Training Your Son for Manhood

As one who spends much time working with men, the question of what it means to be a man comes to my mind often.

What is a man?

When does a boy become a man?

Questions like these are important to ask and even more important to answer well. And, of course, as a Christian I want to answer those questions biblically.

In about five days my oldest son will turn 13 years old. (I will have two teenagers in the house. I give thanks to God that I have such a wise, godly, mature, and hilarious daughter who has helped my wife and me ease into parenting teenagers.) I know there’s nothing inherently magical about the age of 13, but it does seem like a fitting time for a boy to start thinking about manhood… what it means to be a man. It is also crucial, I think, that he begins to be treated in such a way… greater responsibilities, decision-making opportunities, etc. (all under the careful direction of his parents). Those in the Jewish tradition certainly have found a wonderful way to highlight this time in a boy’s life.

Of course, parents shouldn’t wait until their son turns 13 to begin this process. Hopefully, “manhood training” begins at birth. My wife and I have certainly done our best to talk to our boys, in age-appropriate ways, about what it means to be a godly man. Yet, beginning on our sons’ thirteenth birthdays, there will be greater focus and intentionality on helping our sons navigate this time in their lives. I get to put my money where my mouth is in less than a week.

This is all still a work in progress, however, I have been thinking a great deal about how my oldest son and I might spend our time together. (There are some helpful books on raising sons and helping them move their way toward becoming godly young men. I’ll mention them at the end of this post.) Robert Lewis of Men’s Fraternity wrote an outstanding book entitled, Raising A Modern-Day Knight. In that book he makes much of the idea of marking vital times in your sons’ lives with various kinds of ceremony. For the age of 13 he suggests taking your son out to dinner (spend some money on it… not fast food). The purpose of this meal is to mark in your son’s heart and mind the reality that he’s moving toward manhood and will be treated accordingly. This time together can be an opportunity to share stories of your own childhood and journey toward manhood. It can also include hopes and dreams and actual plans for how the two of you will spend the next five years together before he turns 18.

My goal is to spend one morning a week intentionally discipling my son, (away from our home), working through the Bible as well as other helpful books on the subject of godly manhood. It will be a time of checking in with him, praying with and for him, seeing how’s he’s doing, focusing on particular issues in his life, etc. But most of all it will be a time for continuing to build and maintain a close relationship with him. Following our time of focused discipling, we’ll go and grab a bite to eat together and just chat about whatever may come to mind.

Beyond this set-apart intentional time of discipleship, my wife and I want to emphasize to our son that he will have greater responsibility in his life, which we hope to follow through with and give him. Yet there will also be greater privileges as well, which we’re still working out. More to come on all of this later. I’m also checking into how he and I might spend more time together away from home… whether it’s traveling together, attending conferences, outdoor activities, or other types of adventures.

My point in sharing all of this is not to show you that I’ve got it all figured out. I’m quite certain you’ve realized that I don’t. As I said, all of this is in process and I’m sure there will be many failed efforts. My purpose is not to present to you a finished and polished product. Instead, I want to emphasize that we must be intentional in pointing our sons to manhood. The world is only too happy to tell your son what it means to be a man. The video I shared last week by Mark Driscoll makes that point all too well (Make sure to watch it if you haven’t already.). As many others have said well, it’s a dangerous time to be a boy. The culture is certainly not invested in helping your son move in a God-glorifying direction.

A former mentor of  mine used to say often that ”the world will define you by default; the Word will define you only by discipline.” The same is true with regards to your son becoming a godly man. It will not happen by accident or by wishful thinking. It will come only by grace, faith, prayer, and lots of intentionality (not to mention persevering through it all).

I’ll do my best to check in with you and share updates of how it’s going… what’s working and what’s not. I covet your prayers as I begin this journey with my son. I desire even more that you will pray for him so that he will indeed become the godly young man God wants him to be.

Below are a few books that I have found helpful… including some that I am planning on reading through and discussing with my sons.

Grace and Truth,
Dale

1. Future Men by Douglas Wilson
2. Raising A Modern-Day Knight by Robert Lewis
3. The Measure of A Young Man by Gene and Kenton Getz
4. King Me by Steve Farrar
5. The Young Man in the Mirror by Patrick Morley
6. Every Young Man God’s Man by Stephen Arterburn, Kenny Luck and Mike Yorkey
7. A Young Man After God’s Own Heart by Jim George
8. Boyhood and Beyond by Bob Schultz
9. Practical Happiness by Bob Schultz

There are many other good ones that I’ll include soon.

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Manly Libraries and Studies

My favorite room to investigate when I visit someone’s home is their library and/or study (provided I’m allowed to do so without being too nosey). I find that such a room says so much about a person. My little makeshift study in my home is my favorite room in the house (though it is occasionally hijacked and turned into the laundry room or the Food Network viewing room).  I’ve also written here about John Baillie’s study. What an amazing place of peace, intimacy with God, study, fellowship and ministry it must have been.

As providence would have it, I was considering just last week sharing that post once again as part of a larger post on various libraries and studies throughout history, but I never quite got off the ground with it. Well, the good folks at The Art of Manliness have put together an impressive list of The Libraries, Studies, and Writing Rooms of 15 Famous Men. They did all the work for me (and far exceeded anything I would have done). You really must check it out!

And while you’re coveting your neighbor’s library and study, take a look at this list of 14 Famous “Man Rooms,” also put together by The Art of Manliness. And finally, please check out this great post on A Man’s Library by Douglas Wilson at Vision Forum. (Excuse me while I wipe the drool off my keyboard.)

Here’s to dreaming dreams and to reading good books.
The Lord bless you,
Dale

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Read to Your Sons

R.M. Ballantyne wrote…

Boys [should be] inured from childhood to trifling risks and slight dangers of every possible description, such as tumbling into ponds and off of trees, etc., in order to strengthen their nervous system…. They ought to practice leaping off heights into deep water. They ought never to hesitate to cross a stream over a narrow unsafe plank for fear of a ducking. They ought never to decline to climb up a tree, to pull fruit merely because there is a possibility of their falling off and breaking their necks. I firmly believe that boys were intended to encounter all kinds of risks, in order to prepare them to meet and grapple with risks and dangers incident to man’s career with cool, cautious self-possession…. —R.M. Ballantyne, The Gorilla Hunters

Click here to learn more about R.M. Ballantyne and his great books for boys. Thanks Vision Forum.

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The Young Men Film Pack

I wrote this last year.

This coming Fall, I’m going to begin a very long journey of teaching fathers (and, probably, mostly learning from them) on how to raise their sons. We’ll eventually cover those of us who also have daughters, but I think we have much to learn about how to raise boys in this day, age, and culture so that we can help them become the godly men that God desires them to be.

As a father of four, I have occasionally paid attention to what has worked and not worked with my own children and have actually learned a couple of things along the way. But I have also been reading everything I can get my hands on by “the experts” about raising children (and sons in particular). I have also been looking for great curricula and study material that will aid us in this pursuit. There are some really fine resources available that I’ll be sharing in the days ahead. But, I hope it goes without saying, that the greatest material is what we learn in God’s Word as his Spirit leads, instructs, and encourages us.

 

One of the ministries that has some interesting resources is Franklin Springs Family Media. While they don’t produce curricula, per se, they have a wealth of materials that can serve as a tremendous inspiration to families of all shapes and sizes. Here is the link to their “Young Men Film Pack,” which looks fantastic. You can watch the trailers to this film pack below.

Pursuing God’s Blessings for A Thousand Generations,

Dale

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The Man’s Library

by Doug Phillips at Vision Forum

My father has never been a wealthy man by the financial standards of the world, but he gave me many rich treasures: He gave me life. He gave me an education to which he contributed substantially through personal discipleship. He gave me his hard-earned good name. He gave me a love for the Word of God and a child-like acceptance of the truth of that Word. He gave me many challenging, inspiring, and wonderful experiences that helped to define my view of manhood.

And my father gave me one physical possession that intersected with each of the above—he gave me a library, a library that he built over many decades, and which was hand selected by my father for me.

But it all began when my father taught me the joy of reading and the blessing of being a son in his father’s library.

As a boy, my father’s library was always a thing of awe and beauty. I loved the rich mahogany-stained shelves of the sacred inner sanctuary called “Dad’s Study,” but more importantly, I viewed the old square room as a time vault into the unfolding history of my father. The shelves of the library were not only thick with books, but phenomenal artifacts from Dad’s world travels. The books themselves came in every shape and size, with dust jackets and without, in multi-volume collections, and as single volumes—but the vast majority were quality hardbacks. The various seasons of my father’s life—from his childhood at the Boston Latin School, to his undergraduate work at Harvard, to his various epochs of service on behalf of Christ and country—seemed to be chronicled for every family member to see through the many books which he had acquired over a lifetime of adventure, experience, and intensive reading.

Click here to read the whole article.

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