[00:00:00] Speaker A: You talk about multi generational wealth all the time, but you aren't actually implementing the strategies. You talk about child training all the time, but your kids are a tornado.
[00:00:14] Speaker B: Run your home and your dough like a biblical boss. Today we are hitting the court with a playful vibe, I hope, but serious. We're going to talk about pickup games with eternal stakes as we unpack four kinds of men. Boys, evil men, passive men, and good men. I have to give a shout out to William E. Mauser and his book Five Aspects of Masculinity for Young Men. This second edition was published last year. There's a group of guys around me that are going through this, and as I've met with them, I've been really excited about the content. I'd like to share some of it with you.
So we're going to be digging into God's word, rallying our community of bros, and challenging each other to lead like warriors. Let's do it.
All right, Mark, we're going to give a little. A little chat time as we like to do. But I got to say this first, okay? I just want you to imagine a pickup basketball game, okay? And in the game, there's different profiles. I think you've probably seen these kinds of people in a pickup game. There's the young buck who's just figuring out the rules, doesn't always make the right pass. He's trying, and you want to encourage him, help him along. There's a guy who's fouling everybody and he elbows guys in the nards every time he wants a rebound. And this is the evil man, the basketball player. There's a dude who. This is such. This has been an archetype in the basketball world forever. A guy who he kind of stands in one spot, is screaming for the ball.
If you ever do give him the ball, he will be shooting it. And then when it's time to get back on D or to buckle down, he kind of does the deal. Oh, there's a fast break. He'll throw his arms up and kind of go like, oh, I was trying. Or he'll do that deal where you put your head back and make it look like you're trying real hard. But he's not. He. He's not really interested in, like, doing all the work of playing. This is the passive man who's not willing to. Let's go, buddy. And then there's the captain who's running plays, trying to get everybody engaged. He's thinking he's willing to pay the price now. Swap that basketball Court for the home scene. And I ask, who are you among those? Are you the boy who's figured out the rules? Are you the guy who's fouling people to get his way and, you know, stacking the deck as far as you can so that you don't have to work very hard? Are you the guy who's just wants to be the show, the showboat? Oh, I, I, I'm really, I'm very important. But you're not willing to pay the price? Or are you the guy that's actually doing the work?
So we're going to talk about those four kinds of men.
[00:02:50] Speaker A: I'm just glad you didn't include my character. When I show up for pickup basketball, which is like the athletic but highly unskilled chucker, you're like, and he knows he sucks, but like, he's got to shoot it once in a while when they leave him wide open just for respectability sake.
[00:03:12] Speaker B: And the worst thing, but you're trying very hard.
[00:03:15] Speaker A: He's trying. The worst thing that can happen to him is the first one goes in because then he's like, I'm on fire. It's time to heat. Check this ball for the next.
[00:03:24] Speaker B: Give me that ball. I'm clearly the man.
Mark, I'd like to tell you something, I'd like to tell the people something at one time that's going on.
[00:03:34] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:03:34] Speaker B: We're doing an Abraham's Wallet retreat.
I'll just, I'll just lay it out there. It's happening and it's going to be happening at the, toward the end of November.
It's the weekend of the 21st, 22nd of November, the week before Thanksgiving.
And it's going to be in the Cincinnati area. So people will be flying into Cincinnati or driving to make it happen. And I'm very happy to say we have a team of volunteers that have, have come our way through er, through the wonderful channels of er, and they're putting this sucker on.
And here's the theme of the deal is running the Abrahamic playbook. So the reason that we're, we're taking this approach is if you've got friends at church or just dudes around your life and you think, I really want to loop them into what I'm trying to do as far as being a family leader, financially and spiritually.
This is, this is the retreat to bring them to, because we're going to just try to give an overview of. Well, this is the, this is the lifestyle that we're trying to encourage, some of which we'll be talking about today and you don't have to be, you know, a deep fanboy of the podcast to be long at this weekend. It's something that you can bring your friends to and we're just going to be talking about, you know, just the basics of what does it mean to be an Abrahamic leader, following the five capitals, et cetera. So it's going to be a really good time. This is the first time we're announcing it and you can go with. Right now. It's live right now. You can go to abrahamswallet.com retreat and get some info on it and sign up for it. What do you think of that?
[00:05:26] Speaker A: I'm excited. I'm hopeful that a, because we're in the Cincinnati area, we're going to get some of those familiar faces I already know. For example, we're going to have graybeard and pastor extraordinaire, our friend David Sheldon is coming with us.
[00:05:43] Speaker B: We, yes, we will have David there.
[00:05:46] Speaker A: I'll be there, that's for sure. I'm flying in and I, I think it's going to be a lot of fun.
You did not mention Steve.
[00:05:55] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:05:56] Speaker A: Something that I would have thought was maybe the headline for you, which is, oh, shoot. This particular venue is. I wouldn't say it is exclusively for this purpose, but last time we did a retreat, it was a golf themed retreat. There was a couple of golf courses on the place.
This place is set up for the pickleball.
[00:06:20] Speaker B: No, no, it's not. I'm sorry. I'm sorry if you've been led astray that you can. We will have a gym that's like available to us the whole time that we're there. We're kind of taking over this camp.
[00:06:32] Speaker A: The pickleball is off site.
[00:06:34] Speaker B: The pickleball is off site. I would love, I'd love to hype this. Why, why not hype this for the people?
Our good friend, a guy that has been profiled here on the Ab Wallet podcast, Joe Freudenberg. Yeah, Freud. Freudenberg.
Joe Freudenberg. He's the guy. If you recall, we did an episode about him starting his business pouring and painting pickleball courts. He started into this business.
Guess what?
Business is booming. It's going very well for him. He, he has recently moved onto a property. Get this, he moved onto a property. It's like five acres. It used to be a horse farm. So there's a big flat, I don't know, field where they, Joe and his wife Caitlin have been doing a kickball family league in this big field. And there's been a, there's an arena, a horse arena where you like do training under this, under this roof. And Joe was, was stroking his chin and thinking, I, I have a vision here.
What Joe has done is adios to the horses, goodbye to the dirt. He's laid asphalt all under this horse arena. And he now has three pickleball courts.
Joe's, Joe's one of the greatest players that I know. So he, he decided I can lay pickleball courts here. I can train people who come, who come to work for me. We'll just keep repainting these courts over and over again. And they're, they're my little home courts. So as Joe has said to me, the days of us looking for a court and hoping to get time on a court, those days are over.
So we are very happy to announce that as a part of our retreat, at some point, it's not like you have to play pickleball, but we going to make, we're going to make it available to the dudes. Hey, let's take a 10 minute car ride, go to Joe's wonderful converted horse arena, Pickle Pickle palace and play some pickleball.
[00:08:37] Speaker A: And, and just to put a bow on this, if you're thinking, I would like that. But I'm the, I'm the chucker in the basketball pickleball.
[00:08:45] Speaker B: You're the pickleball chucker?
[00:08:47] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm going to play pickleball and so I'll be there for you. You could have someone to play that you would probably be able to beat. Even if this is nice, that's your first time pickling. If you're thinking I am A, a 5.0 tournament player.
[00:09:01] Speaker B: Oh my.
[00:09:01] Speaker A: Well, my guess is that Joe can still beat the pants off of you.
[00:09:05] Speaker B: Yeah. You will be entertained by Joe's plan. Yes.
[00:09:08] Speaker A: Come one, come all, it's going to be inclusive. That's something that's important here at Abrams. What? We're inclusive. And it kind of leads me to the one thing I wanted to just fill you in on before we jump into our topic today.
[00:09:20] Speaker B: All right.
[00:09:21] Speaker A: I, for two years I have had my apple to do list. And I always get down. I'm like, I'll just throw things on there if I am like, I want to do that when I have time.
And there has been one thing that has been on my apple to do list for two years that I never got all the way up to the top and had time to check off, and that was that I like Send.
[00:09:44] Speaker B: Me blue bell ice cream. Was that one of the things or.
[00:09:48] Speaker A: No, that has been checked in the past.
[00:09:49] Speaker B: Okay. Yes. Yeah. Hey, I've done that.
[00:09:52] Speaker A: This was. I have always thought we host this podcast on a online platform. That's where all our episodes live. And I thought, I know, the Internet can just do weird stuff sometimes. We could endure a period where we were out of favor with our tech overlords, or just an accident could happen and this website where we host everything could get deleted. I don't know. I've always thought how ridiculously heartbroken I would be if we lost the, like 348 episodes we have made of this podcast.
[00:10:26] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:10:27] Speaker A: And it has been on my to do list to create an archive. And so I took a day and a half this week and just downloaded, reviewed, renamed, and organized every episode we've ever done. Wow.
And it was really fun because you name.
[00:10:45] Speaker B: You typed in names for 350 episodes.
[00:10:50] Speaker A: I did.
[00:10:51] Speaker B: Oh, my word.
[00:10:54] Speaker A: Was really fun because as I did this, just maybe there's a more efficient. If you're a tech person and you're hearing this and going, you could have just done a batch export and block. I'm sorry. I did it manually, but as I was doing this, I.
It autoplayed the first 30 seconds of each episode before I got over to stop it and download it and all that. And so a. I could hear the evolution of things like our intro music, which has changed a lot since we started.
[00:11:24] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:11:24] Speaker A: We started out with like a little synthesizer, and then we quickly moved on to the da da da da da da.
[00:11:32] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:11:33] Speaker A: We've had a lot of different things. There was the inspiring kind of American prairie music with the horse running and stuff.
We've had all sorts of things.
We had the Joe episode, the Joe Freudenberg episode.
Back then. When we recorded that, he was going like, I think maybe this business could work. I think so. And now he's Daddy Warbucks of pickleball. I don't know.
[00:11:59] Speaker B: He is. He's a pickleball maven now.
[00:12:03] Speaker A: I just think it was actually. We've even had our own challenges, Steven. There was a time when we just couldn't figure out our volume and it stunk. And every episode was like, either gonna blow your ears out or you're gonna have to like your ear pods on noise canceling just to hear us.
[00:12:21] Speaker B: I know it.
[00:12:22] Speaker A: I'm just thankful. It was like a cool opportunity to take a review of everything that God has done through the last since 2019.
And just go. Wow. What a cool thing. I never thought we would be 350 episodes into this project and so much of what has been covered.
It's kind of like you talked about this retreat weekend.
I think we just need to hear it again sometimes. So I enjoyed going back through it. I was listening to some sermons from a buddy this week that he had done on generosity, and I texted him and I said, it wasn't that your sermon had all this new information.
It was just really good for you to, like, remind me of some basic scriptures on giving and generosity. Like, that's why we need to continually hear the Word. And I hope that at Abraham's Wallet, you get to sort of continually hear some of those things. That's what we're going to do with the retreat is if you've been drilling this stuff since 2019 with us, you might go, I kind of know what you guys are talking about. I think it can still be really encouraging to just revisit those things in a group of people.
Or like you said, if you're brand new to it, it would be a very approachable way to just kind of get caught up on how we think about doing household and money. So it was encouraging to me. And now if our site gets nuked, I think we can have everything back up and running in a couple days. So that's exciting, too.
[00:14:01] Speaker B: Well done, Mark. Okay, now I have to say this up front. I'm very bad about doing this. If you had listened to 20 old episodes, you would know we've maybe done this twice in 200, 350 episodes. I should do this all the time. It would be responsible of me to do. And I have to say this.
If you love. If you're a podcast listener, I have to say this. Do you love what we do? Do you believe in the mission of trying to get families up and going?
Subscribe. Please share an episode with a friend. Grab
[email protected] we're trying to build a tribe of leaders here, and we'd love to have you along as a part of our tribe. We usually tell people, please go to abrahamswallet.com support and you get involved in our tribe. Come Visit us at Herb. But this week, I want you to go to abrahamswallet.com retreat and I want you to sign up for the retreat. All right, let's get into it. Let's talk about real quick these four kinds of men that I was talking about with our basketball pickup game. The Bible does not mess around when it comes to manhood. It talks very frankly about Adam's failure in Eden. We know about David's heart for God and his heart for Bathsheba as well. It's all there. And today we're going to profile boys. Evil men, passive men, and good men.
And these aren't just labels. They're. I hope that they're going to be a mirror into you, into who you see yourself as being. And I want you to. I want you to think of yourself as we describe these four kinds of guys.
I told you that I was. I was part of a group of fathers that are taking their sons through this Mauser content, which is really good.
But as I'm thinking about this, something that just comes to mind is that our good friend Justin Wolfenberg is constantly saying, the great battle of every man is passivity. Passivity, passivity. We got to fight against it every day.
So let's, let's look at this. Let's look at this arc of men.
First of all, you got boys, and they are the rookies on the team. These are the court newbies. And they are, they are exploring the world. They're supposed to be exploring. They're supposed to be learning from dads, and they lean onto others for protection.
They are. The best way to describe a boy is a dependent consumer. It's the guy that you're having to prod. Get out of bed, son. So school time is coming.
Let's go. These are dependent consumers, and they need to learn the mechanics of work and productivity. They are still foolish in a lot of ways. They still lack skill. They need to gain experience, ideally with supervision.
And I'm going to talk about relationships to women in all of these categories. They still look to mother for care and support.
Think of that guy that's dribbling awkwardly out on the court. You, you want him to be on the court, but you're not going to be depending on him to, to score points for the team. He's fun, but he's not a leader. And I just want to say it's not wrong to be a boy, but it is wrong to stay a boy.
So where you're lacking skill, you. You are dependent on others. You're still looking to mom for care and support.
First Corinthians 13:11 comes to mind. Paul says, there's a time when you should be putting childish things away to become a man. So if you're still coasting, my bro, it's time to grab the ball and grow.
So unless you listen to this and you're 17 in which case that is totally acceptable. You just need to find good guys to be around.
[00:17:50] Speaker A: Or you might be 70 and you met Jesus six weeks ago.
All of us go through a boy, young person stage, both spiritually and physically.
[00:18:03] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:18:03] Speaker A: So hopefully if you're a 70 year old, there's components of your life in which you grew up, even if you had no spiritual life at all. But we can be patient with you if this is a new, new thing for you. We expect that. Paul talks about, you know, spiritually, you need milk at first. Yes. But it looks real weird when you're still drinking it later on. Yes, I have more thoughts on boy, but I'll save them until you point at me and tell me to talk.
[00:18:31] Speaker B: I just have one more sentence to throw it about describing boy. And it is the kind of thing that we've talked about before, which is the danger of like big trust funds or like nepotism. You get the VP job without any experience.
Those, those kinds of, of artificial legs up, they can doom you to perpetual immaturity. And so we, we want to encourage every man.
If you're, if you're in boyhood, so be it. But we cannot stay there. We, all of us, if you're over age 13 listening to this, you should be well on your way out of boyhood and taking steps to leave it. Okay.
[00:19:18] Speaker A: Well, one thing I wanted to chip in on boyhood is that, and I'm not trying to, we're not just talking about spiritual in this episode, we're talking about the way you handle money. I mean, I love what you said just then because I, I tell my kids all the time I am saving aggressively to be able to do something big, like help you make a down payment on a home when you get married. And I absolutely won't do it. If I look at you and go, you're not equipped to handle that type of thing, or I don't see, you know, motivation and, and initiative on the part of you and your husband someday.
But spiritually speaking, most churches, we've been talking to people lately who are on the hunt for a new church and things like that.
Most churches are designed to encourage you never to leave this phase.
[00:20:11] Speaker B: That's correct.
[00:20:12] Speaker A: Because you said dependent consumer. And you know, we're not going to get into it in too much detail in this episode, but the whole, the way we do church, I mean, let's just point a bunch of chairs at the front and we would probably have security escort you out if you started talking. And I'm not saying show up at church and start talking.
But it's something to really think about when you're looking for churches. What are they trying to build here? Are they trying to build happy consumers? And even amongst your friends when people start going, well, here's how I grumble about my church. I might leave and find a better one. Well, you're talking like somebody who's primarily a consumer of the product.
[00:20:55] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:20:57] Speaker A: So just be aware that the entire American spiritual industrial complex is designed to make you a dependent consumer. And I like what you just said. That is something that is characteristic of a boy, not a man.
[00:21:13] Speaker B: You're exactly right. I'm not even going to touch the church topic or I'll just waste all of our time. I just don't want to get off on it. Okay, I'm going to the next topic.
The next kind of man is the evil man. I want you to think of the fowler.
This is the guy who's like. Like when you're trying to drive the baseline, he's constantly bumping you out of bounds with the hips. And then he looks around. What? I didn't, I didn't do anything. What.
[00:21:36] Speaker A: What man? I was thinking you were talking about the man with.
Isn't a fowler somebody that uses, like a bird of prey to hunt? Or is that a falconer?
[00:21:48] Speaker B: It might be a falconer.
[00:21:50] Speaker A: Okay, okay, continue.
[00:21:52] Speaker B: Yeah, he's not only fouling and takes cheap sh. Shots and does the John Stockton about, you know, when the ref's not looking, he's giving you a punch down low. Also, when he's taken a shot and he misses, there's always been a mystery foul somewhere. Some. Some ghost has fouled him. And we always go, where's. Where's the foul? Oh, yeah, you. You. You hit me on the arm after the, after the shot you missed. That's what happened. This, These guys, these evil men, they stake their claim with theft and oppression.
They become the evildoers that good men must fight.
They do not honor, protect, or provide for women.
They use and abuse them.
So Proverbs 16:27 says, A worthless man digs up evil and his speech is like a scorching fire.
So he burns people around them. He takes advantage of people around him, and he causes mayhem wherever he goes.
If you look around your life, I think that. I think that a lot of guys that we would categorize as evil men don't see themselves this way.
And what they do is they re. They go from relationship to relationship, going like, you know, there was just increasing drama there. There was just like this guy. I don't know what his problem was.
And okay, I'll believe you the first time and maybe the second time, I'm iffy on the third time. But when you're walking through your life is a stretch of burned relationships because you can't maintain friendships over time and there's always drama and everything is burning to the ground and you know, you can't. One of the earmarks for us was always when a couple, they just can't keep a nanny around because they think that she does some weird thing over time. Like, well, did you set up clear expectations? Why? I don't understand why it's always a problem for you to find good people always having trouble with your employees, et cetera, et cetera. I'll say again, a worthless man digs up evil and his speech is like a scorching fire.
If any of this hits home or describes you, the good news is God's grace is ready for you.
It's. I don't think you're. If your starting point is a villain, it's, it's any more of a long term problem that if you start to be a boy, you just need to confess, repent, turn around and start moving in the opposite direction and start protecting your team.
I doubt that a lot of evil men are listening to this podcast, but it is a category of man. There might be some aspect of your life where you are unknowingly or you came from a family where you manipulate people or something, but I got to throw it out there. It is a category of human being. The Fowler, the evil man.
[00:24:47] Speaker A: Yeah, there's a book that I've talked about a long time ago on the podcast that's called the Way of Men.
I think the author is Jack Donovan.
We don't recommend him in any way as a guru. He is not the type of guy you want to build your life after. Yes, he did put his finger on some very helpful thoughts when it comes to categorizing men, though. In his little book, and it was, he talked about there's bad men who are good at being a man.
And he kind of said that's your, your Taliban fighter. They are brave as heck and they committed and they're not going to chicken out. And they, but, but they're evil, so they're using their masculine giftings towards evil. And then there's good men who are bad at being a man. So they have a good heart and the best intentions. And I think I'm leading you into your next category. But they might just kind of be unable to get off the couch or afraid, cowardly, all sorts of things that stop them from actually being good at being a man, even though they're not bad men. So both of these things, your, your nature as a man, you will have temptations at different times to either be good at being a man but use that in a negative way, or to have a good heart and be bad at actually implementing it using the masculine virtues that God intends for.
[00:26:21] Speaker B: Yeah, so that's right.
Yeah. So here's category three.
It is the passive man or the fake jogger. Oh, I'm getting back on D. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
This is the guy who is avoiding the fight that you. Many of us know the hard conversation that we need to have with the wife.
We know the hard conversation we need to have with the 13 year old boy.
We need to take away his Nintendo Switch or whatever it is.
But you're avoiding the fight and you are depending on the labor of others.
My kid doesn't really love Jesus. He's not interested in spiritual things. If we could just get him to a Christian school and into the right church, maybe some great youth minister could fix him. I don't know. And we're really aiding evil by doing nothing.
These guys are not exploring the world, something that the boy has on them.
They're not staking a claim.
They're lazy and dull and becoming duller because they exercise themselves in nothing.
They effectively remain dependent on women for leadership and provision. They're not taking care of them.
And like Eli, letting his sons run wild in First Samuel, that passivity costs huge. With regards to your legacy and what you're building.
I, I there, there are so many little ways that I battle passivity.
One of the, one of the things is I think of this as a.
I hope you'll, I hope you'll understand when I think this is a passive guy move.
When I do anything, it could be taking out the trash, it could be doing the yard, it could be folding the laundry when there's, you know, 10 minutes to spare. I'm listening to a podcast, fold the laundry.
I have this reflex of me that wants to run around and go, did everybody see what I did? Is anybody going to praise me for doing the lawn? Did everybody see the lawn? Did you notice when you walked across the lawn how nice and cut it was?
I think that is a, I think that's a weak man's move that I need to have somebody affirm every little thing that I do. There's, or you Know, I don't want to do more than my chores. I took the dishes last time. I want the house to be in order. I want the kids to act right. And then when everybody sits down at the table, I want to take the spotlight and Father will open the Bible. And then I want everyone to go, oh, Father, you're reading the Bible again. What a wonderful father you are. As opposed to going like, this is my job. I don't have to get kudos for it. Does that make sense that I think that's one of the temptations of being this kind of passive guy?
[00:29:07] Speaker A: For sure. I think that there's two things that you said that stuck out.
One is you. You called them the fake jogger.
[00:29:16] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:29:17] Speaker A: And, man, I remember Stephen, I was probably 39, and you were what, 45, 49.
Are you that much older than me?
[00:29:27] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm 10 years older.
[00:29:29] Speaker A: Well, I remember going on a run with you, and for the first time, we have gone on runs here and there in our relationship.
[00:29:36] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:29:37] Speaker A: I kind of looked at you and went like, he's kind of jogging a little more like an old man now. And I. I kind of judged you. I'm not gonn high. And I thought, I'm a. I'm a athletic young man. And so. And so. And I have to tell you, yesterday, I was on the treadmill at the gym doing my jog, just trying not to get fat.
[00:29:57] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:29:57] Speaker A: And there was a mirror next to me, and I looked over and I went, I run like an old man.
And I'm a lot younger than Steven was when I first thought maybe he had lost a little bit of his bringing this up. And so I don't know. I might be the fake jogger because my jog has. Has changed shape for sure.
So that hurt a little bit, but okay.
[00:30:21] Speaker B: All right.
[00:30:22] Speaker A: More seriously, you. You kind of describe. I think, when you just say passive, we think this is a. A guy who just won't get off the couch. He won't do anything.
[00:30:33] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:30:33] Speaker A: And what you actually described is a guy that I think might be a lot more common amongst our audience. So it's. It's like the guy who knows how to talk the talk. You talk about multigenerational wealth all the time, but you aren't actually implementing the strategies. Or you talk about child training all the time, but your kids are a tornado.
[00:30:59] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:31:00] Speaker A: That is so common.
[00:31:03] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:31:03] Speaker A: To some degree, I think we all do it. And so I'm not judging anybody who goes, huh? I.
I really am embarrassed for the way my Family conducted themselves. Last time we went to the church house or whatever. Like, we all have win winning and losing seasons on some of these things. But I do think sometimes there's risk for the passive man. If you get around a bunch of dudes who like to kind of talk about this stuff. Yeah, it can become pretty easy to learn how to play the part without ever surveying your flocks and going, what is the actual status of things? It's one reason money is a nice starting point for actually talking to guys, because you can't really fake what's going on there. Well, you don't have any money in your account, so what do you mean? You're talking about multi generational wealth.
We, we can do a lot better job of kind of faking our spiritual leadership or our relational discipleship of our kids or, you know, all that stuff.
And I think that it's just, I want to put it on people's radar as a watch out is just because you're listening to this podcast and maybe you're coming on the retreat or want to hang out with guys who talk this way.
We still have to occasionally go, I'm going to take a very hard and as best I can, unbiased look at what my scene looks like and say, am I guilty of, of maybe being a talker more than a doer?
[00:32:35] Speaker B: Yeah, I think that's great.
What I'm thinking of, as you say that is. Forgive me, but I'm just thinking of these guys as a reference. I think of some of these dudes that are VJ and Brandon and Thomas and Christopher and EJ and I just think these are people who are trying it. They're trying stuff and they're trying to get in the game and it means so much. They're. They're actually the next category. But. Sorry, yeah, we. It's so easy to talk and start using some lingo. I meet with guys occasionally. I know who these guys are and they know what to say. That will get my eyebrows up like, I'm trying to train my child. Oh, let's. Let's start talking. And then as you say, I'm around their kids and going like, you know, you're not, you're not trying anything. Give me a break.
I have to add to this category of passive men because as I said, it's. It's Justin Wolfenberg's favorite whipping boy. Mouser says in his book that men like this make Jesus want to throw up.
He wishes they were either real men or overtly satanic. But their Lukewarmness is disgusting. I'm going to throw you up out of my mouth.
And these guys are like, I want you to kind of think I'm with it guy. I'm not really paying the price at home. I'm trying to keep things cool with the wife. You know what she's like, she's kind of a feminist and a ball buster and so I just kind of let her go. And you know what my in laws are like and oh my gosh, my kids. So you know, I just want to keep the peace in my house. These are fake joggers on the team and they're not paying the price. I don't mean that there has to be conflict everywhere, but, but there has to be proactive leadership as a, as opposed to passivity. I was just having a conversation this week. We had a mid rash and a guy was asking about training his children and we got into a conversation about the American deal is you kind of watch your kids and go like, oh, they're making a mistake here. No, that's not how you put the dishes away. So you correct it. Then you stare at them and watch them. Oh no, that's not how you share toys. You have to do it this way. That is reactive. And I would call that passive. All you're dealing with is the trouble that's under your nose at the moment. It's not proactively training your child.
So proactive is, are you training your kids in the word of God? Are you training yourself? Does your schedule reflect that you have goals about who you want to be as a family leader? Does your budget reflect the fact that you have goals that are beyond. Well, I just don't want to go under. I don't want to live in the red and go bankrupt. You have goals beyond that. You should have goals beyond that. So anyhow, that's. I love his application of that lukewarmness verse.
[00:35:23] Speaker A: One thing you can do, and this is why I keep coming back to the retreat, just because it's a time when I know a bunch of people who like to talk about this stuff will be sitting around together. But it's just as applicable. Like we've had a family come over to our house and go, do you think they know like how unpleasant that was or something? And, and, but, but, and so we can say that and kind of like you said, well, you're not training your kids.
But how often do I walk up to a trusted brother and say, hey, give me feedback on how you perceive my family to be functioning on this level. Honestly, I don't. I. I think there's a role to play in, in somebody else like me critiquing their scene. But really, who cares about that if I'm not asking multiple families and dudes around me like, hey, can I show you my budget? Does this look like I'm faking it? Am I talking one way and doing something different with my money? Can I just have you observe my children and give me unfiltered feedback? That's the type of thing that can help you identify areas where you might be this kind of passive faker.
[00:36:39] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:36:40] Speaker A: So you, you.
It's easy to start thinking in your brain. Well, I know some families who on this, this and this, they're maybe passive. Don't do that. If you're listening to us now, and I'm preaching to myself too, it's like I'm trying to think, what are the. Who are the guys? I could say I need you to give me a very honest take on my five capitals. Where am I?
Maybe not in line with what the way I talk. That would be a good takeaway for you.
[00:37:07] Speaker B: Yeah, that'd be great.
Now our fourth category is the good man. The team captains. These are the guys are the MVPs. And we love you dudes, man, do we ever. These guys stake their claim to the world.
They produce through labor to become independent providers.
They battle evil with skill and they battle evil in themselves. They battle it under their own roof. And then maybe in some way out there in the world. They battle evil with skill. They grow in wisdom.
They honor moms. They learn from men.
They are becoming protecting heads in marriage. And they show us the glory of God in their masculine, God given roles. You remember when Joshua said, as for me and my house, we're going to serve the Lord. Now that's the language of a good man. That's a. That is a family leader who's going, like, I have a vision, I have a course that my family is going to go down on the court. These guys are calling plays, they're protecting the team and they're building a legacy.
So aim here, bros. It's where we are called to shine. That's what we talk about all the time at Abraham's Wallet. I don't know if they describe too much about this guy except to say it's where we're all going. And probably we, we all have shades of, you know, putting on different, different on faces for different categories of our lives. But I got to put that man in front of you, the good man. I want it to be your vision of I want, that's, that's who I want to be. I want to be like Joshua who's declaring this is how my family is going to be. And I'm trying to take practical steps forward in that stuff, as you guys would know.
[00:38:59] Speaker A: Yeah, I, the Puritans talked a lot, they used the terminology about killing sin. Like you have to find your sin and you have to slaughter it. Like it was this violent battle language that these peace loving puritans would talk about. I kind of think as you talk, even the good men among us, we, we are out there doing battle against the passive man and the evil man that lives in us all the time. So I, I know you didn't say this to go now we want to categorize you and if you're the evil or the passive man, I'm sorry, but you aren't welcome at er. That's not what we're saying. We're kind of giving you, no matter how much you could have been walking this path for 30 years and be way ahead of Stephen or I, and there's still a battle to be waged with the passive man and the evil man.
And I like that, that imagery because just like we said, there's risks to hanging out with people who talk this way and use this language because you can end up faking.
There's also benefits. Like you could hang out with a bunch of good men and I promise you they will start to rub off on you and you'll start to go, oh, I, I need to level up if I'm going to be, be running with this crowd. It's why one of the most effective forms of discipleship is not let's have lots of coffees, it's, let's go run with a crowd that's going in the same direction. And you won't be able to help but be conformed to some of the image of the guys that are a few steps ahead of you. So I don't really, I care, but I don't really care where on this journey you find yourself. Like, I think the encouragement is that we're all in process moving towards this good man. And, and thankfully we have an example, we have an example of the goodest of good men. And you know, if we're, if we're trying to, to get there, we should spend time with him and also look at the examples that he gave us in his word, which, I mean we here at Abraham's Wallet are partial to the prototypical Father Abraham, when it comes to fathering. Sure, Jesus didn't have a whole lot of tips on. On marriage fathering specifically for us, but he gave us some great examples. So, yeah, there's guys to run with, both physically and in the word.
[00:41:35] Speaker B: Yeah, I. I want every guy listening as you've been, as you have been doing this, I'm sure reflexively, to just analyze yourself.
We all want to be the good guy, but where are you really right now in your life, like, financially? Do you find yourself passive? Do you find yourself exploiting your opportunities so that you can kind of hide out spiritually?
Do you. Do you. Are you just kind of trying to draft and go like, well, if I do the minimum, I'll be fine? Are you, like, going, I'm following hard after the heart of God. I'm looking for him. I'm. I'm going to be a disciple. Admit it if you're a boy, or admit it if you're mostly passive. Just admit it to God and maybe a brother that can pray with you and, and move on from there. I had a great unplanned conversation with a guy today where he sat down and said, I just got to have somebody to confess to. I find that I struggle with the fear of man.
With one of my direct reports, he's like an insecure guy, and I never want to talk truth to him because I'm afraid of hurting him. So I don't. I always shade the truth. And then I have a guy that I report to and I have the fear of man with that guy. I don't. I don't want to disappoint him and I don't want to oppose him.
So I got to get over this for if I'm going to get to where God wants me to be. It was such a great confession. Well, I'm so excited when somebody does that. I'm like, I want to pray for you. I mean, there's all kinds of hope for you if you're at a place where I think I realize there's this problem with me and I want to move on from here. That's so good. And I bless you right now as you're listening, that the Holy Spirit would convict you of, of sin in your life so that you could grow out of it. Which brings me to the last point that I want to make, Mark, when I say you getting convicted, I. This is a. This is a deleted scene, little bonus scene. But I think it really applies to this conversation.
You were talking about the church, the culture of the church and how it makes boys and wants you to be a dependent consumer. Okay.
I find that the church, the Christian culture, by and large, tiptoes around men's duties and are scared to guilt trip anyone in for, for benching their family, for, like, faking it running down the court.
I, I, I'm, we've, we've used this verse before. It's, I just saw it again this past week. First Timothy 5, 8. Slaps. Can I say that it slaps as a verb?
[00:44:08] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:44:09] Speaker B: Okay. It says, if anyone doesn't provide for his household, he's worse than an unbeliever.
That, that is pressure.
That's pressure right there. And it's godly.
It's like being in the locker room at halftime and the coach is going, what are you doing? You are not guarding your man. He's killing us.
And we at Abraham's wallet and at ER and all of our just regular relationships that don't have a brand name attached to them, we're trying to encourage each other to own it.
And if you feel the heat to lead your home, that's conviction. It's not condemnation.
And if you're, if you feel like you're missing it, fix it. I find that we kind of hit the eject button when we're feeling convicted a lot and say, you know, that's the spirit of performance.
You're trying to make me feel guilty for not doing something. Well, you know, being a disciple does mean doing things. I had another conversation this week where a guy said he thought he was being he. I should say he's been conditioned by church life to think that if he feels bad, he's like, I, I'm. You have told me, Stephen, to write in this notebook every day and write. Here's the passage I'm reading. Here's what my, what I'm doing with God. Yes, I have told you that. And I tell, you know, sometimes I feel guilty when I don't write anything in the, in the notebook on a day because I haven't spent any time with God. And that's probably just a spirit of performance and I need to get over that, isn't it? I said, no. That's what it feels like when you don't do the thing you're supposed to do.
And it's wrong that you didn't do it. I'm not saying that God doesn't love you if you don't have your little Bible time every day. I'm saying that as a disciple. We've gone past Whether God loves me or not. He loves you. He loves you. He died for you.
But you can't coast on. Well, God. Doesn't Jesus die for me? Doesn't he love me if I don't do anything that I'm supposed to do in my home?
He does have expectations for you. And we can't hit the eject button of. Well, that's a spirit of performance. You're telling me. Yeah, you do have a job to do. Did you get married? Okay, well, you, you made some vows, you have a covenant, did you have children? Okay. You have some obligations to them. You do have to do the job.
So I, I'm. I, I do believe there is an evil spirit called the spirit of performance. I don't think that that lets you off the hook from ever feeling the. The responsibility of duty as a family leader. Does that make sense, Mark?
[00:46:45] Speaker A: 100%.
[00:46:47] Speaker B: Okay. So I want everybody to. That hears this, to know you're not alone in your fight against passivity.
And whether you're trying to level up from bully mode or you're walking away from passivity or you feel like, man, there's kind of evil man traits that are in my family. I would like to undo those.
God is ready to partner with you, and we are too. I mean, I'd say that as a. As our little outfit, but I'd say that for myself. If I'm anywhere around your life or get any time with you, I want to help you, and I want you to dig into his world. I want a word. I want you to build your team. I want you to lead. Joshua 1:9 said, he gives. He gives. God gives Joshua his assignment. Famous verse here. He gives him the sign that he kind of looks him in the eye, makes a fist at him, and says, now I want you to be strong and very courageous as you do this thing that I've commanded you to do. And I think that's God's heart. For every man that is receiving the calling, like, it's a big deal to be the leader of a family, be strong and be very courageous. I would love for you to leave today, our time with us, feeling like, okay, I know what I'm supposed to oppose, and I feel invigorated. And God, God's encouraging me to do this thing.
[00:48:05] Speaker A: I think you're just saying the same thing I want for. For all the guys listening, which is this is not supposed to be a beat down. It's supposed to be a let's go get it.
And that's what I was trying to express with my kind of throwing the target out there. And. And the only ways for you to do that are to stare at what we're going for, which can be found to some imperfect degree in other guys and to a perfect degree in. In the Lord and his Word. So go get it.
[00:48:40] Speaker B: Yeah, you know, I'll just speak for myself as we're closing and say, as I said, there are. There are shades of all of these guys that, that are on the periphery of my life.
And it helps me so much to keep in front of me a vision. We're actually told in Hebrews to keep this vision in front of us. The goal that's set before us.
We're keeping Jesus, we're keeping Abraham in front of us. As that's where I'm headed, I'm going to be this kind of man. And the laziness that gets in my way, the kind of shirking responsibilities I want to throw off, am I getting that stuff. Stuff out of the way because I know where I'm going of this vision. That's what we're like constantly trying to describe for you guys is where we're headed. And we want you to be strong and courageous. So Please stop by abrahamswallet.com for tools to join our crew. Share your thoughts and questions at ur we we would appreciate it if you'd rate and review us as we keep running for the kingdom together. And so until next time, run your home and your doe like a biblical boss.
