Rough Men At The Outer Edges

There's a place for you in Christ's church.

“True holiness does not make a Christian evade difficulties, but face and overcome them. Christ would have His people show that His grace is not a mere hothouse plant, which can only thrive under shelter, but a strong, hardy thing which can flourish in every relation of life.” - J.C. Ryle

Today’s Reading: Ezekiel 22:30

Physical Challenge of the Week: Max carry, 100 yards. You can use dumbbells, sandbags, a truck tire. You can do farmer’s carry, bear hug carry, you choose. Just pick up something super heavy and walk 100 yards with it.

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It’s Monday, so I’ll give you the Bottom Line Up Front (BLUF) for today:

The very men who believe they don’t belong in church are often the ones God intends to use at the points of greatest friction and conflict.

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Imagine, for a moment, that you are in charge of a village.

This village is centered around a town square, where the people live, work, and conduct business. At its center lies a beautiful church full of rustic wooden pews, stained glass windows, and quiet hideaways in which to read, study, and pray. The bells ring at the top of the hour far above the street as the townspeople come and go in the course of their daily travels, greeting one another with a smile or a handshake.

As you travel away from the church and further out of town, passing the densely packed neighborhoods where children play on cobblestone streets and parents socialize on front stoops, the landscape grows increasingly sparse.

Once outside the city gate, you see the occasional rural estate or working farm, but eventually find yourself alone in the wilderness. You keep going, and eventually run straight into the giant wall which encompasses the kingdom’s perimeter.

These walls serve to defend the kingdom and its people from those who wish to do them harm and wreak havoc on their way of life.

Recent reporting suggests that the threats of enemy attack are well founded, and growing increasingly likely by the day.

As the person in charge of this kingdom’s security, you have to decide where to emplace your men.

Who will you put in the city square?

Who will you put by the gate?

Most importantly, who do you put on the outer walls, where support is scarce, life is harsh, and bloodshed is all but guaranteed?

In case it wasn’t clear, this is a metaphor.

Duties within a well-ordered society exist on a risk spectrum. The teacher, or pastor, for example, faces some risk but is relatively safe from the dangers of the outside world inside of his classroom or study. The hunter’s job is a bit more dangerous, but far safer still than the soldier standing watch on the outermost guard tower overlooking “Indian country.”

The question for the church is the same as for the village: Who do we put at the physical, spiritual, and ideological fringes, the point where order and beauty meet savagery? And more importantly, would somebody like that even be welcome in our churches?

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One of the more common complaints I hear about the modern church is that it leaves little room for men who don’t fit the “churchman” mold. You can probably imagine the stereotype I’m referring to here; well-dressed, highly polished, soft-spoken, “mousy” even, the guy who only ever wants to talk theology and seems to be allergic to his own sweat. These caricatures are not universally true, but they do exist for a reason.

This can leave more “unorthodox” men (in dress, personality, or appearance) feeling as if they need to renounce their masculinity before seeking church membership.

This mindset is largely a product of a peaceful, relatively affluent society, where the “church” brings with it a connotation of softness, quietness, whispering, and harp strings, rather than the notion of the “church militant” that our forefathers embraced.