What the world needs now, is love sweet love! I believe that is a quote from some Bert Bacharach song. I feel the lack of said love rests solely on us males. We are the problem. Notice I said us “males” not us “Men.” There is a difference. I have met Men, lots of them in fact, but I have been super blessed. A lot of people don’t know many Men, and when we meet one he sticks out in our heads. I have read a lot of good blogs about Men and a book recently called Adam’s Return. In Adam’s Return the author speaks about the need for initiation to become a Man. He says the five essential messages of initiation are this 1) Life is hard 2) You are not that important 3) Your life is not about you 4) You are not in control 5) You are going to die. All Men seem to get that, but they also know there is a “but” for all five. 1) Life is hard, BUT the pain one brings on oneself by living outside of evident reality is greater and longer lasting 2) You are not that important, BUT if we know our original blessing we can easily handle our original sin 3) Your life is not about you, BUT if you live in radical humility you will never know it 4) You are not in control ,BUT if you cannot control the biggies, like life or death why should you spend so much time trying to control all the lesser outcomes 5) You are going to die, BUT not really. It seems that we are born with a longing, desire, and deep hope that this thing called life could somehow last forever and it does.
The need for Men is so obvious to me as I hang out with the children at the New Faith Family Children’s Home. That group of pre-teen boys long for any physical contact they can get from a Man. These kids all have horrible backgrounds of abuse and neglect, but they still long for a father. Rohr, the author of Adam’s Return, mentions that with the lack of Men/Fathers the society turns into a sibling society with boys looking to other boys to learn how to be a Man.
My brothers this cannot continue! Let us be Men and not males and learn from the Men who have gone before us! The future depends on it. Lets make all those sitcoms that make fathers look like idiots become idiotic because they are so far from reality. Right now they hit a little too close to home for a lot of people. Also, thank God He is the ultimate FATHER. Here in Manila I recently met a MAN by the name of Jeff Long. He has brought LIFE to Manila. KIDS International is wonderful and he has raised some great kids, and he fathers some big time ministry!
The boys reading to each other.
