How to raise boys is something I think about a lot. In addition to having a Youth Ministry full of teenage boys, I also have three little boys of my own, and I’ve noticed over the past year that the question of how to raise boys is not just a matter of personal importance. A much-needed conversation has emerged in our society around how to raise boys in a modern world that is not always conducive to their flourishing. The growing concern for the well-being of boys has been spearheaded by two recently published books: Of Boys and Men by Richard Reeves and The Boy Crisis by Warren Farrell and John Gray. While these books are not written from a Christian perspective, they do offer helpful, common-grace insights into some troubling trends among boys. These are concerns that youth directors, pastors, and all Christians should be aware of. The authors build a compelling argument that the way our society is structured has made it difficult for boys to grow into mature, well-adjusted men.
That is not to say that girls have it easy in our current cultural climate. Quite the contrary! Girls are growing up in a unique environment of pervasive social media, unrealistic beauty standards, and gender confusion, which is causing record-breaking rates of depression among teenage girls. But the point is not to pit boys against girls in a zero-sum game of who has the more difficult road to adulthood. Rather, these boy-focused books are meant to address the growing, well-documented trends showing that the well-being of boys is falling behind that of girls in many areas of life.
Christian writer Samuel James summarizes the problems discussed in Of Boys and Men. He says that:
...the ‘educational gap’ between boys and girls has completely closed from its male-favorable years in the 19th and early 20th centuries, and has widened once again, except in reverse: women are more likely to go to college, finish college, and build on a college degree than men. This gap doesn’t just appear at university. It starts as early as age 5 where girls in America are “14 percentage points more likely to be ‘school ready’” than boys and continues all throughout school, where there is an 11% gap in reading proficiency between eighth-grade girls and boys.
James goes on to say, “You may have even grown up, as I did, hearing that ‘Girls mature more quickly than boys.’ This is offered to explain classroom dynamics that any first grade or Sunday School teacher can observe.”
Through God’s common grace, our society is starting to realize (at least to some degree) that boys need unique care and nurture (as do girls). This is an encouraging development, and the church has an opportunity to show the world a better way; not only to help boys mature into adulthood but also to help them grow into godly men who love the Lord and serve the church. Christians can offer the world a vision of hope for both men and women created in God’s image - a vision that affirms God’s good creation of “maleness” and “femaleness.”
So how can the church address “the boy crisis” in practical ways? I think writer Leah Libresco Sargeant is onto something when she says:
Teen boys need to be needed, and they need examples of how they can grow into someone that others can depend on…. For teen boys, adolescence is a time of growing into strength without necessarily knowing what to do with it. Team sports are a way to blow off energy and grow into a brotherhood; shop class can be a way to learn to make a mark on the world. But it’s hard for young men to get experience with the other purpose of their strength - to be a support to someone weaker than themselves.
For boys to grow into godly young men, they need to be needed, as Libresco says. Perhaps we can help our boys grow into godly young men not by giving them less responsibility but by giving them more of it. Boys need the church to be a place where they can use their strength for a good purpose–to serve others. And they need older men to show them the way! Our church already has many wonderful avenues of service for both boys and girls, but it would be good for our church community to have conversations about this issue and to be aware of the challenges boys face as they seek to become men. May we be a place that shows the world a better way for men and women to flourish, as image bearers of the King.
