Caleb Reed: If I could title this session this session would be don’t be a girly man right you know the Arnold Schwarzenegger phrase uh and what Arnold Schwarzenegger was saying when he was getting at that is he was actually saying, he was admitting of binary, there are two genders, and men act like men, or should, and women should act like women. And he was saying, don’t mix the two.

Now, this session is not trying to go to the Bible and explain to you that there are only two genders, and the XY chromosome, and the XX. That’s not what we’re doing here. You all know that, and I would guess that you all agree with that.

But what this session is meant to be is So biblically, what is a man supposed to be? Biblically, what is a woman supposed to be?

If you’re familiar with the name Matt Walsh, some time ago Matt Walsh produced a documentary, and the documentary was What is a Woman? Some of you maybe have seen that one. A question that he asks a whole bunch of people, and of course they all waffle and they can’t tell them what a woman is, and he’s trying to get to the simplest biological, that the fact there is a difference between men and women.

We know that. The goal of this session is to not try to define biologically what is a man and what is a woman. We’re not trying to defend from the Bible, is there only two genders?

We know that. We’re settled on that. That’s just Bible.

And if you’re not sure about that, I would love to talk to you about it, not in a condescending way, but to help you see from the scriptures what God says about the two genders. The goal of this session is to cast a vision for what we as parents and what we as peers are calling our children and our peers to be? What is the vision, the biblical vision of what a man is supposed to be?

How can I as a peer and how can I as a father call men to be men? And what is the biblical vision for a woman? Biblically, how can I challenge other women?

How can I challenge my daughters to be biblical women? So what I would like to do, and I’m going to, I want all the men, I’m going to address the men first and then I’m going to address the ladies. And because of time, I probably only have about 15 minutes for each gender, but I want you to track with me.

So here’s what I want for all the men to do right now. In your mind, I want you to think when you think of manhood, when you think of the ideal man, what name comes to your mind? And I’m not trying, I’m not, this is not a trick question.

So I’m not trying to get you to come up with the name Jesus. I’m actually trying to get come up. It can be a secular figure.

It can be someone in church history. It could be your dad. It could be a Navy SEAL.

But when you think of the ideal, idyllic manhood, what name comes to your mind? So you’ve got three seconds to think of a name. For some of you, you know it right away.

Caleb Reed. Obviously. If you have a name in your mind, raise your hand.

What guy came to your mind? Your dad. Okay, he says his dad.

James? Theodore Roosevelt. Theodore Roosevelt.

Okay, who else? Yes, sir? Robert E.

Lee. Robert E. Lee, okay.

Pastor Van Gelderen. Pastor Van Gelderen, all right. Yes, sir?

My pastor. Your pastor, okay. Joel?

Chris Kyle. Chris Kyle, okay. Ron Royalty.

Ron Royalty, his grandfather. My dad. Your dad, all right.

Stonewall Jackson. Stonewall Jackson, okay. My grandpa.

Your grandpa. Okay, so Joel Roberts is the only one going with a Navy SEAL? Or was he a Navy SEAL or a Marine?

Navy SEAL, okay. Anybody else? Okay, all right.

Your prayer buddy, okay. Very good. You rascal.

That’s me. Okay, maybe some of you, you thought of David Goggins. Maybe some of you, you thought of Marcus Luttrell.

Some guy may have thought of Arnold Schwarzenegger. But many of you, okay, if I had the time to go through and ask you, what are the qualities of the man you named that made you believe he was a man, we would probably hear throughout this group, well, he’s loyal or he’s strong or he’s compassionate or he’s caring. And if I asked you to boil down to the three essential qualities in your mind that make up manhood, what would they be?

And maybe if we had the time, we could write those out. Well, what I have done is I’ve been trying to cast a vision for my son and the men around me and my own vision And going to the scriptures, I’ve said, Lord, what are, and it doesn’t have to be three, but what are the three essential qualities that make up manhood? Because I do believe, though everyone we just named are great illustrations, we would all agree, well, Jesus is the greatest illustration.

And anything that those men do that is similar to Jesus is actually why we look at that and say, now that’s manhood. So if we were to boil it down to what are the three main qualities of biblical manhood, this is the three that I’ve come up with. You might come up with three that are different, and that’s totally fine.

But here are the three that I have come up with. Biblical manhood. Men protect, serve, and lead.

Because in those three attributes or in those three qualities, we see Jesus all through it. And so in calling men to be the same, I am calling men. If you are to be a biblical man, you are to be a man who protects, a man who serves, and a man who leads.

First of all, to protect. Did Jesus not come and give his life for the purpose of protecting? Sometimes, at least I have considered, I remember I was on an airplane, I was flying with my older brother Zach, and we were flying somewhere together.

We were talking about raising boys. I had one at the time. He had three, and we’re talking about this.

And I said to him, I want my boys to be a warrior. And he said, I want my boys to be a protector. See, there is a difference.

A warrior oftentimes, at least the way that we think of it, a warrior is someone who is a fighter, maybe someone who will use violence, but it’s for the purpose of winning a battle or winning a cause, whereas a protector will use violence if he needs to, but it is always for the purpose of saving life, not taking it. Is it possible that you someday will be called upon to take life? Yes.

But it is not so that you can be violent. It is so that you can protect. It is what Jesus came to do.

It is because he loved us so much that he was willing to even lay down his own life. The scripture describes him as being the one who cares for the widow, as being the one who cares for the weak, being the one who cares for the orphaned, those who cannot protect himself. James who can’t protect themselves.

To be a man, it is to protect. May I say this also, men, God has called you to be a leader in relationships with girls.

And if you freely and willy-nilly move in and out of relationships with girls to use and abuse their emotions and to get something from them and then drop them and dump them and move on to someone else, even if you’ve never entered into a committed relationship, if all you’re doing is just emotionally flirting with them so that they make you feel good and then you move on, you are not being a protector. God has called men to protect. God has called men to serve.

Philippians chapter 2 gives us, you don’t have to turn there, you know this passage. Philippians 2 lays out what real servanthood is. If I could boil Philippians chapter 2 down to one statement, it would be this, Servanthood is living for the best of others.

Sometimes that looks like being a doormat. You realize that? In the upper room, Jesus set aside his garments so that he could wash somebody else’s feet.

He placed himself in a lowly, submissive position so that he could serve. But did you know that’s not the only illustration of servanthood? But men, let me just pause right there and say, God has called you to be a man who serves.

When you hear the phrase, a servant leader, it is not just a catchphrase. It is what Jesus did. It is not below you, men, to wash toilets.

Men, it is not below you to take your coat off and to give it to someone who is cold. Men, that is what service is all about. It’s not below you to take a step back, to turn the other cheek, to not revile.

It is what a servant looks like. I am choosing for your good, I will back down and I’ll make sure that I am serving you. But in the scriptures, and I wish I had more time to develop this.

You just have to track with me if you can. In the scriptures, Jesus was not only a part of one foot washing. He also had his own feet washed.

And did you know that even when Jesus’s feet were being washed, he was actually serving. When that woman comes in to wash his feet, the Pharisee who’s eating at the Pharisee’s house, the Pharisee backs up and says, I can’t believe he’s doing this. If he knew who that woman was, he’d never let her touch his feet.

And Jesus, reading his thoughts, turns to him and says, no, no, no, no, no. Her washing my feet is her salvation. Do you realize what Jesus was doing?

He was not there for a pedicure. Is that feet or manicure? Okay, I think I get those mixed up, right?

He was not there for a pedicure. He was not there to get his feet washed. He was there because she needed to wash his feet.

For her sake, she needed to do that. And so he allowed himself to have his feet washed because he was all about her needs. It actually shows itself in many different forms and fashions.

But, well, there’s not many fathers in this room, but can I just say this. Someday you men are going to be a father likely. Don’t let yourself physically go to pot because your children need you to take care of yourself.

Actually, right before I got married, I started working out because I thought I wanted to be just buff and top of my wife to be impressed, which she ended up not being impressed. And I was like, you don’t care about this? She’s like, whatever.

And so I quit working out because it’s like, well, she doesn’t care about it. Then I’m not going to put the time in. I have since discovered that I need to be exercising, not because my wife’s impressed by it, but my children need to be able to still be able to throw a baseball at 40.

Okay. So actually my choosing to exercise, my choosing to eat well is I’m doing something for me, but it’s actually not for me. It’s for somebody else.

As a husband, there are going to be times where you need to put your foot down in the sense that You need to say, honey, I cannot allow you to do that because that’s going to be hurtful for you. That’s actually serving her. And the final step of a man, biblical man, is a leader.

Christ had a responsibility from God the Father, and He accomplished it. He stood for truth. He called out error and sin, and He loved with incredible mercy and forgiveness.

Every man, young people, is a leader. even if he is submissive to someone else. Think about that.

When we think of leaders, we think of, okay, that’s the guy standing in front. He’s obviously the leader. Did you know you could never stand in front?

You could be under your pastor and serving in your church, and no one knows who you are, and you could still be a leader. So how do you do that? Because God has given you a domain that you are to lead.

Where’s that domain? Take a peek as a chalk, draw it around your feet and whoever’s standing in that circle is the man you need to lead and you need to do it well. That’s why Joshua at the end of the book could say, okay, you nation, I thought I was supposed to lead you.

You’re not following my leadership very well. And you guys can run to all the pagans if you want to, but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. You will never lead men until you have first made the decision to lead yourself, choosing, as for me, I must obey the Lord.

You know, there are times when graduates get frustrated at the things that they had learned in their college or there’s church members, they get frustrated. Well, you taught me this and you told me this and you led me this way. And it is true.

There are times when colleges and institutions and academies and churches do things that are wrong. But at the end of the day, I have to take responsibility for myself. I was with a pastor back in April and he went to an institution many years ago that today, if I was to name the institution, you all would recognize, yeah, they did some things really wrong.

And he said, I went back to that institution years later, and I sat down with the leaders that were there, and I brought up the issues, and they all said, yes, we were wrong. We didn’t address it. He said, I gave them a chance to pass the buck.

But every one of those college administrators who said, yes, back in the day when we didn’t confront that sin, even though that was the man committing adultery, and we didn’t commit adultery, he committed adultery, the fact that we didn’t confront him, we were wrong as well. That’s taking leadership. It’s taking responsibility.

What I am calling you men to is taking personal responsibility. We have a plaque in the trailer in the kid’s bedroom that says, it’s an engraved plaque, it says, men, protect, serve, lead. It’s what I just gave to you here in very quick form.

I have that plaque in my son’s bedroom because I constantly am trying to cast that vision for him. There are times when Gilbert is very, very selfish. I do not say to him, Gilbert, you’re not being a man.

No, I say, Gilbert, you’re a man, but right now you’re not acting like one. You all are men. There are times when we don’t serve.

There’s times when we don’t lead. There’s times when we don’t protect. But God is saying, because you are men, be who you are.

Act as you are. Now, let me turn now to women. Now, this session I’m not as familiar with because I’m not one. but as my wife and I were preparing originally this all originally started with a family seminar we did when as we were preparing for this beginning to ask ourselves so what is the essence of womanhood my wife helped me work through some of these things and and they are not three completely different topics than what we just dealt with with men

because in a similar way women have similar responsibilities I mean you have to take risk personal responsibility you need to be someone who leads in your own way. But as we look at what the scripture, how the scripture describes what a woman does, what she can be, and her vision, we came up with these three. And the three that we came up with is, what is biblical womanhood, or what does it mean to be a biblical woman?

A woman serves, loves, and inspires. Again, because of limited time, I don’t have time to develop all of this, but the challenge that I gave to men about serving, it is the same to ladies. A woman has been called to serve, and that does not mean that you’re supposed to always be barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen.

There are times when you need to go to your peer and your friend and say, sweetheart, sister, friend, I can’t let you do that. This is uncomfortable for me to confront you like this. I don’t like this.

This doesn’t feel good, but because I love you and I want to do what is best for you, my confrontation is actually serving you. God has called us, called women, to be also servants. Women are also called to love.

Now, think about this. Both male and female are made in the image of God. You cannot get a full picture of the image of God without both genders.

God is, the scripture describes him as being a father, a man, a male. But the scripture says that when he made man and female in his image, he is not saying, well, really the image of God is man, and then women is the 2.0, the lesser half. No, actually, God is everything.

Womanhood is everything that God is. God is everything that womanhood. You have to have the two.

So if a man, if your wife someday comes to you and says, I don’t know if I feel this is right, don’t be like, well, men don’t function on their feelings. No, she actually may be giving you something that is from God that you don’t have a complete picture of. And one of those aspects is to love.

A young lady, a woman, her emotions is so much more brimming and on the ready than maybe a man is, and that doesn’t make them weaker in the sense that they are less valuable. It actually may be giving you a better picture of who God is.

In Titus chapter 2, Paul writing to women, he says, The aged women likewise, that they be in behaviors, becometh holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things, that they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, to believe God has uniquely made a woman to love. Young ladies, don’t ever feel ashamed of giving another young lady a hug.

Don’t ever feel ashamed of allowing the tears to flow because of your intense love for someone. You are demonstrating to us guys a level of godliness that some of us do not have, we are not in tune with. God has called you to love.

The last thing what God has called women to do is to inspire. Now, as I was trying to prepare for this, thinking of the classic passage that would deal with women is that a woman was, well, you look back at Genesis. What was woman there for?

She was to be his help, meat for him. She was to be his completer. And so I was tempted to say women complete.

But if you are single, you might find yourself thinking, well, but who am I supposed to complete? Do I complete my dad? Well, no, that’s my mom’s role.

Who am I supposed to complete? And so if I had said women only completes, that might tempt us to narrow that to only married women. But I believe in the midst of what that command or that provision for a woman is, is at its essence, it is that women inspire.

Consider this. What Adam lacked, she filled in the holes. A woman is uniquely made of God to bring out of a man or bring out of someone the very best in them, maybe even a level of effectiveness they didn’t know they had in themselves.

It has been said behind every great man, there is an even greater woman. This drives to the heart and the power and the mission that God has created a woman for. She is called and gifted.

Gifted, I believe, far more than men are. She is gifted to inspire others to great things. Do you realize, women, the power that you have by saying to both a man and a woman, to coming up to your friend, to coming to someone and saying, you can do this.

I can do that with guys, but I’m just telling you, when a girl comes up to a guy, and I’m not saying that you need to go out and do this to every guy, but I’m just telling you, when a girl comes up to a guy and says, I believe in you, you can do this, you know what a guy starts to think? I got wings, man! There’s something about it.

The feminist says, your worth is by proving what you can do, right? So therefore, get out there and fight with the best of them, because you’re not worthy, you’re not effective, unless you can get beside them and do just as well as they do. But the feminist is missing what it is that women are gifted to do, and that is to call others to their greatest potential.

I believe that many times women find greatest satisfaction in not being the frontrunner of the family, but a woman finds great satisfaction when she has tirelessly poured into her husband and her children, And when she watches them succeed, it fuels something inside of her because her calling and gifting to inspire has just been fulfilled. Any man who has that kind of woman behind him will climb the tallest mountain and cross the swiftest river.

He’ll face a lion head on and take a bullet if necessary because when he is a woman who believes in him and tells him so, he feels he could face an army single-handedly, and the odds are in his favor. Okay, I recognize I’m speaking to singles, but any guy who’s ever felt a woman believe in him, you know what I’m talking about. And any man who is married who’s had his woman tell him, I believe in you.

It’s like I don’t need the praise of anybody else. So two singles, young ladies, do you realize God has gifted you and called you to not be someone who is trying to get to the top of the dog pile in your own woman way. God has actually gifted you and called you and will fulfill you when you see others move forward because you’ve inspired them.

It means going next to that young lady and saying, I believe in you. I believe God believes in you, And I want to help you move forward to your greatest potential. It’s what Ryan talked about, about never being alone.

Young ladies, you have that opportunity to come uniquely next to someone and to call them to what God has made them for and to stick with them and say, I’m not going to let you be alone. To inspire. So may I challenge us, and I’m about out of time, May I challenge both men and women to fulfill all that God has called you to be.

Because truly, only a man can do what a man does and only a woman can do what a woman does. Glory in the unique gifting that God has made you for. Now, if you say, Brother Reed, I feel like you should have addressed this one.

And I feel like you should have addressed that. That’s fine. You don’t have to use my three.

But we have a plaque also in my daughter’s bedroom. Well, it’s the same bedroom, so we’ve got them stacked one on top of the other. And we’ve got a plaque that says, for my daughter, it says, Women, love, serve, inspire.

Because I want to, now Ginger is almost two. She doesn’t have any clue about what we’re talking about, right? But I want to constantly cast this vision for her, because truly that is where fulfillment is.

Let me just tell you a very quick story. It is casting vision is huge. It’s just huge.

As we’ve been casting this vision for Gilbert earlier this summer, Gilbert, you need to protect. Gilbert, you need to serve. Gilbert, you need to lead.

Ginger was trying to get her bike up onto a sidewalk, and she’s toddling there trying to get it up there, and she can’t get it up there. And Gilbert drops his bike and runs over and picks up the bike and puts it on the sidewalk and then runs over to me and says, Dad, I served. And I thought, yes, he’s getting a hold of it.

And even recently, I did something, and he came up to me and said, Dad, you served. And I thought, he’s getting a hold of it. Cast a vision for your buddies.

Cast a vision for your sisters, for the girls around you. Hey, this is what God’s called us to. Fellas, if you know a fellow who’s free with the girls, challenge him.

Are you protecting them? Are you being careful with them? Are you serving them?

Are you leading well? Young lady, you’ve got a friend of yours that’s free with the guys. Serve her.

Love her. Inspire her to guard her heart. It’s not just for you.

It’s to cast a vision for somebody else.