Love is Manly
By Brian Goins
Author of Playing Hurt: A Guy’s Strategy for a Winning Marriage.
Blog post adapted from UNCOMMEN Husbands YouVersion Devotional
One of my favorite quotes goes a little something like this:
“When I was a child, I acted like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.”
You’d think that the dude that wrote this phrase had just been following up an impassioned plea for men to “act like men”. But he wasn’t. Instead he wrote it after something you’d expect to find ensconced in crochet or festooned on flowery greeting cards:
Love is patient and kind… Love bears all things,
believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
“Love” in our culture is like WD-40. We spray it on everything: I love burgers; I love the Cowboys; I love my wife. Hopefully our love for our wives means more than our love for cooked cow or grown men tackling each other. This uncommon guy indicates there came a time in his life when he grew out of an immature, boyish love and embraced a more mature, and dare we say, manly love.
If we’re going to love our wives like we ought, we gotta let the boy die.
Check out the comparisons below:
Boys retaliate quickly when hurt; manly love is patient and kind.
Boys require constant affirmation; manly love is not arrogant or rude.
Boys stew, stammer, and hold grudges when they don’t get their way; manly love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful.
Boys try to win every argument; manly love does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.
Boys have a short fuse; manly love bears all things.
Boys write people off when wronged; manly love believes God’s best for the relationship.
Boys lose hope after they’re hurt; manly love always hopes for reconciliation regardless of the pain.
Boys expect to be served; manly love endures all things.
All of this begs the question: what’s one way you can let the boy die in you this week and develop a ‘manly’ love?
- Endure a minor offense?
- Reflect on a criticism rather than retaliate?
- Serve in a tangible way (i.e. put the toilet seat down, offer to take the kids when you are tired, make the bed with all the throw pillows placed perfectly, etc…)?
This same author wrote, “stand firm, act like men, be strong” after defining true strength as love. This might have his way of saying, “BE UNCOMMEN!”
Brian Goins is the Creative Director at Family Life and the author of Playing Hurt: A Guy’s Strategy for a Winning Marriage. He will be a featured speaker at the 2017 Higher Ground Men’s Conference, Saturday, Feb. 25, 8:30a-4:30p at Westminster Chapel in Bellevue, WA.
- GET EARLY BIRD SPECIAL – 15% OFF INDIVIDUAL, STUDENT AND ACTIVE MILITARY TICKETS NOW THROUGH DEC. 31ST – USE PROMO CODE: LEGACY
- See All Higher Ground Speakers and Breakout Sessions
- Discounted tickets for groups, youth groups, Fathers & Sons and active military and first responders.
The Higher Ground Men’s Conference features more than 20 in-depth breakout sessions facilitated by leading psychologists, pastors and thought leaders on topics of sexual brokenness and recovery, father-son relationships, healing the father wound, spiritual authenticity, navigating a hyper-sexual culture, biblical manhood, marriage enrichment, teens and young adults embracing integrity in dating, and being agents of social justice in regard to poverty and the sex trade.
