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Resources
Featured Books
by Patrick Morley, David Delk and Brett Clemmer You’ve got men, you’ve got a church. Add a testimony, some pancakes, and prayer and – poof! A men’s ministry. Right? Not necessarily. This book is based on over 30 years of combined ministry experience, of training classes at the Leadership Training Center and thousands of interactions with men’s ministry leaders. It is filled with practical strategies and real life stories from leaders like you who are discipling men in the local church. You can reach men. You can get them to grow closer to Christ. They can help you change the world. This book will show you how. Click here to see what others are saying about this book.
What if it feels like you're never going to "make it?" Men often get
caught in the "performance trap." We can't escape our own and other's
expectations. It's easy to end up living a life of obligation and quiet
frustration. True Christianity is not about "acting good." God offers
more than behavior modification. He offers heart transformation! Come
learn how God REWIRES men's hearts to build a passionate faith.
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January/February 2007 Vol. 3 No.1
Building a
Sustainable Men’s Ministry WHAT MEN WANT IN OUR EXPERIENCE with men and men’s leaders, we have found three things that every man wants: something to give their lives to, someone to share it with, and a personal system that offers a reasonable explanation for why the first two are so difficult! All men want something to give their lives to: a mission, a cause, or a purpose. Every man wants to get to the end of his life and feel like it counted for something. In addition to something to give their lives to, men want someone to share their lives with. Typically it includes marriage, but it goes beyond marriage, as well. All of us are looking for meaning, happiness, peace, tranquility, contentment. By default, a man will look for satisfaction primarily in his accomplishments (something to give his life to) and in other people (someone to share it with.) But most men will also tell you they are frustrated with the difficulty of finding success in accomplishment and relationships. Most of the “systems” that men buy into seem to answer one problem or the other: Work as hard as you can to build a successful career, stay late, take on big projects, travel on a moment’s notice. But a system designed to maximize your career will undermine your ability to have meaningful relationships in your life. You might build a prosperous lifestyle, but you will have no one to enjoy it with. WHAT MEN NEED The obvious answer to the question, “What do men need?” is that they need the gospel. The gospel is the one system that really works—a system that helps men change the core affections of their hearts. This process of helping men move from relying on themselves or others to relying on God is discipleship. It is a process of deepening a man’s relationship with God. Click here to order No Man Left Behind from the PCA bookstore WE NEED YOUR HELP
Jesus built his
church by discipling MEN, and we believe the church is weak today
because we have forsaken his example. Get In the Game is
intended to help our 1600 churches disciple men as effectively as
possible. Please help us do that by
giving us feedback on this e-newsletter.
Called to Sexual Integrity Because God has hardwired men to respond to visual stimulation, today, the men in our congregations must battle for sexual purity in an unprecedented era of sexual temptation. Never before has pornography been so easy to view. Never before has the content of simple TV commercials and “family hour” TV shows flooded our family rooms with provocative images and ideas that start our sexual engine running. We are bombarded daily with such unwanted stimuli. For this reason, during 2007, we will have a regular column in GITG, which highlights key Biblical principles for making progress in this battle. TRACING SEXUAL SIN TO ITS ROOT It is sometimes thought that Jesus was adding something new to the prohibitions of the Law when he commanded us not to lust after another man’s wife. But, in fact, this prohibition is in the Decalogue, itself. The tenth commandment prohibits coveting our neighbor’s wife and the Hebrew word for covet is also translated lust after. The same is true in the New Testament. EPITHUMEO, which means literally, over-desire, is translated both as lusting and coveting. So, lusting after another man’s wife has always been prohibited by God’s moral law. Lust is a matter of the desires of the heart, and we must begin the battle for sexual purity here—at the level of our desires. The root sin of lust is idolatry. It is looking to sexual sin to satisfy the desires in our hearts. RTS professor Steve Childers makes this clear.
The root sin is that we have chosen to go outside the boundaries of the kingdom of God to look for pleasure in the land of idols. Illicit sexual pleasure feels good, relieves boredom, medicates pain, soothes our stress. Such payoffs can be nearly impossible to resist. The most effective way to combat sexual sin over the long haul is to chip away at its roots. So, how do we chip away at our tendency to look to the idol of illicit sexual pleasure to satisfy our longings? We must look to the true God to satisfy those longings instead. There are two ways we need to look to God to satisfy our longings instead of to the false God of illicit sexual pleasure. First, we must surrender our sexual desires to him and trust him to be the one to see that they are satisfied in a righteous way or give us the grace to go with them unmet. Second, we must learn to delight our heart in the Lord, himself, because he alone can satisfy our deepest longings. No matter what your situation, when sexual desire is aroused, take it to the altar and ask God to provide for those desires to be satisfied. If you are single, pray for a wife, and seek wise counsel concerning the lessons you need to learn before marriage. When you feel sexual desire being awakened, channel that desire into a fervent prayer for your future wife. If you are married, Scripture is clear that passionate love-making with your wife is a key to overcoming temptation. (See Prov. 5:15-20, I Cor. 7:5) If there is a sexual misconnect with your wife (which is very common among Christian husbands and wives,) take this concern to the Lord, as well. He wants you to have a passionate love life. Surrendering your sexual appetite to God and trusting him to meet your desires is the quality of meekness. As the third beatitude, this is a foundational quality for the Christian life. When Paul was addressing the sexual immorality of the Corinthians, he cut to the root of the matter in 6:13, when he tells them, “You were made for God and God is the answer to your deepest longings.” John Piper gets it right, when he says, One reason lust reigns in so many is that Christ has so little appeal. You were created to treasure Christ with all your heart—more than you treasure sex or sugar. If you have little taste for Jesus, competing pleasures will triumph. Plead with God for the satisfaction you don’t have. Quote Psalm 14, "Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love that we might rejoice and be glad all our days." Then, look, look, LOOK at the most magnificent person in the universe until you see him the way he is. There is no instant solution to overcoming sexual lust. Our sexuality is very deeply rooted, and equally deeply rooted is our sinful nature. We believe in radical depravity. Sinful habit patterns that took years to build are not easily rooted out. But, in the long run, the most effective way to strengthen the purity of your heart is to steadily chip away at its idols. In this case, that means trusting your sexual desires to your master, and being intentional about delighting your soul in him.
How
Much Should You Tell Men About the
Volume 131 If men knew what Jesus actually said about the cost of discipleship what would happen? First, what does it cost to be a disciple of Christ? Jesus said, “If you want to be my follower you must love me more than your own father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters -- yes, more than your own life. Otherwise you cannot be my disciple. And you cannot be my disciple if you do not carry your own cross and follow me--So no one can become my disciple without giving up everything for me” (Luke 14:26-27, 33). Notice three things required to be a disciple:
Given the high cost of discipleship, it should not surprise us that a) many leaders are afraid to tell their men the cost of following Jesus or b) once told, many men are unwilling to pay the price of becoming a disciple. (Click here for link to Weekly Briefing Vol 131 May 23, 2005) PCA Men’s Ministry News Member of Village Seven PCA Has Vital Ministry in the area of Sexual Addictions.
Copyright © 2006 PCA Christian Education & Publications. All rights reserved. |
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Dr.
Schaumburg is the founder and Executive Director of Stone Gate
Resources, specializing in the treatment of adultery, pornography and
all forms of sexual sin through Brief Intensive Counseling. It is this
pioneering program that has drawn over 2000 laity and clergy from the
U.S. and fifteen foreign countries. The program operates at its own
facility, Stone Gate, a private counseling retreat located north of
Colorado Springs. 
