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On November 8, 2023 By In Culture, Family and Children, Men, Women

Men, Marriage, and the Feminine Imperative

Gilder, George. Men and Marriage. Moscow, ID: Canon Press, 2023.*

By 1973, the hightide of second-wave feminism had flooded the beaches of American culture. Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique eroded the shores of traditional female roles by naming and stirring up further domestic discontentment. Kate Millet wrote her dissertation-turned-book, Sexual Politics, which sought to overthrow the patriarchy with her Marxist revolutionaries through the National Organization of Women (313). Against the flood,, conservative George Gilder manned the dikes with Sexual Suicide in 1973. With the rise of intersectionality in third wave feminism, Gilder revised and re-titled the book Men and Marriage in 1986. Besides the 2023 Preface, Canon’s republication is the 1986 edition. While the stats are antiquated, his underlying principles and overall message are clear, and his prescience of future events based on trajectories have far exceeded what he probably imagined.

When Gilder first published Sexual Suicide and then doubled down in Men and Marriage, he infuriated all the right people, drawing the ire of the main players in the feminist movement and exposing the places in our culture where the latest iterations of feminism had taken root. Second-wave feminism fought for equality with men in the workplace and the sexual marketplace. Women wanted to be like men. While the elimination of the differences did not rise to the level that we see today, in which many are claiming that there is no such thing as a man or woman, the equality called for in second-wave feminism helped lay the foundations for what we are experiencing today. Women didn’t want the consequences of sexual promiscuity, and the creation of the birth control pill and swelling tsunami for the legalization of abortion gave their wombs the liberation to live sexually promiscuous lives.

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On September 14, 2023 By In Culture, Family and Children, Men, Wisdom, Women

Good Wife, Good Life: Integrity, Industry, & Generosity

Despite what many masculine influencers tell young men today, marriage is good. There is no greater blessing in a man’s life than to have a good wife. While marriage has its own challenges, a good marriage makes life easier in many respects because you are facing challenges with mutual support and effort. A good wife makes a good life. (This, by the way, is very different than what is usually meant by “Happy wife. Happy life.” That’s another subject for another day.)

The good wife is described in rich, poetic detail in Proverbs 31. While not every woman will do exactly what this woman is said to do, women in general and wives in particular are to emulate the character of this woman.

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On August 10, 2023 By In Men, Wisdom, Women

Do Not Give Your Strength To Women

The words of King Lemuel. An oracle that his mother taught him: What, my son? What, son of my womb? What, son of my vows? Do not give your strength to women, your ways to those who destroy kings.

~Proverbs 31.1-3

In 1969, Mallory Millet was invited by her sister, Kate, to attend a meeting to start a revolution. They were in the preliminary stages of forming The National Organization of Women. Kate was finishing her Ph. D. thesis for Columbia University that later became the book, Sexual Politics. The group met in the home of one of Kate’s friends, calling the meeting a “consciousness-raising-group.” The group was unabashedly Marxist, taking on communist talk and exercises. In the meeting, according to Mallory, the women went through a litany much like the Catholic Church might do but with very different content.

“Why are we here today?” she asked.
“To make revolution,” they answered.
“What kind of revolution?” she replied.
“The Cultural Revolution,” they chanted.
“And how do we make Cultural Revolution?” she demanded.
“By destroying the American family!” they answered.
“How do we destroy the family?” she came back.
“By destroying the American Patriarch,” they cried exuberantly.
“And how do we destroy the American Patriarch?” she replied.
“By taking away his power!”
“How do we do that?”
“By destroying monogamy!” they shouted.
“How can we destroy monogamy?”
“By promoting promiscuity, eroticism, prostitution and homosexuality!” they resounded.

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On August 3, 2023 By In Men, Wisdom, Women

The Wonder of Attraction

“Three things are too wonderful for me; four I do not know: the way of an eagle in the heavens, the way of a serpent on a rock, the way of a ship in the heart of the sea, and the way of a man with a maiden.”

~Proverbs 30.18-19

When you first see her in the crowd, she catches your eye. You wonder who she is, so you ask people about her. As you mill about in other conversations, you constantly scan the room to find out where she is, wondering if she has noticed you. You are nervous about talking to her, but you summon the willpower knowing rejection is better than regret. As you approach her, you notice that she becomes a little fidgety herself, involuntarily giving a little grin with a blush and a concern about her appearance. Your heart rates increase, and your minds are singularly focused on one another, blocking out everything and everyone in the room. You are attracted to one another. Much more must be learned about one another to sustain and mature this attraction, but the dance has begun.

Why her? Why him? Why didn’t you feel this way around other people in the crowd or other people you’ve met in various situations? Ahhh, the wonder and mystery of attraction. Some aspects of attraction are quite obvious, but some we will never grasp. This intersexual dance is a beautiful feature of God’s created design and an integral aspect of fulfilling the mission God gave us.

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On July 19, 2023 By In Men, Women

Why Can’t We Be Friends?

In 1989 the Rob Reiner movie When Harry Met Sally starring Billy Crystal as Harry Burns and Meg Ryan as Sally Albright hit the screens. There is a popular scene from that movie that exposed something that many people won’t say: men and women can’t be friends. Harry and Sally are riding in a car together talking. Harry explains to Sally that men and women can’t be friends because the issue of sex always gets in the way. Sally incredulously and in shock tells Harry that this isn’t true. She has a number of men friends, and the desire for sex is not involved. Harry disagrees with her, and the conversation ensues.

Rob Reiner and his characters are no biblical scholars to be sure. What they expound as truth certainly needs to be tested. Is it true that men and women can’t be friends; that is, that intersexual friendships are very different than same sex friendships? I actually think Harry Burns is on to something. I believe that although the sexual relations issue is one of the biggest issues in intersexual relationships, it is certainly not the only one.

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On June 28, 2023 By In Discipleship, Men, Wisdom, Women

Toxic Friendships

“The satisfied soul tramples the honeycomb but to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet.”

~Proverbs 27.7

“Toxic” is a word that is overused and often misused in cultural conversations—any discomfort in any relationship, whether casual or intimate, may be characterized as toxic. You said something with which I disagree and hurt my feelings, so I now characterize you and my relationship with you as toxic. Toxic masculinity is all the rage for any male who demonstrates any traits of masculinity at all. If you want to shut down any meaningful, intellectual, and logical debate, label your interlocuter “toxic.” This is as bad as being a “racist” or “abusive,” also overused and misused.

The reaction may be that there is no such thing as a toxic relationship. However, the abuse of a word doesn’t negate its legitimacy. Some relationships are toxic, and Solomon warns his son about toxic companions.

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On June 22, 2023 By In Discipleship, Men, Theology, Wisdom, Women

Influencers

“Whoever walks with the wise becomes wise, but the companion of fools will suffer evil.”

~Proverbs 13.20

Though “influencer” has been practically coined in recent years with the rise of social media’s vast number of personalities, the concept is nothing new. We have always had these types in marketing or the latest gurus who gain popularity by promising the good life to those who buy what they are selling, follow their teaching, or, most of the time, both. Influencers, as we now understand them, are celebrities, real or perceived experts, popular social media personalities, and content creators who can separate you from your money and/or change how you think and act. From the Kardashians to Jordan Peterson, influencers affect our lives. They may not affect our lives directly, but they indirectly shape our lives by shaping the culture.

Influencers have always been around. Other people influence our thinking and affections from the time we are born until the time we die. Whether parents, peers, or potentates, our hearts are shaped by our relationships. This is why we must be vigilant in guarding our hearts by guarding our friendships.

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On June 18, 2023 By In Men

Fatherhood and the Gift of Bread

The Bible tells us that fathers are to be providers. If he fails to provide, he is worse than an infidel (I Tim. 5:8). Infidels give their sons stones when they ask for bread. The world is replete with false fathers and imitation versions of fathers.

The father famine in our society grows with each passing day. The economy suffers because fathers do not train sons and daughters to be productive stewards of the happy grain offerings. Instead, they leave the house of bread (Bethlehem) to the house of misery (Moab).

There is a need for godly fathers who know their roles as providers in the home; who don’t offer cheap substitutes for real provision or entertainment without love or goods without grace. Fatherhood is deeply trinitarian because it is an overflow of the love of the Father for the Son.

Fatherhood gives true bread and never confuses false loves for the bread of life. Far from a flawless father, the good father is familiar with repentance. He gives bread because Bread saved him. He gives life because the manna from heaven was not stingy in giving of himself, but gave himself body and soul as broken bread to the world.

Fathers, to give your children bread is to give them of yourselves. Nothing else will cure the father famine in our culture. Fatherhood gives because he has received much and to whom much is given much is required.

Happy Father’s Day! Be wise, men! Love your children and those under your fatherly care the everlasting bread so they may never hunger again.

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On June 15, 2023 By In Culture, Discipleship, Men, Theology, Wisdom, Women

Why Friends?

“A man who isolates himself seeks his own desire; he quarrels against all wise judgment.”

~Proverbs 18.1

We need friends. Whether same-sex comradery or the intimacy of marriage, we need to know and be known by others.

Friendships at every level have faced challenges in every age of history. Twenty-first century Western culture is no different. Though the challenges take different forms, genuine friendships are threatened by a number of cultural factors. The way we understand friendships is changing rapidly. We are more connected with people and less relational. We are friends with hundreds or thousands but with few or any in particular. Technology changes the way we relate. The telegraph gave us information about people thousands of miles away with whom we had no connection and contributed to desensitizing us. (See Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves To Death.) The blessing of air conditioning holed us up in our homes and made it uncomfortable to visit with neighbors. Television became a source of entertainment and information tempted us not to interact with the people in our homes.

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On May 4, 2023 By In Culture, Discipleship, Men, Wisdom, Women

Generational Warfare

“The glory of young men is their strength, but the majesty of old men is their gray hair.”

~Proverbs 20.29

There are different glories for different bodies. When speaking of the resurrection of our bodies, Paul says that not all flesh is the same. There is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of animals, another of fish, and another of birds. There are celestial bodies and terrestrial bodies, each with its own glory. Different glories exist within each of those categories. Sun, moon, and stars all have glory, but each has its particular glory, even down to each star differing from other stars (1Cor 15.39-40). Each body has its particular function and, therefore, its own glory within the great tapestry of God’s creation.

Glory is not only particular to different kinds of bodies that will never be the same but is also true of the same body at different stages of life. There is a glory when you are young and a glory when you are old, as Solomon says in Proverbs 20.29. The young man’s glory is his strength. The older man’s glory is in his gray hair (when found in righteousness; Pr 16.31).

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