A couple days ago, there was some roadwork being done in front of our house.  Men were shoveling gravel into a dumptruck, and it brought a thought to mind that I find myself having a lot.  It’s a thought I have when driving through mountains and seeing the strips of land cleared across nearly impossible terrain in order to run power lines.  Or when I watch little league or men’s softball games.  Or when I see a man walking on a roof, or see photos of the construction of skyscrapers and massive bridges.  It’s a thought I have over and over and over again just observing how my husband lives life:  men are so much stronger than women in so many ways.

Up until I was about ten or eleven, I think I mostly bought into the notion that our culture had so blatantly tried to instill in me that boys and girls were equal – the same in strength, and ability and intelligence.  I had so far always been among the smartest, fastest and strongest of my peers.  My biceps were the biggest in my fourth grade class (uh, can we say tomboy?).  I thought I would always be as good at anything and everything as the boys.  Somehow, though, by the age of twelve, I remember having come to a very matter-of-fact understanding that, as a girl, I just wasn’t cut out of the same cloth as the boys.  Despite all of the indoctrination (which I got a good dose of at home as well as at school), I knew…I think because it was just obvious…that boys were actually better at a lot of things, in many cases simply because they were boys – and even then, found comfort in that reality.

Now, as I consider all the things that men can do that I can’t do – that, in general, women can’t do – I find God’s design so humbling and so amazing.  Honestly, the fact that anybody dreamed that they could criss-cross mountain ranges with huge power towers and electric lines is mind boggling to me.  There is so much wrapped up in that – vision and courage and intelligence and physical endurance and persistence – that I truly think is part of a man’s God-given nature.  And though not every endeavor that a man undertakes is so monumental, those traits are valuable and necessary in so many of the demands of everyday life.

When my husband talks of dreams for the future, it’s not unusual for me to cringe and want to point out all of things that won’t work the way he hopes they will.  The weight of the idea alone is enough to crush my spirit, to make me want to cling to the safety of the known, humdrum, easy(er) work of life.  I admit, I am not always (or even often) an encouragement in those moments.  But I’ve felt challenged lately – challenged to recognize that there’s a reason he’s the leader and I’m not.  The call on his life requires a particular strength of will, strength of character, strength of faith that are just not a part of who I was made to be.  There’s a necessity for me to support even when my comprehension is limited.

I’m also becoming increasingly aware of how this affects the way we raise our boys.  As I’ve sat at baseball games just really floored by the fact that pre-teen boys are already capable of things, strength-wise, that I’ve never been able to do, I’ve realized even more that I need to learn to restrain my natural inclinations toward being over-protective and risk-averse and “practical” when it comes to how they approach life.  I want my boys to dream big.  I want them to recognize that God has made them to be visionary and faith-filled and persistent and tenacious and courageous and faithful.  But can I just say that this scares me more than a little?  God, grant me the wisdom and faith to trust them in your hands.

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We live in a society that doesn’t value men.  We are surrounded by a culture that has chosen to marginalize the very characteristics in men that uniquely qualify them to protect and lead and provide and, in some very meaningful ways, reflect the nature of an all-powerful, but always good God.  I have seen so clearly and personally how effectively the Devil can destroy a man by undermining those qualities.  And, it seems, in each generation in recent history, that undermining is taken to deeper and deeper levels.

How crucial it is, then, for me to encourage my husband to walk in all that he is as a man of God – to support him in prayer, in my words, in whatever way I can as his helper – not just so that our family can move forward in God’s plan for us, but so that an unbelieving world can look on and see how good and right and necessary it is to let men be men.  And how imperative it is that my boys know that they have a calling as men in the Lord, regardless of whatever else they are called to, and that they can recognize that there’s something special in that.  There’s a responsibility, but there’s also an opportunity to impact their family, their community, their nation and the world, for the kingdom of God…simply by wisely and faithfully exercising those strengths they’ve been given.

I am so thankful for godly men who walk worthy of their calling.  It strengthens families and builds churches.  It is salt and light in our ever more decaying and dark world.  It testifies to the wisdom of God’s design.  It bears fruit for His kingdom.

I can’t say emphatically enough how much this means to me, personally, and to our world.

It matters.  So, so much.