Reaching Men

I firmly believe that you reach a family through reaching the men. For years churches have tried to reach families through the children and through mothers. This is not bad as we do lots of things for kids in efforts to reach parents. However I firmly believe that the headship in a home is through the husband and father as scripture explicitly challenges. Men are called to lead their wives and lead their children.

Therefore at Awaken we stand firm in our philosophy that if you reach the husband you reach the family, if you reach the family you reach the community that family is in, if you reach that community you have potential of reaching the city. In our particular area this has the potential of spreading across the globe due to the military concentration. Our men are a doorstep to the nations with the gospel!

Just this week we saw how easy it can be to reach guys when you think outside of the box. Last weekend as a small church we had 17 guys that loaded up into trucks with 4 wheelers, guns, bows and arrows, and a whole mess of camping gear and food. We honestly looked like a small militia entering a small town just southwest of Richmond, Virginia.

Two of the guys leading the retreat took about 20 minutes each and challenged these guys to what it meant to fight and be Godly Christian men. Another two of the guys who are trained on guns in the military set up a shooting range and helped show the guys how to handle the different guns out there. I must say over just a short 24 hours you could see the spirit of these guys come alive. Amazing what God can do within the hearts of guys when they go off and blow stuff up while being reminded what it means to live and lead as Godly men.

This igniting that took place in the hearts of these guys has continued as they have come back home. We are seeing an excitement within the guys which over time we believe will become contagious to their families and the rest of the church.

As followers of Jesus we need to find creative ways to let our guys be just that guys. Through this I believe God will continue to advance his Kingdom.