Why Men Hate Going To Church

Why Many Men Hate Going To Church

Introduction

1. Today I am going to give all of you something to talk about around the dinner table for the next few weeks. I am going to challenge some of you to look at Jesus differently than you possibly have and my hope is that you get a better understanding of who He really was and how His kingdom really works.

2. I received an article from the Columbus Dispatch 12/22/06. The title was “Christians flex manly attitude.” It was all about the church realizing that it is not reaching men and what some churches are doing about it. It is an interesting article, about a preacher Brad Stine who when he preaches adds a little color with a swear word every now and then. Here is one of his quotes, “It is the wuss-ification of America that is getting us!” Part of his closing prayer goes like this, “Thank you Lord for our testosterone!”

3. Many churches and pastors are taking a new look at only presenting Jesus as being meek and mild. There seems to be a great concern that the Christian faith has been effeminized. A new kind of men’s movement is sweeping across America right now. It involves weekend paintball wars, wilderness retreats, and X-rated chats about lust. Thousands of Christian men are reaching for more forceful, more rugged expressions of their faith.

4. Several best selling books have come out in the past few years addressing this issue. “Wild At Heart” by John Eldredge, and “Why Men Hate Going to Church” by David Murrow, and “No more Mr. Nice Guy” by Paul Coughlin. They are all saying the same thing, Christianity has been effeminized and as a result it is not effectively reaching men.

5. The national average for churches across US is almost 70% women and 30% men. In many churches it is more like 80% women and 20% men. Now some people have made faulty conclusions because of this. They assume that men are not going to church because they are not spiritual and they think that women are “more spiritual.” How ridiculous! If that were true someone would have to tell God, since He was the one that said that the man is to be the spiritual head of his house. If the woman was naturally more spiritual, God would have made her the spiritual head of the family. Men are very spiritual and it can be seen in many of the major world religions like Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism and especially Moslems, where men are clearly the majority and unashamed about their spirituality. The problem only seems to be in the Christian church that a fair representation of men are clearly absent.

6. Now I realize that talking about this kind of stuff is not really politically correct. And I realize that if I talk about stuff like this, some ladies are going to leave here convinced that I am starting a “good old boys” club.

We are not starting a “he man women haters club.”

1. Now just relax. I am not trying to start a “good old boys club.” Some people are just so religious and so uptight about life. You need to step back and don’t take yourself so seriously, take a deep breath, have a sense of humor.

2. I am just trying to bring some balance to the church. I have been concerned about the effeminization of the Christian church for 10 years. This is why I have purposely made it a point to do men stuff on Sunday. Some people think that the reason we have Biker Sunday, Hunter Sunday, Hot Rod Sunday is because I just like to be radical. Well there is some truth to that, but the main reason is that I am being intentional about reaching men.

3. We must be doing something right. We surveyed our church for the several months toward the end of last year and on Sunday we are almost at 54% women and 46% men.

4. This year I have been working with Ps. Mark to think outside the box when it comes to men’s ministry. We have men who like to camp and came on our father/son camping trip last year. It was a very spiritual event. We have men who like to fish and came on our fishing trip last year. It was a very spiritual event. We have men who like muscle cars, motorcycles, jazz and rock music, tools, barbequing, sports, exercise, card playing, and so on. We are working on using these interests to help men become stronger spiritual men. Instead of just having “boring men’s meetings” that have no focus we are setting up men’s activities that encourage men to get together and build friendship doing things men like to do. We see this as extremely valuable to furthering the Kingdom of God. This is one of our church goals. Our church’s mission is to “build people.” We do this by helping people “Get in the game” 1st base “finding God,” 2nd base “finding friends,” 3rd base “finding family,” and scoring at home plate by “finding purpose” in serving.” I am passionate about this. I have committed my life to this.