(Michael Ray video)
Real Men Don’t Eat Quiche was a bestselling tongue-in-cheek book satirizing masculinity back in 1982.
Personally, it caused me try my first “egg and bacon pie” and I quickly realized that quiche was quite tasty. I’ve enjoyed it ever since, and I still consider myself to be a real man!
Lately I’ve been listening to a new song pop up on the country music charts. It’s entitled “Real Men Love Jesus.” It’s a catchy title, and I decided do a little research into Michael Ray, the country artist who sings it, to find out the rest of the story behind the song.
“I wanted to put a song out there for the guy who gets overlooked — the guy who’s working all week and has a few beers on the weekend but just trying to do right, keep his head down and raise a family,” Ray said in an interview.
“Those are the guys who raised me. That’s my dad, that’s me, that’s my grandpa — the men who were in my life.”
Certainly all of us are somewhat influenced by those who raise us in our formative years. But not all of us have grown up with positive role models, and certainly many did not receive the positive Christian influence that Ray mentions.
The greatest influence in my early years happened to be my Grandpa. He was a German farmer who tilled the soil on his 87-acre Texas farm for nearly 70 years. Opa was a good man who loved to work the land, and he and my Grandma helped my Mom raise me while my Dad was overseas during the Korean War.
Rather than focus on what it takes to be a real man, I’d like to take this in a totally different direction. Let’s talk about “loving Jesus” and just what that looks like.
I was 40 when I first came to love Jesus, and that love has continually grown as I’ve come to know Him more intimately.
We’re not talking about just expressing our love through words. In any relationship words are certainly important, but our actions are what matters most.
My desire is to “love God with all my heart, with all my soul, with all my mind and with all my strength.” And I know He wants me to also express my love for Him by “loving others as I love myself.”
Notice that I must love myself before I can genuinely love others. You see, I understand that we’ve all been wonderfully made — created especially for God’s pleasure and purpose. And He truly loves us with all our blemishes and shortcomings.
Can you relate to loving Jesus? It’s easy for all kinds of things to get in the way of that most important relationship. Religion can certainly get in the way. As a child we can be emotionally traumatized by a parent, and that hurt can linger for years and possibly a lifetime.
Grieving the loss of a loved one can cause us to blame God for our personal tragedy. Being treated unfairly can make it difficult to love others, let alone Jesus.
In Galatians 5:22-23, we’re reminded that, “The fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. Against such things there is no law.”
You see, it’s not about the law or commandments. It’s simply about Jesus and what He accomplished for all mankind on the cross. It starts with His love for us and real men and real women need to reciprocate that love. He deserves our love and devotion. He has mine, and I hope you’ll give Him yours as well.
Here to serve,
Jim Langley, CLU
Passages to Ponder
— Jim Langley has been writing for more than 30 years while working as a life and health insurance agent in Santa Barbara. In recent years, his passion has turned to writing about his personal relationship with God, and his goal is to encourage others to draw near to Him as well. As a longtime member of CBMC of Santa Barbara (Christian Business Men’s Connection), he started writing Fourth Quarter Strategies columns in 2014, and he now reaches an international audience through the CBMC International devotional Monday Manna. Click here for previous columns. The opinions expressed are his own.