Hop

I took my daughters to see the movie Hop this weekend. The plot of the movie involved the topic of the failure the launch by twenty-something young men. The heir apparent to the easter bunny didn't want to step into his role as the new easter bunny, so he decided to run away. One of the other main characters was a guy who still lived with his parents, didn't want to get a job, and played the part of the stereotypical slacker who was stuck in a rut of sorts. The two main characters in the movie did not want to grow up and step into the next stage of the masculine journey.

On the surface, the movie was a silly kids movie about the easter bunny. Going deeper, the movie captures the crisis of masculinity in our society very well. Many young men in America are lost and confused about how they might live their lives, so they choose to live in the latest script that the world gives them. These young men live in their parents' basement, and bounce around from job to job and relationship to relationship. It's a selfish existence that does not satisty in the long run, but it's a path that many young go down.

In his book The Way of the Wild Heart, author John Eldredge describes the following stages of the masculine journey: boyhood, cowboy, warrior, lover, king, and sage. He suggests that all men should move through each one of the stages, but we often struggle and become stuck in one particular stage of the journey because the cost seems to be too high if we make the next progression. Eldgredge writes, "There is no more hazardous undertaking, this business of 'becoming a man,' full of dangers, counterfeits, and disasters. It is the Great Trial of every man's life, played out over time, and every man young and old finds himself in this journey. Though there are few who find their way through. Our perilous journey has been made all the more difficult because we live in a time with very little direction. A time with very few fathers to show us the way."

And so in America, many boys are stuck in mens' bodies. They move in with their girlfriends, failing to offer their full strength to the women who love them. They bounce around from one thing to the next, desperately searching for the next big thing that will bring them meaning in life. But they will not find it in anything this world has to offer. God has a plan and purpose for all men, but we cannot go down that path if we fail to take risks and move into the next steps of the masculine journey. That is why our society needs men who have taken the steps in the journey to mentor the next generation of young men, many of whom are struggling because they do not have other men to show them the right path. Mentoring is so important in our modern context. We need more men who are willing to give themselves away to others and step into their roles in our culture.