Rough Diamonds: A new kind of man - tough, trusted, transformed

ONE

Show Us What You’re Made Of

How many a man has dated a new era in his life from the reading of a book.

– HENRY DAVID THOREAU, WALDEN

Men are anxious to improve their circumstances, but are unwilling to improve themselves; they therefore remain bound.

– JAMES ALLEN, AUTHOR

As a schoolboy, I remember standing on a freezing, hard pitch in shorts that wouldn’t fit for five years, hating the humiliating football game I was so inept at that nobody wanted me on their side. I longed for the game to finish so I could thaw out my hands on the white dusty pipes inside. Despite my best efforts to keep out of the action the ball would cruelly roll my way as the teacher shouted, "Delaney! Show us what you’re made of!"

Men are under pressure, feeling the heat. From the boss, from their family, from impossible stereotypes that the media set up of what a real and successful man should be or do. We feel compelled to strive toward our own unreachable goals, or the targets others set for us that too often we fail to meet – or the ones that we set ourselves. It’s only afterwards we realize they are often pyrrhic victories, ruinous to our souls, relationships, or character. Instead of being elated we’re deflated again. Wrestling inner doubts and strong temptations, outer struggles and spare tyres, we wonder why we bothered.

It was considered character building when as a sixteen-year-old police cadet I was told to go out for a morning run across bitter mountainous areas, before breaking the ice off a stream and submerging myself in sub-zero waters. No whimpering permitted as your breath was taken away, or push-ups were the punishment. The only character trait this developed in me was a reservoir of latent loathing for sadists with a little power. "Show us what you’re made of!" rang in my ears again.

Some men climb mountains or base jump to show that they are made of something strong, resilient, and manly. Dissatisfied with life as they know it, others seek sexual conquests, to seek to prove they’ve still got it. Trophy wives, company bonuses, or certificates on the wall may paper over the gaps, but not for long. So they keep looking.

Can athletics, acquisitions, or achievements really validate our manhood? Do the 300 workout, or going Paleo show that we’re tough, or sensitive, or whatever we think a real man should be like?

The problem is, nothing external shows what we are really made of. If we want to know what we truly are, we need to look inside. To dare to go below the surface. Ask those who live closest to you, who know you best, if you dare. Look in the mirror and ask yourself.

Who is the you that nobody else can see? Who are you when you’re under pressure? When you feel the heat?

I believe you also need to ask the God who made you. If you’re not there yet come along for the journey as I hope to convince you why you will never understand yourself – your limitations and your potential – until you know what he made you of, and for.

Why go to God for answers? For many the thought of religion or church is repulsive. Here in the United Kingdom a recent study suggested 54 per cent of men considered themselves atheist or agnostic about the existence of God and nearly 50 per cent of men under thirty left church in the last twenty-five years. A survey in men’s magazine Sorted found the vast majority of blokes would feel more comfortable visiting the lingerie section of a department store than their local church. What has Christianity got to say to men today?

At least you have a choice. As a little boy I remember being made to go to a church service. As I knelt down at the front, where the sickly smell of incense was strongest, the priest smudged dirt and oil on my head, intoning what I later discovered was a very biblical and also scientifically accurate notion. Remember you are dust – to dust you shall return. Not a very nice thing to tell a six-year-old. I didn’t understand it. Now I do.

In my journey from Police Officer to church minister I have become very familiar with our mortality. I have stood at thousands of gravesides and realized the mortality rate is still running at 100 per cent. Nobody gets out of here alive! One day the atoms we are made up from – all those protons, neutrons, and croutons – will return to dust. Carbon. All that will remain of you as a carbon-based life form will be some mercury from your fillings and whatever kind of legacy your decisions created, which will really show what you were made of.

The central picture of this book comes from two kinds of mineral both made of carbon, as we are: coal and diamond.

Coal Men

A lump of coal can look quite big and impressive, pretty tough. But, put it under a bit of pressure and it will crumble. Expose it to heat, it will burn. It won’t last. I know too often I have been like that. Content with the outward show of looking like I have got it all together. Men are like that. Not some men. Every one.

To protect a vulnerable inner self and project that I’m doing OK, we put on a show. We don’t really know who we are or what it is to be a man and what we want from life. But we know that there must be more than this.

Karl read too many comic books and became convinced he could fly. He was always making some kind of wings or jumping off the prefab buildings at my junior school. When you heard the ambulance siren, it was a safe bet he’d discovered gravity again! From the time we put on a cowboy outfit or climb high to test our superpowers, men become skilled at play-acting. We put on a mask that says everything is happy and OK in my little world, inside of me, with my friends, my family, my work. Occasionally something happens which gives us a buzz or a taste of what we were really made for, that can keep us smiling or distracted for some time. But whether we make the sale, get the girl, or score the goal, eventually men ask, Now what? and settle back into the phoney role playing.

Do you know why coal is black? Two reasons. First off, it’s loaded and mixed up with all kinds of impurities. Secondly, the structure of the atoms in coal is such that it absorbs light of all wavelengths. It doesn’t allow for the transparency that makes a diamond so precious. If we’re self-absorbed and we don’t let anyone look at what’s really going on inside us, we end up in darkness.

Coal men (no offence to anyone in the solid fuel delivery business) have perhaps never known the genuine love of a father in a way that they can understand and relate to. Therefore they are not able to form good relationships with others. They don’t understand themselves, so good luck trying to understand others, especially women. Their networks of friendships are often shallow, superficial, and short term. Coal men often end up with their wives divorcing them and their kids not talking to them. They throw themselves into their work to try to show themselves that they are successful somewhere, then die early from stress.

Coal looks impenetrable, but when you examine it up close you can see it’s actually full of holes. A Coal man has nothing at his centre but emptiness. Isolated, lonely, always competing with someone he can never win against (himself). Emotionally stunted, never quite able to make the difference that in his best moments he would like to make in the world – because he would have to deal with his inner world first.

Some Coal men are violent, aggressive, patriarchal, resentful, misogynistic, or abusive, embittering those that they are supposed to love and protect. Others are New Age luvvies trying to project sensitivity as the appropriate response to fearful feminism’s advances, but too weak and afraid of healthy conflict to be respected by women, or to bring the guidance and discipline that are actually required to be a good parent.

Look a little closer. Coal men are male, but not real men. Our society is 50 per cent populated by anxious little boys who never grew up to attain the glorious maturity of maleness that is their true destiny and inheritance.

Men commit over 90 per cent of all acts of violence. They comprise over 90 per cent of the prison population. Tragically, far too many, tired of the outward show and the emptiness of their hearts, decide the best contribution they can make would be to step out of this life sooner rather than later. Men kill themselves at four times the rate of women, making suicide the single biggest killer among men aged from twenty to forty-five. From my intake year at high school I can think of five men who never saw their thirties because they topped themselves. They never got to fly.

Coal men, whether of the hard and scary or soft and wimpy variety, have a very hard time getting married (because of fear of commitment) and an even harder time staying married (because of failing to do what they said they were committed to). They are stuck in front of the TV or computer, or stifled in jobs they don’t find meaningful. They get into debt for pastimes that don’t satisfy or to fill the internal void, buying things to impress friends they are not close to. They make slow progress through the levels of real life they discover no computer game could actually prepare them for.

If you tell me none of this connects with you, you are in denial. Someone may have given you this book for a reason! Years of policing and pastoral experience give me confidence that I am not talking here about extreme cases. Conversations at men’s events, at retreats, and in counselling rooms tell me that this is the unspoken truth about the vast majority of men in our society. It’s getting worse with every new generation.

Despite outward indications, if you put most men under some kind of pressure they will crumble one way or another. Today’s paper will portray more stories of the Coal men: vaunted sporting heroes hang their heads in gossip column photos because they can put it in the net, but can’t keep it in their pants. Those in high office couldn’t resist the low deal. Integrity and reputations lie in tatters in the boardroom, with families in ruins.

There but for the grace of God go I – and I really mean that.

Rough Diamonds

I’m certainly not a perfect man. I’m just an ordinary bloke who discovered the grace of God is more than a saying, it’s a reality. I believe there is a better way for us to live passionately, positively – as a perfect man (under construction!).

You may disagree with what I say – but please don’t dismiss anything out of hand, even the stories of Bible characters I’ll use throughout. Because the Bible is not just the good book, it is the most honest book in the world as it tells the stories of its characters warts and all. If you don’t believe in God yet, come along anyway and at least believe that I believe God has a great plan for you. He sees your value and potential. In fact, the heat and the pressure of life are his tools to shape within you something better and brighter.

God didn’t make you to be a Coal man, they are ten a penny. He sees you as precious and valuable, a Rough Diamond. Diamonds are not brilliant to look at when first found. The process of diamond recovery sifts out 180 million parts of other material to yield one part of diamond. They differ in colour, character, and clarity and can be cut in many ways. The cut greatly impacts how they shine. If it is cut poorly, it will be less luminous and may even be permanently damaged.

We are going to examine six facets of life. If I pushed you on these facets, would you crumble, or shine?

The chapters are about vital issues and will be challenging for every reader. They stand alone as tests of clarity and quality and you might be tempted to skip straight to one that interests you immediately. I know that’s what most men do when they read books but I’d be grateful if you didn’t. Please check out all sides of the stone in turn.

I’ll ask questions now and then. You might want to ponder them or get together with others who are reading the book too. If it helps you engage with it, make notes and use a highlighter. Commit now to finishing the book. Much of what I’m saying only hangs together because of what comes later and I know you’re the kind of man who finishes what he starts, right?

Remember, a diamond is still carbon, but deep in the Earth’s mantle, way below the surface, it has been formed under high-pressure, high-temperature conditions. Rather than crumble or burn up, its very nature is changed. Impurities disappear, and the more that happens the more transparent it becomes. It is reflective rather than self-absorbed. The closer you examine its lustre you see that something wonderful and precious shines from within. What matters most is what is at the centre.

You can unleash the potential you were created for and intended to live, with nothing to prove, nothing to hide, and everything to live for. As we go around the Rough Diamond chapter by chapter, I wonder what you would place at the centre of your life right now?

Many men would say their family or friends are at the centre, which is admirable. Others live lives centred around past failures, or their finances, or their football team. None of those are of course bad in themselves (unless it’s Manchester City), but they are not meant to be the centre you live from. Try to live with any of those things at the centre and you will crumble when the heat is on.

I will tell my own story too and tell you about the best decision I ever made. It affected all the other areas because real change only happens from the inside out. It happened when I decided more than anything else I wanted to become more like the only perfect man. While you might admire a sports or movie star, I say that throughout history the only contender for that title is Jesus Christ.

The facets around the diamond shape are all to do with your decisions, your actions, and your attitudes. Difficulties with health, parenting, screwing up at work are just symptomatic of the hole we men have in our hearts. We can pretend this doesn’t