Man Up
Steve Smith was a professional golfer for many years. Steve says that when you’re coaching, your job is to fix people’s behavior. In his first golf lesson, Steve shows a beginner how to hold the club. They always say, “that feels really strange.” A coach’s job is to break bad habits. As Tom Landry coach of the Dallas Cowboys said, “I get men to do what they don’t want to do, so that they can achieve what they’ve always wanted.”
Steve met Craig at Influencers Irvine. Steve was looking for what he was missing at mens’ group ministries he had attended. At that first Influencers meeting Steve heard the soft spoken call of God that said, “Son, you’re home.” Even though Steve lives in Palos Verdes he drives to Fullerton every week to fellowship with our Influencers band of brothers.
Some “politically correct” secularists consider the phrase “Man Up” a call to toxic masculinity. Extreme Feminists would say that the term “toxic masculinity” is redundant. The bible says that the world calls good evil and evil good. One of the themes of influencers is that as followers of our Lord Jesus Christ, blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you and say all manner of evil against you falsely for Christ’s sake, for great are your rewards in heaven. To experience true fellowship with our Lord, we must enter into the fellowship of His suffering.
Sales trainers say, “failure is not an option.” This is also what coaches tell their athletes. Steve’s calling to “Man Up” was when God told him to reach his “Hand Up.” Our first response must be to give all to God….casting all your cares upon him for he careth for you. We can either depend on our own pride and our own sufficiency or we can come to the realization that He alone is our sufficiency in all things. “Hands up, I surrender” is not what the world teaches. However when we surrender to him we will understand that “thy strength is made perfect in my weakness, thy grace is sufficient for me.”
What was history’s greatest moment of surrender? The greatest moment of surrrender was when Jesus prayed to his Heavenly Father in the Garden of Gethsemane, “let this cup (of wrath, sin and death) pass from me, nevertheless, not my will but thine be done.” When Jesus surrendered to his Father’s will at the cross, he became the perfect sacrifice for sin on our behalf that we may be made the righteousness of God in him.
To Man Up is to press toward the mark of the upward calling of God in Christ Jesus. According to Philippians 3:13-14, 13. Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended (already attained): but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, 14. I press toward the mark for the prize of the high (upward) calling of God in Christ Jesus.”
To Man Up also means to set our affection on things above and not on the things of the world. Jesus said, “Don’t treasure treasures upon earth where moth and rust corrupts and thieves break through and steal. Instead treasure treasures in heaven. For where your treasure is there will your heart be also.”
What does it look like to Man Up? One attribute of manning up is that our strength is in God. Psalm 46:1 says, “God is our refuge and strength…” Isaiah 49 says, “he gives power to the faint and to them who have no might he increases strength.”
Another attribute is perseverance. Colossians 1:11 says, “Strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness;”. James 1:1-4 says “My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; 3. Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. 4. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.”
A third attribute is integrity, 2 Corinthians 8:21 says “Providing for honest things, not only in the sight of the Lord, but also in the sight of men.” According to Psalm 41:12, “And as for me, thou upholdest me in mine integrity, and settest me before thy face for ever.”
Overcoming is another characteristic of manning up. Who is he that overcomes the world? 1 John 5:4-5 says, “For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. 5. Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?”
Another aspect of manning up is to do what is needed. According to James 1:22, “But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.” Galatians 3:9 says, and be not weary in well doing for in due season we shall reap if we faint not. James 4:17 says, he who knows to do right and doesn’t do it. To him it is sin.
It’s only by God’s grace and mercy that when we sin, we can man up and hand it to him. Manning up is to surrender our will to his will and our ability to his ability. Romans 13:14 says, “But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof.” On our own we can do nothing. To man up means that God is our sufficiency in all things.
We all have two fathers. One is our earthly father or the father figure who taught us the Word of God. Steve’s father in the Word said Give up and Give everything to God. God is our Heavenly Father who loves us and will never forsake us. When we man up by surrendering our will to his will we will understand these lyrics of an old hymn:
Make me a captive Lord, and then I shall be free.
Force me to render up my sword and I shall conqueror be.
I sink in life’s alarms if by myself I stand, Imprison me within thine arms and free shall be my stand.
God exhorts us to Man Up and rise up as men of God. And in so doing may we ever live to the praise of the glory of His grace!
Your brother in Christ,
MIchael