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REAL MEN DON'T DO CHURCH?

By Carl Beech.

Men believe themselves to be self-sufficient, all-capable and in no need of a crutch, so why be a Christian? That’s for wimps and women, isn’t it? And nothing at all happens in church that is of any relevance to men, does it? And let’s face it; frankly a church meeting on a Sunday is just boring and filled with romantic sentimentalism, isn’t it? 

By now, after just a few lines, you are either outraged and want to email me to complain, or you are starting to get excited.

We need to face hard facts and ask tough questions! We have all seen the statistics and we know there is a problem. We are quite simply haemorrhaging men from the UK church at an alarming rate of knots. In fact, according to Tear Fund research, 75% of men in the UK are either antagonistic or apathetic towards the Christian faith. It’s those men I have in mind as I write; the men who are way outside of our churches and don’t even have it on their radar.

In 2006, further Tear Fund research showed that the profile of most churches is typically about 35% male (after polling 7,000 British adults). Anecdotally, our own less scientific research backs that up. We find that the percentage is often 30-35% male.  If you have more than 40% men in your church you are doing quite well!

Most men completely by-pass church. They see it as a place that, according to a BBC radio survey, is for wimps and women and is irrelevant! Lets not make the mistake of thinking that when the “wheels come off” in a man’s life they look to the church. A small minority might, but for the most part their perception of what/who Jesus is and stands for will be quite the opposite of what they feel they need in a crisis. So what are we going to do to put hairs back on the chest of the Gospel?

Men today still look for robust and strong environments to forge friendships. They may not express it like this, but men really do desire authentic relationship. Men want a “band of brothers” that they can stand shoulder to shoulder with. So, they shoot off to the pub, to the match, curry house or the lodge meeting! In reality men don’t expect to find a band of brothers in a church, so they just don’t look there! For the most part, major male driving forces are money, sex, and power. I’m sure some of you will want to argue that with me (and yes, I am painting a broad brush stroke picture), but before you do, just consider the most popular question men ask when getting to know another man;

“What do you do for a living?”

Why is that the most popular question? Simply because men instinctively want to work out the hierarchy and the pecking order in the new relationship. It’s why, when you go to an expensive gym, you see men place their car keys on the bar with the brand of car on display (unless, like me, you have an eastern European car!). It’s why men say “I’ve got the BMW parked outside....” instead of “I’ve got the car parked outside”.

Men will instinctively believe (thanks in part to the media) that what the church has to say about those issues will be diametrically opposite to what they want to hear! For the most part they are right. The publishers of some of the best selling quality men’s magazines know want men want as a result of extensive and expensive research. You can read some of it in on the internet and it makes for fascinating reading. Their livelihoods and profit margins depend on them featuring content that men are interested in and so they make sure they have got it right. By contrast, in the church we don’t research the culture, nor do we even read the magazines and therefore we so often fail to hit the spot. Call me an old fashioned orthodox Christian, but I truly believe that we have people’s eternal destinies at stake, not a mere profit margin. We need to engage in some serious thinking and cultural engagement.

Take for instance the issues of status and success. These are of huge significance to many men, which is why their work is of such importance. Yet church rarely, if ever tackles workplace issues head on. You could easily attend most churches for years and come to the conclusion that God isn’t interested in what happens 9-5 at all! But where does that leave men? 

Carry out an audit: take a look at your church. When did you last hear a sermon on work? Do you have a theology of work? When did the church last pray publicly and seriously for those at work? In general, we are great at praying for the so called “caring professions”, but when have you heard a prayer for a Tesco van driver, a policeman dealing with child abuse work, a solicitor handling divorce work each week or a train driver who must spot the red lights or endure the trauma of suicide attempts? We pray for those in “full time Christian” work and we tend to pray for those in teaching or medicine (because they are perceived to be more Kingdom orientated as they are caring professions), but we leave out the vast majority because we haven’t developed a robust and holistic theology of every day life. When it comes to teaching in church, Christian men, let alone those yet to believe, will sit under sound and tremendously accurate Bible-teaching only to wonder what’s in the service for them. The preaching deals at best with generic issues, or with churchy or touch-feely things, and the very things that absorb so much of a man’s time mid week are never mentioned. While we sit under teaching about how to pray better or give more, most men will be thinking about the challenges of the week ahead.

Consider the real things confronting a man at work this week:

?       Setting Profit and Loss

?       Stress

?       Fiscal control in hard times

?       Negotiating Skills

?       Human Resource Management without exploitation

?       Empowerment

?       Integrity in advertising

?       Leadership

?       Handling Redundancy - each side

?       Submission

?       Conflict Resolution

?       Sexual Harassment

?       Discrimination - race, gender, religion, disability  

?       Time Management

?       Work, home, church balance

?       Personal ambition

?       Debt issues

?       Late payment terms

?       Negotiating parameters

?       Knowing when to close down

?       Employing Christians because they're Christians

?       Materialism

?       The Place for Compassion

?       Self Image

?       Corporate Sponsorship of Christian Events.

Let me emphasise again; Men are being spiritually starved in church and they are voting with their feet! The decline in male attendance at church is almost terminal. “Believing” men are switching off to church at an incredible rate of knots. We desperately need churches to engage with men on the real issues they face.  

Let’s think now about the more personal issues that a man faces. Sure, there will be a fa?ade that most men construct that says, “Hey, I’m doing just great”, but behind that there is often a much rawer reality! Many men are really wrestling with issues such as sexual temptation (Channel 4 and 5 after 9pm and the internet), serious debt, failure at work, family communication breakdown, rage and anger, etc., yet too often we never touch on these matters, preferring to handle only safe subjects such as parenting, studying the Bible, or tithing.  

If we don’t get real in church, we won’t get men.   

How about a seminar for men on a regular basis that tackles issues such as “overcoming addiction to pornography and masturbation” (you might not want to give that title, but let’s hit the issue because a significant percentage of men who are in church will be seriously struggling with it. Or how about “Dealing with rage”, “Handling your debt” or “When promotion passes you by”? Let’s engage the men with some solid Bible-based teaching and let them see that being a Christian isn’t for wimps, but for those who have real guts and courage.

Let’s also briefly think about the culture of church:

• We talk of Jesus being our lover when men want a leader and a captain.
• We talk of surrender  and going on retreat which carries connotations of defeat (and is only mentioned in the Bible in those terms!), but men will bend the knee and submit to a higher authority!
• The language of personal devotion time, the “quiet time” is a passive term, not suited to those with testosterone (perhaps we can keep the principle but recast the language?).
• Men don’t like to get too close too soon, yet we think it really helpful to break into small groups or say “grace” whilst looking into each others eyes.
• Men want leadership whilst the church provides pastoring.
• Men love to declare objective truth about God, and yet we sing about our feelings.
• Men want to be challenged, yet we wrap the gospel up in fluff.
• Whenever we speak of church, we think instinctively of the Sunday meeting, not what happens in the rest of the week.
• Most church websites feature activities for children and use religious jargon - a male turn off.
• Most church decoration is childish or female.
• Teaching styles tend to favour the female psyche.

I’m scratching the surface and you may find cause to disagree with some of what I suggest...but hopefully it will get us all thinking!?

Getting men into the Kingdom is a topic in itself, but for now here are a few things we believe as a ministry are crucial if we are to win men for Jesus. Make sure your church:

?         has a long term strategy to reach the men outside the church

?         recognises that, in the UK today, it takes a man five years to come to Christ (three for women)

?         realises that men today are miles from the Kingdom and need to hear the Gospel at least 30 times before making a commitment to follow Jesus.

?         understands that 80% of people who come to Christ are brought by a friend

?         Realises that many men struggle with small talk, but will open up in the context of activity.

?         Sets in place a programme to deal with these realities.

Perhaps the biggest lessons I have learned about reaching men have been while riding my bicycle! A couple of years ago, in an effort to transform my life from being an overweight unfit pastor, I took up cycling. Always being one to go the extra mile, I decided to respond to the challenge to cycle from Lands End to John O’ Groats in under 9 days. After a bit of training, I, along with six other guys (half of whom weren’t believers), did it. All the guys who weren’t believers ended up in a weekly bible study. The following year we did the same with 16 guys, but this time from Calais to Nice over the Alps. The same positive spiritual outcome took place. Some of my most effective conversations about Jesus have taken place while side by side with other men in the context of cycling. In fact, sometimes the most intimate and personal things have been shared. Why? Because we are side by side, exerting ourselves, struggling though the pain barrier together with all the guards and defences torn down. We also used the cycle ride to raise money for a worthy cause, thereby igniting men’s hearts with the chance to do something positive for those less fortunate than themselves (in this case, a work in Africa). The efforts that some went to in order to raise money was extremely humbling.

I’m not suggesting we all go out and cycle crazy distances, but perhaps if we in some way made a small effort to walk and journey with men, rather than expect them to come into our world, we may see some startling breakthroughs.

So, in conclusion, let’s unashamedly gear some ministry towards the men.    

Some things to consider:

For believing men:

?       Prayer triplets - weekly if possible; 45 minutes will do; accountability among members

?       Termly breakfasts - give them some fellowship time, saturated fat, and teach them some relevant biblical truth

?       One on One mentoring by mature men for younger men

For Not Yet Believers:

?       Well organised social/sports events with no overt Christian content

?       A termly breakfast with a good speaker who gives his testimony and a clear Christian statement. 

?       “Enquirers’’ courses such as Alpha, but occasionally run for men only. We need to understand that as Jesus shines his light into a man’s heart, the issues that he will be struggling with (perhaps gambling, pornography or hidden stress) won’t be discussed in front of Jane, but will be talked about with John and Steve (especially if he has been doing some stuff shoulder to shoulder with them).

For Both groups:

?       How about a semi retired/retired man being released to serve as an encourager and pastoral worker amongst men, carrying out work visits and giving wise counsel.

That’s far from all and, as I have previously said, we have painted broad brush strokes and made inevitable sweeping statements and generalisations. Hopefully, however, there are some useful thoughts in the above to get us all thinking and see some more men introduced to Jesus. There’s a big job to do and a bit of up hill boulder pushing to engage in, but when you consider that, according to “Evangelicals Now” in 2003, when you lead a man to Jesus, 93% of his family follow to Jesus (as opposed to 3.5% for children or 17% for adults), we need to get serious about the way we reach out and minister to men.