Editor’s Note: This is the first in a series of articles called Uprising from Kenny Luck, where God’s men seek to reject the material world and embrace God’s world. This series will be featured weekly in Charismamag.com’s New Man during January.
What is an uprising? When we study historical movements, we find that uprisings have common denominators. First, all uprisings—both locally and globally— have one or more deeply felt issues at their core.
One common denominator of uprisings is that they convey a sense of deeply felt injustices that are perceived to be going on in society. Injustices could fester for decades, or simmer for centuries, but eventually they explode, unleashing a revolution. Remember the Green Revolution in Iran a couple of years ago? Do you recall the French Revolution? The American Revolution? The Bolshevik Revolution? Tiananmen Square?
All of these revolutions — and many other uprisings — have common issues: Deeply felt issues of injustice, emotional pain or being marginalized followed by a flash point eruption. Everything unravels after that.
As God’s men, how does this relate to us right now?
Guys, it’s about masculinity. It’s about the partnership between evil and the broken male culture worldwide that has been allowed for centuries to run over our women, our children and the innocent bystanders of the world, pulling them into pain and suffering. The Bible — in Isaiah 5:7 — warns us is a centuries-old problem.
Guys, we just can’t be part of it. As God’s men, it’s our role to stop it.
We need to stop the “male blast zone,” the male mantle of global leadership that is sometimes misused to inflict suffering sometimes even among God’s men. That’s what Isaiah is saying is happening in this passage of Scripture. God’s men, Isaiah warns, are creating suffering and God’s prophet speaks to us about it in verse 7.
The Lord’s Vineyard – Isaiah 5:7, New Living Translation (NLT): “The nation of Israel and the men of Judah are the Lord’s vineyard. The people of Judah are his pleasant garden. He expects a crop of justice, but instead He found oppression. He expected to find righteousness, but instead he found cries of violence.”
I want to pause there. I want you to think about this for a moment. God is our Father. We are His sons. There is a separation between His sons and everyone else on the Earth. This does not say our daughters are less important. What this says is that there is a generational feeling between a father and a son.
We are to protect our daughters like they are diamonds. Our legacy, however, is in our sons. So when the Bible says that the men of Judah are the “garden of his delight,” it means that men are the object of the Father’s watchful eye. It means that men are a reflection of Him in the masculine. Our Dad — God — has high expectations of us. He wants us to be like Him: faithful, honorable, truthful.
Both then and now, God looks for justice, but sees bloodshed. He looks for righteousness, but hears cries of distress. So when we talk about global injustice and global suffering being connected to the broken male culture, we are not talking about a new phenomenon. This is the corruption of sin in the world. What we are talking about is a centuries old phenomenon.
God is watching. God is tracking. He is particularly tracking His sons; their part in it, what they are doing about it, and that’s why he would sends us His prophets — the men of God — to call out His boys and say enough is enough. It ends here.
What is the war for male identity that is going on right now in your life? I know it’s there because it’s reality for all of us. How does it happen? What is the formula behind the broken male culture? What is it going to take to defeat it? What is an example from the Scripture that shows us the way out? After we answer that, then I want to ask you point blank: Are you going to lead the uprising at home, with the men of your church?
In 1 John 2:16-17 (NLT,) God talks about the genesis of the broken male culture.
Do Not Love This World
“For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father, but are from this world. And this world is fading away, along with everything that people crave. But anyone who does what pleases God will live forever.”
What do we glean from this passage?
We glean that there is a very powerful force out there. God tells us not to love culture, and specifically, the masculine vision of what you should be. Reject the broken male identity. Reject our desire to be great, and our need to contribute and to be significant in the world.
When you study “Uprisings,” whether it’s the French or Bolshevik revolution, there are common elements. They all begin with injustices, deeply felt emotions and issues. And then, the simmering turns to a boil, unleashing a flash point where things explode. Across the globe, we are currently seeing an increase in flash points clearly showing us that we are being pulled into uprisings.
God’s men are responding around the world with our own Uprising! Men are turning away from the carnal world and embracing the spiritual world. There is a spiritual “Uprising.”
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Kenny Luck is the men’s pastor at Saddleback Church and is the founder of Every Man Ministries. His 20th book–Sleeping Giant: No Movement of God without Men of God— is a blueprint for men’s ministries, and was recently released through Broadman & Holman Books. Follow Every Man Ministries on Facebook and Twitter.
Joseph Mattera 
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