If I stood next to my closest friend and said, “Stu, your name is like honey on my lips, I’m out of my depth in your love, I love feeling your arms so strong around me…’ I think he would get out of dodge. I find it hard to sing such lines to a man I worship and love in the agape and not eros sense. Agape love requires a different approach. I think the church gets confused about the difference.
Some songs are inadvertently erotic. For example ; “Jesus take me as I am, I can come no other way, draw me deeper into you.” I’m not seeking to be crude. In fact there are far worse examples but in the interest of decency I won’t post them. In the cold light of day the lyrics would look semi pornographic or at the very least not out of place in a Jackie Collins novel and yet we sing them all the time. I read some lyrics to my unchurched mate and he was wiping tears from his eyes in laughter.
The fact that so many men are aggrieved does indicate there is some problem somewhere, as does the incredibly steep decline in male church attendance. We cant write it all off to men being out of touch with their emotions etc. I was in a church recently and the worship leader opened proceedings by saying “Jesus wants to romance you this morning…” I did find it a bit tricky to engage with. - Carl Beech Head of Christian Vision for Men (CVM), an international evangelistic men’s movement.