In their book Posers, Fakers, and Wannabes, Brennan Manning and Jim Hancock introduce us to a character they call “The Poser.” They argue that The Poser (a person who pretends to be someone he is not) lives in all of us. I saw a lot of myself in the following story in which Jim recounts the images The Poser created for him—images that would be accepted by other people:
I first took advice from The Poser when I was faking my way through junior high school. I wanted to fit in. I was afraid of being left out. The Poser helped me appear better than I was (or worse if worse was better). He helped me conceal the truth from people I thought might judge me as harshly as I judged me. I kept taking his advice because, mostly, it worked.
The Poser is the man of a thousand faces. He taught me how to construct a mask for any occasion from whatever I found lying around. With my musical friends I was all about whatever music they liked. For my jock friends I was brooding and barely verbal. When I got with smart kids I bluffed my way through by recalling trivia and making up stuff (wait a minute … I still do that!). With The Poser’s help, I managed to hold my own into high school, but it was hard, exhausting work. I went to church (spiritual face), I hung out with friends (wise guy face), I went out a little (sincere face). So many disguises, so little real fun, playing all those roles without knowing who I was. Or if I was anyone at all.
I was on an impossible quest, searching for my identity in the eyes of other people.1
Does Jim’s journey into manhood sound familiar? It took him (and lots of young men) a while to figure out why he was such a social chameleon. Being The Poser was so natural he didn’t even know he was posing! Although a Christian, his actions were dependent upon whatever crowd was around him, because The Poser created a new identity or “mask” for every situation. The problem with these multiple identities is that Jim could not develop any of them fully since he had to change costumes so often.
One of his identities was his “God Mask,” but because of the competition for people’s acceptance—versus God’s—his identity in Christ was weak and useless. The same thing goes for us. When we lack a strong identity and don’t know who we are, our ability to be loyal to anything or anyone is severely hampered.
Let me tell you about Brandon. At fourteen years of age he heard the message of God’s love for him at a church camp. For the first time everything made sense to him. Brandon responded by heeding the speaker’s call to come forward and give his life to Jesus Christ. His decision stuck—until he was confronted with the party scene in high school. Girls in their tube tops, raging hormones, pressure from buddies, and an invitation from Amanda to “go to the lake” caused Brandon to experience what I call “identity drift.” Inside he was battling to keep his faith locked in a compartment away from his new—and very exciting—social life. Everything that reminded him of his commitment to Christ, including connections to Christian friends, faded into the background.
When we lack a strong identity and don’t know who we are, our ability to be loyal to anything or anyone is severely hampered.
At a party Brandon listened to Amanda ripping those “born agains” she saw having Bible study at Starbucks. “Praise the Lord and hallelujah!” she mocked, and her passionate performance got a good laugh.
Brandon felt he should say something, so he uttered one of those “Yeah, ain’t that the truth” comments, which effectively denied his identity as a Christian. He didn’t feel good about it, so Brandon faked an excuse about having to go to the bathroom. He took that opportunity to step outside and look up at the full moon staring down at him. To Brandon it felt like God was staring him right in the face. Then a picture came into his mind, and it hit him like a ton of bricks: the campfire, the smell of smoke, the speaker, the warmth of God’s love, and that full moon!
Brandon’s true inner loyalty had been unmasked, and God had just called it on the carpet. Then another picture flooded his head—the cross at the campfire and Brandon nailing a note to it with a hammer and nail. The note contained the frivolous yet personal sins of a fourteen-year-old as well as his commitment to follow Christ his whole life. Seeing the moon that evening was as if God was saying, “Remember who you are.”
So many men, young and old, are caught between competing identities that divide their loyalty, just like Brandon. Maybe you’ve worn a mask or rationalized your faith away when it’s been uncomfortable. If your inner loyalty and commitment to Christ are divided, how can you expect to overcome the fear of what other people think about your being a Christian? Moving into the Man Zone means having a radical inner loyalty to a person, not an abstract belief. It’s having a clear and personal picture of Jesus Christ’s passion for you on the cross and then letting your heart match His with love and loyalty. When you arrive at this kind of commitment, you will become more confident about bringing your faith into the open. Getting to that place will mean making a choice between Christ and everyone else.
To end boyish excuses, develop godly loyalty, and move into a solid identity requires manly honesty before God and people. So, I must take this moment and ask you a serious question about how you are going to live out your life. Ready?
WHERE IS YOUR LOYALTY GOING TO LIE?
Well? Do you have an answer? If you know who you are (God’s young man), then you will not be afraid to identify with Him. If you can settle this now—before you leave for college or get out there on your own—you will experience a freedom like never before.
“How is that?” you ask.
Answer: simple—when your loyalties are settled, your decisions and actions will be easy. That’s how it was for Hezekiah:
Remember now, O LORD, I pray, how I have walked before You in truth and with a loyal heart, and have done what was good in Your sight. (2 Kings 20:3, NKJV)
God had told Hezekiah that he was going to die, which would certainly get my attention. In response, Hezekiah dialed 911, and amazingly, he was granted a fifteen-year extension on earth! While Hezekiah knew God was all-powerful, he also knew that God was also a rewarder of those loyal to him, and that a “loyal heart” produced “what was good in Your sight.”
How do you see yourself? What’s your core identity that defines who you are and shapes your loyalties? Before you get into tough situations as a man, you have to get your identity settled and strong. Then you can focus on being who you are versus someone who oscillates between God Guy and Poser Guy, between Sunday Guy and Tequila Shooter Guy, or between Bible Study Man and Porn Studies Man. (These masked men show up out of nowhere, leave as fast as they arrive, and leave people asking the question, “Who was that masked man?”)
To develop consistent loyalty and spiritual integrity, you have to make real choices under real pressure before you can experience real results.
The most successful, disciplined, and free people are those who know who they are. Exhibit #1 would be my cousins—yes, they’re really my cousins—Wuv and Sonny with the band P.O.D. When I watch them perform on television or hear their new single on the radio, I see them as God’s men who happen to be musicians. They had to work hard and sacrifice to get there, however. They practiced their instruments for years, stayed in fleabag motels, and survived on a diet of fast food for a shot at a contract with a major label, which they eventually got when they signed with Virgin Atlantic. Since then, P.O.D.—this stands for Payable on Death—has become one of the most successful Christian bands around.
Those at the top of their professions—Lance Armstrong, Shaun White, Kevin Garnett, Drew Brees, and Bono, to name a few—are totally sold out to what they do best. Lance stays in the saddle six hours a day, Drew studied for years the art of throwing the perfect spiral under pressure, Shaun endlessly adjusts his speed and angle for the perfect launches, Kevin shoots hundreds of free throws every day, and Bono and U2 practice their songs until they’re sick of them. We see and admire guys who work on their sports or their crafts, but we don’t get how it applies to our thinking about becoming God’s man. How much training are you doing to become God’s man? When you are doing zero training, you’ve compromised. You don’t have a loyal heart.
What does it take to have a loyal heart?
An absence of fear.
I am in your space to remind you that your loyalty will be tested so your spiritual backbone can develop. God will put your spiritual commitment into arenas of testing to see what’s there. He will help you get consistent and confident in making the right choices. When you do that—show loyalty under pressure—you will sense His approval and His pleasure:
I know, my God, that you test the heart and are pleased with integrity. (1 Chronicles 29:17)
First, God will test your commitment to Him. It’s just like great coaches who have their players practice under gamelike conditions. That way, when it comes time to deliver during a game, players will have the freedom to execute without the distractions of ignorance or fear. God knows this. To develop consistent loyalty and spiritual integrity, you have to make real choices under real pressure before you can experience real results. For instance, He will allow you to encounter alluring images of women (real or pixelated) to see what you’ll do. He will allow you to choose whether you go out with a girl who doesn’t share your faith in Christ. He’s gonna see if you will respond differently than your school buddies who sleep with their girlfriends. God narrows your choices to make you into His man.
Second, God is pleased when you choose Him. You may not feel His pleasure when you’re put on the spot by your friends, but you will know it later that night when put your head on your pillow. You can’t hear the applause from heaven, but you may receive confirmation from a brother who was convicted by your stance. You may wonder why your youth pastor keeps harping about abstaining from sex, but you’ll thank him on your wedding day. You see, every father is pleased when he sees his son loving the things and doing the things that he loves and does. Similarly, your heavenly Father is greatly pleased when He sees you undivided between what you believe and how you actually live and think.
Here’s how it plays out later on. Once, my nine-year-old son, Ryan, and I were watching an NFL playoff game when the Victoria’s Secret “angels” hit the screen with only their wings on. The remote wasn’t nearby, so I immediately turned my head to Ryan and blabbered stuff like: “Hey Ryan, how’s it going? How you doing? What’s going on?”
I engaged him in conversation to draw my eyes—and his—away from the skin belonging to our fine-feathered friends.
He looked at me (okay, my ploy worked), and then he asked, “Dad, what are you doing?”
“Dude, there are some ladies on TV right now without any clothes on, and I don’t want to look at any other woman that way except for your mom. So you can help me out by talking to me.”
My son, who still thought girls have cooties, shrugged his shoulders. “Okay,” he said.
Fast-forward two weeks later. Ryan and his younger sister are downstairs watching football, and I hear the same Victoria’s Secret ad come on from my upstairs perch. I was just about to rush downstairs when I heard Ryan say to his sister, “Hey, Cara, how’s it going? How you doing? What’s going on?” You get the picture.
Think I was pleased? I was stoked! Think I felt God’s pleasure? Up and down my spine! It happened because I wanted to remain loyal to God and bounce my eyes from sexy images and stay loyal to God and my son.
Fact time: each test of your loyalty gives you a chance to “win” spiritually, and each time you chalk up a victory, you gain increasing amounts of self-control, confidence, and clarity as God’s man. Could you go for a little more confidence in your walk?
One of my part-time jobs in high school was working in a liquor store as a stock boy (my alcoholic father knew the owner real well). As I got older I worked behind the counter and rang up sales on the cash register. There was another benefit to working behind the counter: that’s where we kept the “adult” magazines. When things got slow on Sunday afternoons, I had total freedom to rifle through those magazines—and I couldn’t resist. (This happened before I got serious with God that evening in my bedroom.) I became hooked by this stuff—it was like nitroglycerin in my hands. Those sexy images took a heavy toll on my mind and heart.
Girls who didn’t share my convictions about sexual purity gravitated to guys more than willing to play.
Still, I was determined in my new faith as a college freshman to fight this fight. I had my work cut out for me, though, because I was enrolling at UCLA, that bastion of babes, beer, and beach time. The nightlife in Westwood—well, let’s just say that my Bruin pride believes there’s nothing better. What a chick magnet! We’re talking Babeville with the hottest-looking girls on your left, on your right, and dead ahead, but I was committed to honoring God and remaining loyal to Him. I made that commitment public; I let other people in on the fact that I was a Christian. I became active with other Christians on campus, not because I thought I was some superhot Christian, but because I knew I wasn’t a superhot Christian.
From the moment I said, “No thanks, that’s not for me,” and put my loyalty to Christ out in the open, that effectively removed me from the invitation lists to various parties. Girls who didn’t share my convictions about sexual purity gravitated to guys more than willing to play.
My stand made me accountable for my faith in front of seventy other fraternity brothers, who watched me like a hawk, wondering when I would compromise. I didn’t mind; in fact, I welcomed this healthy pressure because it felt like a godly reminder not to betray my stand. My fraternity brothers may have thought I was being strong, but the opposite is true: I was weak. So I had to rely on Christ to make my stand. Relying on Christ generated feelings of integrity within me, which bolstered my confidence to stand for Him.
The wisest man ever, Israel’s King Solomon, made these points about integrity: “He who walks in integrity walks securely” and “The integrity of the upright will guide them” (Proverbs 10:9, 11:3, NASB). With undivided integrity:
• Choices are clear.
• There’s no double life.
• There’s no fear of getting exposed.
• You move beyond instant gratification.
• Feeling right replaces having to feel good.
• You maintain and deepen your connection to Christ.
• You experience God’s rewards.
• You’re less stressed.
• You get better at making right choices under pressure.
• You grow a spine for God. (That’s what I needed most.)
Jesus Christ had an unbending and loyal heart for His Father. So why should any of God’s men be surprised that the captain of our team would call us to develop such a heart for ourselves? Even His skeptical, conniving competitors had to admit that this guy was the real deal:
Teacher, we know you are a man of integrity. You aren’t swayed by men, because you pay no attention to who they are; but you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. (Mark 12:14)
Jesus Christ:
This same Jesus lives in you. One day Jesus surprised a big group of his followers by saying, “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?” (Luke 6:46). What Jesus was saying was this: “Are you on the team or aren’t you?” He was attacking the thinking that a man could name Him as his leader (“Lord”) yet still live a life opposite of what his leader valued. It’s obvious why this doesn’t make sense, yet so many men try to live this way anyway. Jesus wasn’t interested in winning a popularity contest or getting on the good side of a girl. He was not going to be played.
All of God’s men—even the strong ones—struggled to be loyal. They knew they couldn’t do it on their own, so they fought hard to stay committed. God wants you to live a life loyal to Him, but it starts with a loyal heart.
If that’s your desire, then you can pray the same prayer the most famous God’s man ever prayed:
For you are great and do marvelous deeds;
you alone are God.
Teach me your way, O LORD,
and I will walk in your truth;
give me an undivided heart,
that I may fear your name. (Psalm 86:10-11)
David needed to go to the next level that God was calling him—the place of total loyalty and commitment. A place where his walk was solid and true. God is calling you to that same place because an undivided life starts with an undivided heart.
Our next stop in the Man Zone is about having guts—the spiritual guts to get out of your comfort zone and make changes in who you are and what you do. What you’ll discover is that God loves you too much to leave you unchanged.
1. Brennan Manning and Jim Hancock, Posers, Fakers, and Wannabes (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 2004), 10-11.