I wanna be a hero, Part II

Bob Parr, "The Incredibles"

In Pixar's masterful work, The Incredibles, Buddy Pine loves the heroes. He wants to be a hero. When dusted by Mr. Incredible (aka Bob Parr), Buddy takes matters into his own hands. He's going to be a hero. He'll be noticed.


And that's precisely the problem with wanting to be a hero. You get your perspective all askew, and pretty soon you've wreaked havoc on a city and have become jet-engine paté.


When last we met on these hallowed shores, the topic on the table was man's innate desire to do things heroic, a desire knit by God into the fabric of his being. If you so desire, you can catch up by touching here (you can also hear there the song that got me cogitating on the subject in the first place).


There is a huge difference between desiring to be a hero and desiring to do something heroic. The one points inward while the other points outward.


But who doesn't relish praise? In the right context, it's not a bad thing. Consider that even Jesus encouraged his hearers to live in such a way that they might one day hear "Well done, thou good and faithful servant" tumble from the lips of the Father (Matthew 25:21, 23). If my entire purpose in life becomes my glory, I have missed the most important purpose for my life and that is his glory (1 Corinthians 10:31). When one longs for his own praises, he becomes the character in the second verse of Steve Taylor's, "Hero."

Growing older you'll find
That illusions are bought
And the idol you thought you'd be
Was just another zero.

I wanna be a hero.

Heroes died when the squealers bought 'em off,
Died when the dealers got 'em off,
Welcome to the "in it for money as an idol" show.

When they ain't as big as life,
When they ditch their second wife,
Where's the boy to go?

Gotta be a hero.

Hero!
It's a nice-boy notion that the real world's gonna destroy.
You know
It's a Marvel comic book Saturday matinee fairytale, boy.

Wow. That's a downer. When hall-of-famers end their human race by putting a shotgun in their mouth because they can't cope. When men of God walk into sin by closing the door to counsel the distraught woman ("she needs me, you know"). When Presidents disgrace their office and thereby our nation with a game of White House fellatio. When families lie in rubble because their man didn't hit it big at the poker table when he knew he would, or because the second mortgage went to pay off the pusher to get one more bag, or because the boss (and the police) finally caught up with the money he was skimming from the company's coffers.


Just another zero. But I wanna be a hero. I gotta be a hero.


Wanna? Okay. Gotta? Not really. Desiring to be used heroically by God or to do heroic things is as normal as Blake Griffin defying gravity and hitting 7.9 on the richter scale with a slam dunk that reverberates all the way to Schenectady. Trying to be a hero leads to vanity, self-absorption, compromise, and putting yourself on the throne in God's stead.


To be usable in the hands of God, to be used in any manner he sees fit, it starts with the small stuff because that's where God calls you to be faithful.


-- Tell the truth because you love God, you know he is the source and God of truth (Psalm 119:160), and you want to look like your heavenly Father.


-- Do not steal but give because God is a God who is lavish in his giving and calls us to be the pipeline of his grace and goodness to those starved for such nourishment.


-- Be faithful to your woman because you love God and because God is ever faithful, you long to be like him and please him by remaining true to your wife.


-- Obey God in all the little things. If we cannot be faithful in the small stuff, can we be entrusted at all with the big stuff (Matthew 25:23)?


The real hero is the guy still eager to get home to his wife after work not despite but because of having lived together for 45 years.


He is the guy who has been a faithful and true laborer for his company for fifty years, happy to have and to do his job which he does so with the dependability of the sunrise.


He's the unknown guy who has served on the mission field for 60 years for God's good pleasure.


Really, brother, the best hero, the real Hero in this drama remains unchanged. He's the example for all to follow, the Author and Finisher of our faith (Hebrews 12:2). Verse three from Mr. Taylor.

When the house fell asleep
From a book I was led
To a light that I never knew.
"I wanna be your hero."

And he spoke to my heart
From the moment I prayed,
"Here's a pattern I made for you.
"I wanna be your hero. 
"I wanna be your hero."

Wow, again. The very One who said, "No greater love has any man than this that he lay down his life for his friends," defined heroism with his life. He is the greatest good. He so loved the world that he became man that he might die as a man to save those who would turn to him from eternal damnation. And "To all who receive him, who believe in his name, he gave the right to become the children of God" (John 1:12). Wow.


It is quite likely that the real hero will never comprehend in this life the full extent of his heroics because though he longs to accomplish them, he won't realize he is so doing. It will be the furthest thing from his mind. It will go unrecognized and unheralded, but that never means it will go unseen. 


Be obedient in all things. Live bowed and submitted to our God and King, so much so that when we are finished, we can only respond that we have done our duty (Luke 17:10). We have carried out the commands of our Master.


Then, on that day, the King will call us before his throne. We will go with uncertainty, awed and humbled at the splendor of his glory. Jesus will look into our eyes, put his hands on our shoulders, and with a smile at his lips and a tear in his eye, say, "Well done." Stunned by such proclamation, we will replay the 8-track of our life trying to pinpoint the Super Bowl touchdown or the grenade we fell upon of which he is speaking, only to find that there were no such events. 


With perfect clarity, Christ will recount the tiniest details of the minutest acts that we did for his glory--things we thought so inconsequential, and he will say, "These things you did for me!"


You might not have to dart into a burning home. You may never administer CPR or the Heimlich. You might not score a goal or be asked your opinion by anyone outside your family. Such opportunities are not of your make. You can only be ready to respond, "Here am I! Send me, please." Until then, just do those things God calls you to do and trust him for the outcome. There is nothing more heroic.

I wanna be a hero, Part One

I love Steve Taylor. No, not the Aerosmith guy (or the American Idol guy for anyone under thirty). Steve Taylor is a singer/song writer/producer. Great music, in my humble opinion. Biting, incisive lyrics. He skewers everyone, inside the church and out, not just to skewer but to exhort and if necessary, convict. Consider him a prophet, of sorts. I recommended him to some friends and let them listen to his CD, Squint. When they returned it, they looked at me as if I'd tried to feed them sauteed puppies. To each their own.

Anyway, Taylor penned a little ditty titled "Hero" that speaks to the seed within the soul of every man that long's to be just that, a hero. Here's the first verse:

When the house fell asleep
There was always a light
And it fell from the page to the eyes
Of an American boy.

In a storybook land
I could dream what I read
When it went to my head I'd see
I wanna be a hero.

But the practical side
Said the question was still
When you grow up what will you be?
I wanna be a hero

Hero!
It's a nice-boy notion that the real world's gonna destroy.
You know
It's a Marvel comic book Saturday matinee fairytale, boy.

Little boys grow up wanting to be heroes. It's as inherent in their nature as dumptrucks and digging dirt. Many women don't understand this about their man, that inside there is a man who aches to do great things, to score the final goal in overtime to win the Stanley Cup or to go all the way and lay down your life for something greater than yourself, for God or for country. Theologian of yesteryear, Phillips Brooks (yes, both ess-es belong), captured this itch when he wrote,

"Bad will be the day, for every man when he becomes absolutely contented with the life that he is living, with the thoughts that he is thinking, with the deeds that he is doing, when there is not forever beating at the doors of his soul some great desire to do something larger, which he knows that he was meant and made to do because he is still, in spite of all, the child of God."

Almost as if he were sticking his finger into the chest of the 21st century American church, Brooks "called for a manliness in the ministry and deplored "the absence of the heroic element" in the churches."*


Why do you think comic books sell? Why do we drop dollar after dollar to watch Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, and Spiderman? Why do grown men count the days until The Dark Knight Rises? Why is Gladiator a great movie? How about Glory? Why do tears fill my eyes even now when I think of the Iron Giant streaking toward the sky to obliterate the nuke at the cost of his own life to save his friends. "I'm Superman." Why can you find minor league ball parks in tiniest corners of America? Why do we stand in awe as the elderly men of the VFW shuffle down the street during the parade? Why do men enlist year after year after year despite the ebb and flow of American military favor? What gives?

"I wanna be a hero."


I have heard it said that God gives us a good appetite for the good things he has created. Food, relationship, and yes, sex come quickly to mind. I believe that God created his men to long to do great things on his behalf. The man who longs to save souls from the pit of hell has the heart of a hero. So, too, the man who toils to provide an income for his wife and children. So, too, the man who longs to paint the masterpiece or pen a soul-stirring ballad. To save, to create, to provide, to be relied upon and depended upon. To do a good thing. Jesus declared heroism's epitome when he said, "No greater love has any man than this, that he would lay down his life for his friends."


It is truly a God-thing. It's knit into the heart of man.

Heroism is often thankless and mostly unseen. Its costs are high and its rewards often thin. It demands the totality of self, laying ourselves into the hands of our Creator that he might do with us what he will even at the cost of our lives. Considering this is a blog to husbands, you know full well where you are to pour out your life. She might recognize it. She might not. But you are to be your woman's hero on this earth. You are her defender and friend. You are her comforter and provider. All of these things are God-things that he has assigned to you in this life. You are the vehicle through which he pours his heroism into your wife.

Be that man. But be careful. Worse than Syndrome's cape, pitfalls await the man who wants to be a hero. And that will take us to the song's second verse.  In a day or two.


*Warren Wiersbe, "50 Christians Every Christian Should Know," (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2009), p. 154

Your honor

The word of God struck me again this morning.


Backfill. A missionary friend of mine encouraged his readers and supporters to try a Bible reading plan where you read the same book of the Bible every day for twenty days. Not just part of the book but all of the book.  Tough to do with Jeremiah unless you have scads of time or are a fast reader; I whiff on both. These past twenty days I have anchored in 1 Peter. One of the fundamental verses for understanding God's heart for husbands is in that letter. In case you're a first time visitor to this blog:

"Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered."

~ 1 Peter 3:7

As I rode to work on the most pristine morning north Texas has seen this year, I wished that I had reworded the question. Try this on. "Honey, do you feel that I have dishonored you in any way, word or deed, in recent memory." The wording of the question does a couple of things.

If she says yes with follow on instances as support (hoping for few), she is not stating that you implicitly dishonored her but that what you said or did made her feel this way. It doesn't accuse your intentions or indict your character even though both may be worth such. Also, in focusing on the dishonoring, it's not tooting your horn or giving you reason to puff your chest for the things you are already doing, but it's giving you as a husband specific areas to work upon where you may be falling short.

So, husband, give it a whirl. Man up and thicken that skin. If it surfaces some deep hurts, you might be in for a torrent of emotion. Bear it. Keep your cool in love and listen through and past the emotion to the truth therein contained. You are a man. Lead her well.

You may think she does not deserve honor. You are wrong. If she is a believer, she is a coheir of the grace of life, and that makes her a princess, the daughter of the King of Kings. If she is an unbeliever, she is still his creature and created in his image. As the wife may win the unbelieving spouse through her godly conduct (3:1), so, too, might you. Let her see Christ in you as you love and honor her as the weaker vessel.

A good verse for a Monday morning to prod husbands (read: me) to love their wives! 

God pounds upon me through this verse everytime I stop to listen. This morning, honor kept pounding in my head. I looked up from my Bible and turned to my woman. "Tracy, I don't want you to answer right away but to think on this. Do you feel that I honor you in word and deed?" By the way, she's still mulling it and her answer will remain between her and me. Nice try.