What does the Bible say about being a man?

After these details the apostle gives a few pithy words of exhortation: "Watch, stand in the faith, play the man, be strong.* Let all your doings be in love." (Vers. 13, 14.) They are words eminently suited to the state of things at Corinth, besides being wholesome for all saints in all times and places. Carelessness had marked them as a company, and therefore were they now called to vigilance. They had allowed speculations to work even on foundation truths of revelation, and so they needed to cleave firmly to the deposit of faith. They had been walking after the manner of man (κατὰ ἄνθρωπον), and had shrunk from reproach and suffering, feebly dreading the world's opinions; they are urged, therefore, to quit themselves in a manly way (ἀνδρίζεσθε), and to be strong. They had need also, and above all, that whatever they did might be done lovingly. It is the final application of that which 1 Cor. 13 had opened out — the blessed energy of the divine nature, which lives and delights in the good of others; and it is the fitting preface to his next topic.

The condition at Corinth required each exhortation of verse 13, and who today is not in such need also? "Watch ye": for laxity and love of ease finds us too frequently unprepared to meet the subtle attacks of the enemy. "Stand fast in the faith": for that firmness of decision to stand upon the clear principles of the truth of God, may all too easily give place to compromise and retreat. "Quit you like men": for man was originally made in the image of God, and therefore put in the place of representing God in a hostile world: let us not lightly esteem such dignity and honor. "Be strong": for whatever our natural weakness, strength is certainly available in Christ, and it is the only strength that can overcome the pride, fleshliness, and Satanic deception that was raising its ugly head at Corinth, and is no less active today.

Verse 13. "Watch ye," etc. Other helpers might be wanting, but the Lord is ever with His people. To themselves, therefore, they must look as in His sight, and learn in His strength to bear worthily the name by which they are called. The fourfold admonition contained in this verse addresses itself to those points in the character of the Corinthian saints which have already been reviewed. He had chidden them for desiring to reign here below as kings, and had shown them, by their own example, how such unseasonable ease tends only to dishonour. Let them no longer luxuriate in truth, but use it as a girdle to sustain them on their watch. 2. They had moved away, to a certain extent, from the hope of the gospel, and the very foundation of their faith had been shaken, through listening to the fallacies of those among them who denied the resurrection of the dead. Let them cease from vain disputings, and abide in that which they had heard from the beginning. Let the words of God give rest to their minds as well as hearts. "The faith" is here, as often elsewhere, expressive rather of the doctrine held, than of the quality which leads men to embrace it. The apostle's parting boast was, that he had "kept the faith;" and he would have his children emulate his zeal, that they might also share his crown.9 They had shown but little spiritual manliness when they allowed themselves to be so outwitted by their adversary, and pushed down from their proper excellency as partakers of Christ, as to be again "carnal" in their ways. It was unmanly to yield to the enemy the ground they were anointed to defend. It was unmanly to consult their present ease, and be contending eagerly for earthly gain, instead of walking in the path the Master trod. It was unmanly also, with such manifold endowments as they had received, to make so puerile a use of them. Let them be babes indeed in malice, but in fortitude and wisdom be as men. They had once seemed strong, when he who had begotten them was weak; but illusions were now yielding to the force of truth.1 There would be left in them but little strength, when they viewed themselves attentively in the mirror of his words. This he knew, and seeks therefore to reassure them by a fit word of encouragement. Let them find strength where he had found it — not in their own profession of the faith, but in the grace which is in Christ Jesus. Self-confidence had proved their feebleness; in returning and resting in the Lord, they should find a renewing of their strength.

The husband is not to demand of the wife this submission, which is her place. Husbands are to love their wives as Christ loved the Church. He stands in the Christian family as the representative of Christ and is called to love his wife. And how did Christ love the Church? He came from heaven's glory to be a servant. He served and is serving the Church. The husband's love towards the wife is to be expressed in loving service in her behalf and giving unto her, as unto the weaker vessel (1 Peter 3:7). Not the wife is to serve the husband, but the husband is to serve her in love, thus manifesting in a little measure the love of Christ for the Church. Beautiful is the description of the love of Christ for the Church. It is a love in the past: "He loved the Church and gave Himself for it." Thus there is a present love: "That He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the Word." Then there is His future love: "That He might present it to Himself a glorious Church not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish." it is the love which passeth knowledge, the love which never changeth; the love which is eternal. Equally blessed is the truth contained in verses 30-33. We are members of His body, and of His flesh and His bones.

But the duty is not one-sided. The apostle adds, "And ye, fathers, provoke not your children to wrath but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." (v. 4.) Both parents are to be obeyed, but this admonition is addressed only to the fathers. This may be partly because fathers are more likely to err in the provoking of their children to wrath than mothers; but the principal reason is that the father, as the head of the house, is responsible to God for the bringing up of the children, and he is treated on the ground of this responsibility. This principle, as seen in Eli's case, runs throughout Scripture. It is all the more solemn because under Christianity the children are already holy, as belonging to the house of God; and the obligation is therefore the greater to "bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." The Israelites were holy by birth — not personally, but as belonging to a nation set apart to God — and therefore the fathers were to instruct the children in the law, their then link with God. So Christian parents are to instruct their children as to what becomes the holy character which attaches to them as members of a Christian family.

As David was about to die, his words to Solomon have serious significance. Just as Paul (2 Tim.4:1-6) and Peter (2 Pet.1:12-15) were concerned about the testimony of the Lord after their decease, so was David, for they were not moved by selfish motives, but by concern for God's glory among His people.

David therefore urged Solomon, "be strong, therefore, and prove yourself a man" (v.2). If he was to do this, he would have to keep the charge of the Lord, to walk in His ways, to keep His statutes, His commandments, His judgments and His testimonies written in the Law of Moses. Only by heeding this law would Solomon prosper (v.3).

The Lord had told David that if his sons would be diligent to walk before the Lord in truth with all their heart and soul, then there would be no lack of a descendant to sit on David's throne. David reminded Solomon of this conditional promise (v.4). Sad to say, David's sons did not fulfill the conditions. Solomon began well, but very soon departed from the truth of scripture, and his sons departed farther still (1 Ki.11:1-9; 12:1-15).

Now, what are we to learn from this? Surely that we are to long to be men. Of course, it is not now a question of sex in this matter, a sister may be a man of God (2 John 10). And in Romans 16 where we get a list of God's mighty men (corresponding to the mighty men of David's army, 2 Sam. 23), we find that a large number of them are women. Therefore, it is not a matter of sex, but of spiritual strength and of growth. Every child of God should desire to grow and be strong for the Lord, for it is written, "Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong."

"Be strong! Be men" is all the men of the world can say for each other's encouragement; but, relying on the Lord, the man of faith says with the apostle, "When I am weak, then am I strong." "Ye walk as men," was the same apostle's rebuke to the worldly Corinthians who gloried of prominence in the world. "Every inch a man" is the complimentary commendation of the world as to one it approves. Men of "blue blood" (or men of "red blood," as it is now) are the pride and confidence of the natural man; but God has said, Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord" (Jer. 17:5).

In Him, then, at last, God found the Man who was, without exception, after His own heart — the One who embodied the perfection of His own thoughts, and answered to the ideal of His own mind — THE PERFECT MAN. In every circumstance, therefore — what He was toward God, and what He was toward man; what He was in the presence of friend, or enemy, whether in sorrows, persecutions, or temptations; in all possible scenes, whether in retirement, or in public — in all things, in every manifestation of His life down here, He was our example; for all His manifold experiences were but occasions for the unfolding of what He was as the obedient and dependent man; and hence the revelation of God's standard for all that are His. If, therefore, I would know what God desires that I should be, I must look at Christ, and trace out His steps in His pathway through this world.

Verse 27 states that duality characterizes man. It says that God created "him; male and female created He them." This fact is elaborated in Genesis 2, but the few words here show us how closely male and female are identified. The word, "man" covers both, and jointly they were to have the dominion, though the male from the outset was given the leading place. From the outset too they were blessed by God and bidden to multiply and replenish the earth. Before sin came in therefore children were in God's purpose for them.