Despite my incessant droning on and on about the importance of having a mission I'm still seeing lots of guys who give introductions without telling us your mission. I realize this is partly my fault for not including it in Rule 2. Problem solved.

So I'm asking you all to contemplate two questions right now:

  • What is your mission?

  • Why do you need a woman's help with it?

SINGLES

I disciple a guy who I'll just call Dave. Dave longs for a wife. We've had lots of conversations about how to attract women. He's making progress. Up-front he's told me that his mission is to make disciples, starting with his wife and children. That's a commendable goal. I asked him today: Why do you need a woman's help with that mission?

He thought about it for a second and concluded he doesn't. Right! So why would a woman want to sign up to be your helper when your mission is so small-minded that it doesn't require a helper in the first place? That's not very attractive.

Your wife is to be your helper. That means you have to be doing something that requires her help. That means your mission has to be bigger than you or her alone. If your mission is too small, a godly woman will never think, "I want to be a part of that!" But consider that you can never ask too much of God. Your mission can never be too big. You may fail at grandiosity, but at least you tried.

MARRIED MEN

I disciple another guy I'll just call Bob. Bob is a married man. He's on the rocks with his wife. He left his job and moved across the country to become a pastor at a local church. Bob loves his wife, but he finds a lot of tension between his work with the church and his home life. They don't blend very well. I asked him what his mission was: "To make disciples who make disciples." That was the motto of the church. That's a great mission! I said. So, what are you doing to invite your wife into that mission?

He said he hadn't really thought about it. He mentioned some conversations they'd had about pastoral issues and decisions for the church and ways that her insights had helped him. Do you think those conversations make her feel like she's living your mission alongside you? "Probably not," he says. Do you need her help to make disciples in the church? "I guess not," he says. That's not very attractive.

You're thinking too small-minded, I told him. If your mission doesn't require her help, and you're not inviting her to participate, why would she feel excited to be living that mission alongside you?

CHRIST'S MODEL

Interestingly, there are actually two competing yet good answers to the problem of a man with a mission that he doesn't need help on.

First

The first is that their mission is too small. If they were to think bigger, they'd find themselves in more need of help, giving their wives an exciting and fulfilling role to play in her husband's life. She can actually be his follower and helper. What does a bigger mission look like for Dave and Bob? Jesus actually gives that answer too. They got so caught up in "make disciples" that they forgot about the "of all nations" part.

I used to think pretty small too. I comment from time to time that my mission is disciple-making, but this is just a generalization. My true mission statement is: To glorify God by advancing His Kingdom into the nations through spiritual generations of workers and laborers living and discipling among the lost.

In the old days my mind was small. I assumed that by discipling one or two guys at a time locally, somehow the aggregate effect would reach the nations. Indeed, for a time I had 1-2 guys in my spiritual lineage who were making disciples overseas. It was progress, but very slow. At some point I had to make a decision: do I want to be intentional about pursuing something bigger, or am I content with so little?

So, I increased my efforts. I started discipling people who I knew would be traveling overseas, including missionaries. I focused on leaders of larger ministries rather than individuals, knowing they would have a wider influence through which to carry on my legacy. I began ministering to men in other countries directly, investing in their personal, daily lives - including through reddit. Because of these efforts and more I can now count at least 14 countries where there are men living active disciple-making lifestyles because of me. My discipleship book, to my knowledge, despite never having been published, has been translated into 2 different languages and someone from this sub just a week or two ago said he might want to add Portuguese to the list.

But that's just my mission. A dear friend of mine, who I also disciple, recently joined my gym - over a 25 minute drive away for him - so that we could spend more time together, even though he was already a member at a gym 5 minutes down the road from him. I was asking him about his mission a few weeks ago. It was to reach kids in the foster system for Christ. He and his wife recently adopted 2 of the kids they'd fostered. It's beautiful. But he wasn't thinking big enough. He eventually caught on. Without me even having to bring it up today, he's suddenly going on about how God gave him a vision to start a state-wide ministry to train other parents for fostering troubled youth - and also how to share the Gospel with these children and raise them up in Christ (i.e. disciple them) within the bounds of the state foster care system. This is a beautiful mission! He's thinking big. This is a task he can't accomplish without his wife. I love it! He has something to invite her to join him on. This is attractive. His results are proof of that conclusion.

Single men: are you thinking big enough? Is your mission something that will attract a wife to want to follow your lead? Or are you living in a way that doesn't give her a place? Maybe that's a big part of the reason you're still single.

Second

What else can we say to the man who is on a mission for which he needs no help? To spin things in an entirely different direction: Jesus doesn't need our help either.

That's right. Jesus could make disciples of all nations on his own. He doesn't need the church. If we didn't do it, the rocks would cry out! So why does Jesus use the church? Simply put: because he wants to. It glorifies and pleases him to see his bride engaged in the work that matters most to him.

So, husbands, is your wife glorifying you? Is she passionately pursuing the things that are most important in life to you? Are you showing her what these are and how to get involved? Sure, you may not need her to get it done, but do you want her to get it done? Do you want her to live your life alongside you? When other people see what she's doing, do they revel in what you've done through her life?

SHE'S A HELPER, NOT AN ENABLER

My guess is that most husbands here - especially those with small-minded missions that don't demand much help - are using their wives not as helper, but as enablers. They think, "I have my mission, but I need someone to take care of the house and kids so I can go out and get stuff done." This is using her as an enabler. She is there merely to enable you to pursue your mission.

Having a helper is quite different, especially if we want to take the model of Christ. Jesus could make disciples of all nations on his own, but he doesn't. He could write it in the stars, but he doesn't. He could use his Spirit to compel all nations to become disciples, but he doesn't. He uses the Church, his bride.

The way Jesus utilizes his bride as his helper isn't merely to tend to the small stuff while Jesus goes out and takes care of business on his own. For that matter, he doesn't even need help with that small stuff. After all, he's omnipotent and omnipresent. He can do it all. Instead, he uses his bride as the primary vehicle through which his mission is ultimately accomplished. Are you using your bride as a vehicle through which your mission is accomplished?

I used to use my wife as an enabler. It didn't go very well for my marriage or my ministry. At one point, while I was trying to start a discipleship ministry through my church, I realized: If I don't have the capacity to disciple all of these men myself, how much less am I going to be able to build disciple-makers for the women?!? That was a daunting thought. So, I sent my wife into a women's group to start teaching and training those women. She wasn't the leader, but she knew how to build and utilize influence. How? Because I showed her in my own life. Sure enough, people looked to her for all the answers. She became the model that other women were striving after. One woman commented to me, "I love your wife so much, I wish I could be just like her. I would do anything to have coffee with her and just learn how to become everything that she is." What better opportunity for discipleship than to have it handed to you on a silver platter like that!

Now, part of me thought: If you only knew ... But then I realized that my wife was doing exactly what I wanted her doing! She was fulfilling my mission in a way that I could not. She was reaching other women. She was truly helping me with my mission and not merely enabling me to do it on my own. She was bearing my image and bringing it to other women, just as I bear God's image and bring it to other men. This is when I first truly started seeing her as a helper.

CONCLUSION

In short, I want you to walk away from this post asking and answering for yourself:

  • What is my mission?

  • Is it big enough that I actually need a woman's help?

  • If not, do I really want her helping me and adopting my mission, and how do I do that in a practical way?