Our pre-teen daughter bought the movie Courageous yesterday with a gift card that was given her by a very special woman in our church. She bought this movie because she wanted to watch it with her Daddy. The first time we saw it her Daddy was at work and was not able to see it. That was well over six months ago. From the moment she saw it she has thought of nothing but watching it with him.

Last night she did.

She claimed she wanted him to see the funny parts… but she doesn’t know that I could see past that… and when the moment came in the movie when the Daddy took his daughter out and asked her to trust him with her heart and trust his approval over any boy that would want to pursue her… I was watching and I saw what I knew I would see… her looking to her Father to see if he was watching the movie at that very point. You see deep down I knew that was why she wanted him to see that movie with her.

Every girl wants a man she can trust with her heart. A man she can trust to protect her. A man she can trust to provide and care for her. It should be her daddy… and her daddy should introduce her to her Heavenly Father so that she will know that if something ever happens to him, if he somehow fails her, her Heavenly Father never will.

Sadly we live in a day where instead of me telling my girls they can trust a man to protect them… we have to warn them that men will hurt them. Instead of us telling them, don’t get on this elevator unless there is a man on there who could stay calm and strong and help them if the elevator was to have trouble, we have to tell them never, ever, ever get on an elevator alone with a man. Instead of us telling them that they can trust a man to protect them, we have to warn them that many men carry a perversion in them and that perversion will lead these men to hurt them in ways we cannot even describe to them.

I was blessed to grow up with a Father that I knew would die for me. I was blessed to marry a man that I know would die for me… and therefore my girls also have a father that I know would die for them. He would stand before Goliath himself, in a split second, never hesitating a moment, should Goliath attempt to hurt one of his girls.

We need men to raise men. We need more men like my Father, like my husband, who can teach a boy to be a man.

So as he asked in the movie… where are you men of courage?

Where are you men of courage who will step out of the comfort of the pew that your head bobs back and forth fighting sleep in… and get down on your knees in the children’s wing and lead a 2 yr old little man who has no father to lead him?

Where are you men of courage who will stop complaining about the music, about the length of the service, about how no one goes out their way to talk to and will step into the life of a young man, a pre-teen, a teenager, who has no one at all?

Where are you men of courage who will stop using the heart of a woman to meet your own fleshly lust and will instead sacrifice yourself to protect her mind, body, and soul?

You want to be wild at heart?

You want to serve and protect and fight the good fight?

You want to battle evil and stand up for good?

Then stop living out a fantasy on a tv/computer screen and invest in what’s real and eternal. Do it. Do it right. Lay down your life for another.

Stop allowing the lives of these little hearts to be the prey to the evil one while you bob and nod your head in the service.

Stand up.

Come out of the corner with your fists raised and bob and weave, bob and weave, bob and weave in the ring of life. Get in the real cage that our children have been cast to the prowling, roaring lion in, and fight for their eternity.

It’s not about being perfect… it’s about being fierce, intentional, diligent and determined.

How many of you have watched that movie and like he said in the movie… your spirit stirred… but you have not?

What are you waiting for?