Action Men
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Announcements:
No AM service next week. We will have nursing home ministry at 3PM (Corrie speaking) then water baptism next from 5:30PM-7PM. The sign up sheet is online and if you have any questions, or cannot access the sheet online, please see Pastor Charity.
2. Des announcement for outreaches
Worship:
Praise
2. Fresh Wind
3. Worthy of It All
4. I Exalt Thee (Chorus)
Introduction:
Some stats on men in church:
Here are a few stats on the gender gap which was published on June 15, 2021:
1. The typical U.S. Congregation adult crowd is 61% female, 39% male. This gender gap shows up in all age categories. [1]
2. On any given Sunday there are 13 million more adult women than men in America’s churches. [2]
3. This Sunday almost 25 percent of married, churchgoing women will worship without their husbands. [3]
4. Midweek activities often draw 70 to 80 percent female participants. [4]
5. Over 70 percent of the boys who are being raised in church will abandon it during their teens and twenties. Many of these boys will never return. [6]
6. As of June 2022, 36 percent of women say they went to church last week (either in person or online) whereas only 24 percent of men did. [7]
7. Churches overseas report gender gaps of up to 9 women for every adult man in attendance. [8]
8. The typical Christian college in the U.S. enrolls almost 2 women for every 1 man. [9]
9. Fewer than 10% of U.S. churches are able to establish or maintain a vibrant men’s ministry. [10]
Footnotes:
[1] “U.S. Congregational Life Survey – Key Findings,” 29 October 2003, <www.uscongregations.org/key.htm>.
[2] This statistic comes from Barna’s figures on male/female worship attendance, overlayed upon the Census 2000 numbers for adult men and women in the U.S. population.
[3] I came up with this figure by taking the U.S. Census 2000 numbers for total married adults and overlaying Barna Research’s year 2000 percentages of male vs. female attendance at weekly worship services. The figures suggest at least 24.5 million married women attend church on a given weekend, but only 19 million married men attend. That’s 5.5 million more women, or 22.5%. The actual number may be even higher, because married people attend church in much greater numbers than singles.
[4] Barna Research Online, “Women are the Backbone of Christian Congregations in America,” 6 March 2000, <www.barna.org>.
[6] “LifeWay Research Uncovers Reasons 18 to 22 Year Olds Drop Out of Church,” PowerPoint presentation accompanying study, available at the LifeWay Web site, http://www.lifeway.com/lwc/article_main_page/0,1703,A=165949&M=200906,00.html, accessed 12 September 2007.
[7] https://news.gallup.com/poll/350462/person-religious-service-attendance-rebounding.aspx
[8] I get an e-mail message about once a month from a pastor overseas whose congregation is almost totally female.
[9] Camerin Courtney, “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” Christianity Today, Single Minded. View at http://www.christianitytoday.com/singles/newsletter/mind40630.html.
[10] Based on a show of hands at the National Coalition of Men’s Ministries meeting in 2005. The consensus in the room among hundreds of men’s ministry experts was that less than 10% of congregations had any ongoing ministry to men. Compare this to the 110% of churches that offer women’s and children’s ministries.
Where are the men in the church? Why are we not seeing men in the church anymore? What does a godly man look like? Or should I ask, what does a godly man of action look like? This morning we will be talking about how it is time to act like men. What does that mean? We will be in 1 Corinthians 16 this morning and while you are turning there, I want to give us some basic background.
Paul is writing to the church in Corinth who were spiritually immature and living in a very idolatrous and immoral city. He wrote his letter to identify problems in the Corinthian church, to offer solutions, and to teach the believers how to live for Christ in a corrupt society as the church was largely made up of Gentiles.
We need to get something addressed first: God has called you His children. His sons (and daughters). That means our identity is in Him and what He says about us and no one else. God identifies us as His kids (Romans 8:14-16; 1 John 3:1)
14 For all those led by God’s Spirit are God’s sons.
15 For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear. Instead, you received the Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father!”
16 The Spirit himself testifies together with our spirit that we are God’s children,
1 See what great love the Father has given us that we should be called God’s children—and we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it didn’t know him.
It is first knowing who we are in Christ Jesus and who God the Father says we are, that Paul writes this to the church in Corinth (and to us):
13 Be alert, stand firm in the faith, be courageous, be strong.
14 Do everything in love.
Transition: There are some observations from this text that Paul writes to the church of Corinth that I would like to speak to all of us this morning but especially our men. First of all, we need to:
I. Be watchful: alert, on your guard (military term)
In biblical times they would set a watchmen on the wall to be on the alert; to watch and be ready.
Don’t go about your daily routine apathetic to the world around you as Jesus warns us in:
37 As the days of Noah were, so the coming of the Son of Man will be.
38 For in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah boarded the ark.
39 They didn’t know until the flood came and swept them all away. This is the way the coming of the Son of Man will be.
They were to be constantly watchful or alert for spiritual enemies that might slip in and threaten to destroy them, whether it be divisions (1:10–17; 11:18), pride (3:18–21), sin (5:1–8), disorder (14:40), or erroneous theology (15:12).
As men of action, what are we to be watchful about?
-what our family is listening to
-what our family is watching
-who our family is hanging with
-over our marriage
-over our children
-over yourself (character and integrity)
Question:
How are you, man of God, being watchful over yourself and your family?
Are there some areas we need to tighten up on?
Transition: We need to be watchful to make sure nothing creeps in from the enemy in our family or our personal life. Next, we need to:
II. Stand firm: hold tight and stay on your conviction and faith according to the Word of God
-align our behavior with God’s Word and not aligning God’s Word with our behavior
Stand firm in repentance, prayer, tithing, church, etc.
Paul encourages us to stand firm in:
58 Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, be steadfast, immovable, always excelling in the Lord’s work, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.
We can’t allow ourselves to be on a spiritual or emotional roller coaster.
Men build their life and take action on the Word of God and what the Word of God says.
We MUST stay in the Word of God!
Transition: After being watchful and standing firm, we need to:
III. Be courageous or Act like a man:
David tells Solomon as David prepares to die:
2 “As for me, I am going the way of all of the earth. Be strong and be a man,
There is a difference between “being” a man and “acting” like a man.
You can be a father but you need to act like one too!
Being/acting like a man can be defined by two things:
1-don’t act like a woman
-men are called to lead their family physically, emotionally and spiritually
-it wasn’t Eve’s fault in the garden as Adam should have been watchful and protecting Eve
-take responsibility; don’t make excuses on what happens on your watch!
-there are only 2 genders according to the Word of God
27 So God created man in his own image; he created him in the image of God; he created them male and female.
And the second thing that helps define a man is:
2-don’t act like a boy
20 Brothers and sisters, don’t be childish in your thinking, but be infants in regard to evil and adult in your thinking.
11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put aside childish things.
-it’s time to grow up! Don’t expect your wife to be your mother!
Help your wife and partner with her with the home (dishes, laundry, cleaning, etc.), the kids (appts, discipline, activities, etc.), the finances, etc.
Transition: After being watchful, standing firm and being courageous/acting like a man, we need to:
IV. Be strong: this literally means “to be made strong”. In other words, you can’t do it yourself. This is a work that God does.
Through His Word:
8 This book of instruction must not depart from your mouth; you are to meditate on it day and night so that you may carefully observe everything written in it. For then you will prosper and succeed in whatever you do.
9 Haven’t I commanded you: be strong and courageous? Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.”
Through prayer:
16 I pray that he may grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with power in your inner being through his Spirit,
Action men admit when they are weak and only when that happens is when God is made strong!
9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is perfected in weakness.” Therefore, I will most gladly boast all the more about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may reside in me.
10 So I take pleasure in weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and in difficulties, for the sake of Christ. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
11 I have been a fool; you forced it on me. You ought to have commended me, since I am not in any way inferior to those “super-apostles,” even though I am nothing.
Men, we will make mistakes and it is ok. We just need to admit we need help and rely on the Holy Spirit to guide and lead us!
Transition: Lastly, and most importantly, we need to:
V. Do all in love: respond in love (love without stopping (MSG); Love never Fails 1 Cor 13)
1 If I speak human or angelic tongues but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
2 If I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so that I can move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing.
3 And if I give away all my possessions, and if I give over my body in order to boast but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Translation: If I go to church every time the doors are open, and if I am involved in all the ministries of the church and help others in the community, and if I tithe regularly but have not love, it doesn’t mean anything!
If we love Jesus, then it will show in our love to others!
35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
If we say we (as godly men) love our wife, then we need to show it as Christ loved the church!
The same with our kids!
Fathers, don’t stir up anger in your children, but bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.
The same with other people!
Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.
“ ‘For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat; I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink; I was a stranger and you took me in; I was naked and you clothed me; I was sick and you took care of me; I was in prison and you visited me.’
“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and take you in, or without clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick, or in prison, and visit you?’
“And the King will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’
Transition: Being action men mean that you are:
watchful (alert and on your guard to what you allow in your life and the life of your family),
standing firm (in your convictions according to the Word of God and not have the Word of God align to your behavior or beliefs),
be courageous (take responsibility and act like a man and not be childish),
be strong (by recognizing your weakness and relying on God to give you strength) and
do it all in love!
Conclusion:
There is a story of a man who was climbing a mountain with four of his friends. He was a professional mountain climber and the four people who were with him were all tied onto a rope 35 feet apart as that's how they do it. They had all the equipment and it was all used correctly and set up correctly. Although it was very dangerous, their ascent went fine and after they got to the top they had a celebration.
As they started down on the descent, the professional person, that was leading the climb, slipped and fell. And when he fell, because of their inexperience, those he was connected to on that rope one by one began to fall and slide down that mountain. Three of them were killed including the professional but it didn't stop there.
As they were coming down that mountain sliding, sliding, sliding all tied together (one man fell but all those connected to him fell) and there were two other climbers who were descending in front of them and they wiped them out and killed one of them.
And, as it couldn’t get any worse, there were three that were ascending while the group was still descending and they hit those three new climbers and killed two of them.
Gentlemen, you are at the head of that rope and others are connected to you (your family, co-workers, relatives, neighbor, etc.). The way you lead will affect everyone on your rope. If you slip, the rest of those on your rope will follow you and fall along side of you. You can create a disaster if you aren’t careful and it can not only affect you and those on your rope, but it can also affect those around you.
It is time for us to stop playing around and be men of action - the men of God He has created us to be.
That may be realizing who God says you are and giving your life to Him. Not defining ourselves by society or the world’s standards but by what the Word of God tells us we are.
It is time for us to stop calling ourselves men and start bring action men!