How
to disciple in an era of male floundering.
Bob Smietana| Christianity Today May 18, 2018
Bob Smietana| Christianity Today May 18, 2018
The mid-1990s were a pretty great
time to be a Christian man. The televangelist scandals of the ’80s were in the
past. Today’s megachurch scandals and #MeToo hashtags were far in the future.
Instead, Christian men were making headlines for getting together en masse
to pursue “spiritual, moral, ethical, and sexual purity.”
Gary Kramer was there. Twice. In
1995 he joined more than 60,000 other men at Mile High Stadium in Denver in one
of Promise Keepers’ signature moments. Two years later he traveled to
Washington, DC, for the movement’s Stand in the Gap event, which drew hundreds
of thousands of men from around the country to the National Mall for prayer and
worship.
For decades, churches’ men’s
ministries had been mostly small and informal: maybe a weekly Bible study for
the highly committed. A monthly chatty breakfast that attracted a slightly
larger (but still small) group of attendees. Maybe an annual overnight retreat.
But with the Promise Keepers rallies and an explosion of similar church- and
parachurch-driven ministries, men’s ministry seemed poised to step out of the
shadow of much larger women’s ministries.
The Promise Keepers events were
great, says Kramer, now 60. Full of energy and excitement. But nowadays, his
weekly Tuesday morning Bible study and a bimonthly breakfast in Franklin,
Tennessee, are more sustainable. They’re also what sustains his friendships and
discipleship.
“It’s great to be in on something
like [Promise Keepers],” he says. “But to live it out, you need the smaller
group to be connected with and have life together with on a more intimate
basis.”
They’re small and intimate—and
common. In 2012, 58 percent of US churches had ministry groups targeting men,
according to the National Congregations Study.
The survey did not ask how many men participate, but anecdotal evidence
suggests that they remain less popular among male church attendees than women’s
groups tend to be among female church attendees.
Meanwhile, women still outnumber men
in evangelical churches—55 percent to 45 percent, according to Pew Research.
Overall in America, nearly 3 in 10 women (28 percent) report attending
religious services at least once a week, compared to just 22 percent of men.
As large-scale men’s ministries have
disappeared, those targeting women have grown into a national network of
tightly connected events, books, and celebrity blogger-speakers who don’t
explicitly exclude men but who nonetheless pack out arenas full of women. And
these events seem not to have taken the place of the local Bible studies,
prayer meetings, and meal gatherings—if anything, the big women’s events have
only augmented the smaller ones.
It’s not that men have found other
ways to connect outside their churches. Social isolation is rampant in America
and in other wealthy nations,
fueling a loneliness epidemic that is hitting middle-aged men especially hard.
Many men are floundering, both
inside and outside the church. Which poses a pressing challenge for today’s
men’s ministries: Can they help men find a way forward? Can they spark more
male friendships with an eye to discipleship? And to do so, how much do groups
for men have to focus on “manliness” in an age when the term seems to harder to
define?
On a cold Saturday morning in late
October, just after 7, a dozen guys from the Franklin, Tennessee, chapter of
F3—short for Fitness, Fellowship, and Faith—are having the time of their lives.
And wanting to vomit.
Eleven of them gather in a circle on
a morning where the temperature is just above freezing and ground is muddy from
the overnight rain.
In the middle, their volunteer
leader, nicknamed “Torch,” calls out instructions.
Jumping jacks, pushups, and about a
dozen burpees—a combination squat thrush and pushup, with half of a jumping
jack at the end. Then it’s time to mosey. A short, fast-paced run, followed by
more burpees and some other exercises named after animals.
In between exercises, there is
“mumble chatter”—friendly banter, a little bit of political debate, and some
catching up.
Such groups are one vision of the
future of men’s ministry.
Much has been made of the allure of
emerging small, intentional communities centered on activity and a common
purpose. Fitness programs like CrossFit are becoming
especially known for creating religious-like fervor, complete with jokes about
the excesses of their evangelistic zeal. F3 has that emphasis on “fit” but adds
much more on “Cross.”
Social isolation is rampant in
America and in other wealthy nations, fueling a loneliness epidemic that is
hitting middle-aged men especially hard.
Today, there are about 1,300 F3
workouts in 25 states, with about 15,000 regular participants. All are free and
led by volunteers. Multiple men interviewed said the groups make it easy to
make new friends and just as easy to develop deeper relationships.
The format is simple. A group of
guys—sometimes a handful, sometimes a few dozen—get up early and meet outside
for intense group workouts, rain or shine. There are nicknames, banter, and
puking. Every gathering ends with a “circle of trust” (something like a huddle)
and a prayer.
Though F3 is non-denominational—and
at least a few groups are fairly secular—most participants are Christian men.
Many in the Franklin group say their common faith bond is crucial to the group’s
success.
That’s the case for Dave Redding and
Tim Whitmire, who founded F3 seven years ago on a cold January morning in
Charlotte, North Carolina.
Redding, a former Green Beret turned
lawyer, and Whitmire, a former journalist turned leadership trainer, attended
the same church in Charlotte for years. But they never met before they both
joined a community workout group at a local park.
Both were married and doing well in
their careers, but something was missing. Both had few friends they could
confide in. Most of their time was tied up with work and family, and they
rarely connected with folks at church.
“You would go to church,” Whitmire
says. “You’d put on your suit, you would slap guys on the back, you would sit
in the pew—but you didn’t really have any close male friends.”
Both also had gotten out of shape
and wanted to make a change. So they joined a Saturday morning boot camp–style
workout in Charlotte.
Before long, they grew close with a
number of guys in the group. The combination of sweat and camaraderie made it
easy to start new friendships, and it brought a sense of purpose.
“The workout had solved a problem
for us—in that we were both lonely—even though we hadn’t particularly realized
it,” Redding says.
When the workout became too popular,
Redding and Whitmire started a new workout of their own on New Year’s Day of
2011 at a local middle school field. They hoped a handful guys would join them.
Instead, that first workout drew 34 guys. So from the beginning, they had to
think about expanding.
F3—like other small-scale men’s
ministries—addresses loneliness by drawing on two key components of building
strong friendships. They meet a regular basis and they focus on what they call
“shoulder-to-shoulder” activities rather than “face-to-face” ones.
That kind of sideways approach works
better than “man dates”—like meeting up for coffee or beer—says Boston Globe
reporter Billy Baker.
“If you say, ‘Will you come on over
and help me fix my boat, I’d probably show up—even if I didn’t know anything
about boat engines,’” Baker says. “We’d get dirty and the next thing you know
we would have had a male-bonding experience.”
Baker jokes that he became
“America’s No. 1 middle-aged loser” in the spring of 2017, after a Boston Globe Magazine piece he wrote on the loneliness epidemic went
viral. “I’m hesitant to say I’m lonely, though I’m clearly a textbook case of
the silent majority of middle-aged men who won’t admit they’re starved for
friendship, even if all signs point to the contrary,” he wrote. “Now that I’ve
been forced to recognize it, the question is what to do about it.”
For one thing, Baker noticed that he
and many other men had settled for shallow relationships based in social media.
He decided that being intentional about doing things in real life is key,
especially as men age and making friends becomes more difficult. So is gathering
regularly with friends.
After his story forced some
self-reflection among Baker and his old friends, they started meeting up on
Wednesday nights after work. Sometimes they go out for dinner and a movie at
the mall. Other times they watch a ball game or talk.
“This isn’t eating your vegetables
or exercising. This is just hanging out with your best friends,” says Baker,
who is writing a book on friendship. “And the health benefits are incredible
and immediate.”
But can simple friendship and weekly
informal gatherings do more than address loneliness and isolation? Can they
disciple?
Wes Yoder thinks so. The author and
president of Ambassador Agency Inc. hosts a bimonthly dinner gathering of
friends outside of Nashville. Over steaks and wine, Yoder asks questions like:
What’s the greatest sorrow of your life? What’s your greatest fear right now?
For Yoder, such direct questions
about “things that matter” have deepened relationships even with Christian
brothers he’s walked with for decades. “How could we have known each other 20
years and not know this about each other?” says Yoder, who calls the kitchen
table “the least used asset in the kingdom of God.”
Author Stephen Mansfield thinks the
spiritual benefits of simple friendship are at least as strong as the health
benefits Baker points to. Discipling men can’t happen, he says, if they don’t
have “a band of brothers.”
Mansfield built his own band in
midlife—after a stepping down as pastor of Nashville’s Belmont Church in 2002
following a divorce. Mansfield realized that he had many acquaintances and a
broad social network but few close adult male friends.
Many other men, he realized, were in
the same boat. They had no one who knew their secrets, no one they could call
in the middle of the night if their family faced a crisis. And no one who would
hold them accountable if their life went off the rails.
“Most men are awash in a sea of
casual relationships,” Mansfield says.
While intense, activity-driven groups like F3 have established their place in the world of men’s ministry, they leave a lot of men out. Many men would rather take that weekly coffee or beer appointment over fixing a friend’s boat.
As the Promise Keepers movement
waned, the so-called masculinity movement took its place in many
churches in the early 2000s on the wings of writers like John Eldredge and David Murrow. They preached
that men were being left behind by “feminized” churches that no longer appealed
to them.
But critics say the movement offered
more caricature than model of biblical manhood. It may sound odd that the guy
who wrote Mansfield’s Book of Manly Men is among those critics. But he
is quick to argue that men’s ministry should not focus on manliness. Relying
solely on cultural stereotypes to attract men is at cross-purposes from the
core goal of making disciples, Mansfield says.
“It became all about tattoos and
motorcycles and cigars,” he says. Being a real man—and a follower of Jesus—goes
much deeper.
Meanwhile, he says, “The cultural climate has changed.”
Stereotypes about “that’s just how
men are” have turned much darker in the last few years. Articles in 2018 tend
to be less about how lonely men are than about how they’ve abused power for
sexual favors. A year or two ago, there was a lot of focus on how increasingly
hard it is to be a man in America (women are by far outpacing men in college completion,
women in their 20s are increasingly out-earning their male peers, the labor market is
shifting quickly away from male-dominated industries like manufacturing . . .
). Now, in many ways, that has been replaced by a sort of male
self-consciousness amid constant #MeToo revelations.
Nate Pyle, the author of Man
Enough: How Jesus Redefines Manhood, worries that some men’s
ministries—especially those in local churches—are still built on what he sees
as unhealthy models of manhood.
Pyle, who pastors a church near
Indianapolis, says he and some members of his congregation recently attended a
men’s retreat where the focus was on being tough and manly, rather than being a
servant. The message, he says, was, “We’re going to go out and grill steaks, do
CrossFit, and get fired up for Jesus.”
To be clear: Pyle isn’t against
steaks and CrossFit. He just thinks discipleship rarely happens at motivational
pep rallies and that ministry is too easily shaped by American culture rather
than the Bible.
“In America, men are taught to climb
the corporate ladder, conquer foes, and then celebrate their victories,” he
says. “But Jesus descended, denied himself, and died for others.”
Pyle worries that the ideal
Christian man described by many contemporary men’s ministries is always in
control.
“Fear or loneliness or failure
become places of shame,” he says. “Because you have to be the rock that
everybody needs.”
That same focus on control shapes
the approach to sexuality that’s often a key theme in men’s groups, Pyle says.
“Sex becomes this place where there’s guilt and shame and insecurity,” he says.
Pyle doesn’t want to give the wrong
impression. He thinks that Christian men are, in fact, concerned about sexual
misconduct and harassment. They rightly recognize the dangers of pornography
and sexual sin. And they do think sexual abuse is wrong and want to protect
women.
“In America, men are taught to climb
the corporate ladder, conquer foes, and then celebrate their victories. But
Jesus descended, denied himself, and died for others.” ~Nate Pyle
But emphasizing self-control alone
ignores the other fruits of the Spirit. Men are not only called to exhibit
self-control, but also love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness,
faithfulness, gentleness, and other virtues. The emphasis on self-control has
sometimes sent the message that women exist mostly as temptations to be avoided
rather than family members to be loved.
Other men’s ministry leaders say
that an overemphasis on self-control can backfire.
“Often, attempts to do motivational ministry
for men—becoming a more godly father or leader—only serve to promote moralism
and perfectionism, which further perpetuates a cycle of shame,” says Chuck
DeGroat, a professor of pastoral care and counseling at Western Theological
Seminary. “The sense of not being enough fuels workaholism, perfectionism,
moralism, and more.” As a result, he says, many men “resort to adolescent
coping mechanisms which prevent them from loving those around them well.”
DeGroat and others point to research
that suggests strong connections between loneliness, feelings of failure, and
bad male behavior. New York University psychiatrist James Gilligan and Stony
Brook sociologist Michael Kimmel, for
example, found that shame and isolation are the primary drivers of male
aggression.
In fact, it may be that the best
kind of ministry for men is one that focuses least on what it means to be a
man, according to Adele Calhoun, co-pastor of spiritual formation at Highrock
Church in Arlington, Massachusetts.
“The goal of Christian formation is
no different for men than for women—to be conformed to the image of Christ for
the sake of others,” she says. Single-sex events can still afford helpful
conversations, she says. But gender-roles discussions can direct the focus
inward and truncate the biblical model of holiness.
“If I step back and say I will be
pure, I won’t abuse or harass women, but I never stand on the side of
marginalized—that’s not following Jesus,” she says. Men’s ministry
conversations are rarely structured to discuss how to advocate for women or
talk about what it means to share power with them, she says.
Whether the focus should skew toward
male betterment or, conversely, toward descent and relinquishing power, one
thing seems clear: The future of men’s ministry will remain small for a long
time. In fact, it may still be a weekly gathering for the committed, a monthly
chatty breakfast, and an annual overnight retreat.
But men’s ministries are fine with
that. Some of the larger ministries are even encouraging it. Brett Clemmer,
president of Man in the Mirror, a national men’s ministry, says the best way to
combat so-called toxic masculinity and help men rediscover their place in
families and communities is, in fact, very old-fashioned: create disciples, men
who follow Jesus and who want to lay down their lives for others.
He thinks a small-scale approach,
focused on building friendships, is an effective way to do that.
His group had been primarily focused
on producing curriculum for churches and large-scale events until about six
years ago when it switched gears to work directly with congregations. It has 76
staffers in the field serving as men’s discipleship consultants.
The keys to success have been
helping churches create spaces for men to become friends, then getting those
men to study the Bible and serve together. For the most part, the ministry
emphasizes the “shoulder-to-shoulder” shared experiences like F3. But the focus
is more community building than bodybuilding. “The best groups for men are when
they have a chance to serve together,” Clemmer says.
A recent survey of about 1,400
churches it had worked with found modest progress: The average church had more
than 300 men in the congregation and added about 15 men to its discipleship
ministries through its various efforts.
Clemmer wasn’t surprised. Building
relationships takes time, he says.
“We have to give guys a place to
belong,” he says. “Once they belong, and they know that we love them—then we
can speak into their lives.”
Bob Smietana is senior writer for
Facts & Trends and a frequent contributor to Christianity Today.
