Our cultural moment right now is an interesting one.
There is a trend in our culture towards a bubble-wrapped society that is entirely safe and simultaneously entirely restrained. Sensitivity is the highest form of virtue, according to this trending ethos. We would rather lose our freedom to speak uncomfortable truth freely than face the discomfort of speaking uncomfortable truth.
This trend may be called a “coddling”. And it’s not just coddling, it’s a trend of stifling too. Because not only do some in our culture want to be coddled, but they want others who do not share their sensitivity to be stifled. In an attempt to create an emotionally safe society, protected from any insensitive wounding, we have created a society where silence is the only safety (and even that, sometimes is not safe).
This is the ethos of “cancel culture”, a name given to this hypersensitive protectionism against offense.
“Red-Pilled”
On the other hand, we have begun to see alternative voices speaking out against this soft tyranny. Some of these voices are unreasonably harsh and self-glorifying. And yet, they amass a following.
Take, for example, the situation of young men in our culture. There are many maladies afflicting our society’s young men but in the midst of all these maladies there are certain voices that stand out and offer an alternative path. Some, like Jordan Peterson, are generally helpful and productive voices that offer wisdom in the face of such maladies. Others, like Andrew Tate, are thoroughly negative influences who command a following nonetheless.
The rise of the “red pill” phenomenon is a good illustration. “Redpilled” is the conservative version of “woke” and it comes from the movie The Matrix where taking the red pill is associated with waking up from the simulation and seeing reality for how it really is. The use of the phrase, in my experience at least, has often been in connection with disillusioned young men abandoning what society tells them to pursue and seeing the deeper maladies that they face in a feminist-influenced society.
The way that society handles masculinity is a central element of this conversation. We’ve been conditioned against “toxic” masculinity to the point that any expression of masculinity is deemed toxic and problematic. This is an overreaction worthy of abandonment. However, as a reaction to this, voices in the culture have emerged that speak to young men and promote what is, essentially, toxic abuses of masculinity.
Radicalization of Young Men
It’s like the person who gets so tired of being called a racist for every little innocent thing he does that he eventually embraces true racism. He gets told that he’s a problem because of his whiteness and next thing you know he’s found a podcast somewhere that ridicules the hypersensitivity of the “woke mob”. This hypothetical podcast also happens to traffic conspiracy theories about certain ethnic groups controlling things behind the scenes. Before you know it, your hypothetical white man is now embracing radical and dangerously racist ideas because they’re coming from the same people who are validating his feeling of being unjustly maligned for his own ethnic heritage.
Now, in the paragraph above, swap out race for gender. A young man grows up getting told that his masculine expressions are toxic. That because women don’t understand why he would want to play tackle football or go hunting, they tell him that it’s a bad thing that he wants it. He finds a podcast where the host bemoans the feminizing of the culture and the hypersensitivity around him and he’s hooked. But what happens when that same podcast host postulates that women were created to be subservient to men. Or that men with compassion are by nature weaker and not favored by evolution. Well, over time you’ll most likely find that your young man has radicalized into a chauvinistic misogynist.
The “radicalization” of your culture’s young men is partly the fault of people “on the right” (I use this phrase very loosely and in a non-political way) who are promoting dangerous ideas about sex, gender roles, race, and the like. Of course, it’s also partly the fault of the young men themselves who are swallowing this stuff hook, line, and sinker. But we can’t neglect to mention the part of the blame that belongs to the mainstream society at large that is essentially “pushing” these young men into more and more radical places.
Impact in the Church
And how does this all impact the church? Well, here again we see the ditch that young men are climbing out of. There’s a Jesus-is-my-boyfriend kind of Christianity that turns men away. It’s a gospel of warm fuzzy feelings in my heart where I go to sing worship songs and raise my hands and cry and have an emotional experience. Little wonder that many men are just simply not interested.
So they either turn away from Christianity/church altogether or they find a flavor of Christianity that is closer to beef jerky than chocolate bonbons. There’s a certain variety of theology gaining steam now that promotes “Christian nationalism” and the idea of taking dominion over the nation and planting the standard of Christ on the ridge. It’s a Christianity that beckons young men up San Juan Hill to conquer.
I don’t have the space here today to get deep into the Christian nationalism issue or to even discuss political theology or the ideas of theonomy and the like. But I do see this theology gaining traction amidst Christians who are sick and tired of the coddling of evangelical culture. Just like the secular young man may be radicalized by chauvinistic YouTubers railing against a hypersensitive, weak-willed, feminized society of “wussies”, the Christian young man may also be “radicalized” (if we dare call it that) by masculinized theology about crushing enemies under our feet that rejects the “God is a warm feeling in my heart” theology that has overtaken many churches.
“The Whole Christ”
I’d like to conclude by trying to express what I think we need to keep in mind going forward.
Christian men need to know and follow the whole Christ. (Of course, the same goes for Christian women and churches too.) Knowing and following Christ as He is revealed in Scripture is going to bring us to places that are uncomfortable for both sides.
The Jesus of the Bible is not a soy pancake. He’s got flaming eyes (Rev. 1:14). His voice is loud and sounds like a waterfall (Rev. 1:15). Out of His mouth comes a sword (Rev. 1:16). He rules with a rod of iron and dashes His enemies to pieces (Rev. 19:15, Ps. 2:9). He turns over tables and drives away their managers with a whip (John 2:15). His anger burns in his soul against all that harms His people (John 11:33). His wrath is just and cannot be withstood (Rev. 6:16-17).
The Jesus of the Bible is also not a self-centered misogynistic chauvinist. He is gentle and tender (Matt. 12:20). He blesses those who are meek (Matt. 5:5). He speaks tenderly to women (John 20:16). He lays down His life for His bride (Eph. 5:25). He welcomed the presence of little children (Matt. 19:14). He commanded His followers to love (John 15:12). He wept publicly for His friend (John 11:35-36).
If anything in the previous two paragraphs offends us then we must change ourselves, not Jesus. Christ was masculine and sensitive. Powerful and gentle. He was a walking paradox in more than one way. And while we cannot expect to follow Him perfectly this side of eternity, we must understand that the purpose God has given us is conformity to His Son (Rom. 8:29). There are some Christians who need to “buck up” and let Jesus be the man He is. And other Christians need to “get over” the fact that Jesus was more sensitive and gentle than they’d like Him to be. We don’t get to make God in our image. We conform to the image of Christ.
We can rest assured that Jesus is not a contradiction. And He’s not a Jekyll/Hyde confusion. All His character shines forth in all He does. His gentle love is powerfully masculine. His victorious dominion is benevolent and loving. He is gloriously not-like-us. We should not shrink back from declaring the full counsel of God (Acts 20:27) whether it offends our hypersensitive “cancel culture” or whether it repudiates the enticing alternatives we manage to find.