I think we feel a bit of empathy for Richard Gere’s Lancelot in the film, First Knight. Lancelot isn’t tied down, has no obligations, goes where he wants, and lives by his sword and his wits. He is what all men wish they could be, free to roam. It is built within men to crave wanderlust. This is why men don’t ask for directions. They want to feel that rush of excitement of being in a new place, a place they’ve never been before, an undiscovered country. As John Eldridge’s book is titled, men are “Wild At Heart”. When you watch boys playing, there is always some conflict involved, an enemy to overcome, a villain to defeat. Boys crave the wildness of it, the thrill of conquering it, and to receive the adulation for their victory. Boys would echo Alexander the Great’s famous lament, “are there no more worlds to conquer?” if they couldn’t express this wildness of their soul.
Eldridge bases this idea on the pattern in which Adam and Eve were created. Genesis 2 says that when God created Adam, he breathed his own breath into him, the Breath of Life. Then God placed Adam in the garden, in order to work it and keep it. Notice this: Adam was created outside the garden. Adam wasn’t created in the orderly and well-groomed garden, but in the wild and savage world. Eve was created in the garden, from one of Adam’s ribs, in God’s beautiful, civilized garden. The difference he points out is this: Adam was created in the wild, while Eve was created in the subdued garden.
A look inside the DNA of men and women can tell us something else. Inside the DNA of women is the marked difference from men. Women possess a double-X chromosome, two homogenous genes. Men possess an XY chromosome. Even in the DNA, men don’t have two well-behaved genes that have everything in common, but two different chromosomes, that don’t agree on anything. It is built within the very DNA of a man to be disagreeable.
But there is a second element in Eldridge’s book. Though every man is wild at heart, he yearns for a princess to save, a princess to pursue, and yes, a princess to “conquer” and claim for his own. For there is one force powerful enough to bind a man to a place and responsibility, and that is the love of a woman. It is this force which will bring to a man the responsibility that his heart dislikes, which would bind the man to a home, a job, and a family. It is this force which will bring a man to fatherhood.
What is the difference between a man and a father? Though many men have fathered children, not all are truly Dads. A father strikes the perfect balance his wild nature and his marital responsibility. He is still wild enough to lead his family into the adventure of living, but responsible enough to provide, love, and discipline. But a man cannot keep this balance on his own, if he doesn’t know the Lord, only a man of iron will be able to succeed.
We know what the wreckage of lives look like when men weren’t strong enough, or had no God to hold their hand.
This month we applaud the fathers. Those are the men who have put aside their wanderlust for the love of a good woman and raised his children with honor and respect. We salute the fathers that stayed home, resisted their natural impulses, forbade their eyes or feet to stray, to give in to all the things that would pull them away from the children they have fathered, these all who have resisted temptations so that their children would know the Lord.
Do you have to know Jesus to be a good father? No, but he helps. It helps to have a better answer than, “because I said so.” We all know fathers who fail, fathers who don’t know Jesus. We could even be married to them. Pray for our fathers this month. Let’s help our fathers know the Father, who our best example of what a Father is.
Meritt Musings 