he walk naked and they see his shame.”
It’s just interesting, and I think it should drive the point home, that when Jesus appeared again to John, decades after he had risen from the dead, he felt the need to repeat this idea to the Churches he was speaking to.
A Beautiful Ancient Prayer
Sometime in the last few years of the first century or first few years of the second–in other words, within living memory of the Apostles–the leader of the church in Rome wrote a letter to the church in Corinth. It was the same church Paul wrote both of his New Testament letters to. The author’s name was Clement (of Rome), and the document has come down to us as 1 Clement. It’s one of the oldest Christian documents outside of the New Testament, and offers not only devotional depth, but some insight into the way Christians spoke and thought in those days. I recommend finding a copy of it and reading it.
Towards the end of the letter (59:3 – 61:3), Clement offers this prayer. It’s long, but worth slow reading and meditation. Enjoy…
Grant us, Lord, to hope on your name, which is the primal source of all creation, and open the eyes of our hearts that we may know you, who alone are highest among the high; you are holy, abiding among the holy.
You humble the pride of the proud;
you destroy the plans of nations;
you exalt the humble and humble the exalted;
you make right and make poor; you kill and make alive.
You alone are the benefactor of spirits and the God of all flesh,
looking into the depths, scanning the works of humans;
the helper of those who are in peril,
the savior of those in despair;
the creator and guardian of every spirit.
You multiply the nations upon the earth, and from among all of them you have chosen those who love you through Jesus Christ, your beloved servant, through whom you instructed us, sanctified us, honored us.
We ask you, Master, to be our helper and protector.
Save those among us who are in distress;
have mercy on the humble; raise up the fallen;
show yourself to those in need; heal the sick;
turn back those of your people who wander;
feed the hungry;
ransom our prisoners;
raise up the weak;
comfort the discouraged.
Let all the nations know
that you are the only God,
that Jesus Christ is your servant,
and that we are your people and the sheep of your pasture.
For you through your works have revealed the everlasting structure of the world.
You, Lord, created the earth.
You are faithful throughout all generations,
righteous in your judgments,
marvelous in strength and majesty,
wise in creating and prudent in establishing what exists,
good in all that is observed
and faithful to those who trust in you,
merciful and compassionate:
forgive us our sins and our injustices, our transgressions and our shortcomings.
Do not take into account every sin of your servants and slaves
but cleanse us with the cleansing of your truth,
and direct our steps to walk in holiness
and righteousness
and purity of heart,
and to do what is good and pleasing in your sight
and in the sight of our rulers.
Yes, Lord, let your face shine upon us in peace for our good, so that we may be sheltered by your mighty hand and delivered from every sin by your uplifted arm; deliver us as well from those who hate us unjustly.
Give harmony and peace to us and to all who dwell on the earth, just as you did to our ancestors when they reverently called upon you in faith and truth, that we may be saved, while we render obedience to your almighty and most excellent name, and to our rulers and governors on earth. You, Master, have given them power of sovereignty through your majestic and inexpressible might, so that we, acknowledging the glory and honor that you have given them, may be subject to them, resisting your will in nothing. Grant to them, Lord, health, peace, harmony, and stability, so that they may blamelessly administer the government that you have given them. For you, heavenly Master, King of the ages, give to human beings glory and honor and authority over the creatures upon the earth. Lord, direct their plans according to what is good and pleasing in your sight, so that by devoutly administering in peace and gentleness the authority that you have given them they may experience your mercy.
You, who alone are able to do these and even greater good things for us, we praise through the high priest and benefactor of our souls, Jesus Christ, through whom be the glory and the majesty to you both now and for all generations and for ever and ever.
Amen.
Love and Social Media
On Monday night we took some time to think about a topic that has become important, only because so many of us are so involved with it—social media. Now, no one who is in the position of teaching the word is ever supposed to use the time or position just to “vent,” or certainly not (to use internet language) to rant. So while I have strong personal feelings about this, I waited for while to do it, because I wanted to make sure that the study was not driven by them, but by a genuine concern, and the words of scripture themselves. You may disagree with me in some of these things, but I feel like they’re necessary things to look at. And I invite you to take it to God, in prayer, and by searching the scriptures, on any point where you think I’m wrong. Here are the notes:
First, a reminder: Not all truths are found in verses. For instance, there is no verse that says “thou shalt not post on social media.” Of course not. But does that mean the bible doesn’t have anything to say about it? No. Like so many other things, to really understand what’s going on with our cultural obsession with Social media, we need to saturate ourselves in the bible so that God’s way of thinking gets into us, and we can see how lots of big themes and related passages guide us in all kinds of matters that the bible doesn’t address in one short verse.
So how should a Christian think about Social Media? Here I just want to offer up, as food for thought four major issues which are prevalent with Social Media. They are concerns, not positive things. Based on the way the scriptures talk about life, these are things we should seriously consider when we decide how (and if!) social media should be part of our lives.
So, what are the main issues The Issues with Social Media:
1. Venting Feelings. (See Mark 7:21-23 and Proverbs 29:11). We know that a lot of people use social media to rant and vent. Maybe not so much people in the young adult crowd–but maybe a few. If the shoe fits…these verses say that evil is what proceeds out of our hearts, and that someone who vents whatever is in their hearts is a fool. So, if I use social media to vent or rant, it is no longer a good (or even a neutral) thing, it is a vehicle for sin.
2. Wasting Time (See Psalm 90:12 and Ephesians 5:16-17)
The main issues here are distraction and divided attention. The point of these scriptures is that existence, time to be alive, is a precious gift. We don’t have the right to waste that gift.
The two issues with time wasting:
- Wasting time when you could be doing something else. What prayer or bible reading or constructive thing or real resting or good work or act of love could you be doing instead? If you waste the time on social media instead, you’re wasting time God gave you to know him, love people, and do good things in the world. That’s sin. (I think of John Piper’s classic tweet: “One of the great uses of Twitter and Facebook will be to prove at the Last Day that prayerlessness was not from lack of time.”)
- Wasting time when you should be doing something else. Maybe it’s not that there might be other things you could be doing, but that that there are definite things, right then, that you should be attending to. The obvious things are when you’re on social media instead of sleeping, doing homework, or doing work you’re currently getting paid to do. Less obvious, but just as dangerous, are times when you’re on social media instead of being really present with the people around you. This is a total epidemic among parents—we have so many people using their technology while they ignore their children. Think what fruit that’s going to bear in just a few years. It’s really a dangerous trend—I would say it’s already starting to reap a pretty horrible harvest. But what about those of you who don’t have kids yet. Do we ever get on social media to ignore our family or other people we live with? Or how about this one—Do we use social media to avoid talking to people in public? For a Christian, who’s supposed to be all about looking for opportunities to love people and speak to them about Jesus, that’s sin.
3. Looking at Sin (Psalm 101:1-4; Psalm 119:37, Romans 13:14; Matthew 5:28-30)
Let’s be honest, a lot of people, especially men, use social media to look at things that are either blatantly sinful (such as images which are meant to stir up lust) or which are kind of neutral, but the user looks at them in sinful ways. Jesus says, cut it off. That means, if social media is a vehicle for you to sin, it’s better to get rid of it then to keep hell in your life.
4. Envying, Causing to Envy and Boasting
Here’s the one that I think is the most difficult to detect, until we’re ready to be really honest, and also kind of complex, because it involves both the person posting and the viewer, together, in a weird sort of artificial or “symbiotic” relationship.
Envy: (See Exodus 20:17 and Hebrews 13:5) If we’re honest, a lot of us struggle with envy in bad way whenever we look at social media. Some of us regularly move right past envy and onto discontent, depression, anger and even feelings of hatred towards the people whose posts we view. I’ve had people just say straight up, “I hate social media,” because of these issues. Wanting other people’s lives is a big problem, which Social Media makes even worse, because it keeps other people’s lives right in front of my face, all the time.
Boasting, and Causing Others to Envy: (See Galatians 5:24-26 and 1 Corinthians 13:1-4)
1 Corinthians 13:4 is, I think, the biggest, clearest, and most helpful verse on this subject. Social Media is the number one way people boast about their lives today. For a lot of them it’s totally intentional. Obviously. You know, not so long ago self-promotion was considered bad taste, but now, since so many famous people get famous and stay famous by shameless self-promotion, and since so many people want to be like the famous people, we have totally ordinary people promoting themselves the same way. But I want to be really careful here, and ask you to just consider this, because I think this one actually cuts really close to home. When Paul wrote this, he wasn’t writing to famous or want-to-be famous people. He was writing to regular people like you and me, and he was writing to Christians. And he knew that Christians need to think about our tendency to boast, even when we didn’t originally mean to.
And I think the way the NKJV translates the word which some bibles translate “boast” is so helpful. NKJV translates it “parade itself.” Love doesn’t “parade itself” around for others to see. It doesn’t put itself on display—which is all boasting is, right—a verbal self-parade? Since social media is more visual (although it seems like a lot of the text with people’s posts is getting longer and longer too), it might slip our notice, but here’s where the Holy Spirit will talk to us if we let him, I think.
How many of our posts, even if we didn’t really mean to consciously, are actually a little parade of something great about our life? We go on vacation, and we show people. We have a nice day, and we show people. We have a good friend, and we show people. We finally get a great relationship, some man or woman of God who likes us, and we show people. The more serious it gets, the more we post. Notice, absolutely none of these things are even remotely wrong. If you have a good day, or go somewhere cool, or have a great friend, or have an awesome relationship—that’s awesome! God gave that to you. Enjoy it! The Bible tells you to (in 1 Timothy 6:17). But what’s happening to all of us is that, almost all the time now, the good desire to enjoy good things gets invaded by another desire—the desire for other people, who aren’t there with us, to see what good things we have, and to know what good things we experience. And we need to honestly stand before God and ask him to show us—why do I want everyone to see this? Really great, otherwise spiritually mature people fail here. I just want to ask everyone to really seek God about this.
And think… “Why am I no longer able to just enjoy the good things God brings me? Why do I feel the need to capture them, pose them and filter them, and make other people look at them too?”
And obviously this is where we get to the sin of causing others to envy, which is what parading ourselves and boasting is really for. And it’s so funny—probably none of us would actually sit around and think, “you know, I want to make that person jealous.” But if we’re willing to take an honest look at our actions, we have to recognize that when we boast it’s a compound sin—I do something sinful—that’s one issue—and then a lot of the time, I also lead other fellow human beings into sin as well.
So here’s some other person, and if they’re at a rough job, or having a down day, or struggling through a long trial, or maybe if they don’t have the financial means we do—and they have to look at pictures of our great days and our great vacations—our great lives—what have we done to them? Have we helped them? Are we pointing them to Jesus and helping them press on with our inspiring example? Or, are we discouraging them and making them feel worse about their life…and making them envy ours?
Or how many of our friends are wishing for a relationship to come their way—and as soon as their next friend gets into a relationship, they have to sit and look at a stream of pictures reminding them that one more person found love and they didn’t. And you’ll see it gets worse as life goes on—the person I remember telling me they hated social media was a young mom, and all her friends post beautiful pictures of their kids acting perfect all day. And all the couples who can’t have kids struggle every time they see it. And all the moms that do have kids struggle when they see it, because even though they know the pictures are a totally fake representation of that person’s actual life, their kids are runny-nosed and fighting and screaming and disobeying all the time—and they envy the life they see on the screen.
Friends—there’s nothing Christian about this. We’re supposed to love each other and consider each other. (Look at Romans 14:1-22 and 1 Corinthians 8:1-13 to see Paul work through these same issues, even though the conflict in the Roman and Corinthians churches was about something different. These passages are important for us to listen to for thinking about these and all kinds of other matters.)
And here’s one last part of this issue I think almost no one thinks about (but I know it’s true because I’ve been there). Christians in other parts of the world, especially third-world countries and places like that—they look at our social media. Especially if you’ve been on a missions trip and made friends—they’re watching you! What does our Christianity look like to them—a parade of rich people having fun? Just think of what that does to their ability to persevere in difficult times! Honestly my friends, God is going to hold us accountable for this!
Enjoy the good things God’s given you. But if you turn them into something that parades your life and promotes your pride and causes others to sin, you’ve ruined what God gave you, and you’ve used it for evil.
What are the stakes in all of this? If we mess this up, we could be… failing to walk in love (Romans 14:15); preaching ourselves, not Christ (2 Cor 4:5); and therefore, violating the two major commandments—to love God, and love each other.
Four Solutions:
- Cut off whatever leads you to sin. Whether social media leads you to lust, or envy, or anxiety, or anger, if it leads you into sin, there’s no point in keeping it around.
- Allow God’s love to rule your life in such a way that you think about all your actions, and how they will affect other people. Let your decision about whether or not to use social media, and how to use it, to be shaped by the concerns of Christian love for others. Think about how to lead a life that helps others walk with Jesus, and never makes them stumble.
- Pursue real interactions with the actual people God has put in your life. Let social media become less and less important to you, and actual human interaction become more and more important. And never let social media become a diversion from solid time alone with God, Solid time alone resting, public availability to strangers, or time you can spend with the people in your life. This is another reason to just cut it off, as much as possible.
- Redeem the time God’s given you. Think strategically—what are all the ways I could most glorify God with the time he’s given me.
As a final word, I just want to share that my experience is this: There are a lot of things I’ve never done, but I don’t have to do any of them to just look around and see where they get other people–and I know my life is better without them. I’ve never had social media, but I see what other people have, and I know my life is better without it. I can enjoy my wife and my kids without reducing them to images for other people’s consumption. They won’t ever feel that from me, or have to deal with me paying more attention to my phone and people I’m not with than I am to them. I won’t ever embarrass them with a post. I can enjoy the good things God’s given me without a second thought about causing some other person who doesn’t have those things to envy.
I can be more present to my life, to nature, to the moment I’m in, and the people I’m with, without any second layer of thought about capturing, posting, and likes and comments.
I can look back at my time and see that it was used for good, even eternal, things, instead of wasted, scrolling and tapping.
I can be more attentive to the voice of the Holy Spirit, who lives in the present, who gave us nature, who speaks through other people, and who will only lead us to walk in love.
That’s the heart of all of this: loving God by listening to him and being more attentive to him, and loving God by loving other people better.
And if you’re not a follower of Jesus—we just want to say—the world is so much more than all this tech. We invite you to come alive to real world.
It Takes Work.
Here are the notes from Tony’s study on Monday night, August 21.
It Takes Work: ROMANS 7:4-6
Have you ever felt a little unsure of how much you should be doing in order to help your relationship with God grow? How about, even if you know you should be working at it, you just don’t know how? Maybe you’re in a season of your life where you just don’t see any increase in your relationship with God and you’re just “waiting” for Him to “do” something that ends the drought, like He is holding out on you. I’ve been there. However, I am finding the Bible commends to us that more often then not God is not holding out on us; rather, we are unequipped to receive from Him. There is indeed something we can and should be doing to keep our relationship with God dynamic, and tonight I am praying we can start the conversation on exactly what that is. Brian likes to put it this way, “the christian life is a work of cultivation not production.” He is picking up on the teachings of Jesus, a few of which we will look at tonight, that tell us our hearts and lives are ground in which God plants things of His Kingdom and then causes them to grow, it’s called bearing fruit. Since the ground is ours it is up to us to cultivate it and make it ready for harvest. We can’t produce what God wants out of us anymore than farmers can produce crops or fruit, but we can prepare our lives, just like they prepare the ground, in a way that makes us people who God CAN and WILL produce good things out of. A people who are ready to receive what God wants to pour out in order to bring nourishment to the world. I believe that is how we keep our relationship with God dynamic, He is always moving and spreading His Kingdom on earth, we are the ones who to often leave our lives unkept and unable to be planted in.
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Back in Romans chapter 7 Paul says, “…you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to Him Who has been raised from the dead…” Previously in verses 1-3 Paul compares being bound to the Old Testament law to the binding of a marriage. Read v. 1-3
In keeping with what a remarriage looks like after the husband has died Paul says in verse 4 that Jesus died and rose again, “…so that you may belong to another, to Him Who has been raised from the dead.” That is our relationship with God now, we belong to Jesus and Paul says it’s so we as His people “…may bear fruit for God.” Now before I lose any of you who may not be followers of Jesus, or maybe you are a follower of Him and this just seems weird to you, check out what Paul says in verses 5-6, “For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.”
Did you catch that? Before anyone begins a relationship with Jesus, we bear fruit…that is, things are being produced from our lives. So wherever you’re at, something is being produced from your life that is effecting more than just you, and we need to ask ourselves, “Am I bearing things that are representative of God and bringing life around me, or am I bearing things from my own “sinful passions” as Paul put it in verse 5 and therefore bearing things that bring death around me and oppose God’s Kingdom?” If you find yourself in the latter of that question, hang on, there is hope. But first, for those of us who are saying, “Yeah, I want to bear fruit, I want a dynamic relationship with God where He grows things out of my life that are usable for His work in the world.” Then we must ask, “how do I take care of my life in a way that makes it good ground for God?”
I would like to suggest 3 things I found in God’s Word that direct us how.
1. Prepare the Ground | Luke 8:4-15 We need to prepare our hearts in such a way that we are ready to have God’s Word planted in us daily (v. 11,15). What does that look like?
• Keeping our hearts soft toward what Jesus is doing in others (v. 12) Mark 16:14-16 “Afterward he appeared to the eleven themselves as they were reclining at table, and he rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they had not believed those who saw him after he had risen. And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.”
If we discredit or have a bad attitude toward others’ testimonies of Jesus’ Presence in their situation then we have not prepared our heart to receive for ourselves the revelation He might grant us.
• Keeping our hearts rooted in Jesus’ future promises (v. 13) If we want to prepare our hearts to be good ground in order to receive God’s Word then we have to purpose within us that nothing is more important or of more value than what He promises in that Word for our futures. If we place high value on what we have in this world, what happens when it’s taken away? God’s Word is not another thing we can add to our already crowded list of things we can’t live without, it has to be everything worth the expense of anything.
• Keeping our hearts devoted to Jesus’ Kingdom First (v. 14)
Luke 12:22-34 Notice, verse 14 says “their fruit does not mature” meaning people who have the cares and pleasures of this life choke them out do indeed produce some kind of fruit, it’s just immature and unable to be used for nourishment. Mature fruit is not neglecting the responsibilities of life, but being Kingdom minded first so that the things we must do become things God can use.
2. Nourish the Seed | Matthew 7:15-20 We need to nourish what God has planted in us with information that is in keeping with God’s Kingdom. How do we know what to intake? What do the lives look like of the people who’s counsel you hold most valuable? Jesus says you can tell when false prophets are speaking into your life if there is no fruit being born from them. Are they quick to condemn others’ testimony of Jesus in their lives? Maybe they are easily shaken and full of doubt when trials come in their lives, or they’re just consumed with the pleasures and rat race this world has put on. But most importantly, anyone who is preaching anything to you and leaves Jesus out of their message is a false prophet.
I John 4:1-3 “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already.” Just think of all the voices we heed when it comes to things happening in the world and how that shapes our own personal lives. We allow so many people from media, pop culture, or even certain voices in the christian faith, that do not include Jesus in their messages of social justice, peace, equality or love. It’s all a joke when the marriages of these influencers fail, or they can’t stay away from being drunk, or after they preach justice they say we can’t know our kids gender until they come of age and decide, or that we are bigots because we say marriage is only for man and woman along with sex belonging within a marital covenant alone. Friends, lets be real and evaluate the fruit actually being born from the people we allow to shape our minds and hearts. If it’s bad fruit that that doesn’t contribute to what God desires to flourish, then it doesn’t matter how solid the stance they take on justice is, they’re false prophets denying that Jesus came and revealed everything that we need to know for ALL issues in life. Denying Him, denies all the right answers.
3. Prune the Tree | John 15:1-5 We need to be open and ready for God to keep shaping our lives into something usable to produce what He wants long term. Jesus wants us to stay connected to Him, but how does that happen? Well, to oversimplify it, if things are being produced in our lives that are being utilized to further God’s Kingdom then we are connected with Jesus. The problem is often we despise the process of bearing more and more fruit. Oh, it’s awesome to notice that God did something in our lives and we say, “yes keep it coming!” Well, then we have to live in the second half of verse 2, “…every branch that does bear fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit.” ModernFarmer.com breaks up pruning fruit trees into 3 categories,
(1.) Clean Up which includes removing any wood on the tree that is dead, damaged, or diseased.
(2.) Thin Out which involves removing branches that grow downward or branches that compete for space with more fruitful branches in order to let light and air into the canopy of the tree.
(3.) Head Back which basically means cut the branches to a shortness and thickness that won’t break under the pressure of goof fruit.
Now, taking Jesus’ metaphor to heart, are we willing to let Him use anything in our lives in order to make us a fit tree able to handle good fruit and keep growing more of it? Being connected to Jesus means being open to having our lives daily cleaned up, thinned out, and trimmed back as He sees necessary in order to bear His fruit. We act like the trials and hard things in our lives are hurdles to get over, but what if they’re exactly what the vinedresser needs us to embrace in order to make us strong trees with sustainability through all kinds of seasons to bear all kinds of fruit? Do you feel dry or unfruitful in your relationship with Jesus? Let Him clean up, thin out, and trim back all the excess in your life, chances are your life is unkept and full of competing dead branches that need to be cut down. He might already be doing it and once that process is complete fruit will come, I promise. But He has not and will not forsake any branch that has the potential to bear good fruit.
For Christians, our fruit can be evidenced by what our lives look like.
Ephesians 5:1-14 Justice, peace, and the ending of hatred are definitely in God’s Kingdom; but the Word of the King is telling us that only the pure and sanctified can actually be a part of real justice and peace.
For people who don’t follow Jesus, but want to…Repent.
Luke 13:6-9 Fig trees take three years to produce fruit. The owner in the parable wants to cut the tree down because it hasn’t born fruit in the allotted time. The vinedresser however wants to give it another year. A year doing what? He says, “…dig around it and put on manure” (v. 8). He wants to loosen the soil so water can get to the roots a little easier through a pruning process of the ground. If the tree doesn’t respond he will let the owner cut it down. I wonder if you need to respond tonight. We have made it through another Monday and although tomorrow is not guaranteed, Jesus has extended the age of grace a little longer. How do we become good ground? It starts with repentance. We need to ask God to forgive us for bearing bad fruit or not bearing fruit at all and then allow Him to make our relationship with Him dynamic through pruning our lives. If you haven’t made the decision to follow Jesus yet, respond to his turning up of the ground one more time tonight, and bear fruit.
Five questions to help you understand OT History.
This Summer, while we were spending some weeks studying through the book of Judges together, you may have heard references to Daniel Block’s commentary of Judges during some of the studies. It’s a great book, and today I wanted to post some of his thoughts which offer helpful pointers for when we’re reading all those portions of the Bible which are historical–especially the Old Testament stories of Israel from Abraham to the Exile and beyond.
How should we read them? What do they mean? And how are they like, and yet also different than, other works of history we might encounter?
Here’s what Dr. Block says:
In the Scriptures historiographic compositions [that is, stories of history] are primarily ideological in purpose.
The authoritative meaning of the author is not found in the event described but in the authors interpretation of the event, that is, his understanding of their causes, nature, and consequences. But that interpretation must be deduced from the telling.
How is this achieved? By asking the right question of the text:
- What does this account tell us about God?
- What does it tell us about the human condition?
- What does it tell us of the world?
- What does it tell us of the people of God – their collective relationship with him?
- What does it tell us of the individual believer’s life of faith?
These questions may be answered by careful attention to the words employed and the syntax exploited to tell the story. But they also require a cautious and disciplined reading between the lines, for what is left unstated also reflects an ideological perspective.
So when we read the historical sections of the bible, we’re not simply reading to find out what happened, but something more like, “Based on the way God inspired the author to record what happened, what does God want me to learn about Him, the world, his plan, and myself?” That’s helpful, right? I encourage you to use Dr. Block’s questions to help you see the message God wants us to see whenever you’re reading the stories of God’s people in ages past.
God’s own quiet coming
Here’s some gold from Thomas Oden, on the Holy Spirit:
The theater in which God has chosen to meet rational creatures quietly is the inward realm of conscience, moral reasoning, prayer, and study, especially study of the revealed word…
The Spirit is God’s own quiet coming to execute the Father’s plan in due time, to attest the Son’s saving work, to enlighten, counsel, and strengthen redeemed life until the Son’s return.
There is nothing too subtle or dense for the Spirit to penetrate or too sinful for the Spirit to cleanse or too weary for the Spirit to refresh or too dead for the Spirit to breathe life into again. The Spirit strives with us, prays for us, groans with us…
I mean, ponder that for a few minutes. Everyone’s running into fantasy these days. Everyone wants to lose themselves in pretend worlds which seem to offer something more alive and luminous than their worlds of jobs and computers. But the true reality is better than all the tiny fantasies. Better than Yoda’s corny speech about the Force in front of wide-eyed Luke (“The Force is all around us!”), the real reality is this: “Where can I go from Your Spirit? Where can I flee from Your presence?”
Oden continues:
There is no place where God’s Spirit is not. There is no time when God’s Spirit was not.
…In “coming” to one place the Spirit does not “leave” another. God the Spirit can “descend,” “indwell,” “and “fill” without changing place or emptying… God the Spirit breathes life into the souls of human persons…
While human beings have spirit, God is Spirit…
Nothing less than God is meeting us when God’s Spirit is present. God’s own Spirit is shared effortlessly with other spirits without ceasing to be entire, as a “sunbeam whose kindly light falls on him who enjoys it as though it showed for him alone, yet illuminates land and sea and mingles with the air.” (Basil, On the Holy Spirit)
(…from Classic Christianity, p.516)
Here’s the truth: there is no corner of the entire universes which is lonely, dark, or without his life.
When does a boy become a man?
If you’re a person who lives your life in the scriptures, and in God’s presence, seeking to live out his will on earth, hopefully you’ve noticed that, all around us, maturity is vanishing. Our culture prizes youth and youthfulness in almost every aspect–from looks to pursuits. A complete disdain for the actual shouldering of responsibilities is taking over, along with an inability to care about things that aren’t enjoyable.
This is just one way that the way of Jesus is diverging more and more from the way of the culture around us. A Christian understands that God created us, not to spend our lives pursuing fun, but to strive to transcend youthfulness and press on to maturity. For everyone who has reached the age of biological maturity, it must be said: a fully human person is a mature person. That’s why part of our focus in the Young Adults fellowship is on maturity. Christian maturity is absolutely essential for a believer of adult age.
And since those of you who are on the younger end of the spectrum can no longer look to the culture for cues on how, practically, to grow up, we need to turn our attention to the scriptures, and to wisdom from trusted, established teachers in the church.Along those lines, I recently found this excellent guide for young men, from Al Mohler. It’s called From Boy to Man–the Marks of Manhood.
You can download a pdf here, or read it all in two blog posts, Part 1 and Part 2.
Mohler starts off like this:
When does a boy become a man? The answer to this must go far beyond biology and chronological age. As defined in the Bible, manhood is a functional reality, demonstrated in a man’s fulfillment of responsibility and leadership.
Then he goes on to suggest 13 “marks of biblical manhood,” and observes, “The achievement of these vital qualities marks the emergence of a man who will demonstrate true biblical masculinity.”
Here are his 13 Marks of Manhood, with a choice quote for each one.
- Spiritual maturity sufficient to lead a wife and children. “A man must be ready to lead his wife and his children in a way that will honor God, demonstrate godliness, inculcate Christian character, and lead his family to desire Christ and to seek God’s glory…Spiritual maturity is a mark of true Christian manhood, and a spiritually immature man is, in at least this crucial sense, spiritually just a boy.”
- Personal maturity sufficient to be a responsible husband and father. “True masculinity is not a matter of exhibiting supposedly masculine characteristics devoid of the context of responsibility…Marriage is unparalleled in its effect on men, as it channels their energies and directs their responsibilities to the devoted covenant of marriage and the grace-filled civilization of the family.”
- Economic maturity sufficient to hold an adult job and handle money. “Slothfulness, laziness and economic carelessness are marks of immaturity. A real man knows how to earn, manage and respect money.”
- Physical maturity sufficient to work and protect a family. “A boy must be taught to channel his developing strength and emerging size into a self-consciousness of responsibility, recognizing that adult strength is to be combined with adult responsibility and true maturity.”
- Sexual maturity sufficient to marry and fulfill God’s purposes. “The true Christian man practices sexual integrity, avoiding pornography, fornication, all forms of sexual promiscuity and corruption.”
- Moral maturity sufficient to lead as example of righteousness. “As a boy grows into manhood, he must develop moral maturity as he aspires to righteousness, learning to think like a Christian, act like a Christian and show others how to do the same.”
- Ethical maturity sufficient to make responsible decisions. “The indecisiveness of so many contemporary males is evidence of a stunted manhood.”
- Worldview maturity sufficient to understand what is really important. “A boy must learn how to translate Christian truth into genuine Christian thinking.”
- Relational maturity sufficient to understand and respect others. ” “Individuals who lack the ability to relate to others are destined to fail at some of life’s most significant challenges and will not fulfill some of their most important responsibilities and roles.”
- Social maturity sufficient to make a contribution to society. “The Christian man bears a civilizational responsibility, and boys must be taught to see themselves as shapers of the society even as the church is identified by our Lord as both salt and light.”
- Verbal maturity sufficient to communicate and articulate as a man. “Though not all men will become public speakers, every man should have the ability to take his ground, frame his words, and make his case when truth is under fire and when belief and conviction must be translated into argument.”
- Character maturity sufficient to demonstrate courage under fire. “This courage is demonstrated in taking a stand under hostile fire, refusing to succumb to the temptation of silence and standing as a model and example to others, who will then be encouraged to stand their own ground.”
- Biblical maturity sufficient to lead at some level in the church. “There is a role of leadership for every man in every church, whether that role is public or private, large or small, official or unofficial. A man should know how to pray before others, to present the Gospel and to stand in the gap where a leadership need is apparent.”
That’s just a taste. There’s two or three paragraphs of great wisdom under each heading. The whole thing won’t take you more that 15 minutes to read, but it could affect the rest of your life. Literally.
If you’re a man, I encourage you to read it and pray about these things, along with familiar scriptures on the subject (like, say, 1 Timothy 4:12 and Corinthians 13:11). Ask the Holy Spirit–where do I need to mature? Then, take action.
And if you’re a woman, I encourage you to read this piece also, for two reasons. First if you want to be married some day, you should be looking for this kind of man to marry. (Men, listen up!) Pray for God to send one your way. He will not lead you to marry a boy in a man’s body. It’s a man you need, and you should know how to recognize one when you see one. Second, if also one day you end up raising little boys of your own, these are great things to lay down as foundations for the goals of your parenting.
So go read it–You can download a pdf here, or read it all in two blog posts, Part 1 and Part 2.
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