"When the time drew near for David to die, he gave a charge to Solomon his son. 'I am about to go the way of all the earth,' he said. 'So be strong, act like a man'" - 1 Kings 2:1-2
He seemed like a giant. Maybe he was. Every time a boy on our 4-year old t-ball team did something good, he lifted us up from the ground and high into the air so that it seemed we were on the top of the world. I think his name was Coach Carter.
That's what older men do for boys and young men. They lift them up. That's what older women do for girls and young ladies.
I'm grateful that, when I was a kid, my father and mother were involved in our community so that many men lifted me up as a boy through church and scouts and sports and school.
To be sure, I'm grateful for the women who've lifted me up, but I'll speak to that another time.
For today, it's the older man speaking to boys and younger men that I focus on, specifically in today's Bible verse where David charged his son, "Be strong, and act like a man."
There are lots of awesome women in my life, but the charge "Be strong, and act like a man" has its greatest impact when it comes to me from another man, especially an older man. After all, he can really know what it means to "Be strong, and act like a man."
For years, after I first got here to Birmingham, a man named Larry Felix used to constantly say to me, "Be strong!" Every time he said it, it made me think of Coach Carter, lifting me high in the air as a 4-year old. It also made me think of St. Paul, in Ephesians 6:10, saying, "Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power."
This world needs more strong men. And it starts with the church having more strong men, who recognize their ability to lift up another man by charging him to "Be strong; be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power!"
And in so doing to say what David said to his son, "Be strong, and act like a man."
C'mon, Men, stop sitting in the stands as a spectator. The world needs you. Get involved. Engage boys and younger men, and be a Coach Carter, who with your life and your deeds and your words, lIfts up that boy or that younger man as David said long ago, "Be strong, and act like a man."
Praise God!
Pastor Chris
"The gospel is the story of Jesus [what God's only Son has done for us that we can't do for ourselves], spoken as a promise." - Robert Jenson
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