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A woman found a bottle on the beach, opened it, and out popped a genie. The genie offered her one wish. The woman, being in touch with her dreams immediately said, "I always wanted to go to Hawaii. But I’m afraid of flying and I get seasick. So, Mr. Genie, I wish for a bridge to Hawaii." The genie said, "Lady, do you realize the complicated engineering that would be needed for that kind of project?" Being sympathetic the woman said, "Okay. How about helping me understand my husband? I’ve talked with him, read books about men, attended seminars. Just when I think he’s on the right track he does something stupid. Mr. Genie, I wish for complete understanding of my husband." The genie thought for a moment and said, "Would you like that bridge to be two lanes or four lanes?" Understanding a man’s heart is not impossible. It’s what this series is all about. Today is the second of a three-part sermon series about men. Last Sunday we talked about men being separated from their heart. We learned that God has created men with wild, passionate, and adventurous hearts. Much of the content for this series comes from the book, "Wild at Heart," by John Eldredge. He tells the story of visiting a male lion at the zoo. He was drawn to his strength and ferocity as the king of beasts. But this lion lived alone in a small cage, receiving his food through a metal door. "During all my visits," writes Eldredge, "he never looked me in the eye. He just lay there with that deep weariness that comes from boredom, taking shallow breaths, rolling now and then from side to side. For after years of living in a cage, a lion no longer believes it is a lion…and a man no longer believes he is a man." God created all men with a wild, passionate, adventurous heart. We were meant to roam the savanna. Instead, many men feel the boredom that comes from domestication, from living life inside a cage. Sometimes these cages are imposed by others who convinced them they would not amount to much in life. Sometimes we put ourselves in cages. We compare ourselves with other men and the yardstick is money, power, position, and abilities. All men hate the cage, but they don’t know how to get out. Often they are more fearful of the freedom outside the cage. Eldredge writes, "Men are angry, and we really don’t know why." I get angry and sometimes my anger is not justified by the situation. On the plane I hate it when the guy in the seat in front of me slams his seat into my face while I’m eating a meal. I have a sudden urge to knock this guy into first class. As a general rule men are not that patient while driving. We honk our horn at a guy in front who doesn’t see the green light. He jumps out of his car, ready for a fight. We come home from a hard day’s work and the kids failed to do the chores we gave them that morning. It’s blow up time. Men have this free-floating anger. We think it is caused by the situation in front of us. But it often has to do with this idea that we are not living from our wild heart. We are not in touch with our passion. We are angry because our lives are not what we truly desire. "If a man does not find those things for which his heart is made," says Eldredge, "if he is never even invited to live for them from his deep heart, he will look for them in some other way." Where is your search taking you? Pornography is one trap that ensnares many men who are not in touch with their deep heart. If men do not have permission… if we do not give ourselves permission to be in touch with our true heart, men often resort to a fantasy life lived in secret. Eldredge writes, "The less a guy feels like a real man in the presence of a real woman, the more vulnerable he is to porn." One of the basic fears men have is being exposed, to have areas of his life that exist in darkness brought into the light. Did you see the episode of "Seinfeld" where "Relationship George" is coming into conflict with "Independent George?" George wants desperately to keep these two parts of his life separate. But events are unfolding where these two worlds are colliding and it creates a lot of fear and anxiety for George. Most men understand the need to keep our "worlds" apart. We have our life at work, home, and play. Each area of our lives may have a distinct language, a different set of values and behaviors. I love the commercial where the big, burley factory worker is at the plant talking with his preschool daughter on the phone. She wants him to sing "Itsy, Bitsy Spider." Unbeknownst to him a group of his co-workers are watching while he sings the song over the phone. Of course they tease him, but he doesn’t get mad, even though two of his worlds have just collided. A Catholic priest, who had become very deaf in his advancing years, had formed the habit of asking those erring members of his flock who came to his confessional to write their sins on a slip of paper, instead of speaking them to him. The practice worked fairly well until one day when the father heard a heavily-breathing man enter the visitor's side of the confessional and fumble for a few moments as a small, crumpled piece of paper was passed through the curtain into the old cleric's hand. The confession read: Two cans of beans. Quarter pound ham. Four fish filets. Bread rolls. Toilet paper. Large coffee. Soap. Butter. The priest studied the note for a puzzled minute or two and then silently passed the slip back. Suddenly, there came an agonized voice from the stall beside him: "Mother of God, I've left my sins at the supermarket." Here’s a man whose worlds have overlapped. His spiritual life was mixed in with his shopping life. Do you want your worlds kept apart? Do you spend time and energy trying to keep them separate? Is there a desire tucked away somewhere in your heart to stop the charade? Do you want something to bring unity to your life so you can be the same person no matter what world you find yourself? What exactly is the purpose of man? To answer this, let’s look at the story of Adam and Eve. After finding himself created, Adam hears God say, "Adam, here is the entire earth. Explore it, cultivate it, care for it. It’s your kingdom." Eldredge writes, "This is permission to explore a heck of a lot more than cross the street." The point is that God created a man with a built in need for adventure and exploration. This adventure needs to find expression in each of a man’s worlds. And then God created Eve…someone with whom to share this great adventure. But then comes the temptation. Eldredge writes, "Where is Adam while the serpent is tempting Eve? He is standing right there watching the whole thing unravel. What does he do? Nothing. He says not a word, doesn’t lift a finger. He won’t risk, he won’t fight, and he won’t rescue Eve. Our first father gave in to paralysis. He denied his very nature and went passive. And every man after carries in his heart now the same failure." Adam realizes his mistake. He knows this was not the way he was created to live. In Genesis 3:10 Adam makes his case before God, "I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself." Eldredge believe this is significant for men. Most men spend a good deal of their lives HIDING. Because we are afraid to expose our real selves we hide. He says, "We hide in our office, at the gym, behind the newspaper and mostly behind our personality. Most of what you encounter when you meet a man is a façade, an elaborate fig leaf, a brilliant disguise." Last month I took my 17-year-old son, Ryan, to California. While he trained with his running team for a race I decided to play a round of golf. I was placed with a group of three men, young 30-somethings with nice tans and expensive clubs. I could tell that these guys were out of my league. Isn’t amazing how men will size each other up when it comes to sports? As we played I wondered what these guys did for a living, but I was afraid to ask because I didn’t want to admit that I was a pastor. You see, I get real tired of peoples’ reaction which usually goes like this, "Oh, I guess I better clean up my language!" All I wanted was to hang out with some men and be treated like a regular guy. People often treat me differently because I am a pastor. So I decided I would have some fun and lie about my occupation. It was exciting to think about what I wanted to be. My first thought (probably from watching too much Seinfeld) was an architect. But what if one of them was an architect? I’d be exposed as a fraud! So I decided if I was asked what I did, I was going to say a science teacher. This would not be a lie because I really was a science teacher once. It was somewhere on 7th hole when the topic came up. I asked the guy who was driving our cart what he did. He was a pathologist and also managed the Greenlawn cemetery system. He asked me what I did, and without thinking I blurted, "I’m a United Methodist pastor." And he said, "Oh, I better watch my language!" John Eldredge calls this behavior, "posing." Men pose in the corporate world, on the job. They pose about their knowledge and abilities in sports. They pose about their hunting and fishing adventures. They pose in church on Sundays. You know what I’m talking about. We put on our Sunday happy face and pretend everything is alright, even though we’re furious with our wives. We say nice words to people even though we don’t give a rip about their problems. Where does a man go to be real? Who does a man talk with about the dark places in his soul? Who will listen when a man wants to stop the charade and change? Oh how I believe the church of Jesus Christ can be such a place for men to search for their true heart. Some of us are gathering this Wednesday at 6:30 for just such a reason. I invite all men to join us. We all know that a bunch of men are playing a football game later today: Oakland and Tampa Bay. I remember the Oakland Raiders of my youth. The Silver and Black were one of the top NFL teams at the time: Pete Banaszak, Gene Upshaw, Dave Casper. And there was the Snake, left-handed quarterback Ken Stabler. Once Ken was being interviewed by a reporter who was an admirer of Jack London, author of "The Call of the Wild" and other rugged adventure stories. In pursuit of an inspiring quote, the reporter read aloud this poem by London: The promise of the good news of Jesus Christ is that we can become authentic men and women. Open your heart to Christ and you will discover that being exposed can be the best thing that could ever happen. When the dark places in our hearts are brought into the light of Christ, we experience grace, not judgment; love, not condemnation. When it comes to your heart, may God give you the trust and courage to "always throw deep." |
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01.26.03 - Wild at Heart – Part 2 (Series for Men) (Genesis 1:26-31)
