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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.

Redefining Masculinity

Introducing Tethered Masculinity

Cultural Claim: Aggression Is Toxic

Scripture Case Study: John 2

Righteous Aggression Explained

Self-Check And Closing

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Alright, welcome to a new week of the Daily Blade. Toxic masculinity. That's the headline, right? I mean, you guys have seen it all over the place. It's just kind of casually thrown out there as an accusation and as an ace of spades to end any argument about culture, right? And guys, to be honest, I get interviewed on a lot of shows and I almost always get asked about quote unquote toxic masculinity. What it is, what it isn't, how to avoid it, should we even care about it, so on and so forth. And for me, the accusation is always pretty amusing. I mean, anytime someone accuses me of being toxically masculine or doing something in a toxically masculine category, I actually look at it as a compliment. I think you should as well. The reason is because I've dealt with people like that for so long that I know that they, well, I know what they mean by the term toxic masculinity, but they don't even have the foggiest idea of why I act the way that I do and why I do the things that I do, and why I encourage men all over the globe to do the same things. The reason isn't toxic masculinity. It's actually a new term that I want to introduce to all of you so that you can start using it. Tethered masculinity. Tethered masculinity. So what is it? It's actually pretty simple. It's the identity and actions of a man submitted to the authority of Scripture. That's it. It's the identity and the actions of a man submitted to the authority of Scripture. So this week on the Daily Blade, we're going to look at five different cultural claims, things that the culture would say is toxic masculinity, but we're going to set the record straight and show how it is actually tethered masculinity. So cultural claim number one that we're going to look at is masculine aggression is toxic. So this is one of the main things thrown out there by our atheistic culture that hates God, hates men, and resents the blessings that have come from men acting like men. They say that men being aggressive, which is shown by their competitiveness, their intensity, and sometimes even violence, makes men as a whole dangerous. But with most things from our sick and depraved culture, they get the description kind of right, but the prescription is completely messed up. So they will say that since men have used their aggression to hurt people throughout history, which is, you know, obviously uncertifiably true, that masculinity in and of itself is toxic and should be suppressed, if not outright destroyed. But again, what's the theme for this week? It's about displaying tethered masculinity. Because here's the difference when men do not tether their masculinity to what the Bible says, what God says, then the overwhelming likelihood is that they will indeed use their masculine aggression improperly, and it will lead to destruction. So what does tethered masculine aggression look like? Let's actually go to John 2, starting in verse 13. This is right after the wedding in Cana, where Jesus did his first public miracle of turning water into wine. The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons and the money changers sitting there. And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple with the sheep and the oxen, and he poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables, and he told those who sold pigeons, Take these things away, do not make my father's house a house of trade. His disciples remembered that it was written, Zeal for your house will consume me. So right there, that's the line of Judah. It's premeditated, righteous, aggressive violence. Yes, violence. And people will sometimes read this and just picture Jesus driving the animals out like, you know, kind of this angry farmer or cowboy, but they forget that Jesus drove the people out, not just the animals. And he did it with a whip that he made for the occasion. But did Jesus just see something that made him mad and then he just decided to go crazy and break stuff and scare people because he had, you know, an uncontrollable fit of rage? Well, no. That would have been toxic masculinity. You see, he got angry and expressed his physical righteous aggression because people had defiled the temple grounds by scheming and stealing in order to make money. Now, super aggro aggressive guys love that Jesus did this at the beginning of his ministry, and they love that Jesus did it again, you know, the week of his crucifixion, as we see in Matthew 21, Mark 11, and Luke 19. But this wasn't aggression without restraint. That's just immaturity. That's toxic. It was aggression under submission to God and in defense of his moral mandates. So, to you listening to this, have you bought into the cultural lie that your masculine aggression is somehow toxic? If you haven't, have you tethered your masculine aggression to God's word and his will for your life? Keep those questions in mind today.

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