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Boys are Made in God’s Image – With a Spirit of Power, Courage and Strength
Society has decided that girls are the new boys. Girls are being told to be strong, powerful, bold, brave, courageous, dominating, forceful, etc. They are being taught to take on those characteristics without embracing what it means to be a girl made in the image of God. Girls were meant to be classy not sassy!
But what about the boys? In an effort to bring up the girls it has come at a great cost to the boys. They are being marketed as less than. The male image has become trampled on and devalued. Go into any boys apparel department and you will find graphic t-shirts glorifying laziness, lack of motivation, boredom, or the focus on playing video games and eating.
Focus on the marketing the next time you go into a mall. The males in the ads are being placed in passive positions and stances. Shoulders hunched forward. Heads down and looking up to the side. This is with purpose to send a message. Now look at the stances and positions of the females.
Our school systems are no better. I’m a Christian mental health therapist. I work with many children who legitimately have ADHD. But simply being a boy does not qualify! Schools as we know them today are geared towards girls. As a whole, girls are more able to sit still and focus on one task for longer periods of time than boys. And if a boy is unable to sit still for hours at a time and not talk then he must have ADHD and get put on medication. I’m not okay with that. We shouldn’t be okay with that.
Attempting to build up someone (girls) at the demise of someone else (boys) in not okay or good. In fact it is pure evil.
2 Timothy 1:7 For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.
Paul wrote to Timothy as a way to pass the torch, in a sense, as Paul was imprisoned and nearing death. By accounts, Timothy was a shy person by nature but Paul reminds him in 1:7 For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.
Timidity, passivity, apprehension, and procrastination comes from lack of self-worth and anxiety. I am seeing an influx in adolescent boys who are increasing struggling with anxiety. We spend countless sessions focusing on their talents and interests to develop their identity, worth, and self-esteem.
Society is stripping away boys’ self-worth! By asking, forcing, or demanding that a boy not be allowed to tap into his sense of strength and power, they are being diminished.
Boys are made in the image of God!
Joshua 10:25 “Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged. Be strong and courageous. This is what the Lord will do to all the enemies you are going to fight.”
The phrase “be strong and courageous” is said 11 times in the bible within four books: Deuteronomy, Joshua, 1 Chronicles, and 2 Chronicles. In each scripture verse it is talking about taking action in some way.
I chose Joshua 10:25 to make a point and focus on the last part of the verse, “…to all the enemies you are going to fight.”
Fight! Good against evil. Fight!
Boys are made in God’s image! Think of the themes little boys play! Good guys verses bad guys. Superheros verses villains. Cops verses robbers. This is inherent and innate.
Boys believe in doing good and they were built for action to do it!
Let Boys be Boys
As a mom, I’ll admit this can be hard at times. My son is creative and imaginative. And when he is imagining he is energetic, active, and loud! So there are times that I just want peace in my home and I want to squelch the noise. But, if I take the time to actually listen to the themes of his play, it is almost always about good verses evil. He is acting out his spirit of power, strength, and courage!
Now of course there are times that my son needs to slow down and be calm (the dinner table). But I try to make sure when I remind him of “there’s a time and a place” that I actually provide a time and a place for him to be the boy God wants him to be.
Let your boy-
- pretend fight
- play and/or make pretend weapons
- wrestle
- be physical
- play sports
- be in martial arts
- take risks (even if he may get a little hurt)
- climb trees, walls, rocks, etc.
- protect/defend someone else
- go on adventures
There are great resources to help develop and foster your boy’s spirit of power, strength, and courage!
And for your husband, too!
I sincerely pray that this post meets you where you are today and helps you to embrace and encourage your boy to be the boy God designed him to be!
For fun ways to encourage your son’s development check out my post 20 Father-Son Outings to Increase Connection and 20 Mother-Son Dates to increase Connection.
God Bless,
Melissa
I love the title of your post. I think where people get a little “over the edge” is when they don’t teach their boys that there is a “time and a place” as you said. Being a mom of boys, I totally understand their need to be active and loud. It is so important to allow them to be unleashed but also self controlled. Nice!
Absolutely! Thank you for reading and commenting. God bless!
I have also seen a recent influx in adolescent boys who are struggling with anxiety! I teach the youth at my local church and this seems to be a constant battle within their minds. Very well done! Thank you for the great reminder found in Joshua 10:25!!
Your welcome! I’m glad it was a good reminder. Thank you for reading and commenting! God bless!
Wow! You make some great points and wonderful insights! However, I have to say the church has done a great job of making women feel less than equal all on their own. Something Jesus never did while he walked on earth or when God created us. Maybe, if the church worked harder on teaching everyone about the dangers of not treating each other equally, we could then share that message with the world.
Sheila I don’t disagree with you. The church at times has done a disservice to both women and men! That can be a post for the future! In this post I really wanted to focus on the importance of letting boys be boys and not trying to tear them down for the sake of lifting up girls. God created us to be equally important and uniquely different so truly they cannot be compared!
This post is fantastic! It’s a sad reality that boys and men are being beat down in order to raise girls and women up.
Great resources! I’ll have to check them out.
It is a sad reality. Thank you for reading and commenting! All the books are great! We use principles from Knights in Training in our house. He enjoys the idea of becoming a knight and we teach him the code of chivalry. Wild at Heart is an amazing book for any young adult male on up. It also was a great read for me as a wife to better understand the strongholds of a man. God bless!
1. Thank you for writing this.
2. Some of the books you’ve mentioned are really good. I would add That’s My Son to the list.
3. The hardest part, for me as a parent, is the self control part. Just as you mentioned, schools, Sunday schools, any controlled environment… wants my son to sit still and listen as a girl might. He’s five. It’s just not gonna happen. I can’t tell you how many people I’ve had to tell, over the years, “No. He does not have ADD or ADHD…Yes, that’s the opinion of three medical professionals.”
I’m so sorry for your son and for you that you have to deal with people who just don’t understand the appropriate development of boys. They are just different than girls! Thank you for the book recommendation. Thank you for reading and commenting. God bless!
Hyper masculinity is toxic, you should really look at the statistics of the violence men perpetrate due to this notion that men are made to be tough. I’m sure you’ll be glad to know I have used this article to portray the societies view on men in my Social Inequality class at college. As a Psychology major, it saddens me to see that you denounce the femininity in men- as love, compassion, sadness, etc. are things we as human beings all feel. I am sorry that the pose of a man in an advertisement makes you uneasy, but maybe if you focused less on gender conformity and more about inclusiveness, your knowledge as a “mental health counselor” wouldn’t be as skewed. I pray you let the boys you counsel have emotions and stop denying their validity of mental disorders, and one day believe a rise in female equality is not “pure evil”.
Micah 6:8:
He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?
There is power in equality. I leave you with this.
Proverbs 21:19
It is better to live in a desert land than with a quarrelsome and fretful woman.
Guinevere, thank you for reading the post. Your comment warrants multiple responses as you make many false dichotomies and assumed superlatives.
You start out by referencing “hyper-masculinity”, this is a term for the exaggeration of male stereotypical behavior, such as an emphasis on physical strength, aggression, and sexuality. My post doesn’t portray a desire for an exaggeration of stereotypical behavior. I’m proposing that society is now attempting to strip males, particularly young and adolescent males, of their innate desire to protect and defend.
That leads me to your next point of “the violence men perpetrate due to this notion that men are made to be tough.” Be aware that your stating “due” means that you are capable of knowing their intent. That is a dangerous assumption to make and one that is often fraught with errors. The statistics are only able to provide the numbers, it is not able to give you causation.
However, we are able to look at many different factors. In the areas of the United States where male violence is the most prevalent, we also see decreased rates of fathers within the home, increased gang affiliations, as well as increased drug use. In those areas of the country a more appropriate term to use would be machismo, which is a form of masculinity that emphasizes power and is often associated with a disregard for consequences and responsibility. My post does not endorse or celebrate the use of power of any kind for one’s own benefit. Again, boys innately have a desire for themes of play associated with good vs. bad and to protect and defend.
Also, another statistic to view is that the only common factor in the male perpetrated school shootings has been no father within the home. Those statistics would actually lean toward the belief that the presence of a healthy male figure within the home decreases violence.
I am glad that you brought this post to your class as I hope your professor also acknowledged the danger and potential unintended consequences that can take place when assumptions about intent are made.
As far as “denounce the femininity in men”, this is a false dichotomy that I did not make. Nowhere do I say that boys and men shouldn’t show and represent love, compassion, sadness, etc. Yes, those are emotions that human being all feel. Again, the point of my post was to address the fact that society seems to want to strip away the innate and inherently masculine qualities of men – courage, strength, bravery, etc. It is not an “or” statement.
My focus on the poses of males in advertisements was to highlight my point that society is attempting to present men in a more passive and weak way. Instead of teaching men how to embrace the desire to protect and defend, society is trying to reinforce strength in men is bad.
Of course, I allow and encourage the boys in my office to have emotions. This again is another example of your comment creating a false dichotomy I did not make in my post. I stated, “I am seeing an influx in adolescent boys who are increasingly struggling with anxiety. We spend countless sessions focusing on their talents and interests to develop their identity, worth, and self-esteem.” – I’m not sure how you are coming to the conclusion that I am “denying their validity of mental disorders.” As a therapist, our role is to help our clients recognize their emotions, understand why they are happening, where they are coming from, and then help them to appropriately tolerate and manage the emotions.
Your point of “one day believe a rise in female equality is not “pure evil” suggests you didn’t understand my statement. I wrote, “Attempting to build up someone (girls) at the demise of someone else (boys) is not okay or good.” First, I do not believe society is attempting to create female equality, I believe it is attempting to create female domination. Anytime a people or society tries to downgrade a certain population, race, religion or gender that is a society that is seeking domination over that particular population. Trying to hinder a significant aspect of the male psyche and portraying it as bad is to the demise of males. That is then with evil intent.
I’m honestly not sure what to make of your Bible references. I don’t disagree with either of them and I’m not sure how they support the point you’re making in your comment.
Many Blessings,
Melissa