Chapter 10 - Mom and Sisters

This chapter really opened my eyes to the importance of how a mother relates to her sons. In case you haven't noticed, boys and girls are different. A mother needs to have a close association with her husband while raising boys. My husband is responsible to help me understand my sons... and it is also his responsibility to teach my sons about their future wives through teaching them to honor me, their mother, now.

There are certain principles that a mother needs to know about her sons.

First, a mother needs to blend respect and toughness. Mothers with a critical or harsh spirit can certainly be hard on their sons, but it is a demeaning and emasculating hardness. And at the other end of the spectrum, mothers can be respectful of their sons in such a way that they never require anything of them. This kind of respect deterioriates into a mollycoddling mess. But a mother who approaches her son with wisdom is one who respects and consequently expects. When a wise mother sees insecurity in her son, the response should not be scorn, it should not be sympathy. The right response is respect. Boys can rise to respect, when they might crater under harsh pressure or puff up in response to excessive praise.

Second, a mother needs to see small boys as future men. The way boys learn to deal with their various immature "passions" will generally be the way they deal with adult passions. A boy who is not obviously learning self-control with regard to temper, his stomach, his video games, or his school work is a boy who will still lack self-control when sexual temptation arrives. Many times mothers unwittingly train boys to mistreat their future wives through sinful indulgence of boyish passions. It is important to distinguish between the godly service a mother is supposed to supply the household (like cooking the meals) and an ungodly catering that will help destroy her son (like cooking a second breakfast when her son gets up hours after everyone else, and for no good reason).

Third, a mother needs to learn that when a godly father is disciplining a boy, he is doing so while remembering. He used to think the way his son thinks; he used to receive what his son is now receiving; he used to connive the way his son is conniving. A mother can and should discipline her son, but she cannot do it while remembering. She therefore needs her husband's perspective in order to aim the way she ought. For her to have his perspective, he must talk about it with her, an dnot just assume that everyone in the world has the same memories and experiences he has.

Fourth, a mother needs to realize that when she gets exasperated or annoyed with her sons, she is helping them learn how to control or manipulate her. It usually goes like this: A son doesn't do what he was asked to do seven or eight times. Mom finally gets steamed and flares up over it. Mom has more of a tender conscience about her annoyance than the son does about his disobedience. She consequently apologizes and he magnanimously forgives her. The solution is for Mom to cheerfully require obedience from her sons long before annoyance is even a possibility.

And fifth, a mother needs to know that God has given her to her sons, and her sons to her, and that when the gift is received with wisdom, the blessings are tremendous and flow in both directions. But if the relation is foolishly embraced, the book of Proverbs poignantly prophecies a coming maternal grief.

Transitioning to another important aspect of raising boys is understanding that there is a type of toughness in discipline which must be built. Discipline is not limited to responses to disobedience and sin; discipline also includes patient instruction when a child encounters some of life's ordinary difficulties.

Instilling toughness in boys is very important. A masculine toughness is the only foundation upon which a masculine tenderness may be safely placed. Without a concrete foundation, thoughtfulness, consideration, and sensitivity in men is just simply gross. So mothers must take particular care against allowing some of their feminine strengths to be the occasion of stumbling for their sons.

First, a mother should talk regularly with her husband about her sons and her relationship to them. Any number of things may be happening which she does not see and concerning which her husband's advice would be invaluable.

Second, a mother must have the respect and obedience of her sons. The older and bigger they get, the more obedient they should be. A son who is a foot and a half taller than his mother should hear her with respect. Of course she should be careful not to issue needless requirements, but when she requires something, it must be cheerfully done. If it is not, then she should immediately involve her husband. The central issue is not the thing to be done, but rather teaching the son to honor his mother and to respect women generally.

Third, a mother must never subsidize her sons' laziness. Masculine inertia is difficult for anyone to deal with, and the aversion which many boys have to academic rigor is renowned. But educational laziness is the mother of poverty and sloth. The word that should characterize the academic activity of the home is industry. Boys can usually work much harder than they say they can. In all this, under the father's supervision, the mother can equip her sons to rise up and call her blessed.

Another aspect of this is the task of teaching sons how to treat their mothers, and this means instruction in manners. Boys have a need to be respected, but sometimes this need can be communicated in some strange ways. And because boys can gravitate toward such strange forms of communicating their boyhood, they may come to think that manners are for sissies. A well-mannered boy is not a boy who acts like his sister.

Manners for boys should be a means of disciplining and directing strength, and not a means of denying it. This means that boys need to be taught that manners are a means of showing and receiving honor. Honor is a concept which boys instinctively understand and love, but they still have to be taught to direct it with wisdom. Honor, in its turn, cannot be understood apart from authority and obedience.

Boys thrive under authority and are not threatened by it. At the same time, the authority must be of the kind which understands masculinity and nurtures it by hammering it. One of the "hammers" should be a short course in manners.

Boys should not be allowed to think that manners are something which women impose on men. Rather, they should see manners as something which men teach boys to do, for the sake of honoring and protecting women, and for the sake of living graciously with them.

A priority should be placed on those manners and customs which place a distinction between men and women. For instance, men seat women at the dinner table, open and hold doors, stand when a woman enters the room, walk on the sidewalk between a woman and the traffic, etc.

The next class of manners would focus on disciplining a young man to think of the comfort and possessions of others - not tipping back in chairs, not putting feet on the coffee table, and not bouncing the basketball next to the china cabinet.

A third category would be in the realm of personal presentation: not dressing like a slob, not scarfing food, not wearing a baseball cap indoors, etc. In this section, a boy is being taught to present himself as trustworthy in all the categories.

All these manners are a way of showing honor to others in areas which are not of cosmic importance. At the same time, because they are acts of love, even though they are live in trifles, God considers them important.

<"Future Men" by Douglas Wilson>

Chapter 7 - Laziness and Hard Labor

Boys tend to be lazy. One of the central duties parents have with regard to their boys is the duty of teaching and instilling work ethic. "He that gathers in summer is a wise son: but he that sleeps in harvest is a son that causes shame" (Proverbs 10:5).

Work is not a result of the fall of Adam, but work goes the difficult way it does because of the fall. We were created for work. But when sin entered, Go saw that thorns and thistles were needed. In His grace, God cursed the ground. This is why boys need to be taught and disciplined in physical labor. Hard physical work is an important part of a boy's discipleship. He needs to know what it is like to be exhausted, to have callouses on his hands, and to work when his body does not really want to anymore. He needs this; God said so. He is a son of Adam.

A boy who learns to settle into his laziness is being prepared by his parents for a life of frustration. "The soul of the sluggard desires, and has nothing: but the soul of the diligent shall be made fat" (Proverbs 13:4). The fourth commandement has two parts which depend upon one another. One part, of course, is the day of rest, but the other part is the six days of labor. Without the labor, the rest is nonsensical. Without the rest, the work is slavery. Learned together, a boy comes to comprehend the dignity of labor that is offered up to God in the name of Christ.

<"Future Men" by Douglas Wilson>

Chapter 6 - Secret Sin, Tolerated Sin

"But if you do not do so, then take note, you have sinned against the Lord; and be sure your sin will find you out." Numbers 32:23

Boys need to grow up knowing that sin cannot ever be truly covered up. One of our regular prayers should be that God would give us (parents) any information we need to know in order to be good parents.

If young men begin to nurture secret sin in their lives, then they have forgotten (or perhaps have never been taught) certain basic truths from God's Word. "And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account." (Hebrews 4:13)

Secret sin is only temporarily secret. God is not mocked, and a man reaps what he sows. Reaping is typically a very public matter. And God has promised to publicize things we would rather keep secret. As we know from King David in 2 Samuel 11, sin breeds sin and hidden sin breeds more hidden sin. But as sin accumulates, it becomes impossible for the sinner to "manage".

Individuals who hide their sin are often guilty of another sin as well -- the sin of individualism. They believe that what they do affects only them. This is false.

But, through all this, God is merciful. He will forgive young men who have been discovered in the grip of secret sin. The only solution to this is to want God's mercy so much that you are willing to do exactly what He says when you apply to Him for it. And that means full and honest confession. This does not mean that everything is automatically fixed through an act of "mental obedience" alone, but it does begin there.

<"Future Men" by Douglas Wilson>

Chapter 2 - Effeminacy and Biblical Masculinity

As we are living in a feminist and effeminate culture, most people are uneasy with true masculinity and are ignorant about how it should look. There are two directions a boy can take apart from biblical masculinity: effeminacy and macho-like counterfeit masculinity.

In taking the effeminate role, he is taking a set of virtues which are not supposed to be his. With the macho-like counterfeit masculinity, he is adopting a set of pseudo-virtues, practices which are not virtues at all.

Boys should not, as a rule, play with dolls... and those who do have a problem. Most boys naturally see effeminacy as "yuck". Instruction and correction is necessary since boys do not how to make the distinction between that which should be mocked in themselves and that which must be honored in the girls.

Rolling around in the dirt is not the only way to show masculinity... as we've already seen, boys should be studying to become wise, studying to be a sage when he is old. That is not the same thing as wearing a frilly apron. Men can work indoors helping and leading with many domestic duties, though their focus will be different.

Fathers who are domineering will browbeat their sons into a pattern of cowering submission which is effeminate and then wonder why their sons do not follow their example. The reason is that their father would not permit it. He was not training his son; he was sitting on him.

On the other side of unbiblical masculinity is the counterfeit masculinity. This is a problem which occurs when people "glory" in masculinity. This type of masculinity excels at making excuses. It is a matter of pride rather than humble acceptance of responsibility.

One thing that threatens pride is any kind of failure, and the way insecure males deal with this is through making excuses. True masculinity accepts responsibility, period. Boys don't just do this naturally, they also learn it from their parents. Children (especially as seen in sports) don't have to stand up for themselves and their mistakes, their parents are often modeling these behaviors when "explaining" why the coach was wrong in his decision about their son. Boys must learn to say that they were wrong when they were wrong, and that they were responsible when they were responsible.

<"Future Men" by Douglas Wilson>

Chapter 1 - The Shape of Masculinity

You've heard the adage, "Boys will be boys," so obviously there is the aspect of masculinity that is very different from our girls. The first thing to know is "what is masculinity?" and "what are we looking for when we describe manhood according to the Bible?"

First, our boys will be "lords". We know from Genesis 1: 26-28 that man was created to exercise dominion in the earth. Sin has certainly affected our ability to fulfill this command from God, but it did not remove the obligation placed on us by the command.

Another aspect of this command is seen in the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20): disciple the nations and bring them to true submission to Christ. Boys want to conquer and subdue. The point of discipline with boys is to channel and direct their energy into an obedient response to the cultural mandate. It is not to squash that energy, destroying it or making it sullen. Boys, therefore, should be in training to become men who exercise dominion, they should be learning to be lords in the earth, and learning how to be adventurous and visionary.

Second, our boys will be "husbandmen." Man was created to make our world flourish. The dominion mandate, taken in isolation, could result in men trying to build a culture based on piracy. This second aspect means that men are created to conquer and subdue, and after that, to settle down. In Genesis 2:15, "God took man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it." Man doesn't just build, he must tend and oversee.

A rich farmer was once rebuked for having his sons work in the fields when they didn't have to. His reply to that was that he wasn't raising corn, he was raising boys. Boys, therefore, should be learning to be patient, careful, and hardworking.

Third, our boys will be "saviors". Men have a deep desire to deliver or save. The great example of a savior is, of course, Jesus Christ. His deliverance from the serpent (dragon) was promised to His people in the early chapters of Genesis. God promised a curse on the serpent, and in that curse we see the salvation of the world.

Men who follow Jesus Christ, the "dragon-slayer", must themselves become lesser dragon-slayers. This is why it is absolutely essential for boys to play with wooden swords and plastic guns. Boys have a deep need to have something to defend, something to represent in battle. The Christian faith is not pacifistic. The peace that will be ushered in by our Prince will be a peace purchased with blood. As Christ sacrificed Himself in this war, so must His followers learn to do. Boys must learn that they are growing up to fight in a great war, and they must consequently learn, as boys, to be strong, sacrificial, courageous, and good.

Fourth, our boys will be "sages". The sage is a man who is great in wisdom, and wisdom in Scripture is personified as a great lady. Sons are constantly exhorted to listen to her. Looking at Proverbs 1-9, we see that wisdom is a woman who disciplines boys. If he heeds wisdom in her role as the strict school-mistress, he grows up to a certain measure of wisdom.

We must, therefore, teach our boys the masculinity of study, of learning, of books, of intellectual discussion. Too often, boys drift into a situation where they pit one aspect of masculinity against another. For instance, a boy who loves the outdoors can too readily dismiss software programming as effeminate, or even worse, come to look down on poetry.

Intellectual discipline, or, as Peter put it, girding up the loins of the mind, is an important part of growing to manhood. Boys must learn to be teachable, studious, and thoughtful.

Finally, our boys will be "glory-bearers". This last aspect of masculinity is seen in the fact that men are the glory of God. "For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man" (1 Corinthians 11:3).

Boys must be instructed on how to grow up into glory and how to fulfill their responsibility to be representative, responsible, and holy.

In summary, we should want our boys to be aggressive and adventurous. They are learning to be lords of the earth. We should want them to be patient and hardworking. They are learning husbandry. We should want them to hate evil and to have a deep desire to fight it. They are learning what a weapon feels like in their hands. We should want boys to be eager to learn from the wise. They are learning to become wise themselves. We should want them to stand before God, in the worship of God, with head uncovered. They are the image and glory of God.

<"Future Men" by Douglas Wilson>

"Future Men" - Introduction

I heard about this book from my friend, Ivana, who is about to have her third boy and I thought that it would be an excellent book for myself as well since I am going to have my second boy soon. We'll just start from the beginning and hopefully I'll be able to clearly explain what I've learned in each section and maybe even be a help to someone else who has "future men".

The introduction to the book essentially tells parents that they must have faith about our boys. Despite how they look now, they are our future lawyers, airline pilots, pastors, etc. Unbelief is always anchored to the present, while faith looks at that which is unseen. We, as parents, must have the "faith of a farmer, or a sculptor, or anyone else engaged in the work of shaping unfolding possibilities." A parent of faith looks at the present and sees what it will become-- through grace and good works.

Boys don't often think about the consequences before they leap into something, but it is our job to see the best and the virtues displayed in each of those "unwise acts" in order to make something good out of it. Unbelief sees the lack of wisdom that created a situation that could have been easily avoided; faith sees an immature masculinity that is starting to assume the burden of manhood. Unbelief squashes; faith teaches. It is important to take your boys aside and tell him that part of what he did was good, while that other part of what he did got in the way, "And this is how to do it better next time."

Faith is central in bringing up boys, but it is important to remember that the object of faith is not the boy. It is faith in God, faith in His promises, faith in His wisdom. Faith concerns the boy, and the boy can see that it concerns him. Parents are to believe God for their sons, which is a very different thing than believing their sons.

God is the one who places a specific boy in a particular home. And He does so in order that those parents who believe and obey Him might come to delight in a wise son, a son who is like Jesus Christ. "My son, if your heart is wise, my heart will rejoice—indeed, I myself; Yes, my inmost being will rejoice when your lips speak right things..." (Proverbs 23:15-16).

<"Future Men" by Douglas Wilson>