Masculinity Archives - Page 5 of 15

Discipline II – Take Action

“But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.”
1 Corinthians 9:27

“A man without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls.”
Proverbs 25:28

What trait of a disciple is more important than discipline? There is none better. Discipline is the ability to take the actions you must take regardless of how you feel about that action in the present moment. Emotions mean nothing here, so cast them aside. This faith is all about your actions. The second you start thinking that you need to be motivated or that you need to be “In the mood” your faith begins to decay. Very few men are always in the mood to do what is right. The right choice is usually inconvenient, does not promote survival directly and usually takes willpower to act on. The fuel to take these difficult actions in discipline.

Discipline is what kicks you out of bed on time immediately after your alarm clock goes off. Weakness hits the snooze button.

Discipline is what brings you to church on Sunday even though you would rather be in bed or doing something else on one of the only two days you have to get away from the workplace. By using discipline you read scripture and pray daily, without fail, and with no excuses if you do fail.

The church under-values discipline because they overvalue the idea of feeling like doing the right thing. The church does not preach about the fact that most days you are going to want to reject what is right and do what caters to your own lusts. This is the nature of the human being, and the church has a responsibility to teach people about their true nature. In this way religious leaders are falling short continually.

Through discipline you reject your lusts. Discipline says that it does not matter how you feel, you must do what is right. The religious world promotes the romanticized view of Christians that suggests they are smiling through every inconvenience they face. Maybe some, but they are the few. Few people in the world admire those types of Christians anyways. The men who are admired are the Christians who do what is right despite how difficult and inconvenient it is.

At the close of the day, it does not matter how happy you are, or how long you can paint on a smile, it only matters if you can take the right actions or not. Plenty of people feel great about their religion and they do not take on single action for the sake of it. That is the fate of most people. Reprogram your mind to see the vast importance of discipline, and the extreme unimportance of emotions.

Mantra

“Discipline equals Freedom” ~Jocko Willink, retired US Navy SEAL

Application

Take up your cross. This is an action, not a feeling. The cross is heavy and difficult to bear. If it isn’t, we should take some time to examine our faith and ask, “Am I really doing work for the Lord, or am I a loser?”

When you don’t feel like taking action, you act anyways. How do you take action? By taking action. The question of “how do you do it” is a loaded question because what the person is really asking is, “How do I find the motivation to take this action?” or “How do I get to a point where I am feeling like taking this action”. The question is all wrong, because you are not going to feel like it. If anything, the motivation and good feelings will come after you have taken disciplined action. You don’t feel like training, but you train anyways, then afterward you are filled with a sense of pride in the accomplishment.

Now you feel like it.

You have to overcome the lack of motivation with discipline knowing you will be rewarded in the long run for your action. Stop attempting to base all your actions on how you feel in the present moment. Find the actions you know to be good, and start taking them. There is no secret here. Discipline will eventually begin to take over. Taking the good actions will be a habit that you need less motivation for each time. Eventually you can run on pure habit and discipline. So grow some nuts. Get to work. Be a Man.

Identify a desired behavior (Physical training)
Break it into small subunits (sets, reps, running distance)
Take the smallest possible action (put your shoes on/put on your gym clothes/warm up) and the motivation will follow later.

Conduct Yourselves Like Men.

Rebellion – Manipulate Your Mind To Your Will

Our rebellious nature forces us to become men, take our own paths and grow in our own ways. However, this rebellious steak can lead us directly away from Christianity.

“For rebellion is as the sin of divination, and presumption is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, he has also rejected you from being king.”
1 Samuel 5:23

“An evil man seeks only rebellion, and a cruel messenger will be sent against him.”
Proverbs 17:11

No man wants to stay on the path outlined by his parents, he wants his own path. He wants to forge his own way through the darkness using his own strength of will. Following the path of others is for the weak, so we think. This trail blazing mentality is a good thing.

Our rebellious nature forces us to become men, take our own paths and grow in our own ways. However, this rebellious streak can lead us directly away from Christianity. God imposes a vast number of rules and regulations on the behavior of man, and many days the man detests this in his heart, though he may never say it aloud. Many men do verbalize their rebelliousness and even boast about it, saying “I’m a rebel”. No one is impressed by the person who uses this phrase.

Rebellion is needed for the growth of the individual, but is not useful when it leads us to make decisions purely out of a desire to be independent.

Such decisions tend to lead us directly towards evil. It is one thing to go your own way in life and reject traditions passed down by your parents because you think you have better ways to act, it is another thing to reject tradition and the law of God just for the sake of rejecting it. This is what the nature of man is capable of, he does not want to be tied down and commanded. This is the nature of man that must be wrestled against.

Rebellion is brought on by a desire for something better. Israel repeatedly rebelled against God because they thought the other gods were better, or, more likely, they thought the cult prostitutes were more fun than having only one woman. Man the animal is bored to death by laws and commands, while man the spirit is willing to worship God.

The desire to rebel is build into our nature, just as the oppressive need for sex it a part of our DNA.

We must fight against this whenever it is unprofitable, and learn how to manipulate our natural rebelliousness when its effects could be beneficial.

To rebel against the world is profitable.

To rebel against God is unprofitable.

Mantra

Rebellion is an excuse for weak behavior.

Application

Manipulate your rebellious nature to your will. If you have to rebel against something, let it be the enemy. Rebel against the idea that you have to have sex with multiple women to be happy. If most people are doing something, then by not doing it you are rebelling, except in this case you are rebelling against the enemy. Identify what the masses are doing and then go the other way. Sheep will follow each other off a mountain, so you should go your own way.

Rebel against the weak who eat nothing but garbage and have no desire to change.

Rebel against the corpulent culture and be fit.

Rage against ignorance and be wise.

Your rebellious nature is to be used to gain advantage in life.

For the instances when you want to rebel against God, you must wrestle against yourself and your own nature. Yes, you want to rebel, but it will not profit you. You have to convince your mind that there are more total benefits to obeying the Word than there are in rebelling and enjoying sin.

Sometimes this nature will have to be defeated by pure strength of mind alone, and the maneuvering of forces of the mind. By focusing on the negative effects of doing what is wrong, and the positive effects of doing what is right, you can flank your mind and convince it that rebellion brings no advantage to you. Flank your mind into avoiding immediate gratification.

Strengthen the mind.

Hold the line.

Be disciplined.

Be a Man.

Conduct Yourselves Like Men.

The Dichotomy of The Penis and the Rational Mind

Do you know someone who has made life altering decisions based on their sex drive? If you know a man who thinks with his penis rather than his rational mind, please leave a comment below and share this article with your friends.

“For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do.”
Galatians 5:17

No Christian dares to speak about this matter, which is an expression of how afraid most Christians are when it comes to anything related to sex. No one wants to accept the facts of reality that are dark and nasty because they think that somehow it reflects poorly on our Creator when it does not. The greatest physical dichotomy that can be experienced by men is the one that exists between the penis and the rational mind.

The penis wants to have sex with every girl it sees, while the mind knows better.

The mind knows the consequences, the penis knows only pleasure and pleasure seeking behavior. While the penis wants sex every day, the rational mind cares about the needs of the wife. The penis is a primal force of nature, in contrast the brain uses the rational nature of thought. What do you think wins out most of the time? The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak (Matthew 26:41).

The penis will throw away life, career and family for one sexual encounter. Why else would a man risk all his possessions by having sex with a woman who is not his wife? The decision is not rational, but driven by the biological needs of man. The lengths men will go to for sex are unlimited.

If women truly understood the depths of the darkness of the mind of men, they would never complain about sermons on modesty ever again.

Men, whether knowingly or not, base nearly all their choices and actions on the desire for sex. A great career and a nice house are things that come from hard work, and are marketing tools men use to attract the most sexually attractive female possible. The work of man is done for sex. Men get married for sex, and without sec there would be no marriage. How else would men be drawn into such a risky and unprofitable financial maneuver like marriage? There has to be something really nice in it for the men, otherwise marriage does not happen.

KEY: Without the urge to have sex, a man does not commit to a woman.

KEY: Do not let your penis make a decision that your rational mind regrets.

This happens all the time around us. A man makes a life altering decision based on his sex drive alone and years later ends up shaking his head to himself regretting ever having been born. Men do this with things they buy or the career moves they make. A man might choose a certain career just to attract a woman, not realizing he will spend the majority of his time at the job he hates.

Men think with their penises most often when it comes to marriage. If a woman has nice breasts that alone makes her desirable for marriage. If she looks good physically, that is all some men need in order to commit. Do you think men are committing to marriage out of rationality? They are not. They marry out of lust and the basic need for sex.

Just as the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak, so the mind is rational but the penis seeks nothing but sex.

Cult prostitutes are the reason that Israel continued to leave God. The fact that any man could have sex as a part of a worship service is enough for any man to forget the miracles he saw in Egypt and turn into a heathen. If you do not think a man is capable of this, you are dead wrong.

Christian women in the church would be shocked and disgusted to see what a man can do when led by his penis alone. Ever heard of rape? Do you think that springs forth from a place of rational thinking? No. It does not, it comes from animal-like drives. Remember: Man is one part divine and one part flesh and animal. Man has the capacity not only to rape, but also to enjoy it. Such vile behavior is the result of the darkest, most evil thoughts in the soul of man. This is the dichotomy of the penis and the rational, moral being.

Mantra

Do not let your penis make a decision that your rational mind regrets.

Application

Again, do not let your penis make a decision that your rational mind regrets. The importance of this cannot possibly be overstated.

Do not marry out of lust.

Do not have sex out of lust.

Never marry a woman just because she has nice breasts, or a nice butt, or because you think she will be good in bed. These are things that your penis would do if it had full reign on your mind.

The key to making rational choices in life is to be aware of the irrationality of your biological drives.

If you know those drives are irrational, it makes it easier to resist their pull. Awareness of your sex drive is more than half the battle. Here are a few common situations where men begin to think with their penises instead of with their rational minds:

A man has been dating a girl for a few months and thinks she is “the one” (no such thing as ‘the one’). Based on the urge for sex he asks her to marry him, not realizing he had confused his sex drive for genuine love. They get married, and after a few years the newness of marriage wears off.
The dust settles and the man realizes he sprinted into marriage with a woman he did not truly love because he wanted to have sex with her.
A man has been dating a girl for years and really wants to get married. This man is skilled at hands-on jobs like electrical work or construction. But because he wants to please this woman and marry her as soon as possible, he chooses to go into business with his brother or find whatever job he can get the fastest. As soon as he has money, he marries the girl. A few years later he deeply regrets changing his career path based on his sex drive, because now he is completely unfulfilled by his work.
A man is being pressured by people in the church to get married soon (whether knowingly or not many church members exert massive pressure on young men and women when it comes to their marriage plans). He doesn’t really want to get married, but he does want to have sex. He also wants to get all these church members to leave him alone about marriage. So even though he doesn’t truly want to get married yet, he finds a woman, sees her for a period of time and then marries her.

The man soon discovers that sex is not everything it was made out to be, if he gets any of it, especially if he marries a woman who was damaged by purity culture. He sleepwalks through life, never living it to the fullest. His lifestyle is greatly reduced because he has to mentally, physically emotionally and financially accommodate a woman. He is a walking time bomb for a midlife crisis.

There are a few common examples that you have probably witnessed yourself while growing up in the church. There are many more examples; write down a few that you have seen.

You must discipline yourself and recognize that you are going to want many things in life, and the majority of those will be the secondary and tertiary results of your desire for sex. The only men who do not accept the reality of this principle have forgotten what it is like to have more than one nanoliter of testosterone in their bodies.

You must be constantly aware of your desires; the penis will try to shut off the rational part of your brain and force you to think with your sex drive alone. This is the opposite of wisdom. This is how men find themselves in unfulfilling marriages.

You must make all facets of your body subject to you.

You must make the body submit to your rational mind (1 Corinthians 9:27). Without this, you will mindlessly impregnate women and suffer the consequences of that behavior. Command over the sex drive is the defining characteristic of a great man.

Be aware of your drives, and force them into submission.

Behave with honor.

Keep your penis in your pants.

Redirect that sexual energy to your work. Be a Man.

Conduct Yourselves Like Men.

Profanity – Idle Words – Mindless Talk

“But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth.”
Colossians 3:8

“Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.”
Ephesians 4:29

“I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak, for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.”
Matthew 12:36, 37

“but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.”
James 3:8

The problem of profanity has nothing to do with the words themselves, and everything to do with what the words mean. The church has a bad habit of focusing completely on what the “bad words” are and ignoring the root problem behind the words. Syllables, sounds and words are not sinful in and of themselves. It is what they mean that is sinful.

If we curse at someone, we are verbalizing hatred towards that person. This is the sin. Not physically saying the “bad word”, but devaluing a human being with curse words is the evil.

A person only has to cut you off on the road for you to hate him.

Someone takes too long in an aisle of a store and you are up in arms.

We manifest this anger by the use of our language. The hatred, the undisciplined tongue, and the thought behind those words make them sinful.

Profanity is also not a great choice because it aligns us with the world.

When Peter was accused of being a disciple of Christ, he tried to prove he was of the world by cursing. What better way to instantly show that you have nothing to do with any religion or Christianity other than by cursing? It is a quick and easy way to show that you are a person of the world, not a person of God. This is the only decent argument against using profanity out of mere frustration, and not out of hate for another human being.

Profanity accomplishes nothing. Scripture would classify it “idle words” (Matthew 12:36-37), or mindlessly spoken words. Mindlessly spoken words reflect a lack of vigilance in the mind. That is as far as the logic behind profanity can be stretched.

Men do not need profanity. Many use it, but they don’t need to.

There is also a large group of Christians who seem to be okay with profanity because “words are just words”. I can’t say they are wrong. They argue from this basic idea: “What makes one word worse than another?” Societal implication? Who gets to choose which words are bad and which ones are not? The inability of Christians to answer questions like these is the reason why the profanity-sympathizers exist.

Christians try to argue back and say that some words started out good and then were perverted and turned evil by the way that men were using them. This is more evidence for the idea that the problem is not the words themselves, but the meaning behind the words. Based on this argument, any word we use to degrade another person is profane. Any way we manifest hate towards a fellow human is an instance of profanity. So we must stop pointing at specific words as the problem and start focusing on the hearts of men. Stop demonizing the words that men use and instead condemn the attitudes that are the basis of those words. Words are words. Reject aligning yourself with the world.

Mantra

Words are not evil, verbal manifestation of hate towards a brother is profane and evil.

Application

Nothing good comes from profanity, so you might as well stop using those words. But remember that the problem is the heart of man, the evil of the mind and the hatred of our fellow man. Dig up the weed by the root or it will just grow back. Fix the problem at the heart or the profanity will persist for your entire life.

Cursing is difficult to stop because it becomes a mindless habit.

You get used to uttering words without thought. So awareness is going to be your best tool. Again, you must have vigilance. This cannot be overstated, because no improvement is possible without awareness, without vigilance. Get a grip on your words by thinking and be cognizant of what you say.

Once you are aware of the way you use your words, you must identify the situations when you use those words.

Do you use profanity out of frustration while driving or working?
Are you mindlessly using profanity in conversation in order to build rapport?
Are you trying to accentuate a point?

As soon as you identify the environments in which you use the most profanity, you must learn to stop yourself.

If you are mindlessly using profanity out of frustration, you lack self-control. Why are you allowing minor events like driving to make you that angry? In this case the profanity is just a symptom of your overall lack of self control. Work on controlling yourself and your profanity problem may resolve itself.
If you are using profanity in conversation, you have to realize there are better ways to build rapport with individuals. You also do not know the person you are talking to. They may be instantly turned off by your use of profanity. Using language in regular conversation is simply unsavory. It makes you look less intelligent than you are. Very few men in the world can be highly intelligent and continue to sound intelligent in conversation while using non-stop profanity.
There are better ways to add emphasis to an idea than by using profanity. Try expanding your vocabulary. If you cannot accentuate your point without profanity, you simply do not know enough words.

Men need no profanity. Discipline your tongue. Be a Man.

Conduct Yourselves Like Men.

The Defiled Conscience

“To the pure all things are pure, but to those who are defiled and unbelieving nothing is pure; but even their mind and conscience are defiled”.
Titus 1:15

This verse speaks primarily about the unbelieving man, implying that purity of mind and conscience is contingent upon belief in the Word. This makes logical sense, as the Word is filled with various moral directions. But God also instilled a sense of morality in most men, regardless of whether or not they believe in him.

Why does God include moral directions in His words to us? Because without that direction, we would not naturally know how to behave. Our nature pulls us towards evil (Promiscuous sex/theft etc.), and the Bible commands us to resist this nature. This is a key idea: the conscience itself must be cultivated, because otherwise it lends itself to sin. What good is a conscience that points us in the wrong direction? These men have defiled, dysfunctional consciences.

The conscience can be polluted.

Each of these sections on conscience should teach us that the conscience itself is malleable, which means it can either be made into a tool, or corrupted into an evil-seeking device. This is one reason why we should not put too much trust in conscience, because we cannot always definitively prove that it is pointing us in the right direction.

The main point of our discussion about each of the conscience types is this: Conscience itself is not action, it is not a substitute for action, and by itself it will never gain salvation for your soul. Salvation can only be acquired by taking action. Neither faith, hope or good intentions can save you if you do not follow the simple salvation outline in the Bible. Obedience based action must be taken in order to claim the free gift of salvation. Whether or not your conscience is good or bad does not matter if you are not taking any action.

Mantra

Action is greater than feelings.

Application

Action will always override any emotional feeling you have. Conscience is an emotional tool, and should be treated like any other emotion. We should not deify conscience, for salvation is not found in it. We should not promote the necessity of conscience to other people, because we do not know what state their conscience is in. If we tell an individual with an evil or defiled conscience to “listen to their conscience”, they will end up doing evil.

This is your task: reject the dogma of the mandatory conscience. You will give account for your deeds, not the way you felt about them. Take action. Do good. Be a Man.

Conduct Yourselves Like Men

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