Letter to my brothers:
I need to speak to my brothers. I need to speak truth, words that will build you, but more than that, words of apology.
I am sorry.
I am sorry for what the women of today are making you. I am sorry for making into romance novel characters, for lusting after you and making you into things and not men. I am sorry for each time I have looked into your eyes and not looked at you as a man of integrity and honor but as a man who is a thing for my desire. I am sorry for every time I have looked at you and not looked at you as a brother and friend.
I am sorry for each and every time my sister and I have spoken words over you that were not uplifting; for each time we asked where the “good men” were, for each time we asked where the gentlemen were. I am sorry for each time one of us tells you to “be a man” or “grow some balls.”
I am sorry for each word we say that strips you of the man you already are. For all of the time we tell you to stop holding the door, I am sorry. I am sorry for every word and action I have taken to rob you of your masculinity
I am sorry for making you into ideas and not taking you for the strong, courageous, honorable, and broken men that you are. I am sorry for every time I have paired your last name with mine, knowing that it does not belong. I am sorry that we constantly create ideas of impossible men and then blame you for not being him.
I am sorry for all these things, these actions, these wrongs, because we were telling you lies. With each moment we were saying that you are not men and that is the biggest lie of all. You are men. You are worthy courageous men who deserve better than we have given you. You deserve the honesty of us saying that you are far greater than you realize.
You are a man. If you wish to claim that title, it is yours. No one has the specific definition of what a man is and no one can tell you how to be on. You are a man. You are filled with so many things: strength, honor, integrity, courage. You are a man who is worth more than anyone could ever say. I wish I could directly install God’s truth into you, because when you live in that truth you are unstoppable. When you live in that truth I see you tearing down destructive alls and building up new walls of glory and grace. You can change the world with your actions and words. All you have to do is live in the truth of who God has created you. He created you as a man of God. Plain and simple.
