Men's Issues

This past weekend I met a student from Virginia Tech on the tail end of her Spring Break. She explained that she had work to do for class that Monday--her "Men's Issues" class. It was a class that dealt with problems men have, "You know, like dad's not being able to tell their kids they love them. Stuff like that." She explained that the class initially was started as a service to men to help them to grow. Now, however, it was almost entirely women and the couple of guys in the class took regular beatings.

This conversation has made me think some about men and our issues. Really, what is our deal? The American church is over 60% women, the church in the two-thirds world is more like 70-80% women. The curses resulting from the fall have something to do with it: men are "bent" towards work ("You will work the ground...") and women are "bent" towards relationships ("Your desire will be for your husband..."). So when evangelicals talk about our 'relationship with God' or our 'walk with God' it sounds nice, but boring. I wonder if there are more 'doing' ways that we can present the gospel that would connect better with men in our culture that are still true to the fact that we're made relational and God's desire is to be in that relationship with us.

I was in a small group a couple years ago where the men would talk incessantly about boats and fishing and cars before and after the study, but completely shut down when we opened the Bible. This was maddening to me, but I had no idea what to do about it.

There have been tons of books written on this subject--"Silence of Adam" by Larry Crabb is my favorite and I think is the best. "Wild at Heart" swept through the Christian world a number of years ago, but there was one serious problem with it. It articulated men's issues with remarkable precision--and then did absolutely nothing with them. At no point did the gospel, the message of the cross, or a life of true discipleship intersect what most men desire or struggle with in any meaningful way. Excellent in diagnosis, poor in prescription.

In the mean time, it would seem that our Christian communities need to find ways to address, very head-on, men's issues, but in a way that moves past typical male-bashing (it's easy to do, I find myself doing it regularly with students) and creates open, safe and yet challenging space to deal with them.