American culture exalts a narrow view of manhood: you gotta be rugged, strong, and unemotional, like pickup trucks banging up and down mountains in TV commercials, chewing up boulders and spitting out gravel.
But the ads are fake. If you treat your truck that way you will not only destroy the suspension, you may void the warranty. Bob Seger singing “like a ROCK!” should not be taken to indicate you can drive your Chevy directly into rocks. And it may be built “Ford Tough,” but it’s not that tough. Remember Sam Elliot’s “Guts, glory, Ram”? Guts and glory are fine as long as you stay in your lane.
Men were not built to chew up boulders and spit out gravel either. Even the toughest among us have feelings, and when those feelings are ignored, problems result. But what is proper behavior for a man? David may be the best example.
Samuel reports that God called David a man “after God’s own heart” 1 Samuel 13:14. What do we know about David’s heart? He was bold and courageous, brilliant in battle, a powerful king—and he never lost touch with his emotions. He felt EVERYTHING. He reminds me of Macduff, the fictional hero of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, who grieves the loss of his family and is told to bear it like a man. He answers: “I shall do so, but I must also FEEL it as a man.”
David, this man’s man, with a heart that God tells us is like God’s own heart, FEELS EVERY EMOTION. (See Psalm 3:4, Psalm 13:5-6, Psalm 55:4-5,17.)
Yet we hide our emotions. Some of us hide from emotions. There are times when responsibility requires we avoid emotion, but we are wrong to always avoid negative feelings. We are wrong to demand little boys never cry (though not wrong to teach children age-appropriate self-control).
Dear God, our compassionate Father, teach us to inhabit our emotions, to feel them, put them into words, and face them courageously. Make us more like David, a strong man who embraced all his emotions.
ΑΩ
Household Words: 