How long have you been trying to become a better man?
I’m trying to get the kids to go to bed. They’re tired, it’s time, but they don’t want to sleep.
But if I yell at them, they realize the discussion is over, and they go to sleep.
Have you ever left the room during an argument with your wife?
You’re really angry because she’s right and you’re wrong.
You just need some space so you can figure out how you’re right and she’s wrong.
You can feel the fire in your chest.
It’s late at night, and you’re bored, and lonely.
You search for something that isn’t going to lead anywhere great.
Ten minutes later, you feel relief.
But you also feel like a fraud.
And here we are at a men’s breakfast. Y’all, this is the dedicated group. The committed men of the church. We’ve been doing this for years.
I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re thinking, I know everything Carson is going to say today, because I’ve heard it all.
How many sermons have we heard?
How many books have we read?
In my ministry, I write Bible studies. How many Bible studies have we done?
The New Year is coming up. How many times have we said “this year will be different”?
But how much has actually changed?
I don’t want to discourage you.
But I do want to give us permission to talk about what we’re feeling and experiencing.
The reality is, most of us are stuck.
We know what we’re supposed to do.
But the anger, the lust, the anxiety, the distance from God, it’s still there.
We’ve settled for work hard, don’t blow up your family, show up on Sunday, manage your sin.
We look around, that seems respectable. Above average.
But is that all there is?
How do you think God feels about us?
Maybe he’s disappointed?
He’s like, I died on the cross for you. I sent the Holy Spirit into your life, I gave you the Bible, I gave you a good church and that’s all you got?
The good news this morning is that even though we feel like spiritual disappointments, or hypocrites, or even failures, God isn’t avoiding us.
He’s not standing at the finish line, arms crossed, wondering why you haven’t arrived yet.
He’s with us right now, in this room, involved in our struggles.
The fact that you’re here. that you got up early on a Saturday morning, that you chose to be with other men instead of sleeping in. that’s evidence that God is at work in your life.
Just by being here, you have evidence that God is at work in your life.
I’ve spent the last four years trying to figure this out. I just completed my Doctor of Ministry at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, and for my research, I decided to study what’s actually working.
I wanted to find out what it looks like to be spiritually mature today, in the suburbs, whether you’re single or married with kids, and a mortgage and a stressful job.
So, I read a ton of academic textbooks on discipleship, and I interviewed thirty men and women who were the real deal. People who were greatly respected for their devotion to Jesus.
I wanted to know: what made them different?
Why did they keep growing when the rest of us got stuck?
What I found has changed how I’m living and doing ministry.
And it starts with something you’ve already experienced, but maybe you haven’t paid attention to it yet.
Or if you have, it probably isn’t one of your top priorities in life.
But if you want to be like Jesus, what I’m going to share with you today is absolutely necessary.
THE THING NO ONE TOLD YOU
Let me go back to what I was taught.
I grew up in church, and everyone explained to me how spiritual growth works:
It’s God’s grace in our lives.
It’s the gospel.
It’s the work of the Holy Spirit.
We study the Bible, go to church, and have faith.
Quiet times. Accountability groups. Journaling.
All of this made sense to me, and it’s part of the reason I write Bible studies.
But what is missing from this picture?
Go ahead, think to yourself, I know what Carson is going to say.
I know there are people in this room with the answer.
But I want you to get your answer.
Because it’s so obvious that once I say it, you’ll think to yourself, I already knew that.
But even once you know the answer, the challenge isn’t knowing it, but putting it into practice.
You have your answer?
You know what’s most important for spiritual growth?
Ok, let me tell you how I got to my answer.
Let me ask you this: Who taught you what it means to be a man?
You probably didn’t learn it from a book.
I mean, I read Wild At Heart three times!
I was confused, and I was trying to figure out what a real man looked like.
But those lessons didn’t stick. I couldn’t tell you anything I learned from that book now.
When you think about what it means to be a man, you think about a person.
Your dad, a grandfather, an uncle, a coach, a teacher, a pastor.
Someone who got to know you personally.
And someone who showed you, by how they lived, what it looks like to be a man.
That’s why it’s so painful if you grew up without that example at home.
That was a struggle for me.
Because God designed us to learn how to be a man by getting to know other men.
Jesus knew this.
It’s interesting. Jesus didn’t write a single book. Yes, he gave sermons. Yes, we have the Bible.
To be clear, we need the Word of God.
But what’s easier to remember?
Everything Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount, or how he washed the disciples’ feet?
Most importantly, Jesus picked twelve disciples.
He invited these guys to live with him. 24/7.
They saw him eat meals, watched him fall asleep, walked down the road with him, saw how he talked to people.
Three years of being together. Three years of watching his example.
Then he told them, “After I send the Holy Spirit into your lives, go do what I’ve done, and tell others to do the same.”
And that’s how the church started.
Not a book launch - here are four gospels, go read them.
Not with a conference, featuring the Risen Jesus.
But with a community of people who did the things they saw Jesus do.
That’s why the stories of the early church still inspire us today.
What Is Discipleship?
My research led me to define discipleship in a way that I never had before.
For me, discipleship is imitating Christ together.
It’s what Paul told the Corinthians, ‘Imitate me as I imitate Christ.’
That’s discipleship in six words.
Think about the men and women at Corinth hearing that, and deciding to do it.
What would they be doing?
They would be imitating Christ together.
In other words, it looks like two or three friends following Jesus together, day in and day out, because they share a desire to be like Jesus.
In the interview process, as I talked to thirty people, they all did the same thing.
For almost any question I asked them about their faith, they responded with a story about a friend.
It wasn’t just any kind of friend.
They talked about close, close mentors and friends. Mentors they wanted to be like. Friends they admired.
They had arranged their lives so they could prioritize these friendships.
They looked for people whose lives showed them what following Jesus actually looks like.
That’s who they wanted to be.
So they made it a point to become friends.
Back to my question. God changes us. But how does God change us?
Yes, the gospel is foundational. Reading the Bible is critical.
But the Scriptures make it clear that friendship is where it all takes place.
Without friends, we’re stuck.
Not because we’re not trying hard.
But because we’ve been trying to become like Jesus alone.
Once I realized that friendship was the secret, I looked through the interviews to see how these thirty people described their friends.
A GOOD FRIEND
What was it about their friends and mentors that made the difference?
The most important thing is they were hungry for God.
Hungry for God doesn’t mean a lot of things.
It doesn’t mean being extroverted, or being a leader at church, or someone who cries during worship.
All I mean is a holy hunger for God.
These are men and women who want to know God, they want to know God’s Word, and they want to love like Jesus has loved them.
It’s the guy who texts you back at 11 PM not because he has advice, but
because he’s still praying for you.
When you’re around them, you want to go read your Bible afterward.
The point is, this isn’t accountability.
It’s not shame-based behavioral modification.
It’s not a checkbox.
It’s not a weekly, Jesus-juked performance review.
It’s not life coaching.
It’s not religion.
It’s life.
Spiritual life that comes from God.
When two people are both depending on God and investing in each other, that’s spiritual friendship.
You’ve probably already tasted this.
Think about the best spiritual conversation you’ve ever had.
It’s that time you heard someone pray, and you thought, “Wow, they really know God.”
It’s someone who went through suffering and you thought to yourself, “If I ever lose my job, I want to be like him.”
God has been putting these people in your life.
The question is, are we noticing what he’s doing?
And are we responding to it?
THREE QUALITIES
What happens to us when God gives us a holy hunger for him?
My research revealed three qualities that showed up again and again.
First, they were faithful.
A man I’ll call Joe told me about a season when he was running from God. He ghosted everyone who reached out.
But a mentor texted him every single week.
And eventually, Joe decided to go hang out. And that changed his life.
You know who else does that?
Jesus. He’s the shepherd who leaves the ninety-nine to chase the one.
Faithfulness isn’t just how we start. It’s how we finish.
Everyone I talked to in my research shared really hard stuff. The trials that break people.
They told me about going to jail, working through affairs, family estrangement, and mental health issues.
But they all had someone who stayed with them.
Not someone who fixed them. Someone who stayed.
Jesus, the night before his death, asked his closest friends to stay awake with him.
He didn’t need advice. He needed friends that night.
Who would you call at 2am?
Who would call you?
Jesus is a faithful friend.
When we love him, we become faithful friends, too.
Second, they were safe.
For a lot of us, we learned that real men are strong.
So we’re afraid to be weak.
Because we’ve learned that if you’re weak in front of another man, you’ll be rejected.
But under the surface, those macho guys are insecure.
They’re terrified of being known.
And in this room, most men are struggling with anxiety and sexual sin.
And most men here don’t have anyone they can talk to about those struggles.
It’s like we’re drowning on our own, and refusing to call out for help.
We’re thinking to ourselves, 'I know if I swim harder, I’ll get back to shore. ’
But we’re so far out, we don’t even know which way to swim anymore.
One guy I talked to told his closest friends he was looking at porn, and it was damaging his marriage.
He was so scared to open up. Afraid of what they might say or do.
But these guys stepped in. They loved him.
They weren’t soft. But they were steady.
Their lives, their friendship, that was how he experienced God’s grace.
Because who is safer to go to with our sin than Jesus?
Does anyone know your real struggle?
Third, they were wise.
I talked to one leader who was the President of his company. When he faced business challenges he didn’t know how to handle as a Christian, he called his mentor.
This is a guy who would hear what was going on, and start crying because he felt so deeply the pain and the struggle of following Jesus in today’s world.
It can be brutal out there.
But his mentor also knew what to say, and could give advice that worked.
So it wasn’t just, “pray about it” but, “here’s what I did when I had that kind of problem at my business.”
Don’t you want to be like that one day?
That’s the kind of person Jesus is. He is the wisest person to ever live. He knows how to live life well.
The Three Characteristics
So, these are the three key characteristics:
Faithful. Safe. Wise.
These aren’t things you can get overnight. They don’t come from going to conferences.
They come from following Jesus with mentors and friends.
WHY IT’S HARD
So If this is so important, why don’t we have it?
Everyone wants this, right?
Doesn’t this sound good?
But we’re tired.
We’re busy.
We’re afraid.
And we’re waiting for someone else to go first.
The suburbs don’t help - we live far apart.
Our jobs don’t make it easy - we have to travel, work late.
Our families are important - but that means our evenings and weekends are full.
You text someone, and it takes two months to find a time to meet.
It’s hard.
It is really hard.
But here’s the good news: you’re already sitting at a table with men who love God and are looking for friends.
The goal of a Men’s Ministry Breakfast isn’t to have a lot of men come to the event and eat breakfast.
It’s to have a lot of men go get breakfast with each other next week.
If you leave here today with a time and a date to get breakfast with one other man, that’s a win.
Don’t let a busy schedule stop you.
Be the guy who pushes through the hesitation.
Take the risk to go first.
Maybe you’re thinking, but I’m not like the guys you described.
I mean, I’m kind of faithful, I think I can be safe, but I’m not that wise.
Ok, I get that.
But are you willing to go in that direction?
We don’t have to be perfect to start growing with a friend.
Jesus enters our lives with grace. And his Spirit helps us as we struggle.
But you do have to ask two hard questions:
- Do I want to be like Jesus?
- Do I want to be friends with someone so we can be like Jesus together?
If the answer is no, ok. Now you have clarity.
If the answer is yes, then you have enough to get started.
WHAT TO DO ABOUT IT
So what do you do with this? With God’s help, I trust you’ll figure it out.
But let met give you three ways to get started.
First, admit that doing it by yourself doesn’t work.
Stop trying to grow alone.
The Spirit changes us through his Word.
AND, ALSO, God almost always changes us through people.
You need a friend.
You have to decide that the pain of isolation is greater than the cost of vulnerability.
Second, ask God to show you who’s already available.
You don’t have to manufacture this. God has already placed people in your path.
A coworker. A neighbor. Someone in this room. Ask God to open your eyes.
You’re not looking for the guy who has it all together. You’re looking for the guy who wants Jesus and who wants to hang out.
And that means going to places where you can make these kinds of friends.
Mo and I tried to find friends at another church in Atlanta for a year. It didn’t work out.
And we literally lived next door to the church. We walked to church.
It was so funny, everyone driving up in their SUVs, and we were pushing a stroller out of the trees, wiping the pine needles out of our hair.
It was humbling to admit that we couldn’t make friends at church.
But we ended up here.
Third, keep it simple.
It’s already hard enough to do this. So, find ways to connect even if they aren’t dramatic.
This looks like twenty minutes in the driveway.
Someone you call on your way home from work.
A guy who will text you a prayer request.
When we make it simple, we can keep it consistent.
THE INVITATION
Ok. It’s almost time to get into our table groups and talk about this. So let me summarize.
We’re stuck because we’re trying to follow Jesus alone.
But Jesus invited disciples to follow him together.
That’s what discipleship is.
Discipleship is imitating Christ together.
So we all need at least one friend who we can follow Jesus with.
Together, we become faithful, safe, and wise.
Which is a pretty good description of Jesus. That’s the kind of friend he is to us.
When we get into our table groups, we’re going to have some questions on the screen.
The truth is, you don’t need these questions. They’re just some starting points.
The main thing is, they’re an invitation to be real.
You can avoid being vulnerable if you want. And that might be the right call.
Or you can open up a little bit, and see who reciprocates.
This is your opportunity to start a friendship with someone who wants to be like Jesus.
One more thing.
After you get in your car, I want you to think of one man who’s further down the road than you. Someone whose faith you admire.
Text him: “Can we get coffee? I’d like to get together”
After you send that text, then you can turn on the car and drive home.
Guys, everyone is struggling. No one has got this figured out.
But it’s so much harder when we’re isolated.
And you don’t have to be.
Mark tells us that Jesus invited the disciples “so that they would be with him.”
That’s it. Be with him, with other disciples.
That’s how Jesus did it then. And that’s still how he’s doing it today.
Let’s pray.
PRAYER
Father.
Thank you.
Thank you for every man in this room.
Thank you that they showed up. Thank you that they’re hungry for more.
Thank you for the people you’ve already placed in their lives—the mentors, the friends, the examples they may not have even noticed yet.
Open our eyes to see what you’re already doing.
We confess that we’ve tried to do this alone.
We’ve believed the lie that we should have it figured out by now.
Forgive us for the pride that says we don’t need anyone.
Forgive us for the fear that keeps us from being known.
Fill us with your presence.
Fill us with a love for you.
Not hype. Not performance.
But a holy hunger for you. A hunger for your Word. A hunger to love like Jesus has loved us.
Make us the kind of men others would want to follow.
And give us courage.
Courage to go first.
to push through the hesitation.
to open up.
to take the initiative
to stay when it’s hard.
Jesus, thank you for the example you set.
We know you are at work in us today.
It’s in your name we pray, Amen.
Table Discussion Questions
- What does loneliness look like for you in this season of life?
- What makes building or maintaining friendships challenging for you?
- Can you share a story about a friend who influenced your walk with Jesus?
- What’s a struggle you’ve been carrying that you wish someone truly understood?
- If you wanted to strengthen a relationship today, who would you reach out to and why?