Christ for the Generations, Part Four

Godly Younger Men

In Titus 2:6, Paul says, “Likewise, urge the younger men to be self-controlled.”

This morning, we finish our series within a series, as we’ve been looking at Christians in the two most foundational categories of life: male and female, old and young. We’ve considered the older man, the older woman, the younger woman—and now we finally return to the younger man.

Each category of person, Paul tells Titus, is to be exhorted in a way that is particular to their spiritual needs. Of course, that doesn’t mean these are the only areas in which they should be exhorted—but they are the areas in which they especially need it. You can’t cover everything all at once. At any given time, there will be certain areas of emphasis, and that’s just as true for these particular groups.

We don’t treat the young and the old as if age is inconsequential. And we certainly don’t treat men and women in an identical way. While both sexes are made in the image of God, each was created with unique contributions to God’s plan for the world.

For several decades now, there has been an egalitarian spirit that, in the name of equality, blurs and diminishes all distinctions. It flattens and removes all hierarchy.

Yes, of course, we all belong to that one great category: mankind—or humanity. And when it comes to access to God, there is neither male nor female, young nor old. All come to God through Christ, and Christ alone.

But as we are seeing, that doesn’t mean the subcategories are unimportant. So much of biblical, mature Christianity is the ability to hold multiple doctrines—multiple truths—together in proper order, without ignoring one for the sake of the other.

So, we must exhort all Christians as Christians—made in the image of God. All Christians need to hear the great, central doctrines of the faith taught over and over again. But we also must help bring those truths to bear on people’s particular needs. And that is exactly what Paul is doing in this section of Titus.

And now we finish with the younger men. All the other categories received exhortations in multiple areas, but the young men are given a single exhortation: be self-controlled. I find this especially fascinating because both the older men and the younger women were also directly exhorted to be self-controlled, among other things. And the older women received a particular application of self-control—not being enslaved to much wine.

So why do the others get more personalized attention, while the young men receive only a single command—and one that had already been given to all the rest?

In a sense, this might feel like just a general exhortation being applied to that one big category. But it’s not. Sometimes less is more. Sometimes a long list of expectations can actually diminish the weight of a particular need. By singling out this one attribute, Paul brings special attention to it.

Yes, all believers should be self-controlled—he’s already made that clear. But young men, if there is one thing to focus on, one area to give your attention to, one thing to grow in—it is self-control.

Older men do this. Older women do that. Younger women do this. But young men—this is the area to zoom in on. This is an extremely personalized focused expectation that young men desperately need.

The more powerful something is, the more important it is to keep it under control. That’s true of guns, cars, and so on. You don’t need to keep a chicken on a leash—but if you’re walking a Rottweiler down a public street, you do.

One reason it’s absolutely essential that young men learn self-control is because they are, quite simply, powerful. Proverbs 20:29 says, “The glory of young men is their strength, but the splendor of old men is their gray hair.” Young men are strong. They’re physically strong—they can move heavy things, work long hours on very little sleep, and take a lot of physical punishment and keep going.

But their strength also shows up in other ways. There’s often a kind of hyper-focus: young men tend to zero in on a single interest with remarkable intensity. And their strength often expresses itself through a deep desire to organize into groups with other men for a shared purpose. That might be sports. It might be weightlifting. It might be church planting. Or—it might be trying to take over a nation.

Young men have very strong bodies, very strong wills, and very strong inclinations to reshape the world alongside other men in some meaningful way.

Young men are strong. And that is good.

However, just as women’s strengths in communication—given to them to nurture and knit together both their households and society—can be twisted into gossip or slander, so too can the strengths of young men be twisted into a destructive force.

In 2 Timothy 2:22, Paul exhorts the young pastor, “So flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.”

All that strength, that drive, that focus that exists in young men can easily be diverted from what is good, true, and beautiful into ungodly pursuits—what Paul calls “youthful passions.” In his commentary, Matthew Poole writes, “The word ‘self-controlled’ signifies to be temperate, sober, wise, discreet—to govern their passions; an exhortation more specially necessary for young men, whose natural heat incline them to passion and rashness.” I love that phrase: “natural heat.” Young men burn bright and burn hot. Which is exactly why they need this singular focus—so they don’t waste their God-given gift of strength on stupid stuff.

The Church Father Chrysostom, writing all the way back in the 4th century, put it plainly: “Nothing is so hard at this age as to overcome pleasures and follies.”

I think those are helpful categories: pleasures and follies. Let’s consider both for a moment.

First, pleasures.

Inside you, young men, is a natural aggressive drive. It’s part of your design—written into you down to your hormones. Testosterone is not a product of the fall; it coursed through Adam’s veins and now flows through yours. There is nothing toxic about masculinity in and of itself. But that aggressive desire—that fountain of strength—must be ruled, or it will rule over you.

How many young men have been overcome by their passions? You have a strong desire to be with a woman. That desire is God-given. But if it isn’t aimed with discipline toward God’s purposes, it becomes lust. And lust leads a man down the path of illicit sex—pornography, promiscuity, sexual conquest.

Some men think they are conquers when they sleep with multiple women. In truth, they are the ones being conquered—ruled by their youthful passions, controlled by lust. These are men who lack self-control. And this, right here, is one of the greatest sins of young men: sexual immorality in one form or another.

Sexual immorality has always been one of the great destroyers of men. Samson is one of the clearest examples in Scripture—a man with immense, God-given strength whose life was unraveled by lust. Though he was set apart for God’s purposes, his lack of self-control—especially in his pursuit of ungodly women—ultimately led to his downfall and captivity.

We do, however, live in uniquely treacherous times for young men. We live in a pornographic society. Just as words can stir up wrath, images can stir up lust. The most obvious and ever-present example is online pornography. Children today are often exposed to it—sometimes by accident—before they even reach the age of ten.

I know Christian parents will say, “You have to keep them off screens or keep screens heavily controlled,” and I don’t disagree. But the reality is, their friends have phones, there are screens at school, and neighborhood kids have access. Even commercials on television, ads at the mall, and magazine covers at the grocery store have become incredibly immodest.

And then there’s the shameful way so many young women dress today—as if their clothes were painted on. Everywhere a young man turns, he’s visually assaulted.

Young ladies, hear this: you should never be ashamed of your beauty. It is good to be beautiful. You don’t need to mute your femininity. But you can dress modestly in a way that neither hides your beauty nor makes it an obvious stumbling block for your brothers in Christ.

That said—men—you cannot depend on women to dress modestly. And you cannot rely solely on filters, firewalls, or accountability software. Ultimately, you must develop self-control.

Years ago, I was teaching at a youth conference in Rochester, New York. I spent time with some of the young men in the youth group, and they were all worked up about a certain girl. They said she was dressing immodestly and stumbling everyone. They really talked it up. And then I finally met her. She was wearing normal jeans, a regular college sweatshirt, very little makeup. She wasn’t immodest—she was just a very attractive young woman.

What those guys lacked was self-control. And here’s the thing: a man without self-control will always find a way to lust. You can lock down the internet, ban the phones, filter the TV—but if the heart is unruled, it will still find fuel for sinful desire.

Proverbs 25:28 says, “A man without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls.” That’s what’s at stake here. A city without walls in the ancient world was helpless—vulnerable to every enemy, every thief, every invader. That’s what a young man is like if he won’t rule his eyes, his thoughts, his desires. He is exposed. He is easy to conquer.

Some men are so eager to control what women wear or what others do because deep down, they know they have no rule over themselves.

Look, you just heard me exhort the young women to dress with modesty. That matters. But women can’t do all the work. You need to rebuild the walls. You need to train your heart. You need to cultivate self-control.

Because if you don’t, you’re not just vulnerable—you’re already being conquered.

The strong sexual passion that resides in you mustn’t be extinguished. It can actually be an engine of productivity. You do want that fire—that heat—to keep burning, but it must be kept within the God-given confines of marriage. So my counsel to you, young men, is this: don’t delay marriage unnecessarily.

That said, you also need to understand something crucial: while marriage helps in the fight against sexual immorality, it is not a replacement for self-control. I’ve met more than a few young men who struggle with pornography, whose consciences are constantly assaulted by their own sinful compromises. They grow desperate to get married, imagining it will make the problem disappear. It won’t. You must develop self-control. That discipline is required whether you’re single or married.

And one more thing on the topic of finding a spouse: you’ll often hear that women are hopeless romantics, quick to have their hearts stolen away. Maybe some are—but in my experience, most women are far more selective, even pragmatic, in choosing whom to marry.

It’s actually young men who tend to fall hard and fast. I can’t tell you how many guys have come to me saying, “She’s the one,” and then try to move the relationship forward so quickly that they scare her off—only to become obsessed with getting her back.

Young men, protect your heart. Maybe it’s not always wise to marry the first youth group girl who bats her eyes at you. I don’t want you to delay marriage unnecessarily, but recklessly rushing into it can become a source of deep regret later in life.

I’ve lingered on this one pleasure—sexual desire—quite a bit, but there are other pleasures that can consume men. One of them is combat. Men love it—whether participating in it or watching it. Sports, in many ways, are ritualized warfare. The original Olympic games in ancient Greece included things like javelin throws and wrestling precisely because they were forms of military training.

I’ve been a lifelong boxing fan myself, and I think it’s perfectly fine to be invested in sports to a certain degree. But I’ve also seen men become fanatics—completely obsessed.

And while many of us could stand to take our physical health more seriously, I’ve seen that, too, become a kind of idolatry. It’s good to train your body, to grow strong, and to find healthy outlets for your strength. But be careful: if you take too much pleasure in it, it can begin to rule you instead of serve you.

I think this is as good a place as any to sound the alarm on something that’s quietly wrecking a lot of young men: online sports betting. It’s a trap tailor-made for them—a toxic cocktail of three things they naturally gravitate toward: sports, risk, and the thrill of making money. The algorithms know this. The marketing is targeted. And the access is instant.

You don’t have to drive to a shady corner store anymore. You can blow your paycheck between innings on an app that feels like a game but is built like a casino. I’m watching young men get hooked, distracted, and slowly hollowed out—not just financially, but mentally and spiritually. It’s digital snake oil: promising glory, delivering bondage.

So if you’re in ministry, discipleship, fatherhood—pay attention. This isn’t just a “bad habit.” For many, it’s an addiction forming in real time, right under our noses.

Let me turn to follies for a moment. Young men can be silly—they love to pull pranks, toilet-paper houses, scare their friends. And honestly, that kind of playfulness is often part of how young men build trust and relationship. Men bond by teasing one another and taking risks together. That’s a normal part of youth.

But hear me: you eventually need to grow out of that. I don’t mean you should stop laughing or taking bold steps—I mean you must grow in wisdom. Learn the difference between risk and recklessness. Between humor and foolishness. Don’t let your life become consumed with worthless pursuits that stunt your growth.

A prime example in our time is video games. And let me say—just like with sports—I believe it’s okay to enjoy video games in moderation. They can be a legitimate form of recreation. But they are also uniquely dangerous because they simulate productivity and dominion. They give the illusion of real achievement.

Video games offer young men something they deeply desire: the chance to form teams, take risks, complete missions, and build something. And that’s why they’re so attractive. But the danger is this: what should be recreation becomes obsession. What was meant to be a break becomes a lifestyle. And that, young men, is folly.

It is a wasting of your strength on something that builds very little real-world skill. It’s a rechanneling of your God-given drive to build—but instead of building something in the real world, you’re conjuring up fake domains. You were made for more than pixels and high scores. You were made to take dominion in the real world.

You need to develop the self-control to step away from the monitor—to turn off the console—and invest your time in developing real-world skills. You need the self-control to stop being ruled by entertainment that captures your attention and governs your life through a dopamine-fueled fun time.

Instead of being mastered by amusement, learn to master something meaningful. Learn how to play an instrument. Learn how to budget and invest. Learn how to build things. Learn how to code. Don’t spend your strength on folly.

Remember that hyperfocus common to men I mentioned earlier? I’ve seen that laser focus poured into mastering video games—hours upon hours of strategy, memorization, reaction time—and yet never turned toward anything that will matter for the rest of their life.

But Proverbs 22:29 says, “Do you see a man skillful in his work? He will stand before kings; he will not stand before obscure men.”

Skill—real skill—opens doors. Real dominion begins when you choose discipline over distraction.

There’s one more folly I want to address when it comes to youth: the belief that they are wiser than their fathers and grandfathers—that they don’t need older men. Instead, they surround themselves with counselors who are the same age, with the same inclinations and blind spots.

Young men can be deeply ambitious and highly zealous. And like everything I’ve talked about this morning, when that drive is rightly focused, it can become a powerful force for godly strength and service. But Scripture warns us about zeal without wisdom. It warns us about selfish ambition.

One of the clearest examples of this is found in Rehoboam. When he inherited the throne from his father Solomon, he rejected the wise counsel of the elders. Instead, he listened to the advice of the young men he had grown up with—men who told him to assert his power, increase the burden on the people, and rule with a heavy hand. That foolish choice led to the division of the kingdom.

Rehoboam had zeal. He had strength. He had a nation handed to him. But he didn’t have wisdom. And he paid for it.

Don’t be cocky a Rehoboam.

I’m pretty good at seeing how things are going to go long before they get there. Some of that might be a spiritual gift, but most of it? It’s just experience. I’ve lived long enough to know: you’re not that unique. Your idea isn’t that groundbreaking. You live long enough, and you start to see patterns repeat themselves. That’s where wisdom comes from.

That’s why you don’t want to be like Rehoboam, charging ahead without counsel. You want to be like Titus or Timothy—young men eager to serve under Paul, willing to learn, willing to be led, willing to receive wisdom from someone older and more seasoned.

Remember, “the glory of young men is their strength, but the splendor of old men is their gray hair” (Proverbs 20:29). Young men have the fire, the drive, the muscle to get things done. That’s your glory. But older men have wisdom, earned through experience, trial, failure, and faithfulness over time. That’s their glory.

We need both. And mustn’t despise either.

Young men, I need you to understand something clearly: you have a target on your back.

A man without self-control is a man who is easy to rule. He’s easy to manipulate. And that’s exactly why the devil wants you distracted by pleasures and follies—because if he can distract you, he can control you. He can keep you out of the fight.

Because here’s the truth: you are dangerous to the kingdom of darkness when you walk in holiness and purpose. You can do things. You can build things—things that matter, things that last. You can open your mouth and proclaim the gospel. You can build the kingdom through Christian businesses, faithful churches, and godly households.

You are the future fathers, the future pastors, the future presidents, the future CEOs. And without you, we have no future.

That’s why the devil is gunning for you.

In Thoughts for Young Men, J.C. Ryle puts it like this:

“Satan knows very well that you will make up the next generation, and therefore he employs every trick to make you his own. I would not have you to be ignorant of his schemes.

You are those on whom he puts his choicest temptations. He spreads his net with the most watchful carefulness, to entangle your hearts. He baits his trap with the sweetest morsels, to get you into his power. He displays his wares before your eyes with his utmost ingenuity, in order to make you buy his sugared poisons, and eat his accursed treats. You are the grand object of his attack.

May the Lord rebuke him, and deliver you out of his hands.”

Don’t be ruled by your pleasures. Don’t be distracted by follies. Don’t cast off the wisdom of your fathers or surround yourself with ambitious, zealous fools who despise authority.

So, young men—fight back. Build self-control. Guard your heart. Fix your eyes on Christ.

You are not weak, and you were not made to waste your strength.

You were made to spend it well—for the glory of God and the good of the world.