Sermon Tone Analysis

Godly Manhood: A Father’s Day Message [Genesis 1-3; Romans 5:12-21]

If you will turn with me to Genesis 1 we are going to look at Godly manhood from the bible today, we will also be looking at Romans 5. We live in a time with massive confusion and misperception—not only in our culture, but also in the church—regarding what it means to be a man.

So I want to not only honor father’s today on this Father’s Day, but also challenge men in general.

This study has been challenging for me mainly because through it I’ve seen areas in my life that I need to improve and grow, and I pray this message will help and challenge men to take a long look at yourself and see where it is you need to improve and grow in the Lord as a godly man.

I want to speak clearly, even sternly at points, because I am convinced that this is a huge need in our culture and in the church and in families and future families represented all across the room.

I want to speak specifically to men today, but in a way that I hope will encourage women and will help you as women know how to pray for men—married women, to know how to pray for your husbands; children, to know how to pray for your dads; single women, to know what to look for in a man when it comes to marriage; and for you as women to know how God has designed you in a way that complements men for your good and for God’s glory.

God’s Design for Men… [Gen.

1:26-28]

Let’s start with God’s design for men, and really for women also, in Genesis 1:26–28.

Follow along there with me as we hear the Word of God.

Genesis 1:26–28,

And God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.

And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

And God blessed them.

And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

(Genesis 1:26–28)

God created men and women with equal dignity

What do we learn here about God’s design for men and for women in the first chapter of the Bible?

First and foremost, clearly God created men and women with equal dignity.

In verse 26, God creates man and woman in His image, both of them with equal value before God and equal dignity before each other.

This is where any conversation about manhood must begin.

From the start of the Bible, God in His Word speaks against any kind of male superiority or male dominance.

In any culture, any relationship, where man is thought to be better than woman—in any culture, any relationship, where women are treated as inferior, as objects to be used or abused, then we undercut the very design of God.

For all of eternity, no sex (man or woman) will be greater than the other.

No person should ever feel superior or inferior because they are a man or a woman.

We all have equal dignity before God.

Verse 28 says God blessed man and woman, not just with dignity, but with dominion over everything else in all creation—together.

This is a truth that’s reiterated in Psalm 8:3–8, where we hear that God has crowned men and women with glory and honor, over and above everything else in all creation.

God created men and women with great dignity, equal dignity.

God created men and women with different roles

At the same time, God created men and women with different roles.

This is clear in the very next chapter of the Bible, Genesis 2. Genesis 2 contains a parallel account of the creation of man and woman, but this time with more specifics.

I want you to read along there with me and listen to the distinct reasoning behind the creation of woman and the subsequent roles that are given to the man and the woman.

Let’s start in verse 18 of chapter 2.

Then the LORD God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.”

Now out of the ground the LORD God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them.

And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name.

The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field.

But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him.

So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh.

And the rib that the LORD God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man.

Then the man said,

“This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” (Genesis 2:18–23)

What a picture!

Notice God doesn’t just immediately create woman after man in Genesis 2. Instead, God parades all these animals before man for him to name them.

What’s the point of that?

Well, it’s not just for man to name all these animals.

It’s to show man that he is alone, that there is none like him.

He’s looking at all these animals, considering what names match their natures, and in the process, he realizes, “None of these match my nature.”

In this naming process of animals, man realizes his need for a helper like him.

So God performs the first surgical operation, and man goes to sleep, alone.

While he’s sleeping, God takes one of his ribs.

Now remember, man was formed from dust, and God obviously could have created woman in the same way.

Instead, God takes a part from Adam’s side—not from his head, his hips, or his feet, but from his side where his heart is.

This is a picture of how woman would be, in the deepest sense of the word, his partner, literally, as the text says, his helper.

God intentionally forms, verse 18, a helper fit for man.

Now she stands, formed by God, like man and uniquely suited to serve alongside man.

Then God touches the man, wakes him up, and says, “You have one more creature to name.”

Adam opens his eyes, and needless to say, Adam is thrilled.

The first words ever recorded of a human speaking, and it’s poetry, like song.

“This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” (Genesis 2:23) See the joy of the first man receiving the gift of the first woman.

He goes nuts, singing, “Yes, she is from me, my very flesh.

I identify with her, and I love her, and I call her woman, for she came out of man.”

Obviously, man and woman complement one another physically.

They are created physically in a way that they can multiply together.

We won’t go into a birds and bees explanation here.

This complementary relationship is being denied, disregarded, twisted today into all kinds of ideas and caricatures that are not the design of God, and ultimately, as a result, this complementary relationship between man and woman is being ignored, even by many in the church.

Let me give you a heads up.

The Bible is, from the beginning, taking us against the grain of political correctness in our day.

If we will listen honestly to what the Bible is saying, we will see a beauty in the relationship between men and women that we are so missing in our culture today.

Here in Genesis 2, and then reflected all over the Bible.

Man was created to be the head.

Now, as soon as I use that word, I want to be clear in how I’m using it, how the Bible uses it.

This term “head,” it’s referring to a leadership role.

Again, this is not male domination.

This is not greater dignity.

That would go completely against God’s design.

We’re talking here about role, and that’s a key distinction that’s familiar to all of us.

I am a husband and father that’s my role, it doesn’t mean I’m more valuable than my wife it’s simply the role God has designated to me.

Man was created to lead his wife with love, and to provide for and protect his wife.

And really not just his wife, but women generally.

We know this!

We all know that when two guys and two ladies are walking down the street, and some attacker approaches the group, there’s something wrong if the two guys step back so the ladies will save them.

Those are not men.

By God’s design from the beginning, man is accountable for protection in every way.

Any husband who rolls over next to his wife in bed and says, “I heard a strange noise downstairs.

Will you go check it out” That guy has issues.

He’s not a man; he’s outside of the design of God.

A leader provides and protects with love and feels the accountability for that kind of provision and protection.

Sin’s Distortion of Men [Gen.

3:1-7]

In our culture today we respond negatively to the idea of men being head in his role…and that is due to sin’s distortion of men.

Starting in Genesis 3:1-7.

“Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the LORD God had made.

He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?

And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’ ” But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die.

For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.

Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked.

And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.”

(Genesis 3:1–7)