Real Men Keep Their Balls in the Truck

By David Houston

This book is a lot like many other books on the topic of what constitutes a man. However, that is not the main focus of the book. More importantly, it is not what constitutes a man but who constitutes a man. All the self-help books on the subject, psychiatrists and their talk shows, and best friends' sage advice at closing time are all the same-insufficient at best, incorrect at worst. This book looks to the most authoritative source on who constitutes a man-the Bible. The world uses a sliding scale to define manhood, defining it in whatever terms is most comfortable at the time. The Bible's definition of a man has not, and will not, ever change because truth is not a piece of silly putty we get to mold into our view of what is no. 1 Dad. This book takes specific passages from the Bible and relates them in a way we, as Christian men, and those that desire to be Christian men, can understand and, most importantly, put into action so that the world may come to understand and believe what the word says. After all, real men are doers, not just hearers.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Covenant Books, Inc.
• Release date: Nov 21, 2019
• ISBN: 9781645593881

Book preview

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Real Men Keep Their Balls in the Truck

David B. Houston

ISBN 978-1-64559-387-4 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-64559-388-1 (Digital)

Copyright © 2019 David B. Houston

All rights reserved

First Edition

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Covenant Books, Inc.

11661 Hwy 707

Murrells Inlet, SC 29576

www.covenantbooks.com

Table of Contents

Prologue

Introduction

1 Samuel 16:7

Philippians 2:3–7

Titus 2:7–8

Romans 12:2

Ephesians 5:25

Luke 15:20–23

Proverbs 27:17

Galatians 5:22–23

1 Kings 2:1–3

Ezekiel 18:7–9

Cane and Able (Proverbs 20:7)

Epilogue

About the Author

To my wife, Carol.

Foreword

In 2005, as I prepared for morning worship, I noticed a couple enter the rear of the worship center and nonchalantly pass row after row of empty seats. They were oblivious to those watching every step they took until they settled on the front row. I also noticed how unencumbered they seemed in responding to the truth of God’s word that day. Little did I know, in a few short months, I would have the privilege to be this couple’s pastor. For the past thirteen years, they have sat on the front row of Oak Ridge Baptist Church, as eager to be doers of the Word and not merely hearers as the day we first met.

I hope you noticed in this opening paragraph the great fondness I have for David and Carol Houston. They are every pastor’s dream team. With that said, when David asked me to write this foreword and I read the title, I couldn’t help but ask myself, David, what were you thinking? That’s when my wife reminded me of the first Christmas card he sent us after we began serving together. It was a beautiful card wishing us a blessed Christmas in Spanish. Knowing neither my wife nor I speak Spanish, read Spanish, or understand Spanish, I couldn’t help but chuckle and ask myself, David, what were you thinking? And that’s just it. David is always thinking. He’s always thinking about how to use his life experiences as a retired police officer, his love for teaching Bible study groups or criminal justice students, his addiction to the Beatles, his successes and failures, and his love for God to make an impact for the kingdom. No doubt this inspired the writing of this book.

Recently, David was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Not long after his diagnosis, our church body had the opportunity to pray over David and Carol. The following day, he texted me, expressing his appreciation and how much the prayers had helped. This was my reply: That’s awesome. Walking this journey alone will be hard… Walking it with your spiritual family will still be hard, but at least you will have lots of folks willing to laugh with you when the rest of your hair falls out! When I didn’t receive a reply, I feared my humor had been lost in translation. This fear was relieved the following Sunday when David arrived at church with a fresh haircut. His response to me was, I wasn’t about to let cancer take my hair. In the words of Frank Sinatra, that was David saying, I am going to fight this diagnosis my way.

That’s what you’ll find in this book; David writing things his way. It’s my prayer, after reading these words, that you will ask yourself, David, what were you thinking? and will turn the page and enjoy the corny humor and spiritual anecdotes of my friend, my co-laborer for Christ, and my favorite front row Joe!

Dr. Galen K. Cooper

Senior Pastor

Oak Ridge Baptist Church

Spring, Texas

Prologue

Titles are important. The Pittsburgh Steelers organization owns the title of most Super Bowl wins at ix. The Boston Celtics have won seventeen NBA championship titles, and of course, the New York Yankees own major league baseball with twenty-six World Series championship titles. Those titles are worn by those organizations very proudly, as they should be. If you are a female athlete, Title IX is very important, as it is designed to level the playing field between men’s and women’s sports programs in education. In the 1990s Paul McCartney and Elton John were knighted by the queen and given the title, Sir, before their names. Ringo Starr was added to the list in 2018. The title of one of my favorite movies is To Sir, with Love.

If you are one of those folks that does not want to get bogged down with only one title, help is here! According to Campus Pride, there are fifty-eight colleges and universities that allow students to choose their own title/gender.¹ Maybe you feel more comfortable with no title? More and more workplaces are becoming gender neutral so as to not offend anyone. I could put a title on those folks, but I’d probably offend someone.

For those academics that have earned a PhD, they are allowed to have the designation, Dr., before their name. Dentists enjoy seeing DDS after their name and folks that finally pass the bar exam are allowed to have attorney-at-law on their office door and mailbox. In high school yearbooks, you may remember titles, such as cutest couple, most studious, most energetic, and of course, homecoming king and queen. I was given the title least likely to succeed. I haven’t looked at a yearbook lately, but my guess that award has fallen by the politically incorrect wayside. One of the most well-known Beatles songs, Yesterday, was given the working title, Scrambled Eggs by the aforementioned Sir Paul. While Scrambled eggs, all my troubles seemed so far away doesn’t really work, it does show that, even temporary, interim titles are important.

When I was in college, my English professor announced he would give five extra points to the most creative title on an essay we were assigned. I don’t remember the book we were supposed to write our essay on (or even the professor’s name), but I do remember it had something to do with unrequited love. The James Bond movie, Live and Let Die, was very popular then, so I titled mine, Live and Let Live. Expecting to see that +5 on the top of my paper, you can imagine how depressed I felt when it was not to be. I thought it was a very snappy title, but alas, the professor did not think so. Yes, even in my early twenties, I couldn’t even write a memorable title, and here I am, decades older, writing an entire book!

A couple of years ago, I was talking with my son, Ben, about possible business opportunities when he came up with a great name for a pizza place, Give Pizza Chance, after John Lennon’s song, Give Peace a Chance. Before I could place the first pepperoni with extra cheese order, I found the name was already taken by some joint in New York. I wonder if Yoko eats there? More recently, I was eating dinner with my wife at a place that primarily serves chicken. The food is really good there, but the few times I had been, it was relatively sparse of customers. I won’t show the name here, but I felt the name was partly responsible for the low number of first-time customers. I came up with a name that I knew would work, What the Cluck. You guessed it; someone on the other coast had already grabbed that one. They are probably making a mint on inferior, subpar chicken too. And not too long ago—yes, I have another one—I was riding with my wife, and somehow, the topic got on bakeries, probably because I wanted a doughnut. Anyway, the title Our Deli Bread, just popped into my head. Already 0 for 2 in the name game, I asked her to perform an Internet search for the title and, sure enough, it was already taken. Having struck out, I was walking back to the dugout (figuratively speaking, folks; I really wasn’t walking. I was driving, remember?) Carol found that Your Deli Bread was apparently up for grabs. Now if I only had a bakery. While writing this spot, I came up with the title Flour Power, but it is a place right here in Texas!

Every other year or so, my sons and I go on a road trip. The last one was a trip to Florida. We were in the Salvador Dali museum, and after a while, I sat down in the cafeteria to rest. (I am much older than the young’uns after all) I noticed the cafeteria had the usual offerings: soup, salad, sandwiches, and pastries with your choice of hot or cold drinks. At that moment, I had yet another epiphany! Why not call the cafeteria, The Salvador Deli? It makes perfect sense. Museum patrons would be amused at the obvious play on words, sales would double, and there would even be a greater appreciation of Mr. Dali’s work. We may not understand it, but we could appreciate it! I was even willing to give away this title to the establishment. I excitedly approached the manager and told them of my creative idea to change the name of the cafeteria. She smiled and, in her most professional and sympathetic voice, informed me that she gets that very same suggestion about once a week.

Continuing on with the importance of titles. My brother Steve, who I’ve done public speaking engagements about ethics with and who I look up to (he’s 5'11"), always said you must have a hook to bring in the audience. In presentations, he said, you must hook the audience early or you will lose them and your message too.

The same goes with book titles. The title is often the difference between buying and not buying the book. I recently was trolling Amazon Kindle for inexpensive, yet intriguing, books. I ran across a book penned by Chris Sonksen, entitled, Quit Church: Because Your Life Would Be Better If You Did. Mind you, this book was found in the religious section of Kindle. Oh, I had to have this book! I bought and have read the book but will not tell you about it, but spoiler alert, the title is somewhat misleading.

To further my point, let’s conduct an experiment. You have two books in your hand. Which one are you more likely to purchase, title no. 1 Leading by Example or title no. 2 (Lead is Deal spelled backward) Deal: A Backward Approach to Leadership. If you chose no. 1, I must be honest with you, this book is probably not for you, but if you chose no. 2, read on! As you can see, I was very cautious, yet nervous, in choosing an appropriate title for this book. Also, as you can see, I tossed appropriate to the wind. Still cautious, however. I conducted my research on this very sensitive subject. First, I did not find a book, restaurant, or bakery for that matter, with this title. I did, however, find a lot of Internet chatter on the subject. In an article titled, A Tribute to Real Men and Our Balls, Kevin Jackson discusses what it takes to be a real man.² In 2013, Neil Boorman wrote a similar article in the Huffington Post.³ The Pit Bull and Rescue Store came up with a novel way to promote their retail shop with this ad, Real Men Have Their Own Balls.⁴ They are just selling T-shirts! Clearly, the above examples show that I have yet to come up with an original idea. Not that this is a surprise, but I presume Solomon was right when he wrote in Ecclesiastes—there is nothing new under the sun. We still haven’t scratched (pun intended) the surface of why men display bull balls on their truck hitches. There are many opinions out there on this subject. When googling the subject, I was surprised that there were over 2.66 million results. I did not take the time to view them all, but here is a short sampling: opinions varied, but landed on both sides of the hitch. One woman thought it is retarded (her words, not mine) while another woman proudly stated she actually bought a pair for her man for his four-wheeling, mudslinging pickup truck. Some men are dumbfounded over this idea and some are just plain dumb. If the title didn’t give away where I stand, there should be no mystery now, nor should there be any mystery, concerning my intelligence.

In an attempt to get to the heart of the matter, I sought the answer to the age-old question, Why? Some people blame the IQ of the driver. Some blame the driver’s insecurity and that