Fathered by God
“A man must grow beyond mere reason, or he will be stunted as a man, certainly as a lover.” –John Eldridge
Walking through the Redwood Forest, CA
A few months ago I came across a book my brother gave to my husband. It was a book about being fathered by God, by that title, with the tagline, “learning what your dad could never teach you.”
It outlines the masculine journey, and describes six stages that every boy must go through to become a man: beloved son, cowboy, warrior, lover, king, and sage. Naturally as a woman, and a dangerously romantic one at that, I was captivated by the lover. It is that stage I will reflect on here.
I can only offer reflection from the vantage of a woman, but for what it’s worth, I gained value from reading this, and think it has wisdom to offer both sexes.
To begin, context is key. The warrior stage precedes that of the lover – when a man must learn to fight for truth and defend against attacks of the enemy. Fighting is a necessary skill to learn. But it is certainly not the only.
As John Eldredge says, “this is very good for the warrior, to be arrested by Beauty. It provides a great balance for his soul, lest he simply be a fighter. The Celts had a phrase ‘never give a sword to a man who can’t dance,’ by which they meant if he is not also becoming a poet, be careful how much warrior you allow a man to be.”
So here we reach a point in the journey of a man where he is just that – arrested by Beauty. Most often it begins with falling in love with a woman (as the author puts it, “nothing disrupts like Eve”), however falling in love with a woman is not the core of this stage, nor the ultimate expression.
The awakened poet must come to realize, in time, that what the heart seeks through the process of falling in love, is beauty itself. Beauty that, while prompted by a woman, can only be satisfied by God.
This is one of inexorable examples where God’s design is brilliant to behold, because the man must learn to be a lover. There is a moment of awakening yes, but once awakened is when the work begins.
The learning to set aside reason in order to surrender to being romanced – what an interesting and difficult challenge. The quote at the top continues to say, “no woman wants to be analyzed and many marriages fail because the man insists on treating her as a problem to be solved, rather than a mystery to be known.”
As a woman, I will here confirm this is true. I watched my now-husband learn this, sometimes painfully, in the early years of our relationship. And perhaps it is why God blessedly makes woman patient, for it takes many years for men to learn.
But once they do, oh is it worth it. I have a mighty fortress that envelops me in protective love, affection, and wisdom, and gives me the space to grow, mess up, and repent without the fear of being abandoned – ever.
My husband gives himself in love to present me without blemish or stain (Eph. 5:27), which is no easy task given my stubborn self.
Once again, marriage is an earthly microcosm of God’s love for man, and Christ’s love for his church – my husband won’t leave or forsake me even though I leave and forsake him. It is also why the call to husbands in Ephesians 5 is more severe than the call to wives.
Back to the story. The examples we have of real men were lovers at heart: King David, the greatest warrior of all, was first and foremost a poet. One read through the Psalms and it’s easy to see where he gets the title of a man after God’s own heart (1 Sam 13:14).
Then there is Jesus. The Word become flesh who dwelt among us, who left his throne on high to fulfil the law and spend years walking around with sinners and tax collectors. He gave us the most logical, and radical, theological content known to man. Yet his teachings were in the form of parables – stories.
The crowning takeaway of the most well-known speech of all time, the Sermon on the Mount, is at its core an appeal to the heart. Jesus doesn’t want our religion, he wants us.
I’ll end with a concept I once heard from Timothy Keller that I revisit often when contemplating men.
Men and women understand the act of pursuit differently. This is by nature that men typically are the pursuer and women, the pursued. As a woman, I relate to this – there is something deep in my heart that longs to be pursued, it always has.
As the pursuer of women, men have an extra hurdle to surmount in knowing God. This is because when it comes to God and man, man does not pursue God, as would be the natural inclination of a man who is accustomed to having to pursue a woman.
Rather, God pursues man.
This means that man (mankind, and individually, each man and woman) must ditch the pursuit and instead open his heart to be pursued, to be romanced, to answer the call to become a lover. It is a message echoed through the Gospels by Jesus himself – we answer His call, not the other way around.
This explains the abundant biblical imagery of man as the “bride of Christ.” It is natural for a woman to imagine being a bride, less so for a man.
It speaks to me deeply and, man or woman, it is my prayer that it speaks to you also. God calls to us. He summons our hearts and bids us leave all we have, and all we are, to follow him, and to fall in love with him.
In the realm of earthly romantic pursuit, we can maintain other loves and still secure a lover. Not so with God.
He is a jealous lover who demands not one portion of our heart, but all of it. It is why Christianity is not a nice add-on to a good a moral life, but rather a complete implosion. It is why the gospel both requires, and offers, more than we anticipate — why it is always simultaneously more offensive and more comforting then we could imagine.
He must be the sole desire of our hearts. Yet so much stands in the way. It is why Solzhenitsyn rightly assessed each individual human heart as the fiercest battlefield that exists in this world: “The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties – but right through every human heart – and through all human hearts.”
The call to give up our lives in order to gain them is difficult. It is difficult because I quite like myself, and my family, and my life, and my creature comforts. But above all these – above all things I hold most dear to my easily seduced and distracted heart – I choose God, because he loved and pursued me first.
At Columbus Naturopathic Medicine, we provide faith-based care to help you experience God’s design for meaning, purpose, and connection. If you are interested in working with Dr. Leah Gusching, you can learn more and schedule an appointment by clicking the link below.