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Welcome to the Daily Blade. The word of God is described as the sword of the spirit, the primary spiritual weapon in the Christian's armor against the forces of evil. Your hosts are Joby Martin and Kyle Thompson, and they stand ready to equip men for the fight. Let's sharpen up.

Putting Toxic Masculinity On Trial

Defining Tethered Masculinity

Cultural Claim: Stoicism Equals Suppression

The Cost Of Unprocessed Emotions

David’s Lament As A Model

Jesus Wept: Holy Emotional Honesty

Governed Emotions Vs. Suppression

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Good to have you guys back today. This week we're putting toxic masculinity on trial. So we're taking the culture's accusations against men, lining them up and measuring them against scripture. So we're going to keep coming back to one anchor point: tethered masculinity. And our definition for that is it's the identity and actions of a man submitted to the authority of scripture. So let's go to cultural claim number three. Stoicism is emotional suppression. So I want to make something clear right from the jump here for this episode. I'm not talking about the philosophy, right? Or you could call it a worldview of Stoicism. So that started around 300 BC in Athens, and you've likely read some of the stuff by the Stoics, as they were called, you know, Marcus Aurelius, Seneca the Younger, and so on. That's Capital S stoicism. The Stoicism I'm talking about, I guess, lowercase stoic lowercase Stoicism, is about the personality trait that prioritizes emotional restraint, emotional suppression, silent suffering, composion under pressure, you know, stuff like that. And that is the claim that culture is referring to. If a man is stoic, that means he's suppressing his healthy emotions and that's toxic or whatever. And it's actually pretty interesting because the same atheistic, confused culture will say that men need to process and express their emotions openly and honestly, while simultaneously castigating those men for doing so because it would infringe on the sincerely held emotions of women. So go figure, you're you're screwed either way. And look, in some ways, the culture is right. When men suppress their emotions or refuse to process them in a healthy way, men will typically lash out and do unhealthy things. They can get violent, they can get abusive, they can become slaves to addictions of many kinds, and so that's not good. It's toxic, actually. But is that how a tethered man acts? Does a tethered man just suppress all of his emotions all of the time and in all circumstances? Does a tethered man lash out and destroy people and things around them, right? I mean, let's see what the Bible has to say about it. Almost immediately, when I was working through this, I thought about King David and some of his Psalms of Lament. And in those, David is outwardly processing huge emotions. And here we are thousands of years later, and we can go to the Bible and read them. So Psalm 13 is actually a really great example. How long, O Lord, will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I counsel, take counsel in my soul, and have sorrow in my heart all the day? How long shall my enemy be exalted over me? Consider and answer me, O Lord my God, lift up my eyes lest I sleep the sleep of death, lest my enemy say, I have prevailed over him, lest my foes rejoice because I am shaken. So does it sound like David is just stuffing his emotions down? Does it sound like he's just trying to have a stiff upper lip? I mean, it just doesn't sound like it to me. And let's go to John 11. So this is where we see Jesus' good buddy Lazarus die. Jesus and the apostles go to the place of his death, and when he arrives, Mary, Lazarus' sister, confronts Jesus and says that Lazarus wouldn't have died if Jesus had just gotten there in time. And then in John 11, 35, I know many of you have that verse memorized because you were challenged to memorize a verse at some point in your life and you thought it'd be funny to memorize the shortest verse in all of the Bible, and it's this Jesus wept. Jesus, the Son of God, part of the Godhead, wept. And guys, don't get it twisted. Jesus didn't just like shed a little tear. He didn't have a quick sniffle before he got his crap together. He wept. So the text suggests that this was like an ugly cry, like tears, snot, ugly, angry crying, right? Angry at death, angry at the circumstances. But Jesus, who we are to model our entire lives after, did not suppress his emotions. He didn't wait until he could be in private so that he could let it all out. He wept right there in front of everyone. So does that mean as men we just go around blubbering about everything at all times? I mean, of course not. But there are certainly times when processing emotions and even crying is what is needed in the moment. So as we rap, let's actually go back to the end of Psalm 13. This is David, and it's verses five and six. But I have trusted in your steadfast love, my heart shall rejoice in your salvation. I will sing to the Lord because he has dealt bountifully with me. So toxic stoicism equals suppression. But tethered stoicism, if you will, equals governed emotions. So, to you listening to this, have you bought the cultural lie that your masculine stoicism is somehow toxic? And if you haven't, have you tethered your masculine stoicism to God's word and his will for your life? Keep those questions in mind today.

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Thank you for listening to today's episode. Before you go, if you want to help equip other men for the fight, share this podcast around and leave us a five star rating and review. Stay sharp.