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Leading an Unexamined Life
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The Big Idea: It is for a lack of discipleship that men lead unexamined lives. We all want the same things–something we can give our lives to that will make a difference, someone to share our lives with, and a belief system that makes sense of why life is so hard. Christianity and secularism both…
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Biblical Christian or Cultural Christian?
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The Big Idea: No matter how men get stuck in cultural Christianity, the only solution is to disciple them out. When you look around it’s obvious that a lot of men are stuck. Some are stuck because they have yet to experience the freedom of being in Christ. Others have professed faith, yet they’ve been…
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Significance: The Search for Meaning and Purpose
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The Big Idea: The Rat Race is the conflict between who I am created to be and who I am tempted to be. The proverbial questions of the rat race–“What’s it all about?” and “Is this all there is?”–have tortured us all at one time or another. So let’s kick off this new series by…
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Purpose: Why Do I Exist?
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The Big Idea: I will feel most alive, most useful, and most significant when I am doing what God created me to do. It’s just a fact of life. Most men don’t know their purpose in life, or their purpose is too small. Sincerely ask a man, “What is the purpose of your life?” and…
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The Secret of Job Contentment
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The Big Idea: The secret of job contentment is not getting what I want, but redefining what I need. What do you want from your job, and are you getting it? It turns out that most men are not content in their work. In fact, according to Gallup’s 2013 “State of the American Workplace” report,…
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Broken Relationships
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The Big Idea: If you don’t have enough time for your family, you can be 100% certain that you are not following God’s will for your life. Let’s be honest. Work can be intoxicating. It can also be a place to escape unpredictable emotions and whiny kids. Yet no amount of success at work can…
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Children: How to Avoid Regrets
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The Big Idea: Encourage children by fathering their hearts, not fathering for performance. Who hasn’t heard a sobering story about a Dad who alienated his kids? To be a great Dad isn’t a given. Like any worthwhile skill, there are principles to learn and time to invest. Join us to learn the valuable distinction between…
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Wives: How To Be Happily Married
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The Big Idea: After God, but before all others, make your wife your top priority. Sigmund Freud said, “Despite my thirty years of research into the feminine soul, I have not yet been able to answer that great question…What does a woman want?” Too bad Freud didn’t believe in Christianity, because for Christians the answer…
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Joshua: The Principle of Mission Success
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The Big Idea: God will not give you a mission without also equipping you with everything you need succeed. If God has ever called you to a great (or small) mission, then you know the ecstasy of getting started and the astonishment of finding out how hard it is to follow through. You feel like…
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Friends: Risks and Rewards
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The Big Idea: Three 2:00 AM friends can make up for a multitude of disappointments. Sooner or later we all realize that friendships are a beautiful thing. We realize that we need some other men who walk in our same shoes–who share similar problems and life experiences. But adult male friendships are difficult to start…
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Money: A Biblical Point of View
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The Big Idea: Don’t buy the lie that money will do what it won’t, and that God won’t do what He will. Many Christians cling to the illusion that money will make them happy. Of course, money is important. Especially if you don’t have enough. When the 10th of the month rolls around, your mortgage…
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The Four Pillars of Financial Strength
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The Big Idea: The greatest source of financial wisdom about earning, saving, sharing, and debt has always been and will forever be the Bible. What should be your financial aspirations as a Christian man? Does the Bible have clear cut principles to guide how we think about money? Yes, and in this lesson we’ll zero…
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Decisions: How To Make The Right Choice
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The Big Idea: The goal is always to bring my will into alignment with God’s will. Most of us will only make a handful of truly major decisions in the course of a year. “Do I change jobs, move, get married, have children, take on a personal ministry, buy a car, lower my lifestyle,” and…
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Priorities: How To Decide What’s Important
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The Big Idea: Priorities help me manage the pressures that would otherwise manage me. We are all under a lot of pressure. Work pressures, marriage pressures, parenting pressures, money pressures, health pressures. Taking some time for yourself sounds good, but then who’s going to meet that deadline? How do you decide? You have far more…
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![What Warriors Pray [Pete Alwinson]](https://manalivebiblestudy.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/thumbnail.jpg)
What Warriors Pray [Pete Alwinson]
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Christ following men need to know who they are, and the Bible tells us–we are sons, leaders and warriors. While our core identity is as sons of God because of Jesus and His cross, we are also leaders of our families and therefore workers and providers as well. What does it mean for us to…
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Time Management: Doing God’s Will
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The Big Idea: Move from “Plan, then pray” to “Pray, then plan.” Each of us wants to lead a productive life. God wants that too. “Producing a crop” is a big part of His will for us. Yet adding a bunch of rules and regulations to “make it happen” doesn’t really help much, does it? …
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Pride
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The Big Idea: Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner. The Bible says, “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” But what about feeling proud of our son’s grades or getting a promotion? Is that wrong? Actually, that’s a different kind of pride–let’s call it Pride Type I. Pride Type II, on…
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Fear
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The Big Idea: Faith in the promises of God will render fear impotent, even if our circumstances don’t change. Everyone struggles with fear: What if this deal falls through? Will she ever feel safe with me again? Will I be able to make payroll? Is it cancer? How am I going to pay my mortgage?…
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Anger
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The Big Idea: I pledge not to sin when I get angry, but openly confess I can’t do it on my own. Studies show that 75 – 90% of all doctor’s office visits are stress-related, and the most destructive form of stress is anger. Anger is not a sin–Jesus got angry, but anger can easily…
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The Desire to be Independent
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The Big Idea: Don’t “make” it happen, “let” it happen. Men want to be in charge–to call their own shots. And God has given us a lot of freedom. But freedom is not the same thing as autonomy. Yet we’re all tempted to think we can be in control of our lives. It might be…
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Avoiding Suffering
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The Big Idea: Suffering compels us to seek the God success makes us think we don’t need. What is making you suffer? Do you think God knows what you’re going through? If He knows, does He care? If He knows and cares, can He do anything about it? And if He can, why doesn’t He?…
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Integrity: What’s the Price?
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The Big Idea: I have far too much at stake to risk it by cutting any little corner anywhere, no matter how small, insignificant, or inconsequential it may at first appear. I want to be known for “scrupulous” integrity. What made men like Peter, Paul, David, Moses, Gideon, Samson, Jonah, and Job so different was…
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Leading a Secret Thought Life
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The Big Idea: I will make it my ambition to live “one life, one way.” Most of us would be embarrassed if our families, friends, or colleagues knew what went on inside our heads. Here’s the good news: You’re not crazy. A secret thought life is normal. However, you can live your “invisible” life in…
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Accountability: The Missing Link
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The Big Idea: Accountability: To be regularly answerable to qualified people for each of the key areas of our lives. None of us ever planned to fail. So how do we get off track? What makes us stumble? And why do some of us even fall away? One of the biggest reasons is that we…
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How Can a Man Change?
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The Big Idea: Discipleship (food, water, friends) = Changed Life What is something you really want to change about your life, but haven’t been able to? You already know this, but if you could have made that change on your own, it would have happened by now. On the other hand, we’ve all watched men’s…
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Rock Solid Men – Becoming a Man of Courage [David Delk]
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The Big Idea: Courage comes from knowing Who is holding the end of the rope. What does it mean to have courage? Most of us as men lead rather mundane and ordinary lives, yet all of us eventually find ourselves in circumstances that require courage. It may be a disagreement with our spouse, a cancer…
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Do Something Great With Your Life
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The Big Idea: The first step to every great outcome is to imagine its possibility. All men are wired to want to do something great with their lives. Some of us may not think it was ever possible. Others that it is no longer possible. But every one of us longs for it. Greatness is…
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How To Roll Like Jesus
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The Big Idea: Figure out the equivalent of washing feet and do that. The more you’ve learned about Jesus, the more you’ve grown to love Him, right? And the more you’ve grown to love Him, the more you want to be like Him, right? So what does that look like in practice? How did Jesus…
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How To Be An Outrageously Successful Disciple
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1 Corinthians 4:1-2, Matthew 25:14, 21, 23 Can you give a good definition of “Christian success?” By the end of this lesson, you will have no doubt about the answer! It will be crystal clear in your mind. And you’ll have a GREAT way of explaining Christian success to others. PLUS, the Big Idea will…
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Remembering and Proclaiming Jesus
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The Big Idea: Only Christians would think to find strength by meditating on the death of their leader. You’re having a tough month, or a tough year. You are starting to feel like God has abandoned you. You know in your heart that’s not true, right? But that’s sure not what it feels like, is…
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Words of Comfort for Troubled Hearts
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The Big Idea: Telling a person about Jesus will help them a lot more than telling them how to fix themselves. When you’ve been knocked off balance, the last thing you need is for someone to explain why you got it wrong. When your faith is under attack, the last thing you need is for…
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What It Means To Really Know Jesus
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The Big Idea: Jesus is the visible image of the invisible God, all of God in a human body. By the time we arrive at today’s text, Jesus had spent 3 ½ years teaching his disciples about himself, his plan, and their mission. Yet after 3 ½ years there was still a lot of confusion.…
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What Are The Prayers That God Will Answer?
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The Big Idea: It’s 100% that Jesus will give you what you ask when it’s to do what He wants done. We’ve all asked for something in the name of Jesus that we did not receive–something important and precious, perhaps something for which we were desperate. But Jesus said, “Whatever you ask in My name,…
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Why Doing What You Want Will Make You Miserable [David Delk]
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The Big Idea: We are all shaped by what we submit to. We live in the age of doing what we want when we want. So many men struggle with addictions and priorities that distract them from their true calling. Our relative affluence and technology has brought unprecedented freedom of choice and opportunity. So how…
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How You Can Obey Jesus Without Becoming a Legalist
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The Big Idea: Obedience is the trademark of a biblical Christian. Who hasn’t heard a sad story from a man who grew up in a legalistic home or church where he always felt either a) the shame of never being good enough, or b) the pride of thinking he was better than everyone else because…
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7 Things Jesus Said About the Holy Spirit
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The Big Idea: The Holy Spirit is doing even more for us now than Jesus did for the disciples then. The Christian life is difficult, but not impossible. However, try to imagine what it would be like today if Jesus had called, equipped, and sent men to be disciples in their own strength. Disaster! But…
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The Cure For a Troubled Heart
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The Big Idea: Notwithstanding the world is such a troubled place, we can experience the peace of Christ. t’s not just that peace eludes foreign nations, but peace eludes us too. Our walls are broken down. Our cities are struggling. Our neighborhoods are divided. Our homes hide secrets. It’s understandable why so many of us…
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The Secret To Bearing a Lot of Fruit
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The Big Idea: Bearing a lot of fruit is easily sustainable by abiding in Christ. Who doesn’t want his life to count, to make a difference? Who doesn’t want to do something significant with his life? We all want to make a lasting contribution. That’s just how we’re wired! But some men appear to do…
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Exactly How Much Does Jesus Love You, And So What?
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The Big Idea: Jesus wants a relationship with you that mirrors His relationship with the Father. We all know that Jesus loves the world. Awesome. But how does that love get split up? How much of it is set aside for you personally? You may find the answer surprising! Come see and experience for yourself…
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What Should You Expect If You Make Disciples?
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The Big Idea: Half the people in the world are not going to like you anyway, so it may as well be for the right reason. Every Christian man knows he’s supposed to share his faith and make disciples. Yet not many follow through. Why is that? It couldn’t possibly be a lack of knowing…
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Honoring Your Wife’s Emotions [David Delk]
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The Big Idea: Your wife’s heart is a treasure, and God has entrusted it to you. If you are like most men, dealing with emotions is not your strong suit. We know we are supposed to love others, but what does that look like when they are emotional? Especially if it doesn’t make sense to…
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What Does the Holy Spirit Do, and How Does He Do It?
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The Big Idea: The Spirit will make Jesus known to you in every way you need to know Him. The Bible says, and Christians often encourage each other, “God will never leave you or forsake you.” But of course, the human Jesus did leave. So the Bible means that the personally indwelling Holy Spirit will…
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How Jesus Looks At Generosity
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The Big Idea: You don’t have to give a large amount to give a lot. It’s pretty obvious that a $10,000 donation will pay for more charitable needs that a $100 donation. So does that make the $10,000 donor more generous, valuable, pleasing, or righteous in God’s eyes? You may be surprised–or not–to learn that…
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How To Experience Joy Even If You’re Hurting
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The Big Idea: Jesus promises that your grief will end in joy. Many men are hurting because their circumstances are filled with trouble, trouble, trouble. They wonder, “Where is the joy?” You may be one of them. But there are other men in similar, or worse, circumstances who appear to be genuinely at peace and…
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How Jesus Describes The End Times
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The Big Idea: Why be surprised that everything is happening just like Jesus said it would? Here’s a surprisingly relevant topic. Are we living in the last days? Can we know for sure? If so, then what should we expect to happen? When will the end come? And how should we live in the meantime?…
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Helping Men Climb Out Of Their Rut
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The Big Idea: If God puts a man in your path who is stuck, discipleship means finding out why and then helping him solve that problem. You can see them sitting next to you at any traffic light in America. The pace has numbed their senses. They don’t get enough rest. They’re always on the…
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What Does It Look Like To Be A Faithful Man Today?
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The Big Idea: God calls us to be faithful, not successful. Who doesn’t want to hear, “Well done, good and faithful servant.” But what does it look like to be a faithful man in this day and age? Join us and find out why the “if you really love God, you need to prove it”…
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Daniel: The Principle of Uncompromising Character
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The Big Idea: Godly character doesn’t come from “obeying the rules,” but out of the overflow of a faith-filled heart. No man had a more uncompromising character than Daniel. What kind of character do you have? Are you, like Daniel, known for godly character? If so, how will you stay faithful? Or has your character…
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Jesus: The Principle of Building Relationships
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The Big Idea: The most powerful force in the world is a relationship. Men will do for love what they will do for no other reason. Jesus understood that the most powerful force in the world is a relationship. He made building unbreakable bonds with a few men the core of His strategy. It was…
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Jesus: The Principle of Abiding in Christ
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The Big Idea: Meno is the one thing that will most lead to a vibrant relationship with Jesus. What is the one thing that will most lead to a vibrant relationship with Christ? Wow! Is it even possible to answer that question? Actually, it is. And you will feel a lot more confident about how…
