Welcome to the Church and Family Life podcast. Hey, I want to tell you about a really fantastic Conference that every man should come to it's the Shepherds Conference that Kevin Swanson puts on it's not just for Shepherds It's really for every man and boys And at the end of this broadcast, I'm gonna tell you how you can get 50 bucks off of this great conference. Hope you enjoy the discussion with Kevin Swanson. ["The Greatest Showman"] Kevin, this is great. 1 Corinthians 16, 13 through 14.

Be watchful, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong, let all that you do be done in love. So you're gonna call men, all of us, to be men of faith and men of duty. That's right. Scott, we're just really, you know, I think it's time for a call to manhood, to biblical manhood, and to just realize that this is critical for family and church as you know I mean you're the family church guy Scott. There you go.

If we don't have fathers, if we don't have family heads, if we don't have manhood, biblical manhood in the family we are up the creek absolutely. Kevin you have some great titles for messages here. How about killing sin and the priorities of a godly man? Yeah, well that's it. I think more than anything else we're looking for just what it is to be that, act like men, be strong.

That's it. You know, God calls men to be strong. I just finished that book, Strong, and then we got a whole chapter on that topic. But yeah, God calls us to strength, and weakness is no virtue. And we wanna be strong in faith.

And that's, I think, the core, core thing we're looking for here. So you've got some great guys coming, Alex Stroud, Josh Schweiso, Steve Walker, men that you've labored with for many, many years. So give us, hey, give us a thumbnail sketch. What do you want the throw off from this conference to be? Well, I think what we want is to call men to strength, to manhood, to a biblical standard for manhood.

We're looking at a very, very difficult time in terms of the breakdown of manhood in the church and the family. In terms of society, you know, 57% of little boys are born without fathers to the millennial generation. And we have a situation which women are pretty much dominating in church, academia, of what, 60% of master's degrees are given to women these days, which means they are leading our society today, at least in academia. And you're looking at the same thing in politics. You know, you're looking at roughly four or five times the percentage of women leading in governance today than they did in the 1980s.

So we're looking at a very serious time where men have effectively failed. And it's the end of men, the demise of guys. And I think it really has affected the churches. Scott, I think this is fundamental. If we're going to rebuild family and church, we need to realize that our society has affected boys and the way we raise boys and the way we educate boys.

And they have been incredibly disenfranchised. In fact, one of the most positive statistics I've seen recently is 40% of young boys or young men 16 to 28 years of age are attending church today and that's only 28% of young women. Meaning that boys are coming back, women are more or less going the direction of apostasy sadly, Maybe largely because men haven't been leading but the good news is that boys a young men 16 28 years of age gen Z years are coming back into the churches and this is probably the most positive news We have heard in our generation. So that being the case, I think there are a lot of young men going, well then what is it to be a godly man? What is it to be a man of God, a biblical man, who basically replicates biblical manhood, the characteristics that God wants for us?

You know, Kevin, one of the remarkable features of this conference that you put on. And it's very different from others. The hospitality that's there. The times of prayer with men. I mean you're going to feed these men, you know, lots of meals and they're going to be able to eat together, relate together.

It's very different than going to a big conference center and scattering for meals. Now you've got, you're going to have these men gathering together in your church and eating together. That's a pretty powerful one, two punch in terms of just increasing the relational spiritual value of a conference. That was the intent of it from the beginning, Scott. We did the Shepherds Conference way back, I'm going to say 15 years ago.

For the most part, we've held it in my own home. So that's the relational component of it. Our daughters prepared the meals and for four or five days we're together. We are a band of brothers coming together in a spiritual reviving and a time of hearing the word of God brought in straight and true and developing relationships. Yes, small groups, prayer groups will do that at least twice for this conference upcoming.

But really this conference is gonna be a little bit unique in that we are really doing our best to try to bring out what it is to be the biblical man. Behold the man, Jesus Christ, the son of God, the covenantal man, taking dominion in family life. You're doing that one. Taking dominion in work life, dominion for our sons. Talk about the fighting man in the spiritual war, the gospel man in the home, the godly, God-seeking man, the man of word and prayer, Christian manhood exemplified in history.

I'm doing that one as well. We're doing one on raising daughters. You're doing the one on raising sons. We have a Q&A panel on men and women in business, civil government, military. I mean what do you do when you're in the military or in business and your boss is a woman?

How do you interact with that situation? We talk about what it is to be a man in church, the God-worshipping man, the suffering man, God's design for men and women in a gender blender society. We're going through all of these subjects, trying to take it from every possible direction and bringing a biblical view of this. And this isn't just for, you know, grown men, fathers, grandfathers. This is for our sons as well.

We're hoping for men to bring their 13-year-olds, their 16-year-olds, their 18-year-olds. But it is a serious time of getting into the Word, getting the prayer together, getting the good fellowship together in a fairly tight sort of venue. It's going to be in our church building out here in the Eastern Plains of Colorado, Elizabeth, Colorado. And, but yeah, meals provided, you know, that time together, we have resources, we're going to be handing out free copies of my new book, Strong. And so, yeah, it's gonna be a great opportunity, I think, for men to come together and gain a vision.

Scott, I don't think there's anything more important in our day to the revival of the faith, to the revival of family, to the revival of church, to the salvaging of a nation, to the salvaging of a civilization, than to be talking about this subject. I mean, I honestly, I don't, and I don't think that's an exaggeration. I honestly think the absolute most important thing we could be talking about right now is what it is to be a man of God, a biblical man in a day of feminism, the Manosphere, and all of the pseudo visions for manhood we've seen in our generation. Yeah, and that's because God has actually created men to rule, to lead, to take dominion. Now, Kevin, you talk about pseudo views of manhood that are presented in the world today.

Well, what's in your mind about that? What are these pseudo views of manhood? Well, man, there's the adventuresome man. There's a self reliant, self-sufficient man. There's the prepper man.

There's the macho man. There's the, there's the wild at heart, man. Remember the wild at heart, man. Yeah, I remember that. Yeah.

What it is. You talk about a total bust. That was a total, would you agree that was a total bust? That was a total bust. That was one of the most misleading.

You know, it's interesting that book, he really described the problem, but the solution, he actually didn't get the solution from the Bible. Yeah, he didn't get as a humanistic man centered, sort of man sovereign, wild at heart, sort of approach to manhood. And at the end of the day, what we want is a responsible man. You know, what is it? We're talking about a man who is fulfilling the roles and the responsibilities that God has given to him as a man.

That is to be a spiritual leader in his home. That's to be the man responsible for providing for the material needs of his home. The man is to be the shepherd in his home. The man is the resident theologian for his wife, 1 Corinthians 1434. You know, you just kind of go through all the lists of what God wants for a man in the home.

And you don't come down to wild at heart, you know, that absolutely does not play a part in the biblical vocabulary concerning what it is to be a man of God. God requires, I think, most fundamentally, that a man be strong in faith and the fear of God. I mean, this to me is the basis. This is the core, core issue. What is it?

Psalm 112. I mean, I keep coming back to Psalm 112, blessed is the man who fears the Lord, delights greatly in his commandments, his seed shall be mighty in the earth. And then later on it talks about how he's not afraid of bad news, you know, he is steadfast. Why? Because he trusts in God.

So a man of God is going to be strong in faith in God. And so every picture we get of faith in God amongst all the great heroes of the faith from the Old Testament to the New Testament, this is it. And it's also a strength about this, not a weakness. I think that what we're up against is a weakness, Scott. And you know, this has been a thing for me for a while is that we're living in a day, a day of snowflakes.

We live in a day of softness, you know, and, I don't think we've ever seen, such a challenge before us. We live in the softest age in the history of the world. You said before that the man bear is rising again. Huh. What's that all about?

Well, I mean, I think it's the fact that men are so disenfranchised with the age. Men are finally realizing that this isn't going to work. This is, This is a disaster. We can't live in a feminist world and men are going to have to step up to lead, absolutely, in family, church and state. And we're not gonna make it if we're facing the weaknesses that men have.

And I think the embracing of sort of the irresponsible lifestyle of the man playing the games, given way to pornography and such, I think men are finally realizing this isn't going to work and they're responding to a call to repentance. That's really what it is, right? It's like we've been thinking about our own selves and our own responsibilities and duties and roles in life in the wrong way and God is calling us to a different standard. And now men are finally facing this. They're saying, I repented this.

I realized what a disaster this has been for my life, for my family. And it's time now for me to repent and to recover what God wants for me as a man in my home and in the church and in society. Kevin, what does the feminized man look like? Well, I think he's, he's the man who doesn't retain responsibility. He's, he's the man who is Sometimes he may look and act a bit like a woman, but it's more of the effeminate weak man.

It's the breakdown in terms of strength. He's not really stepping up to the plate. He's not leading. He doesn't maintain the responsibilities and the character that is absolutely essential for a leader in his family and his home. He gives up too easily.

He breaks covenant. He walks away from the church at the slightest contention. He can't work through the Matthew 18 process. He folds like a cheap suit. Slightest problem comes out, he can't handle it.

So, you know, it's the covenant breaking man. It's the man who doesn't take up his responsibilities. He breaks down emotionally. He gives way to temptation too easily. He gives way to the temptation of the devil and scandals come quicker than ever before.

So I think this is the kind of thing that's afflicting men in our age today, Scott. Kevin, I know as pastors of churches, we've encountered men over the years who, who they don't lead, the women in their lives, because they're actually, they're actually afraid of their daughters and they're afraid of their wives. They're actually afraid to lead. How did that happen? It's not a fear of God.

He fears man. He fears a woman. He doesn't fear God. I think that's what it boils down to, Scott. He's not really willing to give up his life either, because following Jesus requires us to deny ourselves, take up the cross daily, be willing to give up our lives for the truth, and also give up our lives for our families.

And it's a both and. And I just, I think that's probably the issue. I think that the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge. And he's, he's given way to the fear of man. Not good, not good.

Kevin, you know, you've talked about, you know, these, these forces that are really satanic, they're satanic impositions. And of course, their, their purpose is to destroy the family and to destroy the church. You know, if you can neutralize a man, you've neutralized a family and you've neutralized the church all with one blow. And you know, we've seen this happen, you know, for years, you know, in our own culture. Can you trace sort of the roots of this?

Well, I believe it does go back into the 19th century, perhaps even a little further back. It begins with the abandonment of God's word, God's principles, the sufficiency of scripture for all of life, as you have brought up many times. But in terms of society, I think the social breakdown does begin with the introduction of feminism in the 19th century. And then also, men were disenfranchised and derelevantized very much in terms of the family, largely because of socialism, the introduction of socialism to the world in which women were taken care of womb to tomb by governments. And so why are men needed anymore?

For 5, 900 years of history, men were required to raise their families, to provide for their women when they were pregnant with child, raising children. You know, you couldn't, if a man didn't take care of his family, He was worse than an unbeliever, denied the faith, according to 1 Timothy 5.8. But also he was giving up the possibility of his family surviving. They would literally starve to death without a man taking responsibility for the material sustenance of his own. So I think socialism added that component big time.

Feminism obviously comes in with socialism. The egalitarianism, the equalitarianism, socialism, Marxism coming in the 1840s. Marx specifically said, I'm abolishing the family, I'm establishing societies of women, and pretty much abolishing marriage. And that was the goal for Marxism in the 1840s and 50s. And that started playing itself out in the 19th century and on into the 20th century.

And then men basically began to take on an image of being the drunkard, the immoral person who was abandoning his family. I think also the Industrial Revolution that took the father out of the home. It's interesting that John G. Payton in his autobiography referred to the damage that the Industrial Revolution had done to fathers and creating so many orphans on the streets of Scotland and the cities of Scotland in the 1870s and 1880s. He had recognized that by the time you get to the 1880s.

And so the destruction of the family economy, the destruction of the family farm, the taking the father out of the home, putting him into the Industrial Revolution, disconnecting himself from the family, from his wife, from his children, and then turning the children over to the Industrial Revolution, then on into the public schools. All of this has disintegrated the family. And- Hey, also, hey, I wanna, I wanna, I want you to talk about something here because at the beginning of the 1900s, because of this destruction of fatherhood and, and really a tampering with the family during the industrial revolution around 1900, you have these movements. Maybe you could just call them boyhood, manhood movements. You got the YMCA gets founded.

You have the Boy Scouts gets founded. And I think this was part of an effort to recover some of what was lost in boyhood during the Industrial Revolution. But then it got caught up, cut off at the knees. And then here, you know, in the 21st century, the Boy Scouts actually turns back into the Girl Scouts, the Scouts of Girls, okay? So, but you had this, you had this sort of reactionary movement in the boy scouts and YMCA.

How do you, how do you interpret that? Well, yeah, it is something of a attempt to, to revive the situation, bring manhood back, introduce mentorships, which is essential for young men. They absolutely need some form of mentorship if they're going to be functional in society in any way, shape or form. I think that's the big lesson we have taken. But here's the big problem is that what was needed more than anything else was fathers.

And so it didn't necessarily restore fathers. Now, you know, you have some Christian efforts right now to bring dads back into the picture. And I think that's really essential. It really calls for a reformation, an entire revival or restoration of the father-son relationship, the father-child relationship in the 21st century. So I honestly think it's time for dads to come back home and to dedicate significant time for their sons and for the daughters.

And I know you did that. I did it as well. I was in the corporate world, climbing the corporate ladder, the president of the company I was working for. On my last review, said Kevin Swanson has a wonderful future at this company. And then I took the flying leap off the corporate ladder and then brought my son into my life.

And he began to travel with me, as you know, and you know the rest of the story on that. But praise God, I just honestly did not think that though my wife was homeschooling my son and four daughters, it was not going to go in a good direction in the long term. I think homeschooling can be actually a problem. I think the biggest problem for home education, I've been a leader in the homeschool movement now for 27 years. And I will tell you that the biggest problem in home education is the boys.

It's just wrong for a boy to be tied to his mother's apron strings at 17 years of age. That's really tough. That's really bad. So I think our goal is to get our boys away from mom at 10, 12, 14, 16 years of age and under the wing of dad and incorporated back into the family economy, that's the obvious direction we need to be going. So this is going to call for, I think, a significant change of heart and mind for every dad out there as to how in the world we're gonna raise our sons to be mighty men of God in a feminine age, in a broken age, in a weak age, where we are so incredibly broken down.

So we're absolutely gonna need dads back into the dad-son relationship, but also mentorships, role models, all of that's really critical at this stage in the game. So again, I don't think we're talking about anything more important today than to restore manhood and to find ways to do this, to gain the role models, understand it by way of biblical teaching. And by the way, one of my presentations is going to be manhood from history. You know, what did it look like to be a man of God, to be a real man in the 17th century, in the 14th century, in the first century? You know, what was it?

Ultimately, it's Jesus. Jesus is the best example of manhood for all of us. But as much as we love our families, we love our churches, we love God, we love our nation, we have got to salvage manhood. I mean, this is it. It's manhood or bust right now.

And to regain a vision for manhood, I think is the first step. And then to begin to mentor our young men into manhood, that's the next goal. Absolutely. And wow, what a thrilling context to do that in your church, to sort of lay foundations, not go the direction necessarily of the Boy Scouts and the YMCA, but really the direction of the Word of God, to strengthen men with the word of God to call men back to fidelity to become like a man like Jesus Christ and hey so you who are listening consider coming this is going to be a really pivotal conference it's a great time of fellowship tremendous hospitality opportunities that are there to be encouraged, to be refreshed, to be taught and to be challenged, you know, by these men. Now you can learn more.

You can register at Generations.org. Again the dates are October 29th through November 1st in Elizabeth, Colorado and hey you can get 50 bucks off of this conference by using this code CFL 2025. That's CFL as in Church and Family Life 2025. We are so happy to be a sponsor and a participant. Thank you.

And really a promoter of this conference. I've been to these Shepherds conferences before and they're just very unusual, very powerful. And I hope to see you there. And until then, you know, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. Kevin can't, can't wait to see you there.

Yeah. Amen. Scott look forward to it. Good deal. Hey, and thank you for joining us on the Church and Family Life podcast.

See you in Elizabeth, Colorado, October 29th. Church and Family Life is proclaiming the sufficiency of scripture by helping build strong families and strong churches. If you found this resource helpful, we encourage you to check out churchandfamilylife.com.