Living as a Man of Valor

By Brad Smith

Revealing what the Bible says about a man's position, priorities, and practices, Living as a Man of Valor gives men worldwide the truth of biblical manhood. It is a radical truth, told first to a nobody - Gideon - and applicable to all men who accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.

 

When men build from this position of strength in the Lord - when they hear, believe, and act on these truths - men, women, children, community leaders, and pastors report changed lives, revived marriages and families, and growing churches.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Phial Press
• Release date: Apr 28, 2023
• ISBN: 9781959544074

Brad Smith

Brad Smith was born and raised in southern Ontario. He has worked as a farmer, signalman, insulator, truck driver, bartender, schoolteacher, maintenance mechanic, roofer, and carpenter. He lives in an eighty-year-old farmhouse near the north shore of Lake Erie. Red Means Run, the first novel in his Virgil Cain series, was named among the Year’s Best Crime Novels by Booklist.

Book preview

Introduction

Brad Smith

Why Men?

And I sought for a man among them who should build up the wall and stand in the breach before me for the land... but I found none.

Ezekiel 22:30 (ESV)

When we were fairly new to our church in the late 1980s, I saw an announcement about starting a men’s ministry. I had never heard of a men’s ministry and had no idea what it was. But they talked about hosting breakfasts and events, and I knew I could help with organizing. I was looking to serve somewhere, so I volunteered. Besides, what guy doesn’t like hanging out with other guys?

I was in a lot of roles for that ministry over the years, but what was most meaningful for me was the personal growth I experienced while doing it. Yes, I attended the breakfasts, Bible studies, dinners, retreats, and other various outings, and over time I organized, led, or spoke at most of them. But the biggest deal for me was the personal impact.

I discovered that normal men sharing real stories of how they worked through problems in their lives, work, neighborhood, or in their marriages and families—and what I learned from them—was ten times more important than my service. During many dark days of unemployment, discouragement, and marriage and family challenges, the fellowship, camaraderie, occasional hand on my shoulder accompanied by words of affirmation or a written note, was huge, having major impact on my outlook, perspective, and obedience.

Over time I had the blessing of giving back to other men by mentoring, discipling, and influencing men for Christ. Serving men was and remains an incredible joy.

––––––––

Nothing Like That Here

At one point, I was invited to India to help a group of national pastors and itinerant evangelists with strategic planning (my vocation). These men traveled extensively around India for their ministry, visiting and teaching at churches, conducting open-air crusades, etc. During the breaks, I talked with one of the attendees, Pastor Johnson Duvakumar from Chennai. He asked what ministry I was involved in at my church, and I told him about the men’s ministry and the activities, friendship, and growth in Christ we experienced and the service we did together. While most of the previous conversations we shared were animated, two-way, give and take, I noticed that while talking about the subject of ministering to and through men, he was quiet.

So I asked, What does your church in Chennai do for the men, and what have you seen being done for men in your country’s churches? He did not respond. Thinking it would help to provide some examples, I stuttered, ...you know, men’s Bible studies, retreats, pancake breakfasts...?

He answered, I haven’t seen anything like that in my church, nor have I seen or heard of that in any of the churches that I’ve been in.

I was shocked.

No Life Sharing

I became a Christian in high school; I attended a Christian college and majored in Bible; but it was when I was living life with the men at my church, with all of its joys, pains, sorrows, and support, encouragement, and successes in the midst of real-world, life-on-life reality, that I finally began to experience the abundant life Christ offers. With men—men of God. And I thought, The Christian men in India do not have of any of this?! They don’t know the joy and benefit of sharing life with other men like I’ve known?!

So when Johnson said that he knew of nothing going on for men throughout India, all I could think to ask was, How many men are in the churches?

To me, it seemed obvious: If there is no consistent, organized, dedicated teaching and ministry to and through men, why would the men go to church?

Maybe you have read or heard of David Murrow’s 2011 book, Why Men Hate Going to Church. There are some lighter reasons and some heavy reasons that Murrow offers, and I encourage you to read it if you haven’t already. But in my experience, there are about five main reasons (further discussed later), and one of them is very simple: Churches are often only focused and budgeted towards ministries to and for women and children. Why? Well, that’s who responds. That’s who comes to church!

If there is no consistent, organized, dedicated teaching and ministry to and through men, why would men go to church?

God Established His Church for Everyone

But God established His Church to teach His Word and His truths to everyone! The Lord of the Church has made it clear in His Word how very important men are. Men have a high calling to leadership and service. They have a vital, immensely important role. Men have an enormous impact on the family, in the church, and in the society.

This matters! Men are essential, not just to the church’s ability to do its Kingdom work, but to its survival and ability to flourish.[1] When men don’t attend church, they don’t hear the truth that saves and transforms them, impacting their marriages and families.[2]

Men are essential to society’s survival and

to the church’s ability to flourish.

Granted, men are difficult to reach. They often don’t respond... at least to the normal methods of outreach. But if we give up on them—if we do not make an effort to reach and teach men—we are making a strategic mistake. We are playing into Satan’s hand.

This mistake is not just impacting the church: we see damage from ignoring men everywhere. Families are falling apart. Men are not involved in their children’s lives, and kids are getting into trouble—some serious and life-impacting. Societal norms are eroding—sometimes dramatically. Communities are decaying. Let’s face it: Most of the problems in the world are because men aren’t living their God-ordained roles.[3]

By ignoring men, we are playing into Satan’s hand. And we see the damage everywhere.

It’s because men don’t see the importance they have. They feel that they have no purpose.[4] Feeling hopeless, they often seek to drown their problems in alcohol, drugs, porn, and other idols, fixations, and vices. If the church doesn’t reach and disciple men, who will?[5] Where do men learn how to live properly? How do they understand their position in Christ and their priorities? How do they pursue practices according to God’s clearly successful blueprint? It can only come from the church!

So it was no surprise when, in answer to my question how many men are in the Indian churches? Johnson said, I don’t know, but not many.[6]

I suggested that I bring a team back to India to teach pastors some basic biblical truths about how to reach and disciple men. The first Men of Valor conference was in 2005 in Assam, India, hosted by the Boro Baptist Association. Forty part-time rural pastors attended.

Over the next two decades, Men of Valor went on to lead conferences in almost thirty countries and established national teams in several. Thousands of men have gone through the teaching, and we continually receive reports of men’s discipleship groups forming and multiplying, men living for Christ, marriages healing, families restoring, and churches growing after each conference. Why? Because when a man learns that God sees him as a man of valor, he starts to live differently.

The World Could Look Very Different

If men understood who they are in Christ and what God says should be their priorities and their practices, the church would be a very different place. If each man knew that he was a man of valor, he would live differently. I believe more marriages would flourish. I believe children would live in a world of love. I believe workplaces and communities around the world would look very, very different.

When a man learns that God sees him as a man of valor, he starts to live differently.

I want men to fully understand their deep value in God’s eyes. I want them to know how important they are to God. I want them to see that He has equipped and called them. And to understand and follow what He expects from them.

Men matter. Reaching and discipling men is not simply just the right thing to do. It is not simply that it is because we are losing one-half of God’s human creation. We need to reach and teach men because it is God’s plan.

Why men? I offer four reasons.

1. God’s Model. When you compare great leaders of the Bible, what is the one thing that they have in common? Think of Adam, Noah, Moses, Joshua, Gideon, Samson, Samuel, David, Solomon, Elijah, Elisha, Nehemiah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, John the Baptist, Stephen, Paul, James, Peter, John, and the list goes on.

You might point out their compassion, bravery, strength, or humility. You might say they were filled with the Spirit.

Those characteristics are all generally true of biblical leaders. None of them were perfect. They weren’t all the most respectable people. They weren’t all the best decision-makers. They weren’t all even the best leaders.

But they were all men.

Pastor and author John Piper writes,

God has revealed himself to us in the Bible always as King, not Queen, and as Father, not Mother. The second person of the Trinity is revealed as the eternal Son. God appoints all the priests in Israel to be men. The Son of God comes into the world as a man, not a woman. He chooses twelve men to be his apostles. The apostles tell the churches that all the overseers—the pastor/elders who teach and have authority (1st Timothy 2:12)—should be men; and that in the home, the head who bears special responsibility to lead, protect, and provide, should be the husband. (Ephesians 5:22-33)[7]

Now, God did (and does) also use women leaders, but He primarily appointed men.

To be clear, we are not saying that women cannot or should not be in positions of spiritual leadership. There are many examples of wise, gifted women in the Bible who did God’s work and filled essential roles—Esther, Ruth, Mary, Rahab, Manoah’s wife, Hannah, Abigail, Phoebe, Lydia, Priscilla—to name just a few. And there’s Moses’ sister, Miriam; Anna; and Philip’s four prophetess-daughters. (Exodus 15:20; Luke 2:36-38; Acts 21:9) Paul mentions a prayer meeting of women on the riverside in Philippi in Acts 16:13; surely they had a woman as leader—no men are even mentioned. Deborah was an important national leader: She was anointed as both judge and prophet in Israel—a distinction that only one other person, Samuel, had in the nation’s entire history! People came from all over to hear her judgments. (Judges 4:5)

From the day Jesus began teaching, women have been drawn to Christianity in part because its teachings elevate and honor women more than any other major world religion. The Bible tells men to love and honor their wives, to give themselves up for their wives, to live with their wives in an understanding manner. Galatians 3:28 says that when it comes to salvation, there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (ESV) Men and women are equal in God’s sight. Jesus Christ clearly loved and respected women, teaching them as well as the men, and even allowing them to travel with Him. (Luke 8)

Men and women are equal in God’s sight,

but He is calling men to lead.

Deborah did the job God gave her, but she had to rebuke Barak for not doing the job God gave him: leading the army against the king of Canaan who was oppressing them. Barak wanted to step back and let her do his job, too. (Judges 4)

The biblical model clearly shows

that men are to lead.

But God has and is calling men to do their jobs. And He is calling them to lead. When you read Scripture, the biblical model clearly shows that men are not to shirk or avoid leadership. They are to lead.

Lest we think this puts women in a less enviable position than men, we have to remember that it is men who are ultimately responsible to God and held accountable for the state of the church.[8] God asked, Adam, where are you? because, at the crucial moment when Eve took the fruit, Adam did not take leadership. (Maybe she did the deed, but Adam, you’re responsible). And God still wants to know: Men, where are you?

As Dr. Tony Evans points out,

God created Adam before Eve because Adam was to be responsible to both rule and lead. Adam was given his calling to cultivate and guard the garden before Eve was even created. And, as a result, it was Adam whom God sought when both Adam and Eve had disobeyed Him. This is because Adam was ultimately responsible. As a man you are ultimately responsible for those within your domain.[9]

That’s the first reason why churches must go after men—they are pivotal. When men aren’t leading, we lose more of them because men tend to follow men, not women.[10]

2. God’s Design. In Genesis 2, we see the order of God’s creation and His original intentions for the humans that He made in His own image: Adam was created first, and no helper suitable for him was found among all the rest of God’s creation (2:18). So God created Eve out of one of Adam’s ribs to be his companion, his ezer k’negdo, a help, an ally, appropriate for, corresponding to him.[11]

Right here, in the beginning of the Bible, we see that it was God’s original design in marriage for the man (husband) to be the leader and initiator and the woman (wife) to be the helper. Though these roles have been reversed in many homes, churches, and cultures, that was never God’s plan.

Let’s take a look at Paul’s writing in his first letter to the Corinthians:

But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God. ...A man...is the image and glory of God, but woman is the glory of man. For man was not made from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man...Nevertheless, in the Lord woman is not independent of man nor man of woman; for as woman was made from man, so man is now born of a woman. And all things are from God. (1st Corinthians 11:2-3, 7-9, 11 ESV)

Woman was made for man (11:9), is subject to her husband’s leadership (11:3), and is his glory (11:7). None of this, by any means, gives men a higher position or the right to dominate their wives, who are also made in the image of God. (Genesis 1:27) But what this passage does say to us, men, is that we are to reflect God’s glory. Verse 7 states that we as men are called to exemplify the glory of God.

Pastor Albert Barnes, a respected Bible commentator from the 19th century, defines glory as splendor, brightness, that which stands forth to represent God, or by which the glory of God is known.[12] A man’s actions, demeanor, attitudes, words, and tone are to give the world a glimpse of God... to reflect God’s glory.[13]

Men are God’s representatives;

they are to reflect God’s glory.

When Moses came down from the mountain, the people were afraid to come near him because the skin of his face shone. He put on a veil because the glory of the Lord was too bright. (Exodus 34:29-35) That’s how we should reflect God’s glory!

In Revelation 21: 22-24, New Jerusalem’s light is the glory of God. By its light, by the glory, the nations walk in the city. God’s glory guides them. God’s glory helps them see where to go. The glory of God lights people’s way. The glory of God as shown by you, man of valor, should light your family’s way.

Wives reflect their husbands’ glory. We as men are to reflect God—because she will reflect us. Pastor Barnes also wrote, But the women are the glory of the man, the honor, the ornament. All her attractiveness, all her beauty, her loveliness, and purity are therefore an expression of his honor and dignity, his integrity, his caring for her and the family, his stature, his respect.[14]

Let me tell you something I’ve learned; it’s taken me many years to see this. When my wife is discouraged... if for a few days she looks sad or is quiet... I no longer ask her what’s wrong. I ask God. I ask God what I have done that has made her sad and discouraged... because she reflects me.

Men of valor, we are called to love our wives as Christ loves the church.[15] (Ephesians 5:25) That’s not easy for us to do; it is humbling, and challenging. God doesn’t tell his bride what to do in a harsh, demeaning, or abrasive manner; neither should we. God tells us to be His glory. He calls us to reflect His brightness and His splendor so that our wives can reflect that glory in turn.

As my former pastor often said, Show me a husband who loves his wife as Christ loved the Church, and I’ll show you a wife who has no problem submitting to her husband. When we’re right with God, our transformed lives can blaze a powerful trail for the changes we want to see in our families, churches, and communities.

3. God’s Leaders. In 1st Timothy 2:12, Paul says, I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet. (ESV) With the great respect that the Bible shows for women, how does this fit?

Here’s what Pastor Stephen Kendrick said to help explain this verse: God will not give men the chance to step back in His church.[16]

If a man sees a woman leading, he’ll say, Fine—you do it, and he’ll sit back and take a nap. When a man is not presented with responsibility, it is his nature to be passive. If he does not feel needed, he won’t make himself irreplaceable. He will not rise to a challenge if none is given to him. He will not take his place if his place has been taken from him.

So we see that God is not putting women down. He simply wants men to fulfill their role.

God is not putting women down.

He simply wants men to fulfill their role.

When women lead, men step back, and that is clearly not God’s plan. But, having said that, in order to lead properly, men must be trained by the church and given the opportunity and tools to grow spiritually. No one wants to follow an ignorant or abusive leader.

The biblical calling of men is very important. God wants and commands men to lead. I believe that women assume roles of leadership not always because they should and not necessarily because they even want to, but because the men are absent or unengaged. Praise God for the women who have stepped in when men did not or could not lead![17] Advocating for men is not about diminishing women. But God is still calling men to be the leaders. His plan has not changed.

4. God’s Church. A study done in the United States by Hartford Seminary showed having just a few men in a church is one factor that is strongly linked with low numbers of attendance and involvement for all genders and ages. Additionally, a higher proportion of women in the congregation is associated with decline rather than growth.[18] On the other hand, the involvement of men in the church is directly associated with church growth, health, and unity.[19] In short, a man shortage is a sure sign of congregational paralysis and decline.[20]

Real-life stories bear this out. David Murrow, in Why Men Hate Going to Church, points out that two of the largest churches in the United States began by concentrating on and targeting men. When the church leaders went door to door to announce the start of the new church, they focused on talking with the men in each home.

John Chellah, one of the pastors I worked with in Zambia, turned the attention of his church to reaching men. Three years later, he announced to a group of pastors that the involvement of more men had helped increase the size of his church from 200 to 700 members.

Murrow would not be surprised. He believes that if you focus on men, your church will grow. If you personally disciple men, your church will explode.

Pastor Russ Sawyers explained his church’s outreach strategy like this: We asked, how do we reach the most people? And it seemed that if we could reach the husband or dad, then we had a good shot at reaching the rest.[21]

Churches that have as many men as women are three times more likely to be growing.[22]

Studies have also shown that when churches have more women than men in the congregation and in leadership roles, the churches tend to turn inward.[23] The church tends to look only at itself and not the world around them; the focus becomes more about safety, security, self-preservation, and self-care—and less about outreach.[24]

Is an inward focus totally wrong? No, it’s not. The church is a spiritual hospital, but that’s not all it is. If women are in the majority—if the church focuses inward—it will eventually shrink in numbers. It will feminize and become more of a place for women than for men over time. It will lose its boldness, its daring. That will drive men away.[25]

Lastly, the New Testament tells us that elders and pastors are to be men. (1st Timothy 3:1-7; Titus 1:5-9) If we do not reach and build men, if the numbers of men continue to dwindle in churches worldwide, we will lose the leadership of His church—at least as God intended.[26]

God’s Plan

Why men? Why do men matter? Why should we reach and build men? Because reaching and building men is God’s plan: His model, His design, His leaders, evidenced in His church.

For years, I have enjoyed the camaraderie and challenging example and influence of godly men, inspiring me to pursue love and good deeds. (Hebrews 10:25) Most men around the world are not experiencing that. And we see the results.

If we want to build the church, if we want to restore families, if we want to reach and revive communities, and bring sanity to our world, we must intentionally proclaim the gospel to and disciple men. That’s how we’ll change the world!

––––––––

What Do We Teach Men?

Men of Valor International first teaches men their position in Christ and then, building from that, their biblical priorities and practices. We start with understanding our strength in the Lord and bring a positive, inspiring message, because knowing how God sees us, and knowing that He is constantly with us, makes the battles of life winnable. What follows in this book is what we have taught to thousands of men in more than two dozen countries around the world.

There is material here that you may have seen or heard before, but Men of Valor International has learned that far too many men are not hearing these truths. In conference after conference, men approach us and say, We’ve never heard this before! The sad reality is that few churches are reaching out to men, and fewer still are teaching biblical truth specifically for men.

We hope you are inspired to read on—and learn how God sees you and why you matter to Him.

PART I: A Man of Valor’s Position

God has given us everything we need for life and godliness (2nd Peter 1:3), but most of us feel defeated by circumstances or by our own perceived inadequacies. Gideon certainly did. (Judges 6:15) The key to overcoming your inadequacies or your obstacles starts with knowing who you are.

The problem is that many of us do not know who we are. Those that do, don’t act as if they believe it.

In dealing with trouble, or a challenge, obstacle, or problem, we are fully entitled—even commissioned—to face it, to go forward in strength. We have Almighty God in us, and ...greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world! (1st John 4:4, NASB)

Greater is He that is in you than any trouble. Greater is He that is in you than any challenge we may encounter. Greater is He that is in you than any obstacle we face. Greater is He that is in you than any problem! He gives us His mighty strength and His incomparable great power. We are made in His image and share in His nature.

When you know who you are,