A New Hope for Women: The Return of True Men

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

(This is part 3 of a 3 part series on masculinity. Here is part 1 and here is part 2 in case you missed them. Hope it is a blessing!)

“Tall, darkly featured, mysterious, funny, intentional, successful, independent, charming, etc.”

Some variation of this listed above is my limited understanding of “what a woman wants” from the prospective guy. Thankfully, I’m 5’11 and 3/4 (so close to 6 feet, tragedy!) but for the short guys in my life, I guess you are out of luck (unless you are already married, teach me your ways).

Obviously this is a generalization listed above, but being a wounded and disgruntled online dating veteran, when I read the accounts of women and what they want from their perspective partner, the qualities listed above are both daunting and confusing.

To be completely fair, some of these listed above are important things. In particular, the traits of intentionality, success, and independence.

Referring back to my previous two posts, the three traits all counter the idea of passive masculinity (to summarize, masculinity that has “fallen asleep” and which refuses to engage in life as a counter to toxic and hegemonic forms of masculinity). Intentional men are just that; intentional in life. So this would apply to romance as well as it would with vocation, friendship, church, interpersonal growth, etc. They engage with women they have interest in. They initiate when they feel it is needed, and they also respond directly when they sense it is needed too. This is important to counteract the confusion of women from men who act passively toward them.

Success is vital too. Yet, I would argue the metrics of success are different than the traditional man’s man. Gaining and sustaining money or status isn’t success, it is the fruit of ambition, which can definitely be a good thing. Success, however, is about sustaining health in all areas of life, not just finances or networking. Sustaining emotional health, spiritual health, physical health, relational health, and so on. Successful men understand that success in and of itself isn’t the end goal; health is.

And finally, independence is another trait that, similarly to success, is very important for men, but not in the way we have been taught. The rugged individualist male is still a very, very common trope in stories, one which women have some level of attraction to and which men want to emulate. The lone survivor, the self-made man, whichever title you want to ascribe to it, is a myth. I’ll say it again; no man is an island and no single guy ever “made it” in a meaningful way solely based on his own effort. For all the legitimate hard-working men out there who have made a name for themselves, they had a wealth of advantages, circumstances, and other factors line up in just the right way for them to acquire what they have acquired. So what is independence in a man, in a healthy sense? An independent man understands that his choices have consequences, and that those consequences are his to experience and not to buck onto others around him. Further, the independent man independently seeks for help, encouragement, and solidarity from others, without needing a prompt or outside influence to understand that he needs others to flourish and thrive as a man. This could include but is not limited to: a solid network of trusted and quality friends, membership in some sort of social group that meets regularly, and other men who also independently seek for assistance and guidance from their fellow man.

So if those three traits are positive and should be desired by women from men, what of the others? Specifically, being funny, charming, and mysterious?

Honestly, each of these things are foundational, in some way, to endure and sustain a level of attraction. Obviously the physical component is an important piece, as much as both men and women might want to say otherwise, but one lady’s charming is another lady’s awkward, and one guy being mysterious to one woman may be creepy to a different woman.

A lot of these things are not quantifiable as much as a slew of relationship books and rom-coms might say otherwise. Personality is fixed, to an extent. We all land somewhere on the extroverted and introverted scale, somewhere on the empathic/logical (not necessarily opposing qualifiers but it does often seem one is stronger than the other in most people) scale, somewhere on the vocational/DISC/strengths finder scale.

God is a marvelous creator, and each of us are different masterpieces He designed perfectly.

What has gone wrong, though, I would argue, is what women are implicitly taught to be attracted to in our society. An attraction to masculine traits that are not, in fact, even real. And, therefore, not fruit of the Spirit.

Aggression is not comparable to intentionality. The Twitter rants and open bullying of 45 is not a sign of a healthy form of masculinity. John MacArthur openly mocking his female theological counterpart Beth Moore is not an assertive kind of “truth speaking.” These actions do not come from a place of security or strength; they explicitly reveal the weak ground of toxic and hegemonic masculinity. They are the antithesis of the Fruit of the Spirit.

Yet, the alternative of inaction, or passive masculinity, is a more direct opposite of intentionality. Women won’t be attracted to men who can’t reveal their attraction to them. It is a symbiotic relationship, and although I am not arguing about whether the man should pursue or any other traditional notions of male-female interaction, I am definitely saying that man’s passivity damages the integrity of the Imago Dei of women. Relying on the emotional intelligence of a woman to do the pursuing, the planning, the “wooing” so to speak in dating relationships, is just a different kind of reinforcement of broken and masqueraded masculinity.

As for success, the common theme of previous generations’ standards of proper masculinity is a man who provides for his family but ONLY through financial means. This man’s man reinforces toxic masculinity, if in a less insidious manner, because he teaches his sons that manliness is about career and networking, about acquiring wealth and status, depriving them of emotional nurture and care (which, the man’s man didn’t receive either) and teaching emotional immaturity, while reinforcing to his daughters that a man’s man should always care more about providing for her financially and materially than relationally or emotionally. Further, in this man’s man’s pursuit of the traditional American dream, he is left with little space to seriously invest in the spiritual life.

Yet again, the alternative is no better and not what women could ever or should ever be attracted to either. Relying too heavily on the kindness or hard-work of mom and dad, grandma and grandpa, or any other external source, success, achieved independent from external sources, is not something to be cowered from or not sought after. It is good for a man to pursue passion for his own dreams and goals, while it is not good for a man to kill the passion within by an over-reliance of potentially maturity stunting means; whether it be through video games, drugs, alcohol, or any other coping mechanism intended to hide the fear of failure. As mentioned in my previous post, failure is not something to be feared. It will happen, but can be used as a path to achieve even greater success and greater health as a man. Especially if a man brings his failure to the feet of Jesus.

Finally, independence is not synonymous with emotional isolation. Not allowing others into your emotional landscape is not only a broken form of masculinity but is also entirely unbiblical. The men of the Old Testament were very emotionally aware and intelligent; David danced for the Lord and played instruments while Job openly lamented with weeping and complaint about the circumstances in his life.

And yet, emotional over-reliance on the intuition and deeper emotional intelligence of women is not biblical either and not a mark of a True Man. The more traditionally viewed empathic streak of women is not meant to be a substitute for experiencing emotion as a man. Further, it is not the responsibility of women to emotionally babysit emotionally stunted men. It is up to men to rely on other men emotionally too. For too long have men participated in or openly rejected hegemonic masculinity to the direct detriment of women. Your fellow man, my fellow man, is not my rival, not my enemy, not how I measure my worth. Rather, we ought to turn to one another to reaffirm our worth as sons of God.

So it seems I have traded one impossible standard of masculinity for another. To an extent, yes, that is exactly what I have done.

But I would argue the path to becoming a True Man isn’t something a man ever really arrives at fully. At least, on this side of Heaven. This is disappointing in one way but encouraging in another.

Rather, true men are rooted in the Truest Man. True men abide and flourish through means not of their own effort, not of their own striving, not of their own blood, sweat, and tears. True men abide and flourish via the blood, sweat, and tears of Jesus, of whom we as men ought to emulate.

Therefore, it stands to reason that Christian women ought to be attracted to men who are like Jesus. It may seem an obvious truth, but is this what our society has taught women to be attracted to?

How many women swoon over a Hollywood man who displays gentleness to a disenfranchised and fractured male friend? How many men look up to as heroes the man who picks up the phone to call another man when the itch to watch porn is oh so powerful? How many men and women watch stories about a man learning valuable lessons from his own failure? How many stories do we see men revealing vulnerability to women with this very act shown as a strength, not a weakness? Something to be attracted to, rather than avoided?

True men are wholehearted. True men understand that to love a woman is a huge risk but a risk worth taking. True men understand that within themselves is a bent to be false; to repeat patterns of sin, selfishness, and compartmentalization of their lives. Therefore, true men understand that they can’t be true on their own. They need other men to encourage them. They need their God to reaffirm who they are in Christ. Yet also, they need women to find their true qualities as attractive and their false qualities as not desirable.

This doesn’t mean that if a woman sees false qualities in a man that she should avoid that man. We would all be single if that were the case. However, what should draw a woman to a man is the genuine, authentic, and true wholeheartedness present in his life. A man willing to atone for his mistakes, to receive and embrace praise from others, and an earnest desire to put to death that which is false within him.

We will know them by their fruit, and the fruit of a wholehearted, True Man in Christ is the following: love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

Not abrasive disregard for female boundaries, not bloated and egotistical financial success, not the mastery of emotional suppression. Not disengaged, superficial romantic “apathy,” not ducking or skirting from financial and emotional responsibility, not the mastery of emotional transference.

True men act like, talk like, love like the Truest Man.

Let us then, as men, put to death, therefore, all of the forms of masculinity not taught in the Bible and not embodied by Jesus.

Out with the old modes of being a man, in with the oldest form of being a man, a mode intended for men from the beginning.

Let’s give a new hope for women by bringing back the return of true men.