Wild At Heart

Eldredge, John. Wild at Heart: Discovering the Secret of a Man's Soul. Thomas Nelson, 2006. 256 pages. ISBN: 0785206779

Adam was created out of dust and only then placed in the garden. So, the earth from which Adam was made was not cultivated, but wild. Is this significant? John Eldredge believes it is and he uses this truth as the starting point from which he calls men to overcome the damage done to them by a world and a church that has tamed them.

Why is the story of the brave warrior who rescues the damsel in distress the deepest story in our collective unconscious? It is because we were made in the image of God and this is the story of God’s saving His Church by Jesus Christ.

Since this story is deep within men and women, women need to know that they are beauties worth saving and men need to know that they are dangerous enough to come through in the hour of battle. However, men and women grow up without this validation from their fathers and this wound scars them for life, until the love of their Father of heaven restores them.

As the healing man recovers, his masculine heart is strengthened where there is a battle to fight (so, he engages in spiritual warfare against the world, flesh, and devil); a beauty to rescue (so, he loves his wife the way Christ loves His Church); and an adventure to live (so, he refuses his passion no longer but pursues it as the call of God).

I was greatly helped by Eldredge’s vivid and clear descriptions of the wound and its causes. This book made me want to be a better father to my children and gave me great ideas for becoming one. I was also helped by the observation that wounded husbands overstrain their marriages when they seek this validation from their wives (because masculinity can only by encouraged, never bestowed, by their wives). And in an age when even the church is suffering under record incidents of divorce and addiction to pornography, the clear and vivid writing in this book will be a welcomed addition to any Christian man’s library. Support groups have even formed for the purpose of studying this book together. I take this as an occasion of God sending his spirit of counsel to a church where men grow in Christ.

This is not to say that I agree with everything Eldredge says. I disagree, for example, with his assertion that God ‘took a risk by granting freedom of will to mankind,’ because I think such an assertion bespeaks a God different from the sovereign One of the Bible who ordains whatsoever comes to pass. And while I can agree that men refuse their calling and do themselves a disservice by turning their backs on their God given passions, I’m not altogether sure that the answer to this is to live an adventure of abandon, whereby one is to go back and do all those things he did not have the courage to do when he was younger. Besides, how could one do this and also "flee youthful lusts."

To be fair, Eldredge himself almost obviates this objection by saying “I’m not suggesting that the Christian life is chaotic or that a real man is flagrantly irresponsible. The poser who squanders his paycheck at the racetrack or the slot machines is not a man; he’s a fool.” But then, what is he saying that adventure consists in? Essentially, it is an ongoing relationship with God. Introducing an eschewal of anything that smacks of simplistic formula, He says, “the only way to live in this adventure – with all its danger and unpredictability and immensely high stakes – is in ongoing, intimate relationship with God.” I don’t disagree, but what about growing in the image of Christ? Is this not a prize worthy of our adventurous spirit? It was for Paul (1 Cor 11:1) and for John (1 John 2:6). Still, I do see the wisdom in taking our eyes off ourselves and our transformation and putting them on Christ and His daily leading. I hope that this all Eldredge is getting at.

So, I heartily recommend this book and look forward to more challenges and adventures with John Eldredge as guide.