On Being a Lord

Join us here in Ogden this June for our annual new Christmas conference. This year's theme, the War for Normal, features a great lineup of speakers as well as a whole bunch of fun events to make new friends with like-minded saints. Tickets are more affordable than ever this year with a brand new family pass covering your entire household for one low price. Head to newcrissonempress.com/20206 for tickets and more information. This episode is brought to you by Indigo Sondry's soap company. Clean soap, cleaner body. In our current series here on BrightHearth on Being Human, we've been talking through four aspects of life where a man or a woman can grow, prove and become more fruitful as a result. Those are the physical, the spiritual, the social, and the vocational. In well over a dozen episodes so far, we've worked through those first three categories we've laid out a vision for embodied and physical life for the life of the soul. For social life, living well in community and the family and church and your neighbor. We've talked about your people in place. Last week, we introduced that final subject, "Vocations." Seeing how our vocations are the things that God calls us to do in obedience to him. In this episode of BrightHearth, we take up the vocations of the man, the man, the husband, the father, the head of his household. Every man feels the weight of all of this. Every day, his choice is ripple outward, the tone he sets at the table, the decisions he makes about provision and protection, the way he strives to love his wife from wedding day to funeral, the words he speaks to his children and discipline and encouragement, and more, all of it matters, all of it's heavy. It's heavy because he knows that as goes the head, so goes the household. Scripture is clear in this order, by the way. In Ephesians 5.23, Paul writes, "For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself, its savior." This isn't just some kind of suggestion or cultural relic from a defunctime past. No, this is God's design from creation. He wove this into the foundations of his world. The man stands in the place of Christ in his home and marriage. He shares the title "Father with God Almighty." What could be way dear than this? So join us for another episode of BrightHearth, working through the particular vocations, the callings of the man, what they are, why they matter, and how to take them up with strength and courage. Welcome back to BrightHearth, everybody. Brian and Lexi are here. Yes, we are. Hi. So good to be here with you. Once again, Lexi, looking in fine fluff and feather under your chicken lamp. It's chicken lamp time of year. Chicken lamp. I'm still sick. You should get under this chicken lamp. I really should. You would be sick. Is that a vitamin D lamp? Does that give you any vitamin D? No, nothing. Just warms you up. So I keep telling you to come sit outside with me. You know, this is a morale lamp. It's what it is. Okay. It's a lot better. Guys, how is your chicken lamp going? I'm sure there's plenty of people out there doing it. Let us know in the comments how you're doing. Let us know in the comments by smashing that like, smashing that notification bell, leaving us a five star of you wherever you're listening. You know, all the normal things you would do to tell somebody how you're doing by highly reviewing their podcast on whatever relevant directory you're listening from. I think that's all that we have to say today. I do want to remind you guys, we're talking about some big things today. The vocations of the man and there's a lot there. But in a classic air contrast and you know what else is there's a lot there too of and then war for normal calm. The war for normal calm where you can learn more about our upcoming conference. And guys, it's going to be, it's going to be so much fun. Go there. Enjoy the beautiful, beautiful website. It's a tremendous website. Everybody's saying are tickets available now? Oh, yeah. They've been available since last year. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I actually do remember that. We are going to sell out. I'm not kidding. You should get your tickets now because we're over a third of the way sold out. That's what I was going to ask is how many probably close to half when this episode comes out. Cool. That's funny. And come guys, there's going to be a golf tournament come and play in the golf tournament. It's going to be so much fun. There'll be a breakfast golf tournament, a bunch of stuff, family hang out that morning for those not golfing. TCP Games Thursday afternoon with an award ceremony, big awards, tremendous, everybody's saying it. It's going to be amazing. So come join us in Ogden, stay for church on Sunday. If you can, we're going to have a barbecue that Sunday afternoon. And that's how we got that's the housekeeping for today. So once Lexi's done yawning, I'm getting hungry guys. Well, you're sitting under your lamp. You just wait through the day. That's a nappy lamp. I know what it is. I should turn it up. I should turn it up. The nap lamp is not consistent with no, keep it on. I need it. I need the morale boost. Okay. We're talking today about the primary vocations of the man generally. We're going to focus a lot on the vocations of a married man with children in particular. Though there is obviously a lot of overlap between the two, but this is bright heart. This is productive Christian household. We will get more granular in future episodes about things like making more money as a provider when you laugh. I used that word in the last in the kitchen, but I was. I'm tired. And I was like, is it granular or granular? Glannular. I sat there way too long thinking about it. Last week Lexi did it in the kitchen, which is our Patreon podcast on the exercise that she does for writing down vocations. And she got really granular with it. You do something really similar that I've heard you talk to young men about that I think you should do an in the kitchen on for this episode. Oh, okay. I like it. You have. I don't know how to talk to people about that. Maybe I will. Okay. We'll see. That might throw my mojo off. I am writing. Here's the thing right now. I'm writing a book that is like a hundred thousand word long book just about the verse in Ephesians 5 that husbands should love their wives. It's going to be so good. There is quite a bit in that book about vocation, about mission, about agency, about the man as head and leader. A lot of what we're going to talk about in this episode, but that's going to be a full book. So hey, put it on your calendar. I don't know when to put it on your calendar for. So that's your future rain check in the kitchen on my book. Read my book. Read the book. Okay. I'm sick, babe. We're a little slap happy. Right now I have the mental capacity of you remember that bird in YouTube when in early YouTube video, it was a bird that was eating fermented apples. Okay. Oh, and I got drunk. I got drunk. And this guy was filming with his phone. It was like 2009 or something. And he was like narrating it like David Attenborough. Like as the leaves to the shades of yellow, hues of orange and gold, some of our less responsible woodland creatures are getting absolutely hammered in the park on a Tuesday morning. And I have the mental capacity of that bird right now because of this cold, but you're not there's no alcohol. No, no, as I said, like, just to clarify. And as I said last week, I currently am experiencing twice the agony of a woman in childbirth because I have the common cold. Let's talk about the vocation, manhood. That said. Okay. First of all, I'm going to we're going to talk about vocation to manhood. I'm going to be asking Lexi throughout these kind of like from the perspective of a wife, what are the ways that she interacts with these and how he can be helpful and be good at them for I use good words, good strong words like that. How to be goodly at them and to be the goodliest. So the first thing I wanted to do is just kind of lay out the primary vocations of of masculinity, the man and then and then move in to some of the vocational like the married man with children in particular. If you have listened to me for any length of time, you know that I really like Bill Mauser's five aspects of masculinity, William Mauser, the late William Mauser, unfortunately. I believe he died of cancer not too long ago, but good man. And he wrote some helpful things on masculinity. He wrote a book called The Story of Sex in Scripture about masculinity, femininity, that sort of thing. He described the biblical pattern for masculinity through five aspects of the male. They're not necessarily vocations, but they kind of are. And those are Lord, husband, men, savior, sage and glory bearer. So these are five things that according to Bill Mauser describe the man in Scripture, the godly man. You will hear, you'll notice that if you heard me say that, you're like, that sounds like a lot of other people. A lot of people ripped Bill Mauser off on this. They were like, that's really good. Mark Driscoll was like, Oh, I was thinking the other day. And then he like just said all five of these things. was kind of funny. I don't think he gave him credit, but Doug Wilson in his, some of his books refers to, it does give credit to Bill Bowser and talks about them. I think in future men he talks about this. It's just a great paradigm. It's straightforwardly biblical. I've preached multiple sermons on each of these in the Blueprints for Biblical Household series that I preached, you know, maybe last within the last two years at this point. If you want to go listen to those. But briefly, these are really helpful in framing some of the vocations because a man as Lord means that the man was created to lead or to rule. We'll talk about the head in a minute of the home and how this maps on. But that means that a man is called, there's that word called of God to lead. He's called of God to take initiative and leadership and this shows up everywhere. So it's, he's to rule his own spirit. So is the woman she's to rule her own spirit as well. But the man is to lead in his home. The woman is not in the same way. The man is to lead in the church. The man is to lead in society politically and civically. So masculinity is given to it. It was made for rule. Now all of these aspects of masculinity aren't just things that the man does. They are things that God made him to do. So there are things that are, they are in accord with his, their harmonious with his nature is a way to think about it. God didn't just make a man unit and a woman unit and then say to each of them, here's some arbitrary things to do. Don't you dare do the woman things if you're a man or the man things if you're a woman and then nothing else. No, he actually made a man and he was like, well, he's, he's for rule. And so he's going to have these characteristics in his nature that are consistent with that. He's going to be an initiative taker. He's going to be create, you know, one who is not as worried about consensus. He's going to be more disagreeable. Women are more agreeable. They're more consensus building. Women fight differently than men. Men build and fight differently than women. So men are called to be lords. We could go on and on about this. You see this over and over in scripture. The man is called to rule. Don't get hung up in that word, Lord. You could say rule. You could say had you could say leader. They're all synonymous really. He's called to be Lord. Now Sarah does call you should call him Lord. I mean, I like it. There's a really good section in good on the different titles to call your husband. It's really good. It's really good. Yeah. William Gooch of Domestical duties. Great book. I'm, I actually cite it extensively in my book on loving your wife because he has so much on things like correcting your wife. There's a whole chapter in my book on correcting your wife, which is won't get me in trouble at all. But Gooch has some really good. He compares Gooch and of Domestical duties. He compares a husband who won't correct his wife to a husband who would watch his wife drown and not helper. That was that section you read. Yeah. That was. Or watch her burn to death in a house fire and not run any getter. That he's that bad. So a man is, is to be a lord. A husband man is just a shepherd. It's another word for shepherd. So he's to rule, but he's also to tend like a man. You can see this in Proverbs. He shouldn't carefully know the state of flocks. He should know how his people are doing. He should tend and lead them to green pastors. It's another function of leadership, but it has a different component. He's a husband man. He's also a savior. You'll notice that these are all things Christ is and does, right? So they're not blasphemous. They're not saying that a man is a savior like Christ is, but a man is ahead of his home the way Christ is. It's like that. Man is a lowercase S savior, meaning that he should be ready to rescue people, especially his people, his wife and children and others as well from danger. He should be quick to put himself between danger and his people physically, spiritually, covenantally in many ways. We'll talk about a husband is to be a sage, meaning he's to pursue wisdom. The book of Proverbs is primarily written by a father to his sons to teach them how to be men. That's primarily what Proverbs is about and has broad applicability to women as well, but it is primarily in its occasion, a book of a father to his sons, particularly even a royal father. This sons, we're going to lead a nation. So he's to be a sage. He should pursue wisdom, which is both knowing things and knowing what to do about things. And then lastly, he's a glory bearer in good or sorry, Mauser gets this particularly from Paul's comments and 1 Corinthians 11 that the man is the glory of God and the woman is not the glory of God. The woman is the glory of man. So Paul says for the man is the glory of God and the woman is the glory of man. And so a man also as an aspect of his masculinity uniquely represents the glory of God. And you can see this in some of the ways where where the man shares titles with God that the woman doesn't like father and lord. She doesn't son. She doesn't share that in the heavenly realm. The woman is a co-air with him in the same way that a son is. So this is one of those aspects where there's neither male nor female Galatians 328 in with respect to heavenly things. Your wife is a co-air. Peter reminds men of this treat her kindly with gentleness, not with harshness because she's a co-air with you of grace. In heavenly things, many of the distinctions of earth go away in the same way. So like slave nor free is not an earthly distinction that does obtain and we have duties related to it in earth on earth, but we don't relate to God in the heavenly things the same way. So this is one of those things where in the earthly things the man shares titles with God that the woman simply doesn't even including son, but things like father, lord. These are aspects of his masculinity. So he bears glory in a particular way. He relates to God in a particular way that she doesn't in the exact same way. I think these are very helpful in beginning to think about vocations, but they're not exactly vocations the same way that we're talking about. Hey there friends. Let me tell you about great totalum. They're a family owned small business passionate about creating skincare products that nourish your skin with pure wholesome ingredients. For centuries, Tallow has been valued for its moisturizing and healing properties and Grey Toed Tallow is dedicated to sharing these benefits with your family. They strive to keep their products affordable and accessible, aiming to be a blessing to you and your family. Visit GreyToedTallow.com to learn more and try a balm sample pack. And don't forget to use code Bright15 that's all caps Bright15 for 15% off your order. Thanks for supporting this great small business. When you have a busy house, the immediate demands of activities, events and never-ending to-do lists can overshadow critical long-term decisions. Life insurance, financial planning, education savings, and retirement are continually backburnered. Joe Garracy and his team from backwards planning financial will help you maximize financial tools, management, and strategies. So you can focus on your home and have confidence for your financial future. Visit backwards planning financial.com that is backwards planning financial.com or call 615-767-2555 to speak with Joe to develop a plan for the future. You know how they say they don't make things like they used to? Well now we do. Edwin's heirlooms is a family-run business that provides handmade wooden toys for all ages. From stick horses and push pull toys to tabletop board games for the whole family, all crafted from sturdy materials that ensure heirloom quality and vintage feel. They're aiming to bring back nostalgia and imagination to the things we play with. When you buy Edwin's heirlooms, you buy Love Handed Down. Explore the full catalog at edwin's heirlooms.com and use code HARTH. All caps HARTH for 10% off your order. So I wanted to list them up front as sort of a framework to be thinking about. I think all five of those aspects play into our different vocations where a man will see as a provider and in doing that he is to be a lord and a shepherd and a sage. So those aspects play into it. All five aspects are with him in everything he does. So he needs to be thinking about them as sort of like the baseline programming that makes him a virtuous man and a competent man and then go into his vocations. The particular things God calls him to do. Those are things he is. God calls him to be those things. His vocations are things God calls him to do. If that makes sense. Our kids are being quite boisterous and it's wonderful. They went to the garage. Ah, I see. Before we start talking practically about the vocations of a man and particularly in the household, anything you wanted to add on that kind of what those five aspects any thoughts, anecdotes, compliments. I've been looking at your biceps. They've been pretty distracting. Perfect. That is really sickly. But I was fishing for that to be honest guys. I'm feeling kind of low and I needed a little encouragement. So I appreciated that gave me the energy to move into this next section of the outline. I really appreciate that. And I might talk more in this episode because it's just it's a man's stuff which is fine. But I do want to hear Lexi's like I said, take on a lot of this stuff and how especially how she has a woman in my helper relates to some of these aspects of my vocations. Okay. Let's talk about the primary vocations of that. That's kind of man in general. Let's move into this just married man with children. This productive Christian household married man with children, his primary vocations and callings. The basic one that I would give is that he has kind of one main vocation that results in multiple subvocations that all serve that vocation. And that, and I think the same way about the woman. Yeah, I kind of talked about that a little bit on the kitchen. Perfect. For the man, it's that he is the head. That's his primary thing that he is to do. Be the head of your wife and of your household. That's why he say head of household. He's the head. We'll talk about what that means. And underneath that, there's a lot of smaller vocations that, but they all serve that one like provider. He must do that. And actually, most of his time in life is going to be spent by volume number of hours, probably thinking about how to do that vocation. But that's not the primary one. A head is, and he provides because he is the head and the head provides. Okay. Protector is another one. He has a vocation of being a protector of his family, spiritually, physically, all the rest. He has a vocation of father. And that one has multiple under it, including education, discipleship, discipline, encouragement, pre, again, provision, things like that as a father inheritance. But let's just talk first about the main parts of a husband's vocation as the head of his wife and what that means. The feminists have been trying to cook the books on this one for the last 100 or 200 years and say all sorts of silly things because the word had, Kethalie or however you pronounce in Greek, I don't really know. I went to public school. It can be used of things like the head of a river, like the source of something. And so some women try to reduce this, some feminists, some men as well. Try to reduce this to the man is like the source of the woman. It's just talking about how the woman came from the man. Paul's not talking about leadership. Yeah. That's dumb. It's not how any Christian thought of this passage ever. And when you look at the duties that are involved, the wife is immediately told in the same context to submit to her husband. Which means to obey him, which means he's telling her to do things, which is a leadership function. So when we say head, we are talking about like the head on top of a body. It's directing the body. It's leading it. It is telling it where to go. It's directing the hands. It's directing the feet. It's a head like that. We're talking about like the head of a clan, like a chief tin or a ruler or a Lord, someone who directs. We're talking about essentially leadership there. And then of course, Paul defines leadership in many ways, but at the heart of it is love. The husband is to be the head who loves his wife. Well, and so part of his love for his wife is to lead her well and to be a good ruler, to be a good Lord, to be a good chief, then to be a good head of his home. And again, on this William Gooch has such a good section about how ahead the duties of the head grow out of love. I want to read this. He doesn't an unexpected way to a modern. He says, "All the branches which grow out of this root of love, as they cover the husband's duties, may be drawn to two heads." Number one, a wise maintaining of his authority. Number two, a right managing of the same. That these two branches, or that these two are branches of a husband's love, is evident by the place in which God has set him, which is a place of authority. What are the best good that any can do are those which are done in his proper position, in his own proper position and by virtue of it. If then a husband relinquishes his authority, he takes away his ability to do that good and show those fruits of love which he otherwise might. If he abuses his authority, he turns the edge and point of his sword in the wrong direction. Instead of holding it over his wife for her protection, he stabs her body to her destruction. And so show by it more hatred than love. This is from his of domestic duties. That's the reformed heritage edition building a godly home, a holy vision for a happy marriage, which is kind of like an edited version of good. Happy wife. Happy wife. I think this is such an important thing for us moderns to wrestle with here because Gugis saying what Christians believe forever about this. Then we've transformed it where it's like, "Servent leadership has nothing to do with authority. Being ahead has nothing to do with authority. His vocation has nothing to do with ruling or leading. That's all about just laying his life down for her." But Gugis saying if a husband gives away his authority and doesn't manage his authority well and maintain it, which means like insist that it is honored, he actually sins because he's taking away his ability to love his wife the way God told him to by virtue of his position. On the other hand, if he is harsh with his wife and he uses his authority in an abusive or tyrannical way, he fails again. I mean, he is like taking a sword and stabbing her instead of protecting her with his authority. But for Gug, and for Paul, I would argue, the headship of a husband, his primary vocation as the head of his wife is a vocation of authority where he is ruling well and ordering things well and maintaining that authority well and using that authority for the sake of the good of his people. So to summarize, what is headship as a vocation? Headship is rule. To be the head of a thing is to be the ruler or governor of that thing. To say that a man is the head of his wife is to say that he has ruling authority over her. That he has the authority to direct her, to lead her. Headship is the authority we could say to conform a thing to a given standard or to see it achieve a given purpose or to direct its activities. Headship is lordship, it's authority, it's responsibility, it's leadership. William Goode, again, he talks about a family as a little church and a little nation. So his point is that he appoints rulers and churches and nations. So he appointed them in the household in the form of a head. So husband is the main thing that I want a man, a married man, particularly as a wife and hopefully, Lord willing children. The main vocation he needs to be thinking about when it comes to himself is that of a lord of certain things. So Lexi, first question for you in this episode really, after I've drawn dawn for 25 minutes and 40 seconds according to the wrong, recording prior to editing. It's just simply as a wife, what's your reaction to that? Like how does that make you feel? What do you think? Like how do you, and I know you have an answer to that, but why is that good news for a wife? But in what are some temptations that she has in relation to her husband? Saying like, hey husband, your primary vocation, the thing I want you to succeed at is being a good ruler. Like that's good news really, but there are a lot of temptations that come with it, a lot of pitfalls. So just, I want your reaction on that as a wife. I mean, I saw, I guess as you were talking, I'm just thinking of the history of feminism. And I understand why there are really bad guys out there and there really are, if there really is authority, there really is a misuse and abuse of authority. The problem is most feminists, so first of all, if you have a feminist that doesn't like that, how can they know they don't like that unless the good thing really does exist out there as the problem? But what happened with the feminists is they just completely wanted all of the male authority gone then. Not like, okay, let's uphold the good guys and do away with the bad guys, which Christians would agree with as well. They just wanted, they just, it was like total absolute annihilation of man. But that's not a good solution and that is a temptation in a woman's heart though is the problem. That reminds me of this quote from the French Revolution. It's not, I think it's commentary on the French Revolution that regicide is deicide. It's that in the French Revolution, which is a egalitarian feminist proto movement, they killed the monarchy, the king. In the point of this, whoever said this, I can't remember, was that in killing the king, they were trying to kill God. Yes. And that patracite is also de-esamete killing the father that whatever it would be to kill a pastor, to kill any, like to kill the authorities is an attempt to kill God. Yeah, you can't have, it's funny. I can think of even some accounts on Instagram that weren't like, they were conservative, but they weren't overtly anti-feminist. That as they became more anti-feminist, they Christianity necessitated after that. So it's like the opposite of what you're saying almost, is it my sense of it? Anyway, so I think of that, and I think of the other reality that a lot of the early feminists in the 60s in New York were outright lying about the men, how bad the men were. So that's a very real reality that when you are tempted to think about, well, this is just how men are, this is what the feminists warned me about when you get married, pay Cherokee's really good thing, and then day one, feed on the ground after the honeymoon, and you're battling the flesh, like the actual authority in your life, your husband. You have to realize so much of that was genuinely blown out of proportion. Just an absolute hell. loot lie. We've a lie that the CIA even made so that we could try and get, you know, published this magazine to make women believe that there are secretly oppressed women all over the US. That by and large is not reality. It just isn't. Okay. So far, this to the point where some of these ladies actually went back in later books publishing at the end of their life were saying things like, I'm sorry, I actually went too far with how I depicted my ex husband. He actually wasn't like that. I mean, there's other examples that we know of that it was just a 100% lie. But there's also examples of that where the ladies were like, I did let that go a little too far. It reminds me of if you've ever heard a woman who divorced her husband for being emotionally abusive. It doesn't mean that there aren't men who are harsh with their wives and emotionally harm them. I use words harshly. But oftentimes when you hear these women describe their husbands, first of all, they're exaggerating it to the nth degree. Like just go see David Edgerton's book, White Nights and Reviling Wives. But secondly, they're also minimizing all their own sins. Correct. How those sins provoked or enhanced or through gasoline on the fire of his sins. Yeah. And I bring that up now just because this is the moral imagination that we've inherited as women. So when it comes to the temptations we're facing, when thinking about our husband's authority, it's really important to take the wind out of those sales and just kind of say there's no validity to that. So if you what you are actually dealing with is not some true social agenda that we all need to get on board with, it's actually your sinful flesh that you're trying to do. Yes. So and for me that alone is enough. I know that's not necessarily the case for other women, but that's enough to just understand like, no, this is something that ought to be maintained and honored. And it's part of my vocation as a woman to see to that even to encourage and exhort and draw forth with your feminine glory, the masculine glory of leadership. Yes. Eric, Eric Khan, CEO here at New Christian Press is working on one of the best books I've ever read. Yeah. I'm not exaggerating. He's been researching and writing and laboring over this book for quite a while now. His whole life. It's on long, it's on the long house, which is just a gyno-centric feminine dominated society or a society dominated by men via feminine norms, weaponized feminine norms. It is going to be so good. I mean, I that's all I say. Just look for that. We'll keep your ear to the ground. We'll have it out soon. So when you when you hear the husbands that had, you get why there is a feminine instinct in a fallen world to fear it. Because to be under authority is a scary thing. Yes. Given especially that you know that the authority is imperfect. Yes. Okay. And the authority of all human authority, all authority under God is imperfect. It's delegated from God, but it's also imperfect because it has sin involved in it. And so that is a fearful thing. Part of the chapters on headship in the book that I'm writing, I try to emphasize this for husbands because it's a book intended for husbands to read. But they have to understand like your wife when she's saying, I will submit to you and obey you. Have you thought about how big of a thing that is? That's when we talked about waiting this in the cold open of this episode. That's what I mean. You're actually telling your wife, do what I say. So it you've a good man feels the weight of that that he goes, Oh, I better be saying the to do the right things. So a husband is the head. This has implications spiritually, physically in terms of provision and covenant. I think just as headship, one of the things that means is that he's the spiritual head. He's the covenantal head of his home in a way. Christ is our covenant head, but he also is imitating Christ in this in his home. So when he where he goes physically, the home is likely to go because we don't just obey the words of kings and rulers. We become like them. We imitate them where he goes spiritually. His home goes. So if he is spiritually weak and he doesn't pray for his family and he's not a virtuous man killing his own sin, that image is likely to be stamped on his wife and his children. You think about all of the duties of head for the men went right now. What I want you to think about just as a summary, then we'll move into these subdomains is that as a head, your duty is leadership and rule. And that means that you're ordering things to a standard. So it requires you to have an idea of what that standard is. You have to get really clear on that thinking through every part of the home as the head and your vocation. God told you to do this and then think, what do I want success to look like here and what would God want success to look like here? So economically as a provider, what would it look like for me? Okay, I want to leave it inheritance to my children's children. I need to provide for my family because a man who doesn't do that is worse than an unbeliever is denied the faith. I need to, okay, economically, I have duties spiritually. Okay, a man is charged to raise his children up in the discipline and understanding of the word. Husband is responsible to wash his wife in the water of the word like Christ does. So I have spiritual duties in my home with respect to teaching and the spiritual standards in my home. What does catacism look like? What does worship look like? What does family worship look like? What does prayer look like in my home? Okay, I have, you could think of this whole series, the physical, the social, the vocational. All those, he has duties as a head to order. He has, he needs to have a standard for each of them where he's thinking, what am I trying to conform this household to? What do I want my children to be like? What do I want my wife to be like? What do I want to be like? What do I want? And that he develops a standard and then headship is conforming all the things under your rule to that standard with driven by love or it's nothing. You gain nothing and it's a clinging gong like first Corinthians 13 says. But that's what headship is. Let's talk about some of the constituent parts that come under that now. And I want to talk about provider a little bit here because when he's, you know, he knows that he's ahead. And so he part of the duties of ahead are the duties of provision. He has to provide bodily for his family, Raymond, shelter, clothing, food, all of those things, inheritance, etc. So the duties of a man as provider means that he has to make income of some sort. We're going to talk a lot about this in the making more money episode, which is kind of crass, but it really is the best summary. In a way, there's also using money well. But thinking about your headship, there's a sub-vocation here where you're called the peer provider. I noted that a man who doesn't provide for his household for simply five has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever. So a man has a duty to go, this is when we say vocation. Most of the time, we actually just mean this. We mean like what you do for a living. This is a huge aspect of the husband's vocation. So Lexi, for you, thinking about relating to a husband as a provider, what would you say are the, like, what does it do for a woman when he does this well? What does it do when he does it poorly? And why is this such an essential aspect of his vocation as the head? Well, I imagine it probably makes a woman feel ashamed and embarrassed when he doesn't do it well. What do you mean? There's no, okay, so a wife and children are to be a glory on display for the husband. And if there's no means of making it look that way, it's really obvious that there's something going on, something wrong with his headship and authority. Gotcha. So when a husband is not working, it just means funds are tight. It means you're getting more creative. It means there's no new Christmas dress. It means there's, there's no new haircuts. It means which there's, it's not necessarily that that's a bad thing in some situations, but that is why a woman in this situation would feel that way because she knows he's, if it's an outflow of love, like you said, she knows he doesn't love me enough to do this. Yeah. And it's important to say that a good wife can see the difference between a husband who is working really hard and he's doing everything he can and in Providence, it's a tough season because Paul says he knows what it is to abound into lack. And it wasn't because Paul was bad. Yes. Okay. He had a vocation that was, had some unique elements to it compared to this normal one we're talking about. But that's a good discipline for a wife and for a husband together to have where he can say, look, we're newly married. Sometimes young women can have these wildly unrealistic expectations and say, wow, like you're not making $130,000 a year yet. And he's like, well, I'm 21. You didn't marry a 40 year old summer cruise line. Yeah. Hold up, hold up. He's providing food and clothing and Raymond and housing and things like that and things are tight and she's got to be thrifty and but she can tell the difference. And there's a virtue element here. Yes. Between her husband, he's on an elevator going up and he's working really hard and he's crafty and he's doing everything he can. He's kind of, he's worth, he like, he's believing it all in the field. to provide for his family. A wife can tell the difference between that. And even the stress of doing that really well as a husband and it not resulting in a lot of money yet, or enough tough season or losing his job and it's not his fault, his company folded, the economy downturned, AI took his job. There's a bunch of situations. The key point to keep your eye on the ball is a man isn't that all the time you're gonna excel at all these perfectly, but that you are all the time cultivating the virtue of pursuing them well. Because your wife will follow you into the gates of Mordor if you're that kind of man. But a wife can detect really well. Yes. When a husband is he's giving it about a C minus effort. There really is a difference between, I mean, you've said this to me too, I am doing this for you. When things do feel tight, not financially, but I'm saying like, well, even that too, when things feel stressful, when schedules feel overloaded, when there does seem to be like some financial sacrifice type of a thing, you have reminded me, I am doing this for you, but it's because I know you're working really hard. When I imagine when a wife, Cesar has been not working hard, he literally cannot say, I am doing this for you. There is nothing he's doing for her. What are you doing? She, so it's not as much about, this can be a tough one because you can't just look at the budget and tell all the time. Yes, correct. You have to look at the man and the wife does look at the man. Yes. So a wife can sin here and mistreat her husband and disrespect him when he really is doing everything. And she's sinning and he can sin by not really doing everything. Home and hearth started simply with a mom, dad, and their two kids making clean natural alternatives for women who wanted something better. Through that process came the creation of the cycle support teacher set. For herbal blends, one for each phase of your cycle designed to help you reconnect with your body's natural rhythm. Handcrafted with organic herbs that ease cramps, balance mood, support hormones, and bring calm throughout the month. Every bottle is handmade with care with high quality ingredients. Get the cycle tincture set at shophomeinharth.com/bright and use code bright for 15% off your order this Christmas. A good morning sets the tone for the rest of the day. You read your Bible, review your to-do list, and drink a great cup of coffee. So why would you want bad tasting mass-produced coffee? Lux coffee is a Christian-owned coffee roaster that offers intentionally sourced single origin coffee beans. They believe that convenience is the death of quality. That's why they spend their time roasting small batches of beans to make sure that every cup of coffee tastes delicious. Start your day with coffee that is crafted for the new Christmas. You can go to luxcoffee.co and use code ncp15. That's all caps ncp15 for 15% off your hand-crafted coffee. And of course that link is in the description below. In a world that seems to be at war against goodness, truth, and beauty, handmade art is more important than ever. Ella's Lines is an illustration studio rooted in faith and creativity, creating whimsical, meaningful artwork that tells stories and brings beauty into everyday life. From children's book illustrations to tailor-made commissions, each piece is crafted to encourage faith and inspire warmth and wonder. Commission Ella to illustrate your next project at elislines.com. He can also send another ways here. Now we're gonna talk about this in different aspects of vocation. - When he thinks a hobby is his vocation. - That's certainly one of the, yeah, absolutely. I was thinking of a husband can get these out of order. This is the workaholic. If I fall in a ditch, I'm gonna fall in this one. It's good to know which did you fall in. - What? (laughing) - Newt to me. - Lexi's never heard this before. - I'm just kidding, I love you. - I love to work. - Someone asked me something the other day about, my husband wants to start a business, blah, blah, blah, blah. What do you think? I was like, I literally have not known Brian a day in my life that he hasn't had multiple jobs. - Never. - Never. Since we were young teenagers. - We were young when we were young and in the mountain. - I like it a bunch. - You have integrity. - We're matched. We're matched well in this. And you know, you have to know your wife's capacity. Know the capacity, the woman you're marrying, your helper. If you're a high powered entrepreneur and you wanna be like a Fortune 500 guy and don't marry a woman who's like, if you work an hour over 40 hours in a week, I'm gonna be destroyed, okay? Don't do it. But I can tend to fall in this ditch. It reminds me of a story actually that Eric told me. That really fits in more of the protector role, but it was a man he was in years ago. He didn't say the name of the person so I literally don't know who it was. That he had gone over their house, him and his family and they're having dinner with someone and the husband's like, jacked. I mean, his physique was 10 out of 10. - Okay. - He was 200 pounds, 8% body fat. Absolutely jacked. Perfect physical specimen. - But I think I know where this is going. And Eric said to the wife, like your husband looks really good. Wow, you must be, wow, really impressed with that. And she said, and she shouldn't have said this. And he said it, this was disrespectful. She should not have said this is public. This is not a good example. But it was an honest example. She said, yep, and he has all three and a half hours a day in the gym to show it. And she was clearly miffed. And the thing is, I'm not gonna assume she was telling the truth, whatever. I'm genuinely that specific situation. I don't know. She sent. But it looks like he did too. 'Cause here's the point. You can do a good thing and get totally out of order on it. - Yeah. - And all of a sudden, you're not being a good head. You're being a really good CEO. You're being a really good weightlifter. You're being a really good, I don't know, like a preacher, mountain biker or something. And any of these things can fit in a well ordered house and life. But being a good head, being a good ruler means, you're putting things in their right spot. So a husband can also sit in the other direction with provision to where he's not doing it for the right ends. He just wants to get wealthy. And Paul says that the desire to be rich is a snare and it's destroyed many. Okay? So these are really hard needles to thread. And a good man and a good woman working together, him as the head, her as the helper, they can thread the needle. And you're gonna have to adjust sometimes and repent sometimes. But generally speaking, what I want the men to hear is you're in charge of your economic life as a provider. This is a vocation God's given you. And so be the type of man that your wife can look at whether a bounding or lacking and say, he's a good man. He does this vocation for the right reason and with the right spirit. And when we had to scrimp and save and we couldn't replace the air conditioner, it was still okay because I knew he loved me. And when we were doing really well and he killed it one year and we did get to, have the good investment year and we did get to go on the vocation and that was awesome too. But I loved him in both circumstances because he was a good provider. Yeah. Okay, so that's one aspect of headship. That's very important. As a head, you are called to protect. The head on the body is looking out. He's keeping a watch. He's making sure that there's no enemies. He's walking down the street, paying attention. So a husband as a savior and as a husband, man, as a shepherd is a protector, which means that he's responsible for the physical protection of his family. He's also responsible for the spiritual protection of his family. He's responsible to get between his family and danger. There's a million different ways that you can think about and apply this vocation. But for the men listening, what I want you to think about it as is really that aspect of headship that sees to the safety of your people within God's design. Sometimes you have to tell your people to go into harm's way. Like we don't exist to be safe. We exist to be used for God's glory. But this is that aspect of leadership and headship of seeing to the properly ordered safety of your people. So literally, I mean, there's a million things. This is like the husband thinking about how screens are used with his kids. It's the husband who is thinking about the alarm system of the house. Go see the gun cap that episode that we did with Joshua Adams in season one of Breyerath who you want like a home security episode. It's the husband making sure his wife is situationally aware of where she is going and where she is not going by herself. It's the husband learning how to carry a firearm and use it. There's a million things. The husband's spiritually protecting his home by making sure that they're in a good church community and not in a weak and disordered church under poor leadership. And if he has to move to accomplish this, like this is a part of his vocation as protector. So Lexi, as a woman, you are a woman, I've noticed. And I am appreciative of it. That's all I say on that. As a woman, you're thinking about the husband's role is vocation of protection. What are some of the things that you think are the biggest things a husband needs to hear from a wife on this role, this vocation? One of them, for example, I do think a wife often needs her husband to understand that she's not. put off if he tells, if he gives her clear direction, like, don't go there after this time. Don't go shop at this store by yourself. Like that she appreciates it? Yeah. Or yeah. What is, what does he need to hear from his wife? Yeah. I think some women need to also realize they will appreciate that. I don't think all would agree. I think they do more than they're willing to admit though. But that there is a, there is like a sense of relief when a husband is a covering in that way of yeah, protecting her like really listen. I think, I think for me that can be the harder thing is it seems like there's so many other things going on that the statistical likelihood of that happening. You're just being silly. Don't do that. Don't tell me that. But, but having to like learn to take it more seriously because then I'm also teaching my children the same things. Does that make sense? Yes. So that I think is important for a husband to help maybe contextualize some of it of like, no, I'm not just being paranoid or like apocalyptic about this. But let me teach you, teach the children because then when something does happen because inevitably something will happen, she will be so thankful that he prepared her and the children. So I think that's kind of the attitude that a wife should have towards this is one of thankfulness instead of a husband because just start playing worst case scenarios in your head. Don't be frustrated. Your husband is not micromanaging. Just, just no God made him that way. Yeah. Like the fact that you like to sit in the chair when we're out to eat that can face the door. That's right. Walk on the certain side of the street. Yeah. Like keep a certain hand free. And the reason I'm saying this is because in a feminist culture, this is ridiculous. We don't need no man. Right. So it can be hard and feel weird to let a man play that part. But it is a good thing. And we have to learn to let it be a good thing and honor it. Yeah. Yes. Exactly. So that's why I say it the way I do it. I don't know if that's what you had in mind. But that's that's right. It's an honoring. It's a being submissive to an encouraging of a husband's desire to protect. So like when a husband reminds his wife, please before you leave, lock the doors to the house. Don't leave them unlocked when you don't go shop here on your own. Hey, you know what? I actually don't want you going to that public event around the holiday. This thing because to me, it looks like a terrorism magnet. Literally, it's stuff like that. Don't go in that neighborhood. A husband is wisely ordering his affairs to protect his people and to see to their safety, spiritual safety, physical safety insofar as it's up to him. A lot of it to one of the harder aspects or those non physical parts like I do think the church aspect is really important. Parents like fathers will put up with with weak bad churches for way too long. Yeah. That's true. And a lot of times they need to be willing to displease wife and children. I can think of something I'm really thankful early on in our marriage that I just did not see at all. And it was a good friend of mine that you were kind of like, this is not going good places. This is not going to end well. And unfortunately, it didn't really good friend of both of ours actually really close friends of ours. It got married. And I just could not understand. I think you would said to me at one point, like yes, Lexi, if he wanted to be an elder at our church, he would not be allowed to even be a member. And I just could not even believe that the possibility of them being that far gone was something that I couldn't see. And just realizing ultimately, you know, they moved out of state. And even that was like the Lord's protection because I don't think I realized how influential like a female relationship like that could potentially be for worse. And me having to be like, no, my husband does know better than I do in these circumstances. And you were right. You were totally right. It is, it can be really hard as I think this is one of the hardest aspects of being a protector. Your wife loves it when you're like, I'm going to protect you, babe, from that guy. And that's great. You should do that. But what about when it's your literal best friends? Because that's what it was in these circumstances. What about when you have to correct your wife? And when you, what if when you'd have to tell her something she doesn't want to hear, what if the thing you're protecting the household from is an attitude or behavior your wife has been walking in for a month? And you need to tell her, Eric, and I just had this conversation. One of the best things a husband, a sentence is a husband can learn in mean it is honey, stop it. You need to stop it. When she's spiraling and freaking out and her emotions are taking over and she's catastrophizing and she's, you know, it's that time of the month and everything's looking terrible to her or she's pregnant and everything looks horrible and gloomy and she's like, I'm going to change everything. And he needs to be like, honey, no, you're not. I override that vow that you just made. You're not taking on that new thing. You're not doing this. And he's actually fulfilling his role as a protector when he does that. He's protecting his wife. And she might not like you. Sometimes you are literally protecting your wife from your wife. But the reality is God ordered this way because women need a protection. They need a covering. They need a head. They were not designed to run around headless. Like this is why women going off to college without a male head is very stupid. You should not send your daughters to college fathers. And oh, yeah, she'll be fine. She'll go find a husband. Do you know how many of them find a dozen plus body count instead and become feminists? Find an STD somewhere. That's what she'll find. And it's because she wasn't made to be able to navigate that. She wasn't built for it. She wasn't supposed to do that. You're failing as a protector. She's failing too. But her failure is your fault. Yeah. It's your responsibility. So this is head, headship is that instinct of, I'm going to order this thing to the standard. I'm going to take responsibility for an order to the standard. Now everybody under your authority has a responsibility too. And it cannot be your fault when something goes wrong where the wife is in subordinate and she doesn't listen and she doesn't obey and she divorces you. And that's her fault. And you can't take responsibility for it in the ultimate sense. You just can't like you tried. You were a good leader and it didn't work and it was her fault. What are you laughing? Speaking of those your headphones are mine. Those are mine. Okay. Just wondering. I'm constantly trying to keep track of Lexi's headphones for her. And this is the funniest thing. She's had one of them for like three months because she couldn't find the other one. It was literally more like three weeks. Oh, no, it was. Yes, it was. Okay. Don't correct your wife in small details in public, which is this is public. She lost her headphones for some indeterminate period of time. Her headphone and she said to me, I was like, hey, where's her headphone? Do you want me to help you find it? And she said the headphones give it the headphone take it away. That was her spirit was it will come back to me when it wants to. And then here's the worst part encouraging her. Yet like two days ago, the headphone give it and the lost headphone, the prox, the iPhone returned. I think what it what I meant by that was the toddler. That's really what it was. And I was like, have you thought about putting it in a place where they can't get it every single time you take a mop and shoot that's just sometimes people have a thing because I lost them again. Did she really Lexi? That's why I wondered if that was mine. Lexi. No. No. Okay, guys, we're doing a little marriage in real life. All right. Anyway, that's the episode. No, I really in all this, we can talk about a father. There's a vocation of a father's another one. He has to do to disciple his children give them an education to raise them to know them to deploy them into the world to become godly men to become godly women to marry well. But really, we could spend hours on each of these. But the thing we're talking about today is the vocation of being ahead. You are in charge of your children husbands. Don't let your wife be the head. She is in charge of them too. They need to obey her. I'm not saying that. But you are in charge of how to deploy her even. So sometimes you need to say, this is how discipline needs to change. Sometimes you need to say, this is the consequence this kid needs. Sometimes you need to say that extracurricular activity is gone. There's too much going on. Like a husband needs to rule in how he orders the fatherhood, his fatherhood to see to his children's good. Basically saying, I'm responsible for where they go. Hey, Winnie. I love visitors. Hey, Winnie. Winnie's joining us here for a moment here, speaking of fatherhood. Yeah. So I mean, basically it's an exhaustive. It's all of life. You're ruling yourself. You're ruling your home. You're ruling your business. You're ruling like you're exercising lordship. And I want men to understand that they don't only have permission to do these things. They're required to. You don't have permission. You are required to do them. So some of you are not doing these things because you lack agency. And I think we'll end here. One of the most important things a man needs to get if he is going to do his vocation as head well is agency. Agency is that initiative to act is the initiative of will. It is the power of will. It is the power of deciding and acting of saying, I need to do this. I will will do this. Here is how I will do this. And then I do this. What's that phrase been always says about the human spirit I care remember? I don't know. Oh, never mind. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. Agency that I mean, this is like so many things that have gone wrong in many men's lives is because they are being acted upon and not acting upon. Yeah. So they're just letting stuff happen. And they're like, Oh, I don't make enough money. I can't do this. Okay. I know it's not as simple as this, but it starts with this. I need to make money. I am going to think about how to make more money, whether in my current job or a different one. Here is my plan. I'm going to go work that plan. And even in this hard economy and difficult situation, I have yet to see men who do that well who don't improve things. Now, they things can be said against you and it might not work excellently. You can go to do this in your marriage and your wife still divorces you and takes the kids because the courts are screwed up and women's in. I'm not saying anything other than that. You can still lose your job. Your business can still fail. You can get out competed by illegal immigrants undercutting you in the job market as a plumber, like a plumber in our church deals with that constantly, where people are doing shoddy and frankly dangerous work. They're illegal immigrants. They don't even have the certifications. And they they're charging half the price that he needs to even do it to show up to the job site as a person living here, a citizen of America, paying taxes, it's frustrating. And I get it. It's frustrating. But even in that case, what is the answer? Agency in that situation, the agency to call ice, but it's agency. It's saying, I'm going to I'm going to will to act. And this is not like people hide behind a sovereignty of God sometimes. In weird ways. Oh God, just willed it. That well, yeah, in his in his deck, decorative will, he will that you would do this, but you're sending. Do you remember my dad when he my dad was overseas a lot in he was in Afghanistan. He used to get so frustrated, came back one time talking about how you know, they're trying to implement US military regimen, see there. And the guys just won't show up in my ass. They just will not show up. And my dad is like, what are you doing? We were supposed to teach you how to do it. A lot did not will it? In my I remember my dad saying, I just want to tell you, Allah did will you get here on time? Yeah, this is why you can go to a country like Afghanistan where they lack the will the agency in their culture. Yeah. And so they will, you know, you'll the military will put in a multi million dollar irrigation system to grow crops. And a month later, they will have stripped it for parts of the soul that and that's what he was like, this is not going to work because they do not function the way our culture functions. This is one of the Christian virtues that built the West is agency. So husbands, you are the head, be a good one, you are ruler, be a good one, it you do have the ability. God didn't call you to something that is impossible for you to do. So cultivate the virtue and skill of agency in being a provider, being a protector, being a father, being a husband, in all of it. Okay, that's all we've got for this episode, guys, thanks for listening. If you like what we do here at Bright Heart, we would encourage you to become a monthly supporter. If you can afford it, chip in a couple bucks a month to help us keep make this episode possible. Like I said, last episode, we just hired another full time guy at New Christian impress to help with all the good work that God's put in front of us. And none of it would be possible without you guys listening and supporting the shows, supporting all that we do here, grabbing books when they when they look like they'd help help you. And so we would encourage you to do that. If you like what we do here, thanks for listening guys, thanks to our great sponsors that sponsor the episode as well. And we'll catch you next time on Bright Heart. [Music] If you like our podcasts, we think you'll love our books. Head to newcrissonimpress.com to browse our growing library of legacy resources, published in high quality print formats that look great on your shelf.