“Practice these things, immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your progress”
1 Timothy 4:15
“And though your beginning was small, your latter days will be very great.”
Job 8:7
Psychologist Abraham Maslow put together a pyramid that organizes the main categories of human needs from the most basic necessities to advanced, high level desires. Needs on the bottom of the pyramid are the basic needs that must be fulfilled for basic survival: Food, water, shelter and sex – these are the physiological needs.
The second block is safety needs: Security, employment (in the modern day), and stability. Notice that this level cannot be achieved or even thought about until the basic necessities are provided.
The third block is love and belonging: friendship, personal intimacy, sexual intimacy and connection. Note the interesting fact that while the physical sexual need is on the lowest block, all basic necessities and security must be provided before sexual intimacy can take place. There is a difference between sex and sexual intimacy and you can see plenty of examples of that if you talk to your friends in the world. Also remember that this pyramid was created by a secular man. Obviously many people could have different experiences if they are Christians or not.
The fourth block is esteem: Respect, status and recognition. Obviously if you don’t have work or physical security then you will not be extremely worried about how others think of you until those needs are met.
The top of the pyramid is self-actualization: The need to be creative or to improve the self to the highest level possible. Self-Actualization is a need that should be important to Christian men.
Men in the church have almost all these needs met, except sex and respect. Note that even Jesus Himself tells us that our basic physical needs will be met (Matthew 6:24-35), ensuring that we can automatically focus on developing higher up on the pyramid.
Because modern men have most of their needs met, they have a very important need to improve and be creative in their lives. Christian men, and especially Christian men in America, are in a position where they do not have to worry about basic survival and, therefore, have time to contemplate existential and spiritual questions or think creatively.
There is a humorous image of a man who is being chased by a tiger in a jungle, and the man suddenly sits down and begins to write poetry. No man who has his basic physical survival challenged is going to worry about actualization. We never move on to the higher level needs until we have the lower needs satisfied. If we do not have food, we are not going to be that concerned with being respected. If we have no place to live, we are not going to be thinking about cultivating a sex life.
Men in the church almost never have their survival questioned.
Even if they fall into times of serious need, the social fabric of the church will catch them and support those basic needs. Men in the church no longer have excuses for the lack of improvement in their lives. There is no reason that any man should be the exact same year-to-year with little or no improvement on his character or skill set.
Men must also be creative and inject themselves into the creative pursuits that have been the arena of the secular men for generations. Christian men should be writing masculine music. Men need to write books and movies that promote Christian principles rather than berate them. Men need to excel in fields of science, mathematics and philosophy, instead of leaving all academics to the atheists. We as men must stop making excuses as to why we are not improving or producing anything useful with our lives.
Average men generate dozens of excuses as to why they are not improving, or why they are not even changing themselves in any way. We are not to be these types of men, but should rather be the type of men who improve. We are to build a new reputation for men in the church. This reputation should be one of character and masculinity, not of femininity and weakness. We must create a generation of men who are interested in continually sharpening their personal skills. The age of men who sit in the pews for decades decaying to nothingness is finished.
Mantra
Growth is life, maintenance is death.
Application
Get to work right now. Write down the characteristics of the man you want to be and start changing yourself. Start producing something, anything, there is no excuse for stagnation and lack of production in life. Write music, books and movies, do not worry about how terrible you think they are. Produce philosophy. Train your body and create a masterpiece. Train your mind and improve your thinking. It does not matter what you are producing, as long as you are creating something. It does not matter how you are improving yourself, it only matters that you are changing for the better rather than maintaining your pathetic state of existence.
Start by writing 100 words per day. At the end of the month you have 3,000 words. At the end of the year you have 36,000 words, that is the length of an average short novel these days, all created in about 5 minutes of writing per day.
Train the body every day.
Do not worry about what you are doing or whether or not it is on the cutting edge of scientific training, just train your body every day. It does not matter how long you train and it does not matter what you do, it only matters that you take action and train.
Start learning a musical instrument immediately. Learn the basic embarrassing songs and master them. Learn one new chord a day on the guitar, or learn one new rhythm pattern on the drums. Practice one scale a day on your instrument, never missing a day of practice. At the end of the year you will be better than 60% of people who claim to play that same instrument.
Most of the time it does not matter what you do, only that you do not remain stagnant.
Reject mediocrity.
Demolish your weakness and rebuild a fortress of strength from the rubble.
Develop the strength of your will.
Build your character to incredible heights.
Win the war over your thoughts.
Master your mind.
Create.
Build.
Conduct yourselves like men.
