Love for Our Contributors

You know what I love about this job? Sometimes, when you least expect it, God just hits you square between the eyes with a story that shows how good He is and how much He loves His people. Sometimes this comes during an interview, sometimes it comes from another news outlet, and sometimes it comes from our very own readers. That’s why, for this last issue of the year, we decided to release a special “reader-contributor issue” that features three original articles from you.

One of the great joys of working on New Man as it has transitioned to its online form is getting to read the work of all the new contributors. These are the regular guys out there who want everyone to know how God has been working in their lives and decide to write about it, often for the first time. Their stuff is usually a little rough around the edges, but it’s refreshing to hear from these men who are on the front lines of the kingdom.

Sometimes the stories feature advice that flows from years of experience, something I’m always happy to soak in as a younger Christian man. We’ve had a number of those this year. A great example is our lead story in this issue, “How to Create a Godly Legacy” by Peter Caruso.

Sometimes the stories feature men who are stepping into opportunities the Lord is providing them. These are my favorites, because it’s inspiring to hear about how other regular men in America are finding ways to reach out to others. Remember the police officer from the Oct. 29 issue who was sharing the gospel with clubbers in addition to keeping the peace? You can’t make that stuff up. If you like that, check out “Taking the Great Commission to the Great Outdoors” by Patrick Tyndall in this issue.

Sometimes the stories feature inspiring accounts of God’s goodness from tough life situations, as detailed in “And the Glory Goes On,” by Bob Prettyman. Miracles do happen, and I love it when we get to tell you about them.

Working on New Man this year has been both inspiring and humbling. I’m always amazed when I hear about the powerful things that God is doing through men in the world, particularly when it comes straight from their mouths. I’ve been in contact with men, both famous and unheard of, who have challenged me to grow my faith and live life differently. Thank you all very much, and please keep those stories coming! As always, feel free to email them to me at chriglazier@yahoo.com.

The Joy of Giving Gifts

I recently overheard a woman say that her family doesn't give each other gifts at Christmas, instead they all donate that money to charities. It sounds great on paper, but I wish you could have heard her expression as she said it. It was completely monotone, without any passion or even a smile. It sounded like an obligation that someone had forced on her, and it also sounded like she wasn't looking forward to Christmas morning at all.

As Christians, we're often down on gift giving, and rightly so. Our culture is highly materialistic, one of its greatest problems. It reaches a new level at Christmastime, when a lot of people have no need for baby Jesus because they're so focused on getting the latest toy, gadget or piece of clothing. I will always encourage myself and others to remember to spirit of Christmas and the love of God and give as much as they can to others during this time of year.

However, I think that something is missing when we just give gifts to strangers in charities and miss out on the joy of giving to our families. There's a special kind of love shown when you can find just the right gift for the different members of your family that has nothing to do with the material gift itself. Picking out the right gift for your wife shows that you have been listening to her and understand her wants and needs. Picking out the right gifts for your kids show them that they are valued by you in a different and special way than the normal hugs and affirmations. Giving and receiving gifts is actually one of Gary Chapman's five love languages in his famous book.

Now please don't take this idea to the extreme. I'm not saying we should spoil our kids or our spouses with a lot of expensive presents. I'm not saying we shouldn't focus on Jesus on Christmas Day. I'm not saying we shouldn't give our money and time to those less fortunate than ourselves. If we're not doing those things, we are becoming a part of this materialistic culture. All I'm saying is that giving to our loved ones is a special way to show love, and a Christmas morning without any gifts just isn't quite the same.

Jesus vs. Santa

I love Christmas. I love the family, the food and the fun. I even like the parts that most guys hate, including the shopping (gasp!).

But in recent years I keep hearing something I don’t like during this season: a cultural war. It seems that Christmas time sparks the flames of political correctness and its detractors more than any other time of the year. Fights over the words we can use to greet each other, the stories we can tell our children and the songs we can sing in public seem to hit the news every other day. It seems like I see the ACLU’s name in more stories during the month of December than I do all year long (and that’s not a good thing).

I understand the issues. Christmas brings out a lot of cultural baggage in this country because, other than Jewish people and Kwanzaa-ites, pretty much everybody celebrates it in spite of the fact that it’s a Christian holiday. Then, when those same people miss the real point of the season, we Christians get upset with them. We look at Santa as a rival for Jesus, and the battle seems to get more heated every year.

It’s a shame that this war always pops up at a time when love, grace and forgiveness have historically been celebrated. I’m all for educating people as to the real reason for the season and greeting others with a Merry Christmas instead of a Happy Holidays, but I would beg everyone who is a follower of Christ to also show as much love and grace as possible.
Fiercely bashing anyone who uses the phrase “Seasons Greetings” is not going to help people understand the point of Christmas time. However, living like Christ and reaching out in love to those who are hurting and in need of help will get that point across without any need for words at all, whether they are PC phrases or not.

I Must Become Less

I’m reading through the Gospel of John and a few days ago the Holy Spirit brought new light to a verse that I had never really considered before (don’t you love it when that happens). It was John 4:30, in which John the Baptist is talking about Jesus and says “He must become greater; I must become less.”

What’s awesome about that verse is that it pretty much encapsulates the whole point of life after we come to know Jesus. He must become greater, we must become less. That’s a constant tension in our lives, the battle over the desires of our hearts versus the desires of God’s spirit inside us.

Paul talks about this battle a great deal in Romans, and C.S. Lewis had one of my favorite takes on it in the book Mere Christianity. He says that what all of us try to do is to live the Christian life, but still keep parts of our old selves to us. We’ll give some time or some money to God and occasionally do good deeds, but we still want our own time that’s not God’s. We want both, and Lewis says that we are missing the point. He says what we don’t understand is that God’s way is infinitely better and happier than our way. What we want is happiness, and the only way to full find it is to give our whole selves up to God.

It sounds like a bad or a scary idea, but the funny thing is that the more you do it, the more you love it. I know that the seasons of my life when I am the most satisfied and happy are the ones when I’m following God more closely and giving myself up to him more and more every day. And the opposite is true as well.

Hopefully this week, you can let yourself decrease and God’s spirit inside of you increase.

More Than a Feeling

I love being married. I’ve only been at it for about 5 months, so I know I have a lot of surprises in store, but so far it’s been amazing how God has blessed both my life and my wife’s life through His wonderful institution. I love seeing her next to me every morning, I love coming home to her every evening, and I love talking to her for hours on end. Sharing our lives together feels so right and natural that it seems there’s no way God didn’t design this.

However, there are a lot of people out there who are doing things that feel right and natural. The reason I know that our marriage is a good and holy thing isn’t just because it feels right, but because it is biblical. It is part of God’s plan for a man and woman to become one and to pursue Him together for the rest of their lives.

A lot of people in America today think that following the Bible is an old-fashioned and foolish way to make decisions. What’s more important is what feels right and natural. Albert Mohler does a great job of describing this from a big-picture perspective in this issue’s Q&A. But many of us experience this reality on a very personal level every day.

I have a very good friend who is thinking about moving in with his girlfriend. He’s in love with her, and his decision is based on the fact that being with her a lot feels right. But his Christian family is horrified at the fact that he’s contemplating this, and it’s causing a rift among them. I’m praying for him to do the right thing in the end, but the effects of his making decisions based on feelings and not God’s way are already causing pain in his life.

The reason we follow the Bible isn’t just because our religion tells us that we have to. Christians believe that the Bible is the Word of God revealed to us. If God designed the world, then He knows the best way to live it. Following the way he tells us to live in the Bible isn’t an old-fashioned way—it is the best and only way.

Obviously none of us will follow this way all the time, but the more we can live the way He tells us to, the closer we get to bringing heaven to earth. Here’s praying that we can all live with the love, discipline, peace and humility that God describes in His Word.