Jimn Kyles 0:00
If you’ve ever wanted to know what real masculinity is, what does it mean to be a man then you are listening to the right episode of our podcast today. I’m your host Jimn Kyles. Thank you for joining me today, we are going to have a conversation about understanding real masculinity and what it means to be a man and I am joined today with Josh Khachadourian, he has spent the last 15 years ascending the corporate ladder in a fortune 500 company, where he focused on building high performing teams and developing the best in class leaders. He is also the host of raising the standard podcast. He’s the author of the standard discovering Jesus as the standard for masculinity. And he is our guest today. Josh, welcome to the podcast. So glad to have you here today.

Unknown Speaker 0:53
Jimn, this is an honor, I’ve been looking forward to this. It was an honor when you were on my podcast and can’t wait to get into this discussion.

Jimn Kyles 0:59
Oh, it’s such a needed discussion. And yes, we had the privilege, you invited me to be on your podcast. And, you know, I’ve been looking forward to this now ever since you and I really met, I got your book. And I have to tell you, my sons that are going through it, you have done a really great job, in my opinion, of defining what biblical masculinity is and what it means to be a man. And I think that people listening today, they’re going to be really challenged, they’re going to be really informed. And then really some steps to say, hey, if there’s some deficiencies that I see, I’m going to be able to do something about it. Because that’s really what our podcast is all about. Identify where am I stuck? How do I get unstuck and then I want to become unstoppable. And so thank you for being with us. They’ll tell us first about we go any further your last name. Tell me about that. You wanna? Yeah, that’s unusual. Last name.

Unknown Speaker 1:54
Yeah, 13 letters. And now I see my kids grow up, and they have to remember it and spell it. They’re all doing a great job. But um, yeah, Khachadourian. So I am Armenian. That’s my descent. My parents are both Armenian. They were also born in America born third generation, it was my grandparents that were born overseas. And the interesting thing about my name and the country of Armenia is that Armenia is the first nation to accept Christianity as their national religion. This is around AD 300. Wow. And they, yeah, they had an apostle come to Armenia and that’s how they accepted it. And they made it their national religion. So because of that, Christianity has infiltrated a lot of the legacy of Armenia, including all the names. So catch in our in the Armenian language of means cross. And I came to found out that Khachadourian and means son of the crossbar, wow,

Jimn Kyles 2:49
what a powerful name. You know, you and I were talking about it the book, in my opinion, it’s like, man, that’s exactly what you’re doing. You’re, you’re raising the standard, you’re, you’re carrying the cross and in the thing I love is that it’s an assignment that you have, and you do it. So so well, hey, tell me this, you know, as the thing that’s fascinating about this whole topic. I mean, there’s so many words in our society, that have become cliches or slogans, and one of them being like toxic masculinity, and really these labels that people have really labeled whole sex of society. And for me, that is a challenge. Because when we talk about toxic masculinity, man, tell me this what what is the impact of a generation not knowing what masculinity is? How do you label something you don’t even know what it is?

Unknown Speaker 3:46
Such a great question. So I think we need to take a step back, because you understand this, and I understand this and your listeners understand this, that there’s an attack on God’s image. There’s an attack on God’s plan for family, there’s an attack on God’s plan for his people. And what we see is whenever God wants to win a community over whenever he does something, and we see this even with the last promise and Malecon before the Old Testament closes out for 400 years of silence is that the promise is, he’ll turn the hearts of the fathers towards the children. Yeah. And so we see this, this linchpin of fatherhood, we see this linchpin of men, when God does something, he wants to use the men he wants to activate them. He wants to give them identity, and power and equip them and send them. So if you can take out the men, if you’re if you’re being strategic, and you’re the enemy of God, of course, you’re gonna go after the man what he represents, and what true masculinity is. So that’s where I think you’re seeing an attack on masculinity, and let’s re label it, let’s recalibrate it, let’s call it toxic. Right. So I think you see that happening right now. And then I’ll take it one step further, Jimn, because I think there is a version of toxic of masculinity which actually is toxic, and that’s when men are not acting like men, that’s when men are acting like boys. That’s when they’re being selfish. They’re being lustful. They’re taking advantage of other people. And they’re not walking in their God given domain. That is what toxic masculinity is. But we have the world right now telling us all masculinity is toxic. And that’s what’s dangerous. And that’s what we have to reject. Oh, it’s

Jimn Kyles 5:18
a crisis among men. And we, you know, Tucker Carlson, you write about this in your book. He did a whole piece on American men failing in body, mind and spirit, and the fact that it’s a crisis. I’d love for you to talk about what we’re seeing as the result of a crisis among men. What are some of the effects of that?

Unknown Speaker 5:40
Yeah, well, if we look at the crisis in any country, really when there’s no father, so there’s an attack on fatherhood right now. And there’s a gap in our fatherhood. So wherever you have this missing link with the father has been taken out either through divorce because he’s a deadbeat. And he just left his family, whatever that is that caused that. That’s where we see the devastating effects of fatherlessness. And if you’re looking at those stats, and I don’t have them all memorized, but we know divorce rates, suicide rates, depression rates, everything we’re seeing right now, every male shoot, every shooting, that’s happened, a school shooting that’s happened has always been a male. And it usually was from a broken family. Oh, yeah. So all of these effects that are devastating in society can be traced back to missing fathers.

Jimn Kyles 6:25
Yeah, some of your stats, you know, over 90% of inmates are male 77% of all suicides in America are men. Men are more like the two times likely than women to become alcoholics and die of drug overdose. I mean, the stats are just alarming and shocking, and will really they, you know, we don’t want to focus on the stats, but we do want to see the result of a society that doesn’t understand what biblical masculinity is, and what it means to be a man that it is destructive, when we don’t understand that now, for those of the those that are listening right now, so I’m thinking, okay, masculinity, what it means to be a man can you define for us just in some, like, what does it mean to be a man? How do you define that? What are the qualities? What are the characteristics?

Unknown Speaker 7:16
I mean, I could list a bunch of virtues. And there’s many people throughout history that said, Hey, these are the virtues of manhood. And we, we touched on a lot of those in the book, if we look at the original command to man in the garden, that’s what I go back to. God gives to Adam, multiple commands, you know, provide, protect, talks about Be fruitful, multiply. And just for the record, I don’t believe that only means physical reproduction, I believe that meant that everything man touches is to multiply were to be a good steward of everything we do, when we talk about replenishing, that’s being filled over and over. That’s the potential within man to augment and to reproduce what we carry and what we have. So it’s more than just physical. There’s a lot of spiritual implications to what the Lord says there. And also to take dominion, you know, to take dominion and walk in rulership, which is actually partnership with God, that’s what we see Adam doing in the garden. So that’s where I get my definition of masculinity. And I know we’re gonna get into some of the contents of the book. But when we look at the life, Jesus exhibits, I believe he is man as God intended man to be. And we can really look into the dimensions in his life to say, that’s what a real man does, how he honors his wife how he leads, and mostly how he serves others around him.

Jimn Kyles 8:32
Yeah, and I love it. You know, I know we have some people that are believers, the probably the majority of our listeners, and then some that are not. And so as we are talking about it, it really is about biblical masculinity. And I love what you said, in this conversation that we had earlier that sometimes there’s two perspectives that happen with biblical masculinity, you were talking about the fact that some people can see Jesus as as perfect. And the fact that it’s almost unrealistic if you’re looking as the standard to be Jesus. Talk a little bit about that. The fact that though, you’re you’re writing and saying, Hey, Jesus is the standard. And I know if you think he’s God, and it’s just because he is we can’t meet that standard, you actually give a case as to why we actually can use him as the standard even though he is God. Because he’s not only all God, but he’s also all man.

Unknown Speaker 9:29
Talk about. Yeah, absolutely. So this is this is exciting, because right now, there is many people the way they see Jesus, the way they relate to him, we know that there’s these different viewpoints and perceptions of, you know, with Jesus, this hippie and he was walking around with this message of love and there was never any confrontation. You know, there was no truth. It was just all love and acceptance, right. So we know that’s not biblical, that’s not truthful. And on the other side, you know, I’ve been in men’s groups. You know, I’ve been in men’s ministries. I’ve been a participant where I was at different tables with men, and I would just see them in this defeated state of just getting by and I wasn’t really seeing the overcoming life. And, you know, it was guys saying things like, let’s just try harder. And you know, we’re not Jesus. So like, that’s just like, it’s another week, let’s just do our best. And I’m like, Man is this this is what this is about. And obviously, it’s not. So when I look at Jesus, and actually, when we go into church literature, and we go into the books on biblical manhood, it’s a huge genre, what I saw missing, and I’m not saying I’m the only one that writes about this, but I didn’t see people looking and honoring Jesus as the standard for manhood. I was seeing more examples from other men in the Bible, because we can relate to them because they have failure in their life, right? So like, hey, like, David fell, I get that, right? We wrestled with sin. And we see all these other stories. So that puts Jesus and he should be in a different category is almost a little untouchable. And really, what I’m attempting to do through the book, and what we need to talk about right now, is that we have no problem relating to Jesus as the Son of God. But if we look at the way Jesus relates to humanity, His favorite self descriptor, it’s recorded over 80 times throughout all the Gospels, was son of man. And he relates to himself as a human. So he emptied himself, he’s 100%, God, and he’s 100%, man. And sometimes we forget that or we lose track that everything we went through, he went through only he didn’t sin, right, so he can relate to our broken condition. He worked, you know, the majority of his life and obscurity punching the clock and the daily grind, you know, putting out an excellent product, providing customer service, having good days and bad days, I’m sure, right, just like we do. And that’s the part that I want to get across is that, hey, Jesus is just like us. He’s the second man is what the Bible calls me is the last Adam, and everything that Adam failed in, he comes to redeem, and he provides a new way, and a new source of power that we get to access his life within us. And that’s the standard we’re called to walk in.

Jimn Kyles 12:01
Oh, that’s so good. Well, and there is a standard, I think that’s the other thing that I love about what you’re pointing out is that it’s not about just going with the flow going with the cultural norms, the cultural norms, or what have gotten us in trouble going with the flow and what society says. But there really is a standard, God created man. So here’s a standard for what it means to be a man, here’s the qualities, the characteristics, and not only that God gave us, His Son as the great example. And we can look at his life. And then we can compare our life with his life, which is really what it’s all about, in living out our Christian faith is, I want to be more like Jesus, He is the standard. And so I’m looking at the standard and measuring my life, where are their deficiencies, and then being able to focus on I’m going to develop that I’m going to build that so that I can be Jesus whisking on be a man that God has called me to be the pastor, my family and shepherd them and to take care of my my kids and my wife, and my co workers or employees, or whatever it is, God has placed us on this earth to do we are doing it as a representative of him. I love it. Tell me this, I love the fact of you have this section in here called the measuring read. And it’s what we’re touching on that talk a little bit about that the measuring read.

Unknown Speaker 13:23
Yeah, you know, we see many pictures throughout the Bible, where Jesus is a builder, you know, physically, he was a builder, that was his job. That’s the That’s the life he could have came in any sphere of society. And that’s how he enters Earth’s atmosphere. And he lives out this human existence as a builder. And then we also have references to the way he spiritually builds, if we look at the church, you know, we’re related to a building, we’re a bride, a body, a building. There’s these different metaphors and analogies that we have throughout Scripture. And he’s also known as the chief cornerstone. And we see him in Revelation. And he walks among the churches with a measuring read, he has this rod in his hand where he’s measuring according to his standards. So that’s where that came from. And in that chapter, so the book is basically split up into these six different sections or six books, if you will. And the first one is self mastery. And it’s the way Jesus leads himself. So whenever we talk about leadership, and I believe that God’s calling all of us to be leaders, every man is called to be a leader, but not every man leads. So the way we start this progressive journey, as a leader, is you have to learn how to lead yourself first. You cannot lead your family, you cannot lead in the workplace. You cannot lead in your sphere of influence if you’re not leading yourself. And we see Jesus do that throughout his whole life. And when he invites men to follow him, he makes them leaders, and he’s the example. So this is where when I talk about self mastery, it’s this partnership with the Holy Spirit where he’s not doing it just all in his own will. And it’s not grit, grind and hustle, but he’s cooperating with his father and submitting to his father and yielding to exhibit discipline in his life. I’ve to exhibit diligence. I love it. So walk that out.

Jimn Kyles 15:03
When I love what you said, you said, Every man is called the lead, but not every man does lead. I’m gonna ask you this, what do you think? Have you been able to identify what keeps men from leading and living the life God’s called them to live?

Unknown Speaker 15:16
So it’s a big question, Jim. Yeah, I think,

Jimn Kyles 15:19
give me some of the key things that you think just identify the top three or four things.

Unknown Speaker 15:24
I can tell you what I see what I see from men when they’re not leading. So and we’re in this environment right now we’re in this culture that is set up to put us to sleep, and to not tap into everything that God has for us. So we’re filled with distractions, technological distractions, competing priorities were mostly, you know, if families are together, the husband and the wife are usually both working, the kids have games, there’s so many competing priorities to take us away from the main thing. And there becomes this. You know, there’s a couple things we’re up against just culture number one is like, what is the American dream? What am I going after in life, so you might be going after the wrong thing. Number two, there’s this huge issue with just men living mediocre lives, just mediocrity. Where we’re wired for greatness. I really believe all humans are but it’s specifically I’m talking about the men right now that we are wired with. It’s in our hard drive, to chase excellence, to take dominion. This is why men want to run corporations. This is why people climb mountains. This is why they run races because they’re exhibiting this god given DNA that’s still within them, even though it might be unredeemed. In some, and it might show up weird. So dominion will show up as domination for some. But there’s still there’s still something there. There’s a residue leftover? Well, yeah, and we need to express that we need to find that. And if you don’t, you’ll be very frustrated. And this is where men are watching TV or they’re zoning out or they’re escaping, they’re self medicating with all these different things that take them out of reality. And those are the ways that they don’t lead themself.

Jimn Kyles 17:01
Wow. Yeah, it was so powerful, because it’s, you know, you’re hardwired for it. You’re not doing it, you’re frustrated. You know, we talked about, I love how you even identified same thing to talk about my book. You know, it’s identity, purpose, vision, and really the foundation of what even I love how you talk about the beginning stages of what leads a man to not uncover those things is fatherlessness. It’s, it really is a cycle of the lack of men and real fathers leading the way God created them to do it. So someone, here’s what we know, somebody’s got to break the cycle, right? And then lead people down the path that helps us create a culture and system and process where we can actually raise up other men. Tell me this what what in working with men? What would you say? Because I know the measuring read, you got 10? I think it’s 10 traits, characteristic qualities. What would you say some of the top things that we need as men are missing the top three that you’re seeing that are not found that we should be finding, but there’s a deficiency in? Have you found kind of a common theme in that?

Unknown Speaker 18:15
Yes, the common theme, thus, the root issue for everything is our identity. When we don’t know who we are, we’re going to try and prove who we are to other people with things we own with status. With titles, right, everything is an identity issue. If we get that right. And I know you know this if we if we get that right, everything will come into alignment.

Jimn Kyles 18:39
Well, I think that’s why you and I, we just connected so well. Because my book, The unstuck and unstoppable, the very first thing you have to know because we don’t want to just get people unstuck. We want to make you unstoppable. It is identity. When you know who you are. Nothing can stop you. You’ve got a foundation, things can come in. It’s not what happens to you that matters most. It’s what’s happening in you. And out of your identity life flows. It’s like, man, I’ve got this. I know, I failed, but I’m not a failure. I know I made a mistake. But that’s not what defines me. And that let me ask you this. And I know it’s a big topic. What’s one thing you can do to start down the path of discovering identity, your identity as a man?

Unknown Speaker 19:20
Yeah. I want to talk about that. But before I get to that, let’s just talk about one instance in the life of Jesus that we can learn from, you know, we have this issue of the temptation where Jesus is in the wilderness, right? He departs he goes into a solitary place and he’s with his father for 40 days. You know, he’s in a weakened state physically. And when he’s ended up weakened state, that’s when the enemy number one attacks him so at the most opportune time, right, so men have to be careful when they’re isolated. And when they’re alone, when they’re down when they’re physically rundown. The enemy will look to attack you not when you’re at your strength, but when you’re at your weakest and he’ll try and get you alone. Right and what does he attack Hacking, how does he attack, we see a very specific order of this attack in the wilderness that I think we can learn from. Because this attack is all about identity. And we see there’s 3d realms, right? There’s three temptations, and they all they all correlate to a different part of man. We see him attack spirit, soul and body. And he does it in the reverse order. He starts with body like, aren’t you hungry? Right? Then he appeals to his soul. And then finally, he appeals to His Spirit, but in every single one of those layers of the attack. Number one, it’s the exact opposite of the order God wants us to walk in. And second, Thessalonians 523. Paul prays the prayer that we would be blessed spirit, soul and body, that’s the proper order that our spirit would be in ascendancy. So Satan always perverts the order, he did the same thing in the Garden of Eden. And every single one of those temptations, he’s attacking identity, if you really are when you say you want this, right, if you really are a son, right? So he always wants to get you off your sonship. And he’s doing the same thing to you and I, throughout our lives, as well. So every man listening to this, in order to the second part of your question of how do I become secure in my identity? Well, there’s a number of ways to do that. But we approach God with faith. So when we’re walking with Him, we have to know that he is our Father, and that we are son, and you have to be so immovable in that reality, right, that you don’t flinch, because you know who you are. And when men, Jim, when men don’t know who they are, that’s when you’re pulled into one upmanship. That’s when you’re pulled into, I gotta show who I am. Or I gotta push

Jimn Kyles 21:31
people down, or Oh, yeah, that’s really your toxic masculinity. A lot of that plays in from it, it’s the insecurity gonna be hostile. And it’s, you’re 100%, right? And it always is a seed of doubt, right? If you are, yeah, that he can’t rob you of your idea. But you can place that doubt in the seed of doubt. And the thing that I have learned, and I know you have a thought is not powerful. You know, a lie is not powerful is the power of a believed lie is the power of a belief, thought. And so if he could just cast enough doubt, that you start to not believe, and we know all kinds of thoughts comes in, come in our minds, and we have to be able to stand on what we know, in the midst of hard times struggles, challenges, our weakest moments in life. And if we can do that, man, there’s nothing that can stop us from being who God’s called us to be.

Unknown Speaker 22:27
Yeah, everything’s related to identity. So we go on to all the other things, right? If we talk about how you have compromised in your life, where you have no restraint in your life, are you living a life with zero discipline, no boundaries, no standard of holiness, it all comes back to you don’t know who you are,

Jimn Kyles 22:42
right? Because if you know who you are, you may make a mistake. But you go back to the plumb line of this is who I am, I made a mistake. But that doesn’t define me is not who I am. This is who I am. Identity holds you straight and fast and down the right road. That’s, that’s so great. It’s so good. You know, I wish we could talk forever on your book. It’s, and I want to encourage those of us that are listening, and we’re gonna give you information on where you can find it and how to find it. I’m actually going through it with my boys. I texted you the other day, and he actually sent you a picture. And just we have gotten so much out of this. You know, I know our listeners are as well let me do this. I’m gonna give you a challenge. What’s one thing you know, here in the unstuck and unstoppable podcast, I want people to have one thing take one step forward, I’m listening. Okay, what can I do to really take a step forward in uncovering and becoming the man I need to be? or raise them in I need to be, what’s the step? What’s something we can do?

Unknown Speaker 23:40
Yeah, well, we already talked about a big one, which is identity. So really becoming secure in that and I think your book does a great job with that too. So get unstuck and unstoppable. The next thing I would say, I’m gonna give you too. There was a movement a long time ago, you might remember this. I was probably college when this was going on. But you remember the WWE JD craze? Everyone was wearing the bracelets, right? Yeah. And it was a good way to share your faith. And I don’t want to tear it down or anything. But I believe that questions off a little bit. The question and the WWE J. D stood for what would Jesus to? And I think the better question is, what is Jesus doing? And so when we approached the standard, and when we approached Jesus, it’s not a life of imitation. So I don’t want someone to read the standard and say, Okay, here’s my playbook. Let me try really hard in my own strength to do all these things. That’s not what we’re invited into. We’re invited in the Christian life to live by another life form to live by another life, we have access to something else. So I would explain it that it’s not a life of invitation. It’s a life of participation. So Jesus said, apart from me, you can do nothing. He could do nothing apart from his father. So we the same way and that image of the vine and the branches, we have to be abiding in him. So what’s that look like? So it’s getting our day Kennedy, right. And it’s learning to walk with Him in partnership every day. And so my next practical thing would say, you need to get in the right environment for that you need to be in a local body of believers, you need to be around like minded brothers, you need to be submitted to authority, you need to have a mentor, a pastor, a leader in your life, that’s teaching the Word of God. And then you have to activate that and walk that out. So I would say that would be a great next step because you are not meant to live the Christian life alone, I actually would go as far as to say that you know, we can look at the natural habitat of animals and things you know, birds fly in the sky, you know, fish swim, Christians are habitat is with each other. Right? We are a community, the ecclesia is a body. And that’s why honor the church, honor what you’re doing as a pastor, what you’re building, you have to be plugged in with people Jesus never sends any man out alone, always sends them out in groups. And when he establishes this kingdom, here on the earth, this church, this ecclesia, it’s always done in community never done in isolation.

Jimn Kyles 26:04
That’s so good. Well, and I love I love how you said upgrade to a new environment, get around people, where where you’re seeing what you want to become. So I love it. Great. Hey, now, Josh, tell us where can we get your book? How do we get more connected with what you’re doing? Give us a little bit information on that.

Unknown Speaker 26:23
Yeah, thank you so much for the opportunity. The best place to go would be standard 59.com, standard 59.com. That comes from a verse in Isaiah 59. That’s where we the Lord lifts up a standard for us. That’s where that comes from. All my all my links are there. If you want to connect with me on Instagram or Facebook, it’s at Kingdom athlete. I just launched a challenge. It’s a free email challenge. If anyone’s interested in this topic of, you know, talking about partnership with God, what’s it look like to work with him? What’s it look like to take him with me into my work to cultivate this presence of God everywhere I go. If people are interested, specifically, men are interested in that I just launched a new email challenge called the unfair advantage email challenge. You can find that at standard 50 nine.com. Or you can go to access your advantage.com.

Jimn Kyles 27:09
That’s so good. And you were talking about identity. Episode 11 of this podcast actually talk about identity. So if you’re listening right now, go back to Episode 11. And I’m going to talk about how to discover your identity. Also add some tools and worksheets that you’ll be able to download into descriptions. To learn more about Of course, you can buy my book, and I talked about it in one of the chapters as well. Well, Josh, it’s been so great to have you on the podcast today. I’m so excited about our friendship and what God is doing. I know personally, I’ve we’ve already talked about how you’re going to be involved with helping me and some of the men in our church and the men in my life. And so I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s podcast, I want to invite you to subscribe. That way whenever the episodes are released, it comes automatically to wherever it is that you consume the content. I also want to encourage you to share it, share it with anybody that might benefit from today’s conversation. And then would you rate and review it that helps in the podcast rankings. We love to hear how this podcast has benefited you and is making a difference in your life. Also, if you want to grab a copy of my book, you can go to Jimnkyles.com Jimnkyles.com grab your copy today. You can also go to Amazon. You can get the audible version, the Kindle version, the print version as well. Just excited to be on this journey with you until next time, keep moving your life forward, Bye bye