Sometimes I just don’t understand the men in my life. They are much more complex than women. They can spend hours by themselves playing a game, work for hours without eating a single morsel, and can have a five-minute conversation that for them seems like an eternity. Can anyone relate?

Last week I searched scripture to find out how God sees women. This week I wanted to know how God views men, so I went to our Instruction Manual (the Bible) for answers. What I found didn’t surprise me, and it did give me an opportunity to see how God rests so much responsibility on the shoulders of our men. For example:

Men must be strong, yet loving. In 1 Corinthians 16:13-14, the verses say, “Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong. Let all that you do be done in love.”

Men are expected to provide for their families. They are expected to work for a living, and provide for relatives who are unable to care for themselves. In 1 Timothy 5:8, the verse says, “Anyone who does not provide for their relatives, and especially for their own household, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.”

Men are expected to love their wives as much as Christ loved us by giving his very life (Ephesians 5:25). To me, that means my husband should love me unconditionally, and be willing to sacrifice his life for mine.

Men who desire to be leaders in the church should be above reproach, faithful to his wife, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not given to drunkenness, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, and not a lover of money (1 Timothy 3:2-3).

Men were made to be leaders, protectors, and providers. Sometimes I don’t give my menfolk enough credit for being who they were created to be. This gives me a new appreciation for the men that I hold dear: my husband, father, son, son-in-law, brother, and grandson. I know you have men that you love, too. Join me this week as we celebrate the men in our lives and appreciate how and why we were created differently.