Posted on 08/28/2006 8:44:01 PM PDT by Quix
This book is excellent. It speaks to thoughts, feelings, facts I've long had strong similar to identical convictions about.
Excerpts from Dr Laura's Foreword:
" . . . sold more than one million copies of [I] The Proper Care And Feeding of Husbands [/I]"
. . .
"I expected a huge, ugly backlash. . . . the general public--especially the men--was incredibly receptive. What touched me the most was the sad, pained, resigned letters I received from so many nice men who were suffering deeply. These men explained that while they were deeply in love with their wives, those wives were literally on a countdown: When the kids were all grown and gone, the men were going to leave as well. Why? Because they were abused and neglected. The abuse did not take the form of physical violence; it was much more subtle nagging, criticism, berating, demeaning, dismissing, and rejecting that has become commonplace in American marriages where men are looked upon as side dishes, not the main course."
" . . . When Gloria Steinem enthusiastically proclaimed that 'Women need men like fish need a bicycle,' more than one generation of women was sent in the wrong direction in their search for love, security, bonding, and the joy of a quality marriage. Instead, women's organizations support behaviors that leave women alone and men designated as unimportant: unmarried sex as entertainment, shacking up without a commitment (marriage), single-mothering as a choice, abortions as birth control, no-fault divorce at will, men as oppressors or predators, and so forth. I often ask these women what they intend to say to their male children about their importance in this brave new female-oriented world. They don't have an answer."
"Because we hardly raise men to be anything masculine anymore, we have at least two generations of men who have no clue what it means to be a 'man.' Hence too many guys are, as I have lamented many times on my radio program, [I] males [/I] instead of [I] men. [/I]"
". . . Today's males have had their innate urge to provide and protect removed from their spines, guts, heads, hearts and souls."
". . . .The whole blame, in their minds, is on the men! Unbelievable! When I bring to their attention that for every step of the way (unmarried sex, all birth control has risk, living together without marriage, no spiritual center to their relationships) they were complicit, they get angry with me. It seems that women have been trained to have 'no rules' but still blame men when things don't go as their fantasies would lead them."
. . . .
"The bottom line is that men are blamed for their own and women's misbehaviors. Somehow that doesn't seem to be thmentality you'd expect from groups that espouse 'empowering' women."
" . . . It's clear to me that there isn't a consensus on what 'being a man' means. Women give mixed, confused signals and messages because women are basically confused between what they're being indoctrinated to want and what they really want. Clint Easwood, Keanu Reeves, Kevin Costner, Russell Crowe, Denzel Washington, and others are examples of strong, primal animal men. Women are drawn to such strength (epitomized by the high-school bad boys) because biologically, women are drawn to men who can provide and protect so that they can be safe raising their babies. . . . "
". . . . I can't tell you how many times I've had to remind men that they are [I] men [/I], and that this designation is not about biology; it is about strength, will, honor, courage, leadership, sacrifice, compassion, and love."
- - - -
Quote at the beginning of chapter 1:
"The ordinary man is passive . . . . Against major events he is as helpless as against the elements. So far from endeavoring to influence the future, he simply lies down and lets things happen to him.
--George Orwell
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Chap 1:
"WHat do you think would happen if Jesus were to appear at your church next Sunday and say to people what he says in the Bible?
'Hypocrites!'
'White-washed tombs.'
'Fools!'
'Dull.'
And 'a brood of vipers fit for hell!'
Given how [I] nice [/I] the church expects Christian men to be, I think we'd rush the pulpit and wrest the microphone from his hand. 'Tsk, tsk, tsk,' we'd mutter scornfully. We'd wag our fingers, reminding him of the supreme importance placed on manners and appearances in this holy place. Some women, reaching for soap bars to wash out his mouth, would recite our unofficial church motto: 'If you don't have anything nice to say, Jesus, don't say it at all.' [I] He really should be ashamed of himself.'"
"Shame is big in the church. Helps keep guys in line. Keeps their heads down. Keeps them humble. Supposedly."
"Actually, without shame, guys might be able to live the vital life God intended. This world would be a lot better.
"Instead, we have [I] passive, naive Christian Nice Guys.] [/I] We sit next to them in church all the time, not realizing their identity is being squashed, their will being broken, the lives of those who love and depend upon them being diminished as well. Everyone loses when we follow a false ideal."
". . . . Many sermons we hear are designed to make Jesus appear [I] always [/I] approachable, [I] always [/I] calm, and [I] endlessly [/I] patient. That's fiction . . . this mild Jesus has more to do with EAstern mysticism than with the gospel record. He did [I] not [/I] remain 'above it all,' emotionally hovering above us silly little humans. He got down in the muck and mire of life with us. He really lived; he really felt ey-watering joy and soul-crushing pain. He didn't assume the Lotus, drinking tea and finding us mildly amusing while trying to clear his head of conflict and division. Jesus, the dissident, brought the world both--the kind of conflict and division needed to shake things up for our own good."
"I created my own sanitized, unauthorized translation, [I] The Nice Guy Bible (NGB), [/I] which I continue to see a lot of other guys carrying around. I rewrote some parts and took others out of context to hide from God and from what he really wanted of me. I kept this distortion of Jesus neatly in my mind, the way a Nice Guy feels he should, until it was destroyed by an unusual and unexpected epiphany: Christ's humor. His blessed sarcasm helped me begin to see how he [I] actually [/I] lived and talked, as opposed to how I'd thought. A mental fog lifted. At last my life received a long-needed clarity. I neared the red-hot bonfire of truth, which warmed and saved me. A greater taste for life awakened."
. . . .
"Bill Hybels says that passive christians repel non-Christians from the faith:
[Hybels quote]:
I've learned through the years that seekers are not impressed with spinelessness . . . . Most of the time, seekers . . . . respect and admire christians who aren't afraid to take a stand . . .
Let me say it once more: Seekers have little respect for weak Christians. Deep down they're looking for somebody--anybody--to step up and proclaim the truth and then to live it boldly. (Becoming a Contagious Christian, 63-64)
- - - - -
"The convincing, repetitive message of my inherent worthlessness helped lay waste to my life in disasterous ways, stealing my passion, energy, and resources, and churning my gut, which is where resentment and anxiety live. . . . "
. . .
“The church told me to worry more about sin tan purpose, more about keeping up with appearances than searching for and embracing meaning. More about what I shouldn’t do than what should do. More about being nice than being good. Fear of failure, of falling short, of trying, but not being perfect, has us paralyzed, immobile, and,eventually indifferent. “
“Fear-based religiosity creates dangerous tension that ruins marriages, careers, children—sometimes even our souls. We [I] should [/I] avoid sin, for many reasons—that it separates us from God and from life are atop my list. [I] But so does the immobile life. It’s just harder to diagnose.” [/I]
. . . .
“Another who has noted the perplexing prevalence of Christian male passivity is theologian R. C. Sproul, who says,
‘When I became a Christian, I understood tha Jesus took my sin away. What I never heard from Him was that He intended to take my backbone away.’”
“ ‘Nice’ can’t confront this world’s sources of pain. Niceness makes people agreeable, not good. Somehow we have mistaken niceness for righteousness.”
. . . .
“The meaning of the word [I] nice [/I] is as unreliable as the people it describes. Today it is synonymous with ‘pleasant’ and ‘agreeable,’ but it has also meant ‘effeminate,’ ‘unmanly,’ ‘unable to endure much,’ ‘dainty,’ ‘reluctant,’ ‘ignorant,’ and ‘difficult to please.’ Nevertheless, remarkably, Christian men can be shunned in church and home if they are not unfailingly pleasant, agreeable, and in possession of impeccable manners. These attributes of niceness are taken to be expressions of a Spirit-filled life, yet none of these words or concepts are biblically mentioned as part of the Spirit’s fruit.”
“Besides, the mind of a Christian Nice Guy is anything but pleasant or agreeable. For reasons explained later, these men are often secretive and manipulative. They harbor hissing resentments, and, given all the games they feel they need to play just to survive, their wives ([I] If [/I] they can hold on to a wife) may come to question their own sanity. Though they inwardly exhaust themselves in their determination to hide it, they are easily irritated and frustrated. When nasty behavior surfaces, they may mistakenly or dismissively explain it away as the result of testosterone fluctuation or work place preoccupation. They may label it a kind of male menopause, which is the trend today, or give it a name like Irritable Male Syndrome, which largely ignores a profound spiritual component.”
“Appearances are deceiving, as this wife of a CNG laments:”
“Before we were married, he did all types of things to prove he handled issues. Two weeks after the wedding, off came the gloves. And he told me under no circumstances am I to open my mouth. I barely made it through the first year. I have struggled to stay married to him. . . . “
“His attitudes, mood swings, explosive screaming fits, all the things he has held in, all come out . . . .My husband tells me all the time he is just a Nice Guy. He isn’t, and he isn’t nice to be married to, either.”
There’s a 25 item quiz one can consider to measure their degree of likelihood of being a CNG. It’s worth prayerfully pondering. It’s on pages 21-22.
Coughlin covers Christ’s humorous and biting sarcasm very illuminatingly, refreshingly.
And, he adds on pp44-45:
“Nice, tame, spiritually arrogant people often don’t get or appreciate sarcasm because it disrupts the status quo. [I] Sarcasm bothers them because it stimulates the necessary work of self-criticism, a cornerstone of moral credibility.” [/I]
“But blessed sarcasm does help the weak and needy. Said one subscriber to Hartman’s site [Christian humor site]: ‘I struggle with severe chronic depression. Sometimes the only way I can get going in the morning is by reading your jokes. I just wanted you to know someone appreciates what you do. Christ loves him, you and me enough to wield the mighty and poignant sword of sarcasm.”
He has good chapters on masculinity; working with, in and ministering in and out of one’s passion; and how to have a healthy humor, sarcasm, fierceness after the pattern of Christ.
I think this is a very timely and crucial book. I think it’s one that most every Christian man would profit from reading. Thankfully, those who love them would profit from the men applying their new knowledge and insights in their relationships and lives.
He cautions about jumping off the deep-end with this end of the spectrum, too. I think he has written a very balanced and Biblical book that goes a long way toward correcting a lot of misconstrued constructions on Christianity and about Christ.
I strongly recommend it to any and every thoughtful Christian man. Women could also gain fruitful insights into their men.
Angel-Gal, I would love to have your response to reading the whole book.
Ping
END TIMES; PROPHETIC; . . .
PING LIST
Please let me know if you want on or off this sometimes personal interest Charismania/Pentecostalism sort of ping list.
I'll keep reading..evening Quix, thanks for the ping :)
Sure. Thank you for bothering.
I think you'll find plenty of fruitful food for prayerful thought.
LUB,
The communists are alive and well, and out to destroy faith in God and to dismember the family. I call them Mathusian-Trotskyites based on their belief in population control and their drive to "democratize" the world in their image. Some of the wolves are in sheep's clothing, deception being the hallmark of their master.
Regarding your list --- count me in!!
Not every one who is indulgent is a friend; nor is every one an enemy who smites. Better are the wounds of a friend than the proffered kisses of an enemy. It is better with severity to love, than with gentleness to deceive. More good is done by taking away food from one who is hungry, if, through freedom from care as to his food, he is forgetful of righteousness, than by providing bread for one who is hungry, in order that, being thereby bribed, ;he may consent to unrighteousness. He who binds the man who is in a phrenzy, and he who stirs up the man who is in a lethargy, are alike vexatious to both, and are in both cases alike prompted by love for the patient.
Who can love us more than God does? And yet He not only give us sweet instruction, but also quickens us by salutary fear, and this unceasingly. Often adding to the soothing remedies by which He comforts men the sharp medicine of tribulation, He afflicts with famine even the pious and devout patriarchs, disquiets a rebellious people by more severe chastisements, and refuses, though thrice besought, to take away the thorn in the flesh of the apostle, that He may make His strength perfect in weakness. Let us by all means love even our enemies, for this is right, and God commands us so to do, in order that we may be the children of our Father who is in heaven, "who maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust." But as we praise these His gifts, lets us in like manner ponder His correction of those whom He loves.
-St. Augustine of Hippo, Epistle 93
Beg to differ:
Men who do not provide for or protect the women entrusted by God Almighty to their care are acting out of the seed of Adam from which they are born. No woman "removes" from any man the desire to provide for and protect; men willingly abandon this desire, as Adam did.
And like Adam, men are still laying blame where blame does not belong (Genesis 3:12):
The man said, "The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it."
Did Eve blame Man for her decision to believe the lie and disobey God? Nay, she rightly laid the blame upon the serpent, and acknowledged her curse, and praised The Merciful and Mighty Redeeming God that through her came the Deliverer.
O Man, hearken unto the Voice of the Lord Thy God! Become, as my FReeper FRiend gobucks says, "The Wife of the Word!"
I really appreciate the heart behind the quotation.
thanks for the ping.
Like that quote.
Augustine had guts.
True, true!
Thanks.
Just checked. Thanks. You are on it.
God's best to you and yours this week.
Do you have a link where it can be ordered? I searched Amazon and got no hits.
'Hammer
VERY EXCELLENT QUOTE. THANKS.
= = = =
Not every one who is indulgent is a friend; nor is every one an enemy who smites. Better are the wounds of a friend than the proffered kisses of an enemy. It is better with severity to love, than with gentleness to deceive. More good is done by taking away food from one who is hungry, if, through freedom from care as to his food, he is forgetful of righteousness, than by providing bread for one who is hungry, in order that, being thereby bribed, ;he may consent to unrighteousness. He who binds the man who is in a phrenzy, and he who stirs up the man who is in a lethargy, are alike vexatious to both, and are in both cases alike prompted by love for the patient.
Who can love us more than God does? And yet He not only give us sweet instruction, but also quickens us by salutary fear, and this unceasingly. Often adding to the soothing remedies by which He comforts men the sharp medicine of tribulation, He afflicts with famine even the pious and devout patriarchs, disquiets a rebellious people by more severe chastisements, and refuses, though thrice besought, to take away the thorn in the flesh of the apostle, that He may make His strength perfect in weakness. Let us by all means love even our enemies, for this is right, and God commands us so to do, in order that we may be the children of our Father who is in heaven, "who maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust." But as we praise these His gifts, lets us in like manner ponder His correction of those whom He loves.
-St. Augustine of Hippo, Epistle 93
Good Points.
The enemy is THE ENEMY.
Blame is not useful.
Nevertheless, it is also true that women in the feminist movement have become complicit in the enemy's schemes, goals and actions. imho.
Lovely post. You're not such a "dumb ox" after all, unless, like the donkey of old, you list "dumb" as mute and ox as the vessel of the voice of the Lord!
I really appreciate the heart behind the quotation.
= = = = =
AMEN! AMEN! AMEN!
U R QUITE WELCOME.
Thanks for stopping by.
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