11. David: A Man After God’s Own Heart

Culture has a checklist for “real masculinity” that sounds strong but often leaves men isolated: be impressive, be untouchable, win at any cost, and never admit fault. In this episode, we look at the life of King David, the man Scripture calls “a man after God’s own heart”, to see what his story reveals about biblical manhood today.

We talk about why David was chosen for his heart instead of his image, what David and Goliath teaches about courage and obedience, and how David’s failure with Bathsheba, and his repentance in Psalm 51, shows the difference between defending sin and truly turning back to God.

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Transcript

Editor Note And Reviews Request

Jon 0:10

Hey guys, Editing John here. Wanted to jump in real quick and give a little bit of a point of reference for this one. So the flow for this one's going to be a little bit different. We recorded it a while back and decided not to use it at the time for various reasons. So if you like it, let us know. If you don't like it, please also let us know. And while you're commenting, whether you like it or not, please, if you're on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, go ahead and leave us a review. That would be wonderful. Thanks and enjoy.

Why David Redefines Manhood

Jon 0:46

Welcome to the Uncommon Man Podcast. I'm your co-host, John Pierce, along a good friend of mine, Mr. Devin Jeffries. How's it going, buddy?

SPEAKER_03 0:54

It's going great, man. How are you today? I'm good. Yeah. Better than I deserve. It's freezing outside, dude.

Devin 1:00

It is. Like, to me, if it's going to be this cold, I need snow. And down here in the great state of Alabama, we don't get that. But when we do, it absolutely shuts everything down. Yeah. It's the worst.

Jon 1:15

But, anyways, what are we talking about today, John? We are talking about David. Not just King David. I mean, yes, King David, but David and how he was a man after God's own heart. And how that really goes against what our culture says about manhood. So David wasn't perfect, but he consistently chose God's heart over his own. Our culture celebrates ego image, self-promotion. And David chose a different standard of manhood. He you can't I don't know if you can necessarily say he set the standard, but he definitely in the vast majority of his life lived up to it.

Devin 2:05

Right. He set a great definition for what it looks like to be a man. But here's the problem with today's definition of a man, right? When you look at the world today, the definition of an air quote real man, it's very loud, it's very dominant, it's very sexually successful, it's emotionally guarded, and it's a hundred percent self-made. A man's strength is today, is it's measured by his status, it's measured by his followers. And I would say that probably the worst part of it is, is that weakness is something that you're supposed to hide at all cost.

Jon 2:47

Right, which is not even close to what the scripture says is a man after God's own heart.

Devin 2:53

Right, because when you open the Bible, the man God calls a man after my own heart does not fit that mode of, or that mode, that mold at all for what it looks like of being a man in today's world, right? We're taught if you're going through stuff, shove it deep down, nobody cares, nobody wants to listen. But when you look at what the way that David lived it, he was a shepherd, he was a worshiper, he was a poet, a warrior. And ultimately, he was a man who failed publicly. But the best part about David was he didn't just fail publicly, he repented on a very deep level. So today we're going to talk about David, not as a flawless hero, but as a pattern of godly manhood that is in contrast to the way culture tells us to do it today, a modern

Public Failure And Private Repentance

Devin 3:50

culture. And, you know, as we're preparing for this, we said that he was uh he was a man who failed publicly. What instance did we know in our world that happened a couple of months ago where a man failed publicly? Do you remember?

Jon 4:05

I don't know what you're referring to.

SPEAKER_02 4:07

It was the CEO thing of astronomer.

SPEAKER_00 4:09

Of what?

Devin 4:10

Remember the guy that went to the cold play concert? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's that's that's all you gotta do is say cold play. And it I remember, I remember telling my wife whenever this happened, I was like, if he had literally just played it cool and nobody had ducked down like there was a sniper in the area, he might have gotten away with it. Yeah, no, look, he was absolutely a moron. What my favorite part about that side piece, or or sorry, side piece. Wow, why?

SPEAKER_02 4:38

Because he didn't have a side piece.

Devin 4:41

What my favorite part about that was he said a in his air quote statement, was he said it was a very private moment made public. And I'm like, bro, you took your side piece to a freaking gold pie concert.

Jon 4:52

You can't say it was a private moment when you were in public.

SPEAKER_02 4:56

What did you think was gonna happen, dude?

Devin 4:58

It just it that's that was the thing that that made me uh like it brought me back to that. But here's the thing if that had been modern, David failed very, very publicly, much like this person did. But here's the thing is he repented privately and honest to honestly, yeah, all the memes that came at it, came out of it were top-notch. I loved going through all the memes that came from that instance. But my prayer for him is that he repented. Not because he got caught, but because he sinned against God himself.

Jon 5:31

But anyways, that's we had two very different responses to that whole situation. You were you had a prayer for him. I just heard about it from someone else, and I was like, wow, what an idiot. And then I kind of forgot about it, to be honest. Okay, well, uh my honestly, I mean that's probably you I mean better, better on you than me.

Devin 5:50

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I'm just like my I and I and I told my wife that. I said, I hope to God that he is sorry, not because he got caught, but that he's sorry because he sinned against his wife. Yeah, he sinned against the the god of the universe. But that's a whole different topic for a whole other day.

Chosen For Heart Not Image

Jon 6:10

All right. So moving on, David was chosen for his heart, not his image. As we all know, at least I hope we all know. If you if you're listening to this and you don't know who David is, maybe you're brand new to faith. I I don't know. It's worth looking into a lot for a long time. Just Google David from the Bible and have fun. So many stories, so many, so many like Sunday school Bible stories come from David. So anyway, if you don't know, I guess David was chosen to be the king. So and it so we see in 1 Samuel 16 7, man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart. So he was chosen to be king because of his heart. He wasn't even in, he wasn't even part of the selection process. All of his brothers were looked at before he was. He was off in the field. He was a shepherd. He's off in the field tending the sheep, you know, killing lions and bears.

Devin 7:16

Yeah. Better on David than me, right? I could take a bear.

Jon 7:24

Would you bow up against a bear? A black bear. You mean to tell me? No. Black bear. I mean, it's that or they're both gonna rip your face, clean off your shoulders. Yeah, black bear's more likely to run away. But regardless, I mean, are you gonna Are you a bear expert? No, I'm just a man.

SPEAKER_02 7:40

I'm a man too, dang it. But guess what? I see a bear, there I was. I'm gone, bro.

Jon 7:45

It's faster than you are. I mean, everybody's faster than you are, but the bear's definitely faster than you are.

Devin 7:50

Oh, shots fired. I'll have you know. I got in two workouts this week. Thank you very much. Congratulations. Thank you so much. But, anyways, one of the things we're gonna do, aside from I think I feel like we really need to get a bear now, and I want to just say, all right, dog, go at it.

Jon 8:08

I'm just saying if my options are die or fight the bear, I'm gonna fight the bear. Oh, sure, sure. No, I'm gonna fight it then. But I'm not going to unless I got you standing next to me, I just gotta run faster than you.

Devin 8:18

Yeah, and all I gotta do is probably not hard hurt you or trip you and then just take off.

Jon 8:23

Anyway, so David was chosen for his heart. So here's what culture says it says be impressive, be dominant, be visible, be respected. What God looked for was faithfulness in obscurity, humility, obedience before recognition. That's hard for a lot of people. Yeah, obedience before recognition. They want to be recognized for their obedience. So they're like, I'm over here doing what God told me to do, or what I feel like God told me to do, might be, might not be, who knows? But they they want the recognition.

Devin 8:56

I think one of the other things that culture says is culture, we live in a very instant gratification world. Culture wants that instant gratification, right? So great example is I have no problem in the world in going to cut my grass, right? I I I talked to husbands.

Jon 9:17

Do you do you like cutting your yard? My neighbor does it. He does it so cheap, like I can't even So let me get this straight. You'll fight a bear, but you won't even cut your danger. Whoos. It takes anyways, it takes 30 seconds with his giant lawnmower, and he cut he charges me like 20 bucks. Yeah, I'm gonna let him cut it.

Devin 9:34

Yeah, all right. That might be fair. Anyways, so like I I talked to a husband the other day, and he said, Man, oh, my wife made me go cut the grass. And I was like, dude, I love to cut the grass.

Jon 9:45

To answer your question, yeah, I do enjoy cutting grass because I can just zone out and watch.

Devin 9:50

But for me, the reason I do is it's instant gratification. So culture says that. Culture says, as you said, to be impressive, be dominant, be visible, be respected. But what does God look for? God looks for that faithfulness in obscurity, that humility and the obedience before the recognition. It's almost like if I cut the grass and my wife does not, the next time she comes outside, does not say something to the effect of, baby, that yard looks good. Our yard looks fantastic. I'm like, why do you hate me? Like, what did I do to you? Right? I want the recognition instead of just going to go get it. Understand this, like you said with David and his brothers, he wasn't even invited in the selection process for anything. Right. The lowest of the low, he was the forgotten in the field. How much of what we chase as men is for approval instead of obedience?

Jon 10:54

I would venture to say a lot. A lot. Like it's it's easy. Some some people need more recognition than others. Right. So if you're leading a team of people, you gotta know like some people need a little bit more hey, you're doing a good job than other people. Yeah. Because I don't know, it's just people are different. I mean, look low-key, I'm not. If you're doing it, it's not low-key. It's not low-key at all. It's not okay. I knew that.

Devin 11:23

But but but one of the things I will say that the Lord has worked on me in is being able to serve without needing that recognition. Right. Right. And without needing that, hey, you did a good job, right? Or without needing my wife to come out there and stand in front of the yard, pat me on the back, and hand me a cold one while she says, baby, we have the best looking yard in the neighborhood. Like I don't need that anymore. Guess what? I know I have the best looking yard in the neighborhood, okay? But that is something that God had to prune out of me. Right.

Jon 11:55

And some for some people maybe he needs humility. I don't know. For some people, for some, I mean that goes along with humility. Some people just need that more than others. But the point is obeying God without looking for the recognition. Hide us behind the cross.

Devin 12:11

That's right.

SPEAKER_01 12:12

Yeah.

Fighting For God’s Honor

Devin 12:13

David also fought from faith, not ego. Right. And so we see that in the story of 1 Samuel chapter 17 with David and Goliath. Yeah, ego would have gotten him killed immediately. 100%. What everybody else saw was size. Experts have said that Goliath was in the uh was in the range of around nine feet.

Jon 12:35

Right.

Devin 12:36

Tall. What they saw was size.

Jon 12:39

We don't know how tall David was, as far as I know, do we?

Devin 12:42

Most most biblical scholars will say he was in the six-foot range, the five to six foot range. He was not a very yeah, he was like normal at the size.

Jon 12:51

He was not a he was not a big guy. Were people not shorter back then? I don't know. Whatever. Regardless, he wasn't anywhere close to nine feet tall.

Devin 12:59

I mean, this may be the the equivalent of you versus a grizzly bear.

Jon 13:03

Right. And if I'm Mr. Bear expert, I'm not a bear expert. But if I'm not mistaken, he was uh we when we see when we learn about David in Sunday school, or you see like a little kid's book, he's like seven years old. He looked up to seven. Oh, he was a kid. Yeah. Well, wasn't he like a teenager? Yeah, but still in the grand scheme of his life, he was a kid. He was he was not big. That's the point.

Devin 13:28

But but but so everybody else saw the size, the experience, because you gotta remember Goliath was He was a warrior. He was a warrior, he was the best of the best. Yes. I mean exactly. And and they saw the incredible odds, right? If I'm a betting man, no, I'm looking at that fight and I'm going, bro, you ain't got a chance, dude. But what saw, or I'm sorry, what David saw through his faith is David saw a defiance of God. And a chance for God's glory. That's right. And so what culture's model of strength says is and we're gonna do this a lot throughout this episode. So understand we're doing kind of a compare and contrast of what the culture says and what David's model was for strength and what the what culture says versus what the Bible says. Culture's model of strength for a man is to prove yourself, to assert your dominance, and to protect that reputation at all cost. That there are people who will literally kill if it means that their reputation is on the line.

Jon 14:33

Which is exactly the opposite of what David did here. Yeah. What was David's model? He trusted God. He trusted God. He went and drew five smooth stones. He had his his slingshot and he used one of them. He trusted God over himself. Over himself. If he had trusted himself. The story would look completely different. Different story, and all of the other stories that came afterwards would have never happened. Exactly. It probably would have happened with someone else, because God's gonna have his way, right? But and he didn't fight to look brave. I mean, I'm sure he did, but he probably looked more like an idiot than he did.

Devin 15:23

Well, sure, if from the outside, if you go back to the beginning of this passage of first champ first Samuel chapter 17, his dad said, Alright, fine. Like, David, you want to go, cool, but you need to put this on, you need to put that on, you need to put all the armor in the world on. David puts it on, David can't stink and stand up. And he's like, No, dude, I can't do this. I can't do this with all this weighing me down and slow me down. Like you said, he didn't fight to look brave.

Jon 15:51

In fact, God's name is being marked and he was not gonna stand.

Devin 15:55

Exactly. And that was David's beef. And here's here's the problem. I think that problem still exists to this day.

SPEAKER_03 16:01

Oh, yeah.

Devin 16:02

How many people do we know in our world and in our culture of whatever it says for for a man to be uncommon?

Jon 16:09

To it to me, it's if you want to be common, you mock God. Right. We can't go, we can't go around killing people with the slingshots. But I was never allowed to have one. Have you ever used one? Like David's slingshot?

Devin 16:25

Yeah, like a slingshot. Like if you ever used a slingshot. Yeah, I had one when I was a kid. Your mom and dad must have been awesome. My mom and dad were like, heck no, we ain't giving that kid. I played the woods, so okay. Well, there you go. Like you said though, he didn't fight for the applause. He fought for the honor. He fought for God's honor. Yeah, not his honor. Not his honor, God's honor. That's

Bathsheba And Owning Sin

Devin 16:48

right. David also failed hard.

Jon 16:50

Yeah.

Devin 16:51

But whenever very hard. But whenever he failed hard in his life, he repented on a much deeper level.

Jon 16:58

So now we jump forward to Bathsheba. That's if you want to read it, it's two chapters. I'm not reading it, but 2 Samuel 11 and 12.

Devin 17:07

David committed in what I think culture would say today is an unforgivable act. They would be banished.

Jon 17:17

Oh, he would have got canceled.

Devin 17:19

No question. David did three main things wrong. He abused power. Let's summarize that story real quick before we keep going.

SPEAKER_02 17:26

Okay. Yeah, yeah. Okay.

Devin 17:28

So so David, I'd say, well, you know what? You summarize it. Go ahead. I think I think you do a better job at it anyways. Mr. I can fight a bear.

Jon 17:36

In a day in a day when kings were normally in battle with their army. David was at home. He sees Bathsheba bathing on a rooftop. Bathsheba's husband is in battle. He sleeps with Bathsheba. This after he lost it for her. Yeah. Okay. Yes. There's there's there's a lot that goes into that, but yes. But and then he had her husband killed. That sums up the that sums up the story.

Devin 18:10

Because her husband was off in battle. Yes. Right. David wanted Bathsheba for himself. So he did quite the unthinkable. And had him killed. And he had him killed. He sent him to the front of the lines, knowing that he would get killed.

Jon 18:24

That he would die right then and there. He didn't to be clear, he didn't say you go kill him. He put him in a position where he knew he would be killed. Exactly.

Devin 18:33

It would be the equivalent of if I put you in a He abused Yeah. Sorry. Yeah. If you worked for me on some level, right, but then I I put you, I don't know, in a bear's den. I know you think you could take one bear, but could you take it? Can we drop the bear? No! I can't believe you said that. Anyways. But David did three, three things wrong to summarize this is he abused power, he committed adultery, and he ordered a man's death. He's also a coward. He is such a coward. He was a coward in this story. Yes. But here's the problem. This is where most people stop respecting David. Everybody loved him up until this point, right? Everybody loved him as long as he was doing everything right, as long as he was being praised, as long as he was getting the recognition. But God never rejected him.

Jon 19:23

They love him. They love him up to this point because they don't keep reading the rest of the story. You gotta keep going.

Devin 19:30

And I would even say, like, do we allow that space for there to be redemption? Because God didn't just God didn't reject him not because of the sin, but because of the repentance. And so that's where I said what I said earlier with the CEO of a Sharpener. Like my prayer is that the dude repented not to not to go back to being the CEO of something, but to to be a better leader, to be a better man, a better father.

SPEAKER_03 20:02

Yeah.

Devin 20:03

And because uh and and here here's I think the biggest problem here. And he never in in in his in his outcomings of after this, he he apologized, sure. He he asked for privacy, but let's be real, by then that was that was far gone. But then the biggest thing I think that happened was people only blamed him. Nobody else nobody looked at her, right? And what she had gone through, that that was like I think her second or third relationship that she had just ruined. And so I don't know, I didn't follow the whole story, but with David in his story, is people stopped looking at him at that moment and they never paid attention to the comeback story. You see, culture, culture today, I I would say instead of is we choose to cancel instead of restore. We choose to defend instead of confess, and we used to j we're we're taught to justify instead of repent. There's no excuses.

Jon 21:13

No.

Devin 21:13

But that's like like everybody's everybody's so great at that. They're everybody's very, very good at at shifting the blame.

Jon 21:23

Yeah. Sum that up real quick. You do something wrong, you own up to it. Be a man. Be a man. Own up to it. You own up to it, and you do whatever it is you need to do to fix it.

Devin 21:35

Right. Because Psalm 51 actually shows us what true repentance looks like. It shows us that that when whenever you do that, you make no bone. There are no excuses. No. You own it. You don't shift that blame to somebody. You I wouldn't have done this if you're not sure.

Jon 21:51

Even if there was another some other some circumstance, some other thing that was happening that contributed to whatever the Whatever the scenario is, we should probably have a fake scenario here, but we don't. Regardless, even if there was some external thing that contributed to this, like it that doesn't matter. You still did what you did. That's right. And and don't minimize it. Own it. Own your stuff. However, that's not a reason to just quote unquote cancel somebody either. Right.

Devin 22:22

And the problem is, is at that point in time is culture today, that's what it does. And I said this a second ago, but culture today it cancels instead of restores. It defends instead of confessing and it justifies instead of repenting. Right? But godly manhood being uncommon in being a man, godly manhood means owning your own sin. Submit to the correction. And change the direction, right? I don't know why I'm coughing so much during this episode.

Jon 22:56

God didn't call David because he never sinned. He called him because David never ran from repentance. So what David had here was a gr a an opportunity to practice repentance.

Devin 23:12

Do you think that that's why God called David a man after my own heart?

Jon 23:18

Well partly. Partly. But I I mean I think there are multiple reasons for that. So I mean he didn't he did he did repent and he always did. But he also as we as we talked about a minute ago he was fighting Goliath. He he was defending God's honor. And he was defending his God because he loved his God. And it wasn't he knew that it wasn't about him. He wasn't he was humble. He was humble. David also honored authority even when it was abusive.

Cancel Culture Versus Restoration

Devin 24:03

I've worked for several people who abused authority. I think the majority of of us out there would say that we've done that. That we've we've had to work for somebody who was in a position of leadership and they didn't necessarily deserve it. They abused their power. Right? They would they would set themselves up for the highest bonus potential, if you will.

Jon 24:30

I'd be willing to bet that the majority of people could could could could say that about who they've worked for. Yeah. Because that you're way more likely to work for a really bad boss than

Honoring Abusive Authority Like Saul

Jon 24:43

you are for a really good boss. Oh yeah. I've been pretty fortunate. I've had two really great bosses and multiple really great leaders in my life.

SPEAKER_01 24:53

Yeah.

Jon 24:53

So I'm I'm pretty I've had some bad ones. Don't get me wrong, I've had some bad ones and I've learned as much, if not more, from this.

Devin 25:01

Yeah, I've I would say I would say this. I would say I've probably had more bad bosses than I have good ones. Because, like, for example, I used to work for a guy that we would have to do so much at a very early hour of the morning. And like we're talking like before the sun is even up. And then I remember there was one particular day, like everything was done and over with, and this man literally had a fishing boat parked out front so that as soon as the event was over, this man got in his truck, attached it to his fishing boat to it and hauled butt to the ocean. And I was like, Are you serious? Like he abused his power. He abused his authority. And I think David has a lot to say about that, to uh about abusing his his power. He but understand this through it all, even in my situation with my bad boss, I honored him because he was my authority.

Jon 25:59

Right.

Devin 25:59

I didn't I didn't go tell everybody what a piece of crap he was because he he got to go fishing and I had to stay another three hours.

Jon 26:06

So what what we're getting at here though is Saul wanted to kill David. King Saul wanted David dead, and David had multiple chances to kill Saul, and he didn't. I will not touch the Lord's anointed, is what he said. So he was hunted, he was betrayed, and he was falsely accused. Saul wanted David dead. Why did Saul want David dead? Because he was selected to be he he knew he was going to be king. An abuse of power. An abuse of power, yes. He was abusing his power, and even David knew that. He wanted, he tried to kill David. He failed. David had the chance to kill him and didn't. So what does culture say about it? Culture today would say, let's get revenge. Set the record straight. Like, no, you will No, thank you. I'm gonna kill you. You wanna check you wanna kill me? I'm gonna kill you. But David said no because of the position that Saul was in. And it also says to to take what's yours. As we as we said in the beginning, and culture, we celebrate ego image and self-promotion. Like to the self-made man that's so it's fantasized. I feel like that's mostly a movie. Like movies have just fantasized that. But some better than others, like imagine Batman as a bad guy or something like that. You know what I mean?

Devin 27:37

I saw a fun funny fact. I actually had somebody send me like the 1950s clip of one of the Batman movies, and the caption just said, Was this but was this movie budget 20 bucks and a box of pizza?

SPEAKER_02 27:50

Because it was downright awful.

Devin 27:53

But anyways, with with David and Saul, and as we continue this journey on about David, is as John said earlier, he honored the authority, even though it was not necessarily earned or deserved. David was very uncommon in that aspect. So you said a second ago that culture says to get revenge, to set the record straight, to take what's yours. But David's example was he trusted God with the timing. He refused to become dishonorable just to gain power. What another way of putting it is what is what else the Bible says about it? What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses a soul in the process?

Jon 28:34

Nothing. You see, I you're not taking it to heaven with you.

Devin 28:37

That's right. You see, I want to in in my profession, in my business, I want to be the best of my industry, sure. But I am not willing to screw people over to get there. The problem is that is very counter or or the problem that hinders me is that's very countercultural because counterculture or culture says step on. Culture says go take what's yours. Use their head as a step. That's right. Instead, Davey's example was he trusted it. He said, I'm not, I'm not going to become dishonorable just to gain the power. You don't prove this is where I think people misunderstand this a lot. And if you hear nothing else of this episode, hear this. You don't prove your strength by overthrowing people. You prove it by trusting God with the outcome.

Jon 29:22

Right. It took a lot of strength for him to refrain.

Devin 29:26

David could have ended this story with Saul so much faster. Right. Could have. And we'd be having a very difficult conversation right now. Right. But in reality, what he just decided to do was he's, you know, I could have taken you out here, could have taken you out there. But what he did was he allowed for God's timing. My question for our listeners today is do we allow for God's timing to intercede in our lives? I would say the majority of us don't. Like I said earlier, we live in a society that is very fast-paced.

Jon 30:00

Yeah.

Devin 30:01

Instant gratification. It's got to be done and it's got to be done now. But

Weakness, Vulnerability, And Accountability

Devin 30:06

as we kind of begin to close this thing out with understanding the different sides of manhood and what culture says versus what David actually says. Culture says you need to prove yourself. David said, let God promote you. And, you know, I told you earlier, like that was something the that need for recognition, that was something that I asked the Lord to prune out of me. And it was difficult. And there was a lot of times, man, that I had to really do some crappy jobs to be able to walk through those tough seasons. I think a lot of people, I think a lot of our listeners have been there. Maybe you're there now and you're having to walk through a lot of crappy seasons. And you're you're sitting there wondering, well, what can I do to bolster myself? No, no, no, no. Culture says promote yourself. But what David showed was what was to let God promote you.

Jon 31:08

And then men, specifically for men, hide your weaknesses. But we really need to bring those weaknesses to God. Depending on what that weakness is. Like, yes, you bring it to God. And say your weakness is lust. Are you going to overcome that with a whole bunch of prayer? Yeah. Maybe. Maybe. But you also need a group of men. It's got a starting thing. You need a group of men around you. Yeah, it's got to start. Of course it has started. Yeah. But you also God heals through prayer, people, and sometimes pills. Depending, you know, if you have like a mental thing. Whatever. Yeah. Regardless. I'm talking about the people here. Yeah. You need those people around you.

Devin 31:53

So why do you think why do you think men are scared to hide their weakness?

Jon 32:01

To not let other people see it. Scared to hide. You mean scared to bring their weaknesses up? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. What is that?

Devin 32:09

I yeah, I totally said that wrong.

Jon 32:10

But you meant to be they don't want to be vulnerable.

Devin 32:14

Yeah.

Jon 32:15

There's a difference in vulnerability and transparency. That's right. So vulnerability is we're we're we're sharing this together kind of thing. Like we're not men don't want to do that. In some cases, you sh you probably shouldn't. You should take that to God, depending depending on what it is. But that's another reason you need men around you that aren't going to bash you. If you just publicly bring up a weakness, like you're going to get run over sometimes because of the way culture is.

Devin 32:48

I think you got to be careful about who you bring your weaknesses to, but to under also understand that it's okay to have weaknesses. Yes. Everybody does. Right. In fact, what like I said, David did is David brought his weaknesses to God.

SPEAKER_02 33:01

Right.

Devin 33:02

So if I knew that a weakness of mine was a need for recognition, I brought that to God and I said, Lord, help print this out of me. I don't want this. This does not honor you. I think the other thing though that culture says is it it tells us to chase power.

Jon 33:17

Right. But we need to submit to God.

Devin 33:20

Yeah. We need to submit to his authority and what does what does he want for your life? If I want to have the biggest, best business in the world, but that's not God's plan and that's not God's authority, my job is to be submitted to that. Right.

SPEAKER_02 33:35

Does that make sense?

Devin 33:36

Like, like we can't, I can't sit there and say, God, I want you to bless and honor this business and give me the biggest business in the world. But if that's not your will, well, then I'm off these tracks. Right.

Jon 33:49

Like, huh? Right. Well, if you're pursuing if you're pursuing God's purpose for your life, then if if the if the bigger business is part of God's purpose for your life, then I think exactly. Okay, great. Maybe you'll make a million dollars. But then what happens after you make the million dollars? Then what? Yeah, then what? How many people have have won the lottery but then filed bankruptcy? Well, that's true. But if you don't have a purpose, if you're not chasing what that answers, if you're not chasing purpose, it's I don't remember. Honestly, I heard that recently and I don't remember. But if you're not chasing purpose, once you reach this goal that you have for no reason, then what? If you're after God's purpose in your life, the the things will come if they need to, if they if they're part of God's purpose for your life. If you're just chasing material things, then so a very, very quick answer here.

Devin 34:55

While no precise number exists, estimates suggest around one-third or 33% to as high as 70%. No, that's too big, of lottery winners file for bankruptcy within a few years. The widely cited 70% figure isn't well researched with more concern, anyways. A lot of people a lot of people file for bankruptcy even after having all that. But here's I think another thing that culture makes it very common, and then there's a very uncommon way to do it, is culture says to never admit your fault.

Jon 35:27

Right. Then we push that we push the blame for our own actions off on other people. We justify it. We say, well, this happened. Maybe it did, but you still screwed the pooch here.

Devin 35:40

Yeah. But David shows us to repent publicly. Right. And so, you know, I can remember whenever I was in leadership over a youth ministry one time, and we were we had this event planned, and my leadership team had done a lot of the work. But then what happened, I completely dropped the ball on my end of things. My ball was my ball that I had to do for this project or for this event was simply to speak. And I was not prepared. And guess what? It was terrible. I don't believe I honored the Lord that night in doing what I did. It was terrible. I made excuses all along the way. I blamed other things, other circumstances, instead of just going, you know what? I'm sorry, guys, I screwed that up. And so what I actually did later on, because I asked the Lord to search my heart and find where I went wrong. And where I went wrong was I never took the, I was never held accountable accountable for that. And so what I did is I actually got my team together and I said, listen, guys, I screwed this up. This is on me. I'm not afraid to admit whenever I screw it up. And the reality is, for us as men, we're taught justify it away. You're taught to just say, well, let me just keep that, you know, private. I'll work on that on my own time. The reality is you never will. To be an uncommon man, I believe, means that you repent not only to God, but from a public place as well. Right. If you're if you're screwing around behind your wife, you need to repent of that to her. If you have a problem looking what looking at things on on the internet and pornography that you shouldn't be looking at, you need to repent that to those that are closest to you. Because that is the way that God is honored the most. And I'm not sitting here saying have a truth party. What I'm saying, and and this is quite literally one of the scariest things, in my opinion, about God. You cannot hide. Nope. You cannot run from what God is calling you to do. You cannot. So admit Well, you can.

Jon 37:59

Well, you can, but eventually it's gonna catch up. It's not gonna go well.

Devin 38:02

Sure. I mean, I was called to ministry at the age of 15, but I ran for four years. How'd that go? Miserable.

Jon 38:08

Let's talk about strength for a second. Yeah. So strength. We see strength as the kind of what we talked about earlier, the self-made man, the CEO with like $10 million yachts, Mark Cuban as an example. Strength, true strength comes from obedience to God. We we we obey God and we pursue his purpose for our life. We don't chase material things.

Devin 38:36

Strength, in other words, this culture says strength equals dominance. When what the Bible shows us and what David shows us is strength equals obedience. So just be obedient to what God has called you to in your life. So let's put a bowl. To wrap it up, how David teaches men today.

Six Practices Of Godly Strength

Devin 38:55

Here's a few simple steps for what a godly man today is going to look like. Six. Six. The the why don't why don't why don't I take the first the first three and you'll do the last three? Good with that? Sure. Let's do it. Why not? All right. Your action here, number one, pursue God in private before influence in public. You want God to honor and to bless things in your life. You want him to be the leader and the shepherd of your life. Then it starts being done privately. It starts in those long car rides, whenever you're just in silence. Dude, I love to ride in my truck in silence. And one of the reasons why is because it's just my long time between me and God. So I ask for him. I pursue him. I pray for his protection over my family. I pray for all that in private. Long before I want to be publicly acknowledged for that. Right. Even going back to the origins of this podcast, like we prayed privately about this podcast separately, and then God brought us together for it. Number two, fight the battles from faith, not insecurity. Insecurity as a man is something that I believe is such a double-edged sword. You could you could also replace that with fear, insecurity. So so in other words, fight your battles from faith, not fear. Yeah, I think both work. Is that what you're saying?

Jon 40:25

Yeah, I think both work.

Devin 40:26

Yeah. So, and then number three is a godly man today is emotionally honest with God. Like I said earlier, quite literally the scariest thing is you can't hide. He already knows anyway. He already does, man. And so I think the biggest thing is to be emotionally honest with him. God, I feel like this. He is the only like he people think God is being like this cosmic bully that doesn't want to help, and he's just there to, you know, publicly strike you down with a lightning bolt whenever you screw something up. And the reality is that's just not him.

Jon 41:01

Right.

Devin 41:02

I can remember being so angry at God that like I pulled over in the middle of the road one night and I just screamed. And I screamed at him and I let him know what a piece of everything I thought he was, right? And the real the best part about it was he still loved me. He still loved me. And so I I get to be emotionally honest.

Jon 41:22

Like parents standing there watching your toddler throw a fit. It's like just like, are you done yet? Are we can we are we good now?

Devin 41:30

Oh no, no, I didn't tell you what I did today. My daughter, my my three-year-old daughter, she started throwing a fit and like threw herself down on the floor and was wailing back and forth. So I threw myself down on the floor and sort of wailing back and forth next to her, and then immediately she thought it was the funniest thing in the world. Anyways.

Jon 41:45

I could I can picture that.

Devin 41:46

Thanks. I'm glad you can.

Jon 41:47

Number four. Giant baby Devin. Number four, repents quickly and repents quickly and fully. So as we all we all screw up. We are all sinful creatures. As soon as we realize, as soon as you know that you have done something that requires repentance, you do it immediately. Drop to your knees if you need to and repent for what you've done.

Devin 42:22

Three simple words. God, sorry.

Jon 42:26

For all of it. Fully. Don't leave part of it out, but fully. Fully admit what you've done and actually repent. Don't just be like, sorry, but it's okay because I know God will forgive me. Like, I can go do this, I can go get drunk tomorrow night and screw a hooker, but it's fine because God'll forgive me. Like, no, no, you can't do cocaine and and that's not a life that honors God. No. No, it's not.

Devin 42:54

And it's and here's the thing. If you're gonna sit there and say that you want God's blessing and favor to follow your life, then you have a general idea of what that's going to look like and what's going to bring him honor and glory.

Jon 43:09

Trust God with timing and promotion. That is difficult. For me personally, trusting God with timing. Like you said, we live in a world where we want things to happen right now. Instant gratification. It is sometimes difficult when you God's not gonna give you the whole plan at once. But when you start to see little snippets and you're like, oh, okay. Like I'm not gonna tell tell it now, but I shared with you something that happened to me a couple days ago. I prayed for something that morning. The prayer was answered that afternoon. And you're not gonna convince me that was a coincidence because the conversation between other people happened after I. Prayed. And I didn't even realize it until the following day. I didn't realize it was an answer prayer, but it was. And then I saw a little snippet of the future. What the future might hold. Because I want that to happen now. It's really it's it's difficult to just be like, all right, all right, I'm trusting you. And just I I very strongly believe if you just keep pursuing whatever it is God's purpose is for your life, you have to you have to trust the timing for it to work out. Because if you just if you if it all just happened right now, it well it it probably won't work out for you because there might be a lot of growth that needs to happen. There might be there's a lot of steps between here and there, which is exactly why what you said earlier, most people that win the lottery go bankrupt because they didn't take the steps to get there. They don't have the financial discipline to handle a hundred million dollars, and all of a sudden they have a hundred million dollars and now they have less than zero dollars.

SPEAKER_01 45:09

Yeah.

Devin 45:10

Right? Yeah. And the thing about it is we think about trusting God with your timing, with the timing and the things that's surrounding your life. That means just because you pray for it doesn't mean you're gonna get it.

Jon 45:21

Yeah.

Devin 45:21

Right.

Jon 45:22

And so maybe it's later, maybe it's no.

Devin 45:24

Maybe it's exactly and maybe it is a no. What's an old country song? Some of God's greatest gifts or what? Do you for real not know this? God bless you on culture swine.

Jon 45:35

That doesn't mean I'm a culture, that means I don't listen to crap music.

Devin 45:39

Some of God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers, I believe. Right. Are unanswered prayers. Because his timing is perfect. It's kind of like if if you believe in in his timing for your finances, like do you trust him? Is he your provider?

Jon 45:54

And then number six, use power to serve, not to take. If you're if you are the CEO self-made man, are we gonna use the CEO listening to this podcast? God, yes. Probably not. Are we gonna email us? You're gonna use that power to serve those around you, or are you gonna use that power to try to get more power and step on more heads? You don't have to be famous like David, you just have to be faithful.

Devin 46:26

I think when we when we break down living a life that is uncommon, one of the things that we have to look at and we have to go back to the to the roots of is to people like David in the Bible. That when we understand and we choose to focus and to chase after his heart, that his timing is surreal, is is supreme, it's perfect. And that the best part of it is that through it all, he gets all the honor and the glory. That's what it looks like to live a life that is uncommon. Seek curse the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things will be added for you. Let me pray for us. God, we love you. Thank you so much, God, for people like David. God, for people that that choose to roll after you or to pursue after your own heart. God, I pray for every single person or or person listening to this podcast. Under the sound of my voice, Lord, would you begin right now to convict the areas of wrongness? May they seek accountability. God, would we would we repent publicly? Would we seek after you and trust in your timing and understand that your strength, that our strength comes from being obedient to you. God, we thank you so much for this platform. May it be used to bring you on our honor and glory and hide us beyond behind the cross. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

Prayer, Bears, And Closing CTA

Jon 48:02

For the record, if I had to fight a bear, it's because there's zombies, probably, and I already ran out of ammo. Because if I'm if I'm anywhere near a bear and I don't have a gun, and the only reason I can think of amount of ammo is zombies.

Devin 48:16

So I'm thinking like you fighting a bear is like bare fist and knuckles. Could you do it? Yes or no?

Jon 48:22

Well, I would definitely bare fist and knuckles. Could you beat a bear? Like I said, it depends on the bear. A small black bear? Sure. Guys, we're gonna pray for John. Confidence. It'll be okay. It's that or die. You know what? It's fight the bear or die. I might as well be confident that I can take the bear. Is it a if it's a grizzly bear, I might as well just get in the fetal position and hope for the best.

Devin 48:44

Fair enough.

Jon 48:45

Like I can't take the bear. I'll probably die faster. Thanks for listening. Remember to like, share, and subscribe. If you know someone who would enjoy this, please pass it along. You can follow us on Instagram at uncommon.man or reach out at theuncommonman.com at gmail.com. Keep pursuing excellence, and above all, keep pursue exc.