Where Manhood Began, Part 1 | Clarifying Gender Confusion

     As we turn our attention to our subject for this evening we want to ask and answer a very fundamental question here in our first session. What is manhood? If there has ever been a time in our nation’s history we have lacked clarity about that question that we’ve groped in the darkness to find an answer it’s now. Paul commanded the Corinthian church, 1 Corinthians 16:13, “Be watchful, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong.”

That command, “act like men,” it’s one word in the Greek language, it’s the word andrizomai, emphasizing maleness. Manliness, qualities that are specific to the male gender. For every new generation of Christian young men, that text is becoming increasingly foreign and remote. Just to illustrate that, I recently read an article that appeared in the New York Times last month. You can imagine what I found. The article, it was titled, 27 Ways to Be a Modern Man.

I thought I’d try I thought I’d try some of these out with you. 27 Ways to Be a Modern Man, the Author’s name is Brian Lombardi. He tries to help men navigate the modern age with this list of tips and as I read the first one I wonder how helpful he’ll be for us. See what you think. Quote, “When the modern man buys shoes for his spouse he doesn’t have to ask her sister for the size and he knows which brands run big or small.” Dunno about you but that doesn’t help me at all.

I don’t even know my own shoe size. Number seventeen, tip number seventeen says this, “Does the modern man have a melon baller? What do you think? How else would the cantaloupe, watermelon, and honey dew he serves be so uniformly shaped?” So far we get the modern man focused on shopping and carving out uniformly shaped melon balls. Modern man is sounding quite domesticated. Here’s one you’ll like, number twenty five, tip number twenty five, “The modern man has no use for a gun, he doesn’t even own one and he never will.” You guys okay with that? There’s a good Second Amendment response.

So not only, not only is he domesticated, he’s disarmed, defanged, he’s unable to protect. Next, number twenty six, “The modern man cries, he cries often.” Well that’s true, I shed a tear every time I see a punishing tackle. Nothing quite like the beauty of a skillful, well executed, well timed hit. Just brings a tear to the eye doesn’t it? Final way to be a modern man, tip number twenty seven, “People aren’t sure if the modern man is a good dancer or not, that is until the DJ plays his jam and he goes out there and puts on a clinic.”

Okay, it’s not just my Baptist roots, but it is my Baptist roots, but it’s also the fact that I’m big and clumsy, never be a good dancer. Probably a number of us who don’t have what it takes to be a modern man, we’re just not going to make the cut. But in all seriousness, today’s gender bending has left the modern man absolutely confused about genuine manhood. I don’t know Brian Lombardi, but you can hear it in that article. That kind of confusion, the modern man is flailing at best and he’s making stuff up. He’s trying to redefine masculinity. He’s trying to find some anchor on which to have a sound foundation from which to build and grow his life.

But it turns out he’s informed by the culture around him, he seems to be trying to be more like a woman than a man. Lest that be misunderstood, it’s not that there’s anything wrong with buying wrong with buying shoes for your wife, it’s not that there’s anything wrong with using a melon baller. But the question is, what is true manhood all about? I mean apart from the gender assigned to us by our Creator at conception, what is it that makes a man manly?

As a culture, we’ve been descending down the Romans 1 path of depravity and deep degradation for the last century. Every, every step downward is just another painful reminder that our nation is indeed under divine judgment. Look at Romans 1:18 and following. Suppressing the truth? Check. Ignoring the obvious conclusion of general revelation about the nature and character of God? Check, that’s ignored. Embracing evolutionary myths, check. Exchanging the glory of God for the glory of man, check, that’s been apparent since the Scopes trial in 1925. A century and more of marching away from God.

And so, Romans 1:24, God gave us over to sexual immorality. Giving them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves. The American penchant for all things sexually immoral is known worldwide, it’s been exported by Hollywood. As sexual sin has become more widespread, serial fornication and adultery, pornography, the embrace of every kind of deviancy, divorce has not only destroyed marriages and homes, it’s absolutely ruined children. Kids don’t know what men and women are supposed to look like in the home. Young boys look up to fathers, who are either silent and passive, or else loud and tyrannical. Total confusion has taken over.

Which has been reflected in the portrayal of manhood even on something as common as television. Worldly versions of manliness are everywhere, but biblical manhood, it’s always been hard to find. It doesn’t matter what generation you live in. Post war portrayals of manhood has provided two basic options. On the one hand there was the silent but push me too far and I’ll shoot you version of manhood that’s always been portrayed by John Wayne or Clint Eastwood, characters like that.

On the other hand, you see loud abrasive foolish fathers like characters like Ralph Cramdon from the Honeymooners, or Archie Bunker or even Al Bundy. Those kinds of men up to and including the World War II generation, they provided for their families and they were tough, they protected them from harm. But they didn’t do so well at teaching. They, what they lived out they lived out inconsistently at best. They were happy to tell their children the what, pass on an inherited morality, a list of ethics and rules, but they failed to teach the why behind the what. Add to that either the passivity or the volatility. Add to that either the lack of leadership or complete tyrannical leadership. And then add to that the instances of moral hypocrisy that children were raised seeing in the home. It’s no wonder children of the 60s and 70s indulged in the sins of their fathers, but in public.

What had been hidden in back rooms in the 30s, 40s, 50s, the hippy generation flaunted in the streets. Now we’re living with the consequences of all that, which is Romans 1:26-28. God giving them over to homosexuality and a debased mind, final stages of divine judgment. We are absolutely drowning in sin in this country. So many competing versions of manhood today and each one is just a different degree of totally lost.

Boys growing up today have no idea what manhood is all about. No idea what to look for in a father. And when they get their own sons, their own daughters, no idea what they’re doing. And as I said that’s reflected in popular media particularly, particularly in the sitcoms, situation comedies. Allie, Alexis Madrigal writing in The Atlantic explains his dismay in an article entitled, Dads on Sitcoms.

And he writes this, “As a new dad I’ve often been struck with horror at the dads I see on TV. On the small screen dads are dolts, dads are idiots and while it may seem harmless to get a few cheap laughs at dad’s expense, these characters and their hilarious incompetence form the cultural backdrop for our society’s larger discussion about the rolls father’s play in families. The path from Homer Simpson wringing Bart Simpson’s neck, his main parental action, to our country’s miserable paternity leave rules might be more direct than we think.”

And he quotes somebody, he says on TV, or Hanna Rosin he’s quoting, “On TV, if there’s a dad in the home he’s an idiot. It must have, must’ve reflected on our own discomfort with dads being competent.” Said Hannah Rosen on a panel on the future of fatherhood at the Aspen Ideas Festival. Probably not a lot of good ideas coming out of that festival but, she says “you put a dad in front of his kid and the dad gives the worst advise. You put a dad in front of a toaster and he burns the house down.” She’s talking about what’s on TV.

While Mr. Madrigal rightly identifies the disrespectful cultural portrayals of dads, he then goes from there to immediately veer off course yet again. He believes that the solution is to provide paternity leave policies so fathers can have more time with their kids. He wants sitcoms and movies to provide better messaging to change the cultural perception of fatherhood.

Now no doubt about it, media is a powerful medium but that’s no solution. That’s no way forward, that’s just another turn downward. We’re not going to find any answers about genuine manhood from Mr. Madrigal, Brian Lombardi or anyone else in this culture. It’s time for us to go back to the designer. And to ask him what he had in mind when he created men to be men.

Open your bible to Genesis chapter 1. It should be easy to find, it’s right there in the front. But we need to go back to the beginning and get a good look at God’s original design. If you will, the blueprint of manhood. We’re going to find out what God intended men to be and to do. If anyone, if anyone in the universe can show us what makes men manly it is the architect of manhood, right?

Let’s stop looking around us, we’re not going to find the answers out there. Let’s get back to God’s word, back to the basics of biblical manhood and master those fundamentals. Here in Genesis 1, take a look at verses 26-27. God made men and women to be equal. God made men and women to be equal. We start with the understanding that God made mankind and he made them male and female. Look at Genesis 1:26 and 27, “God said let us make man in our image, after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the heavens, and over the livestock, and over all of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him, male and female he created them.”

That gender binary represents the only two options that are available, male and female, nothing in between. No transgenders here. Hardwired into our genetic design, the XY chromosomes make a male human, the XX chromosome makes a female human. Seems ridiculous, I know that I have to say that publically, but we live in ridiculous times don’t we. Moving on. Notice in verse 26 God said, “Let us make man in our image and let them rule.” Man, singular, is made in the image of God. But then God uses the plural when he speaks of co-regency, co-dominion, ruling together over the created world.

This verse presents that first couple as co-equals and in verse 27 we see God distinguish them. God created man, singular, in his own image, in the image of God he created him, singular. Male and female he created them, plural, both persons are image bearers of God. Each one is capable of representing God’s communicable attributes, that is his righteousness, patience, love, etc. They were created to reflect his glory in that way, and not only that but each one had the rational ability to know and understand and learn and apprehend God’s incommunicable attributes as well.

They could understand his self existence, they could understand his immutability, his infinity, his eternity, his omniscience, all the omnis, omnipresence, omnipotence. As image bearers they possess rationality, they possess an ability to learn, ability to understand, apprehend truth, comprehend concepts, and they were able to communicate it to others. Bearing God’s communicable attributes, apprehending the greatness of his incommunicable attributes, men and women together share the intellectual and emotional capacity to worship God in all of his glory and all of his splendor. They’re co-equal as image bearers of God.

And together God assigned them a task. Look at verse 28, God blessed them, he said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over fish, birds, every living thing that moves on the earth.” Okay? Men and women not only equal by virtue of being image bearers, they are also equal in their God given task to exercise joint dominion over the whole earth. They’re to rule together as co-regents over all creation. They’re to rule together exercising a delegated authority that comes from God almighty.

Obviously, cooperation is here implied along with mutual respect, mutual appreciation. Men and women here are co-equals in every way. But, they are also different. God made them male and female and that signals an initial clue which signals a difference in role, a difference in function. He didn’t want them to be exactly the same. Living as image bearers of God would not look the same. Ruling as co-regents would not be conducted in exactly the same way. And that’s what we see when we turn the page to Genesis 2:4.

Genesis 2:4, go there, brings us to a second point in our outline. God made men and women to be equal but also, number two, God made men to lead. God made men to lead. That opening chapter in Genesis summarized the first week of existence. The first week of creation. Comprehended the entirety of God’s creative activity.

Then we get to Genesis 2:3, says God rested from all the work that he had done. Doesn’t mean that he was tired, it just means, rested means a cessation of all his creative activity. As we move through the rest of chapter 2, we dial in on the sixth day of creation and that focus is on the special creation of mankind. Let’s look at Genesis 2 starting in verse 5.

“When no bush of the field was yet in the land and no small plant of the field had yet sprung up. For the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the land and there was no man to work the ground. And a mist was going up from the land and was watering the whole face of the ground. Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. And the man became a living creature.” Stop there.

That is the very picture of intimacy, isn’t it? God commanded everything else into existence. The light, the heavens, the dry land, plants, heavenly bodies, the fish, the birds, land animals. Let it be and it was. When he created man he used previously created material. Common dust from the ground and he shaped it into a man and then he breathed his own breath into him. Man is a wonderfully, mysterious combination of common dust and divine breath.

More importantly, this pictures God using his hands to form the man. His lips to breathe the breath of life into his nostrils. Now whether this is anthropomorphic language, assigning human attributes to God so we can kind of picture this, or whether this is a theophany. This shows direct hands on involvement. This shows God’s intimacy with the only creature that he fashioned in his own image, mankind; he used his hands, he used his lips.

It’s important to notice that God started making a special creation he started with the XY chromosome human. The man. The male. He made man first, bringing him into existence before the woman. He could have brought them into existence together, at the same time, but he didn’t. He chose to create them one at a time, and he chose Adam to be first and then Eve. Why? Listen, there’s a reason. It’s not a coincidence, it’s not arbitrary at all, this is by design.

You say, “prove it.” Okay, you don’t need to turn there but in 1 Timothy chapter 2 Paul considers this order, man first and then woman, he considers this order of special creation significant when it comes to male leadership in the church. He tells Timothy when it comes to the church, 1 Timothy 2:12 and 13, “I do not permit a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man. Rather she is to remain quiet. For Adam was formed first then Eve.”

Notice, he’s gone all the way back to the beginning. That’s his reason. This isn’t Paul speaking from the perspective of a patriarchal male dominated culture. He has transcended all cultures, all times, all generations, going all the way back to a time before any culture existed at all when there was only one man on the earth. By God’s design, a woman is not to teach or exercise authority over a man, why? Because, she was second on the scene, not first.

For that reason, she can’t teach or exercise authority over men in the church. That’s Paul’s argument. As we go back to the text in Genesis chapter 2, we find out why. Doesn’t have to do with male superiority, female inferiority. Doesn’t have to do with any of that kind of nonsense that I’ve heard before. We already said men and women are co-equals in the most fundamental way. As fellow image bearers of God himself. It doesn’t have anything to do with female gullibility and male logic.

Of all the heretics listed in the Bible you’re going to find it hard to find a woman named among all the male heretics. Listen, this has nothing to do with that. It has to do, everything to do with God’s design. A God ordained distinction in role, in responsibility. These co-regents they work together as a team. One leads, one follows.

As we keep reading notice how many firsts are here, how many firsts Adam experienced before God created Eve. All of them equipping him to lead his wife well. Look at verses 8-14, “The Lord God planted a garden in Eden in the east, and then he put the man whom he had formed. Out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up every tree that’s pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was in the midst of the garden and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. A river flowed out of Eden to water the garden and there it divided and became four rivers. The name of the first is the Pishon. It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold. And the gold of that land is good.” Bedellum, “bdellium and onyx stone are” also, “there. The name of the second river is the Gihon. It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Cush, modern day Ethiopia, that area. “And the name of the third river is the Tigris, which flows east of Assyria. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.”

So right after God created Adam, he took the newly formed man on a tour of the created world. Adam was the first to get a lay of the land. The first to walk through his environment. Adam saw trees that were pleasing to look at, good for food, tree of life was in that category. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil was not. Adam saw the irrigation system for the garden of Eden, figured out how things work. Adam was the first to explore, follow the rivers from their headwaters in the garden to their end.

He was the earth’s first cartographer, naming the rivers, mapping out natural boundaries. Along the way Adam discovered natural resources, which made him the world’s first, maybe you could call him an engineer, mining engineer. He identified minerals that could be mined from the earth and put to practical use. All of this, before Eve existed.

Let’s keep moving, verse 15, “The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.” Here Adam is the first to get his work assignments directly from God. According to Genesis 1:28 both of them were fulfill, to fill the earth to subdue it. But it was, God was specific with Adam before the woman arrived. There’s more to see, verses 16 and 17, and this is where we see a distinctive of Adam’s leadership role and the responsibility that comes into sharper focus.

It says there in verse 16, “The LORD God commanded the man, saying, ‘You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.’” Adam’s like, wait a second, what was that? Die? Things just got gravely serious for him.

Adam just heard a very alien concept from God. Something utterly foreign in this good garden, in this living paradise. Words like evil words like death. Once again though, it’s Adam who received permission about all that’s good, about all that God has provided for food apart from the presence of the woman. It’s to Adam God identified the forbidden tree. It’s to Adam, who heard the warning not to eat from that tree.

The woman has not yet been created. It’s Adam who learns about the consequence of eating from the forbidden tree. He would surely die. Again all this before Eve is created, she wasn’t around to hear one word.