A New Resource
I’m happy to announce the release of my latest book, Preparing for Manhood.
It is a collection of my essays from this blog, each one selected to provide some small measure of wisdom to young men. It seeks to uproot the lies of our feminist culture and teach men their God-given authorities & responsibilities–as Christians, husbands, fathers & citizens.
The volume is now available for sale on Amazon. It is a great resource not only for young men but also for older men who want to help clear the rubble for their descendants. If you’ve enjoyed this blog and want part of it a form that’s more enduring than 1’s and 0’s, if you need a gift for a man in your life, or if you simply want to support The 96th Thesis, I’d encourage you the check it out.
What follows is the introduction to the book:
What has happened to manhood?
In saner cultures than our own, traditions and norms would guide most every
boy into becoming a man capable of governing his own pieces of society.
These domains might be small and personal like his home and family, or they
might be larger and public like a business, a church, or a government office.
But big or small, they would be his—not in the childlike sense of “I can do
whatever I want with it” but in the sense of true ownership. He is responsible
for governing them; he directs them according to godly wisdom; and he takes
a healthy pride in what he accomplishes for God with them.
Sadly, 21st Century Americans do not live in a sane culture. Many people—
even self-described Christians—view such masculine authority with suspicion,
as though it were abuse just waiting to happen. Many Americans even describe
masculinity itself as “toxic.” So rather than raising boys to become men as God
designed them, we discourage them from it. Society prefers that boys become
inoffensive, androgynous consumers rather than patriarchs or leaders; and it
has organized itself accordingly.
To make matters worse, many who want to heal our emasculated culture
and recover a vigorous masculinity find themselves at a loss on how to get
there. Generational links have been broken among us, and know-how that
should have been passed from father to son has been lost along the way. Even
if we recognize that a man should aspire to patriarchy, the nuts and bolts of
confidently building a family and governing a household are often a black box.
Most of us perceive that something has gone horribly wrong in our society.
Many of us recognize the causes. Nevertheless, there is a wide gulf between
recognizing a disease and figuring out how to cure it.
This lost knowledge means that if a boy today asks how to become a man,
no one could simply hand him the answers. There is no straightforward path
into a well-defined manhood marked by clear coming-of-age rituals. Instead,
there is trying, failing, learning from your mistakes, and trying again. Young
men today will have to figure much of it out as they go and rediscover what
has been lost so that their own sons will not need to do the same.
But as grim as this may sound, there is still good news.
First, the traditions with which sane cultures are blessed did not spring
fully formed from Zeus’ forehead. They were first built by men who, like you,
had to grow up without them. The work of civilizing the world around you may
be daunting, but we also know it is possible because it has been successfully
accomplished before.
Second, you are not alone. God has given fathers, friends, and other men to
assist you. Although your elders cannot simply hand you the answers, we can
pass on what we’ve figured out so that you need not restart from square one.
Many of us have learned to spot the lies our culture told us. We have abandoned
common strategies which have proven track-records of failure. We have also
looked to a more successful past for inspiration in building a more successful
future. These may not be solutions, but they are nevertheless seeds which can,
with time and care, grow into good habits, good traditions, and good norms.
Clearing the Rubble
Many teachers in the churches have co-mingled the faulty norms of a failed
culture with the eternal Word of God. “Part One: Prepare to Discern” will help
teach Christian young men to cut through this confusion by separating the
two once again. Skills like identifying false teachers and recognizing the nonbiblical
origins of cultural norms will allow manhood to grow from the good
soil of God’s Holy Word rather than the depleted and toxic soil of our culture.
One of the most critical areas of such confusion in our culture is how we
view women. Our presumption of equality—that men and women are interchangeable
in every way that matters—has proven itself toxic beyond belief.
The essays in Part Two are included to help prepare young men to deal with
women in the hopes of finding & keeping a godly wife. They will cover aspects
of how men and women ought to relate to one-another according to God’s
design, the nature of sex, and how to deal with the immodesty of women in
modern culture.
But the blessing of marriage is not an end unto itself. The very first commands
God gave to men were to be fruitful and multiply and to take dominion
over the earth. He created woman to be a helpmeet to man in this blessed work.
“Part Three: Prepare to Father” is intended to help young men overcome the
absurd anti-child attitudes that surround them and recognize family as blessing
from God. It will also help them each understand how to serve his family
as its God-ordained head rather than as the slave society pressures him to be.
The home may be the center and beginning of a man’s earthly responsibilities,
but his reach extends outward into the rest of the world as well. What’s
more, here in American, each man is given limited authority to govern through
his votes and sometimes to seek other offices. Under the influence of modern
liberalism, even many churches expect a Christian man to govern as though he
were a pagan or atheist. “Part Four: Prepare to Rule” is intended to disabuse
us of that notion and teach young men how to carry out their governmental
responsibilities under Jesus Christ, their king.
But young men will not pursue these things in a vacuum. Our emasculated
culture will neither die quietly nor sit idly by and ignore your attempts to
become a godly man. It hates what you wish to become. Men who aspire to
godly masculinity will therefore meet resistance from the world. The final set
of essays will help prepare young men to push back against ungodly forces
in society and false teachers in our churches—because they will push against
him. God knew what He was doing when He gave men the capacity for aggression.
Each of us must learn to understand when and how to use that capacity
to contend against evil.
Remember: Overcoming challenges is part of manhood in the first place.
Those who persevere will, by the grace of God, be stronger than those of us
who came before. May God, the Father in whose image all earthly fathers were
made, enlighten your mind and bless your path to manhood, so that, like His
beloved Son, you may increase wisdom and in stature and in favor before God
and man.
