Born for Adventure

Dannah Gresh: Erin Davis prepares her sons to say “yes” to any adventure God is calling them into.

Erin Davis: God’s going to ask you to do some things that make you feel very uncomfortable. He’s going to ask you to keep your eyes on Him and not on your own life. But in obeying Him, He’s going to take you to such tremendous places for His glory, and you’re going to learn the beauty of living for something other than yourself. And every boy, though he can’t articulate it, wants that.

Dannah: This is the Revive Our Hearts podcast with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, author of “Lies Women Believe,” for November 10, 2023. I’m Dannah Gresh.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: “Following Jesus is boring.” Now, I don’t know if you’ve ever felt that way, but I know a lot of people feel that way and especially a lot of the younger generation. But Jason and Erin Davis want to remind us that living for Jesus is the most exciting adventure anyone could ever embark on.

They talk about this in a new book they’ve written called, Lies Boys Believe and the Epic Quest for Truth. They’re about to talk with Dannah Gresh about the way we can all cast a vision to the next generation of boys, reminding them that following Jesus, whether you’re a boy or a girl or an adult, is anything but boring. Let’s listen.

Erin: Boys are born for adventure, and you make some general statements. Our boys love to climb and swim and fish, and all of that stuff. If we present following Jesus as sitting very still in church and singing these church songs, then that can feel boring. But actually, following Jesus is a great adventure.

I think of the things I’ve experienced because I’m a follower of Jesus, the places I’ve gone, the stripping away of self so that I am more like Jesus, it’s such a grand adventure. We want boys to know that, that following Jesus is not about sitting still in church, although sometimes you have to, but it is such an exciting life. Because He leads, you follow, and He’s going to take you to places you never dreamed for yourself.

Jason Davis: So, it’s interesting that whether we believe in what’s commonly referred to as “toxic masculinity.” Even in the Church we have certain expectations of boys that aren’t necessarily biblical expectations. In fact, aren’t biblical expectations of what following Jesus is like, sitting still for an hour and listening to the preacher preach, or it’s about worshiping with this type of music they don’t understand, or any number of things.

But following Jesus can be exciting. It can be about them spending time with their own generation, sharing the work that the Lord’s done, and then it can be . . . You can experience the goodness of God on a hiking trail.

Some of the most fascinating Christians are archeologists (most fascinating to me). Christians who are archeologists study ancient cultures. I mean, I guess there’s probably parts of archeology that are boring, but the parts that they put in movies is very exciting.

Erin: It can be taking trips to share the gospel with different people groups. It can be any number of things. It’s not boring. But I think we want to be careful about not communicating to our sons that following Jesus means going to church. Going to church is a good thing, but it’s not the same as having a relationship with Jesus and living an obedient life.

When we look at Scripture, and we should show our kids all of Scripture, let’s not sanitize the stories. Let’s not take out just the parts that are easy for us to understand.

Jason: And there’s probably parts that are more appropriate as they get older.

Dannah: Yes.

Erin: Of course. But you think of Elijah and Elisha, these prophets had these wild experiences.

Jason: Calling out the she-bears to slay the–what is it–the forty-two youths.

Erin: Yes. Calling out the she-bears, that’s a good one. Or King David fighting Goliath.

Dannah: Even the twelve disciples. 

Erin: Man, Jesus was, like, “Hey, leave it all. Follow Me.”

Dannah: Right. What risk! What adventure!

Erin: Yes. They were fishermen, tax collectors, and they still did some of those things. But God called them into the great adventure of sharing hope with the lost world. So, we want boys to catch a glimpse of that.

We’re fortunate that our home church that we’ve been in for many years, the pastor there is conscious of this, this wrestling we’re talking about: What does it mean to be a boy or a man who follows Jesus? So he’s made some decisions that might seem insignificant. There’s not a lot of flowers on the wall or on the stage. He’s not anti-flowers, but he doesn’t want to create an environment that seems like no man would ever want to be in there.

Jason: It’s not a powder room.

Erin: It’s not a powder room. Church services don’t feel like a pep rally. There’s some intentional decisions in the music because he has this really strong conviction that if you build an environment where men want to come and worship Jesus, the women and children are going to come. But if you build an environment that is more feminine, the women will be there. Lots of churches are more women than men, but you’re not necessarily going to get the men there.

So we’ve learned under his shepherding that it’s not necessarily about how you decorate. I’m not telling you that our church has, like, Harleys in the lobby and a wiffle ball stadium in the middle (although that would be cool). But it’s just about this idea that men and women are different. God created us different. 

Discipleship can look different between men and women. We can show boys a version of following Jesus that is exciting and that meets them where they are. It doesn’t require them to make those little bodies very, very still for a long time, which some of our boys couldn’t do.

But it’s about the adventure of following Jesus. There’s so many adventure stories in Scripture. Let’s just tell them and let them know that following God is such an adventure.

Dannah: I love it!

Jason: And thinking about Elisha, Elijah, David walking humbly. That can come across as a little boring. Right? And loving mercy, maybe. But there’s nothing boring about doing justice. And these stories in Scripture where we see godly men bringing about or doing justice, those are stories that are very engaging to men and young men. That’s the kind of life men want to live.

No little boy grows up and dreams of having a boring life. They dream of fire fighting and catching robbers and going on a cattle drive and having grand adventures. Doing justice is engaging. It is exciting. There’s risk and danger involved, which has to be an element of every exciting story.

Erin: And living for something or someone grander than ourselves is an adventure.

Jason: Yes. Think about it. How boring is it to live only for your own pleasure and gratification day in and day out, not striving for anything bigger, not striving any grander plan?

Erin: One of the things I say to my boys a lot is, “They are no people like God’s people.” Like, God’s people . . . we’re special. We take care of each other.

“Look how God’s people are taking care of each other!”
“Look how, when God’s people unite, they can do something about it!”
“Look at what God is using His people to do!”

So I think just showing them the adventure of following Jesus. I call it “the tightrope of terrified obedience” because that’s what the Christian walk is. You don’t know . . . God’s going to ask you to do some things that make you feel very uncomfortable. He’s going to ask you to keep your eyes on Him and not on your own life. But in obeying Him, He’s going to take you to such tremendous places for His glory, and you’re going to learn the beauty of living for something other than yourself. And every boy, though he can’t articulate it, wants that.

Dannah: My husband is reading a book right now called Dominion. It’s a secular book written by a non-Christian. The first few pages of it are just so fascinating and a must-read for every Christian. He says, basically, “I’m not a Christian, but I can say this: every culture that has been characterized by a Christian faith is a healthy culture.” And every good thing that’s happened to society happens because those Christians are (he doesn’t say it this way, but they’re laying their lives down for the great adventure of the Great Commission). 

And that’s the kind of boys we want to raise that will do that for the next generation.

I want to end with this question, and then I want you to tell us a little bit about the book. Because I just know there’s grandmas that are, like, “How do I get the book? When?”

What’s the risk of not rooting them in the truth of God’s Word? What’s at stake?

Erin: Well, Jason mentioned that he prays for our boys every day, and I do, too. So there’s this moment that happens at some point in our day when we’re kind of together, and I say, “Put a hand on somebody.”

And they know everybody puts a hand on some other member of the Davis family. Then I pray for them, and I almost always pray that they would be oaks of righteousness planted by streams of living water. (I didn’t come up with that beautiful language. That comes straight from Scripture.)

And an oak of righteousness is a big, healthy, strong tree that’s going to stand the test of time. It will be able to stand up tall when winds come—and they will—when storms come—and they will—when opposition pushes up against that tree—and it will. Those trees can stand. In nature we realize that tall trees can only stand because they have deep roots.

So the question is not: 

• Will your children face hardships? It’s when.

• Will your Christian children come up against somebody who questions their world view? It’s when.

• Will your child wrestle with some area of deception? It’s when.

So they must have deep roots. 

I think we’re seeing the answer to your question in our culture. We’re seeing young people that are leaving the Church at a really high percentage rate. What’s that about? Well, that’s about roots. Because you cannot get me to leave the Church at this point. You cannot get me to walk away from Jesus. It’s not because hard times don’t come. It’s because the roots of my faith are deep.

So, our oldest is just fifteen, and we’re starting to say things that shock me as I say them . . . words like “college” and “career.” And as much as we would all like to wrap our children in spiritual bubble wrap, we don’t get that choice. At some point, they have to launch out into the world.

And I can tell you,my sons are not perfect. They are not being raised by perfect parents. But they are saplings of righteousness planted by streams of living water. I see evidence that their roots are deep.

So the consequences of not teaching them truth, not helping them identify lies is that they may be easily uprooted. I don’t want that for my boys. I don’t want that for any boys in the Church because if the Lord doesn’t come back soon, we’re going to need the next generation to pick up the baton when we hand it back to them. I want my boys and all the boys to be ready, and they need to have deep roots.

Dannah: Now, these books look a little different from the rest of the “Lies” books. Like the rest of them are, like designed with apples, but you went nuts with this. Tell us what’s in this book and why it looks so different from the rest.

Erin: Well, it is a departure. The boys’ book is a fiction book. The other books are all non-fiction. It follows a dad and his two sons as they go on this grand adventure. They go inside of a mine and find some treasure. They go on a cattle drive. They do some mountain climbing, and lots of things in-between. But much like Jason has been talking about, they’re talking about truth on the way. So that’s the boys’ book.

Dannah: And I’ve got to say,I love that you chose that because that’s the kind of book that the research says a boy will read. If we go to speak the language that they understand to plant the truth in them.

Erin: That’s right. I’m going to make a general statement here, of course—those are the books our boys love. Our boys are avid readers, and they will gravitate toward fiction. So we don’t want to create or buy or put on the shelf books that our boys will look at and think are cool. We want books that our boys will read and dog ear.

Dannah: Do they read it on their own?

Erin: They read it on their own. There’s lots of cool stuff in the book. They turn the book every kind of direction. They actually do dog ear when they turn the page and dog ear it when it reveals a truth every time. There’s things that they draw. There’s quizzes. There’s all kinds of stuff.

I hope your boys will just find it so engaging. I hope that you’ll hear, “Mom! I stayed up ’til midnight reading this book because I couldn’t put it down!” Imagine boys everywhere with their little flashlights.

Jason: “Son, it’s good that you’re reading a book about truth, but I want you to stop reading at a certain time of night.”

Erin: Yes! (laughter) I picture boys in hammocks in the summer reading the book. I hope it’s a really engaging book.

And there’s a parent’s guide. It is your guide to help you have a conversation with your son–an ongoing conversation. So you’ll know what your son’s reading. We’ll give you some prompts for how you can talk about it and will encourage you about, “Why is that important?” and what you might be seeing in your boy if that is a lie that’s taken root in his life.

The parent guide is a quick read because what parent has time to read a long book? I don’t.

Jason: Not this one.

Erin: Yeah, your boy reads the boy book. You read the parent guide. And that’s going to equip you to, I hope, to have some really meaningful, lie-busting, truth-grounding, Jesus-honoring conversations.

Dannah: Awesome! I love it!

All right, Jason, I wonder if you would pray for our boys?

Jason: Sure. Lord, we come to You and thank You for the opportunity to share about “Lies Boys Believe.”

And really, Lord, we want to pray for the boys who are out there who may or may not read a copy of the book, but are in a society and a culture that is communicating lies to them. Lord, I pray that You would impress upon them truth, that You give them godly friends and godly adults that will communicate Your truth to them.

And we pray that You would use this book to impact many young men for Your kingdom and for Your glory so that they can live that out in a way that brings honor to You, Lord. In Jesus’ name . . .

Erin: Amen.

Nancy: Now, I know lots of listeners are saying, “How can I get that book that Erin, Jason and Dannah have been talking about?” Well, when you support Revive Our Hearts with a suggested donation this week, we want to show our thanks by sending you the Lies Boys Believe book along with the parent’s guide.

Your gift today will help us keep sharing God’s truth with women around the world so they can pass that truth along to their families and those around them.

Your support helps make this ministry possible. And when you donate at ReviveOurHearts.com/donate/online, be sure to let us know you’d like a copy of Lies Boys Believe and the parent’s guide, or call us at 1-800-569-5959.

Dannah, thanks so much for this interview with Jason and Erin. I know it’s been encouraging to our listeners. You’re usually ministering to tween girls and young women, but as a mom of a son, you had a lot to contribute to this conversation.

Dannah: This topic is so important. Our young men really need our prayers, our love, and our investment. I love how Erin casts a vision for the next generation of boys. When she sees her boys and their peers, she sees future leaders.

Erin talked about that on The Deep Well podcast, a new season released this week called, “Lies Boys Believe.” All eight episodes are available now. And let’s hear from that final episode as Erin talks about today’s boys and the future of the Church.

Erin: Your boy was made to declare who God is, and we need a better vision for their flourishing than just for them to be physically healthy, to have a good job, to marry a good girl. I want all those things for my boys, too. But Scripture is saying that the righteous flourish in the course of our God because they have a story to tell, to declare who God is.

I just love this image of the Christian life, even though it’s costly. We talked about that. But only in Christ is it possible to live a life to die and flourish and be fruitful. What more could you want for your boys?

Seed planting starts today and the day after that and the day after that. Parenting is a lot of watering and nothing happening. But God’s promised that what you sow, you will reap. And what your sons sow, they will reap. It’s the principle of how God works in our lives.

As you’re listening to this, and the Holy Spirit has done the hard work, if you felt conviction (that’s not me, that’s the Holy Spirit, and you realize), “I’ve planted some bad seeds in the heart of my boys.”

Maybe you realize you’ve built your family life on something, and it could be anything other than the One who Scripture describes as “faithful and true.” I think sometimes the enemy just keeps us so busy with good things that we miss the one thing we were meant to invest our lives in.

Maybe your own spiritual life looks like a stick. You are not seeing much fruit at all.

Or maybe it’s the life of your boy, and maybe he’s not a boy anymore. I know every time I teach there are women listening with prodigal sons, and their hearts are hurting because of the decisions their child has made. They look out their window, and it looks dead. Any hope of him living for Jesus looks dead. There’s no fruit at all.

The final note I want to leave you with for this series is that there’s still time. There’s time to plant new seeds. There’s time to water them in the Word. There’s time to trust the Lord to use your life, to use your boy’s life to produce something beautiful.

There’s two prayers that have been prayed over my sons that have become just a part of our family.

One was communicated by a friend named Wes. He once prayed that God would make our boys dangerous to the enemy. And when he prayed it, I thought, That’s a scary prayer! because no doubt the enemy is a powerful foe. Though we’ve already talked about it, he hates our sons. He hates our family. And so the human part of me just wants to tuck my babies under the wing and keep them off the enemy’s radar.

But when Wes prayed it, I knew it was true. I knew that what they really need is to be a force in opposition to him. They need to be on his radar, and they need to be dangerous and push back the forces of darkness. So we’ve prayed since they were little that our boys would be dangerous to the enemy.

And then there’s my friend Tippy. Tippy just turned eighty. I talk about her in many seasons of The Deep Well. She’s loved my boys really well, and when she prays for them, which is often, she prays, “Make Erin’s boys oaks of righteousness planted by streams of living water.”

It’s the same image that the psalmist was describing. I don’t want my boys just to be little saplings. True, they have new life in Christ. It’s true, they’re going to heaven. But they’re pretty fruitless, and they’re pretty weak because we’ve played it safe. I want my boys to be oaks of righteousness.

And as I think about the era of history when my boys will become men, there’s some fear. God’s people are not the home team anymore. That shouldn’t surprise us. Scripture predicted that would happen. And while there’s never been any golden age of morality since the bite of the forbidden fruit, there certainly have been eras where it would be easier to be a follower of Jesus, and they’re not going to grow up in that era.

But you know what the world’s going to need? Oaks of righteousness planted by streams of living water. Boys who became men with roots so deep in the truth that it doesn’t matter what the enemy hurls at them. They’re going to stand tall for Him.

I’ve thought many times about how many little lives are connected to you who listen to this. I’ve thought many times about what they’ll be like in fifteen or twenty years, and what we need them to be like. My ultimate hope is that Jesus would come back—today—and that my sons and I would be caught up in glory with Him. But if He doesn’t, if He tarries, our boys are going to have to be strong.

And so I want to commission them, the thousands, maybe millions of boys that are connected to us, that are not the future of the Church. They’re today’s Church. And we need them to stand on the truth. I just want to pray for them out of Isaiah 61:1 through 4, that’s the oaks of righteousness that Tippy’s praying. I commission you and I commission them to stand tall for Jesus.

The Spirit of the Lord is upon our boys because the Lord has anointed them to bring good news to the poor. He has sent and will send our boys to bind up the brokenhearted. He will send them to proclaim liberty to the captives. He will send them to open the prisons of those who are bound. He will send them to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God.

He’s going to send our boys to comfort all who mourn, to grant to those who mourn in Zion. He’s going to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness instead of mourning. 

He’s going to give them a garment of praise instead of a faint spirit, that they may be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified.”

Lord, may our boys build up the ancient ruins. May they rise up the former devastations, may they repair the ruined cities, the devastations of many generations. And, Lord, I pray for our boys, for Your boys. Make them dangerous to the enemy. It’s in Your name I pray, amen.

Dannah: That’s Erin Davis, co-author of the new book, Lies Boys Believe. That message is from Erin’s podcast, The Deep Well. A new eight-episode season was released this week about raising boys to follow Jesus. And you can hear the whole new season of “The Deep Well” when you visit ReviveOurHearts.com.

Do you ever doubt God’s love for you? On Monday, Nancy will take us to the psalms and show us why we can count on God’s love forever. Please be back for Revive Our Hearts.

Revive our Hearts with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth is calling you to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

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