My Midlife Crisis — and Counsel for Yours

00:00:00.000 | Welcome back to the Ask Pastor John podcast.

00:00:07.320 | And Pastor John, we have not done an entire episode on the midlife crisis, especially

00:00:12.540 | your own experience of a midlife crisis.

00:00:15.080 | But you have a story to tell, though it's not something that you have talked about at

00:00:19.440 | length.

00:00:20.440 | I think there's an old conversation with you and John MacArthur where you talked about

00:00:23.200 | it a little bit more length.

00:00:25.360 | Now speak to middle-aged listeners, men who are 40 or who are nearly 40.

00:00:31.880 | What did you learn during that dark season of your own life?

00:00:35.520 | And what would you say to other men who are facing those midlife years or soon to be in

00:00:39.200 | them?

00:00:40.200 | Take us into your story and what you learned from it.

00:00:43.400 | I think I was 40 when we were on vacation in California and Ben Patterson, who was at

00:00:53.880 | that time the pastor of a Presbyterian church in Irvine, asked me to preach for him and

00:01:00.760 | offered me his house for some days of vacation while they were away.

00:01:05.760 | And so we took him up on it.

00:01:07.600 | And two things happened, which were remarkable and probably a wake-up call, a warning for

00:01:15.840 | me in midlife to hold fast to Jesus.

00:01:20.560 | One was that I felt inexplicably depressed while I was there.

00:01:26.840 | One morning I was sitting on the stairway to the second level of their house crying.

00:01:34.720 | And my wife found me and was startled because that's not typical.

00:01:41.120 | She asked me, "What's wrong?"

00:01:43.800 | And I simply said, "I don't have any idea."

00:01:48.480 | That's what MacArthur got so surprised by in that conversation that we had.

00:01:54.040 | He just shook his head and said, "I've never experienced anything like that."

00:01:57.320 | I said, "Well, I wish I hadn't."

00:02:00.640 | The other thing was that after I preached at Ben's church, it just so happened that

00:02:08.200 | Jim Conway, the author of "Men in Midlife Crisis," which I believe is still in print

00:02:15.600 | and useful, came to me and asked me how old I was.

00:02:20.520 | He came up after the service.

00:02:21.520 | He said, "How old are you?"

00:02:22.520 | I thought, "What is that?"

00:02:23.520 | And he had introduced himself, so I suspected it must have something to do with midlife.

00:02:29.680 | He said, "How old are you?"

00:02:30.680 | I said, "Forty."

00:02:32.440 | He smiled and he said, "You got a year and a half."

00:02:36.000 | And he meant the average age—I think I've got my details right—the average age for

00:02:42.000 | men to pass through midlife crisis is 41 and a half.

00:02:47.200 | At least that's the way I remember it.

00:02:50.000 | I had never even thought about the issue of midlife crisis.

00:02:56.800 | I tend not to put a lot of stock in generalizations like that, but there is a good bit of evidence,

00:03:04.480 | isn't there, that something happens for many men as they move into their 40s, and

00:03:12.080 | not all of it is pretty.

00:03:14.920 | I don't remember his exact words, but he summed it up something like this, "Well,

00:03:22.200 | John, don't leave your wife, don't leave the ministry, don't buy a motorcycle, and

00:03:27.000 | don't get a sailboat, don't throw away everything you've built," which kind of

00:03:31.600 | captured some of the stupidity that men at this moment do.

00:03:37.680 | They just throw away some of the most valuable things in their lives and try to make something

00:03:44.680 | new out of silliness like that.

00:03:48.080 | So that gives you a snapshot of my brief experience with it and with him.

00:03:55.560 | And now I've tried to think, "Why is this?

00:03:58.880 | Why does this happen to us?"

00:04:01.800 | I am certainly no expert, and people ought to read books, not just listen to a podcast

00:04:07.400 | if they want to try to figure this out.

00:04:09.480 | So let me tell you what I think, though, trying to analyze myself, look at the world, and

00:04:16.000 | maybe wave some warning flags for some guys, like you, maybe.

00:04:20.680 | It's about where you are.

00:04:25.200 | I suspect that there are physical dimensions to this, like hormonal things, you know, male

00:04:32.400 | menopause, whatever you want to call it.

00:04:33.840 | I don't know.

00:04:35.000 | I'm not an expert, but I would guess that there are changes happening.

00:04:40.480 | But I don't know enough to talk about that, so I'll leave that to the side.

00:04:43.600 | I suspect that there are more situational reasons for this.

00:04:50.200 | For example, a man may feel like he's peaking out in his career, and that it hasn't turned

00:04:59.640 | out to be as great as he had hoped.

00:05:04.040 | And a certain measure of disillusionment is settling in as he ponders another 25 years

00:05:12.840 | of doing the same thing.

00:05:15.320 | The dreams for what his vocation might become have not proved to be as satisfying as he

00:05:22.440 | thought, and it can be really oppressive to think of doing the same old, same old for

00:05:29.400 | another half a lifetime.

00:05:31.400 | So I think that's part of it.

00:05:32.840 | Here's another part of it.

00:05:34.560 | He may look at his body in the mirror, or his wife's body, and realize it's downhill

00:05:41.320 | from here on.

00:05:42.680 | I mean, we're not getting any prettier or handsomer.

00:05:47.680 | He's not going to look any more handsome, any more fit, and she's not either.

00:05:52.880 | In fact, he may have let himself go and become a kind of overweight, bedraggled, average,

00:05:59.360 | run-of-the-mill, paunchy man, and feel lousy about it, but physically too tired to do anything

00:06:05.760 | about it.

00:06:07.040 | And the pressures of his vocational life have caused him to let go his exercise, let go

00:06:14.400 | any routine of fitness, and maybe even he's not getting enough sleep because kids and

00:06:20.280 | work and stress is who knows what all.

00:06:24.040 | And when you don't get enough sleep, you get discouraged and easily depressed.

00:06:27.520 | So a bunch of cluster of things like that.

00:06:31.200 | And very possibly, he and his wife have settled into a kind of 20-year-old coexistence with

00:06:41.160 | their long-discovered differences that have not been worked out very well and still function

00:06:48.740 | like irritants between them.

00:06:52.560 | And the peace and the pleasure that he used to enjoy and hoped would get better have been

00:06:59.160 | replaced with a kind of truce with neither he nor her offering affirmation and joyful

00:07:06.600 | partnership like they used to, and that dream seems to be drying up from what he had hoped

00:07:13.840 | it would be.

00:07:15.480 | And here's one more, and I have the gut feeling that this may be close to the heart of the

00:07:22.000 | matter for some guys.

00:07:23.640 | I don't know whether it was for me or not, but this feels big.

00:07:26.620 | At this point in his life, his children—and of course, I'm just thinking of guys that

00:07:32.200 | get children—his children are probably entering their teen years, and they're forcing on

00:07:40.480 | him questions of his own moral and spiritual identity as he tries to lead his children

00:07:49.760 | into adulthood, and the uncertainties and the questions and the perplexities of raising

00:07:55.960 | kids, raising young adults in this world feels like never-ending pressure and confusion for

00:08:05.840 | which there are just no simple answers.

00:08:09.280 | And the need to give guidance and provision and example to the children is relentless

00:08:15.240 | and never-ending.

00:08:16.660 | There are no days off from parenting.

00:08:21.440 | And this all feels new because raising teenagers is so different from raising three-year-olds

00:08:28.720 | and nine-year-olds.

00:08:31.080 | So for all those reasons, Tony, and more, I suspect there is something very real to

00:08:38.720 | this issue of men in midlife crisis.

00:08:42.160 | And looking back now from age 71, I am overflowing with thankfulness to the mercy and the power

00:08:52.120 | of God to hold onto me during those years.

00:08:56.200 | There are some pretty depressing parts of John Piper's journal.

00:09:00.280 | I hope the world doesn't ever get to look at them, because they just—I mean, when

00:09:04.560 | I look at them, I have to say, "Thank you, Father, if you had not been massively true

00:09:10.880 | to your promises to complete the good work that you began, I sure didn't have the fingers

00:09:16.880 | to grip this cliff."

00:09:19.040 | So my encouragement to men is that you lay hold of Jesus Christ, as Paul says in Philippians

00:09:28.160 | 3:12, "Precisely because he has laid hold of you."

00:09:32.880 | That you get up in the morning before your children—and I know that's a challenge,

00:09:37.800 | they've got to be at school at 730, good night, but I did it for years, and I know

00:09:42.960 | it's crucial—get up before your children, go to your private place, get down on your

00:09:48.000 | knees before God Almighty and beg Him for strength for another day.

00:09:53.360 | And that He would fulfill His promise never to leave you, never to forsake you, that He

00:09:58.680 | would help you and strengthen you and uphold you by His Word.

00:10:04.120 | And tell Him, tell Him every morning that He is your only hope as you instruct these

00:10:10.000 | children in His Word.

00:10:12.800 | And ask your wife if you can get a half day away on a Saturday or a Sunday, and you go

00:10:19.200 | away for three or four hours, borrow somebody's house if it's wintertime, go to the park

00:10:24.080 | if it's not, take a Bible and a notepad, and you wrestle with God for three hours until

00:10:30.520 | you get fresh clarity for why you are on planet Earth.

00:10:36.760 | What is the purpose of your life?

00:10:39.560 | Get clarity.

00:10:41.000 | And I don't mean mainly which other vocation should I have besides the one I'm in.

00:10:45.800 | I mean, that might be part of it, but that's not the issue.

00:10:49.120 | The issue is, what about the radical commitments of Acts 20, verse 24?

00:10:54.640 | What about the radical commitment of Philippians 1:20?

00:10:58.440 | And Paul gets real clarity, and it's not complex, it's short.

00:11:03.320 | You can put it in a sentence for why he exists.

00:11:08.560 | To magnify Jesus Christ, whether strong or weak, whether living or dying, to finish our

00:11:15.760 | course in faith and love, not turning to the right, not turning to the left, not making

00:11:21.760 | shipwreck of our faith or our marriage or our ministry.

00:11:25.960 | And I have no doubt, brothers, I have no doubt that if you will take the time to seek his

00:11:32.660 | face and know him and love him, you will mount up with wings like eagles.

00:11:39.520 | You will run and not be weary.

00:11:42.800 | You will walk and not faint.

00:11:45.480 | It's true.

00:11:46.480 | I know it's true.

00:11:47.920 | I have tasted it in the impossible moments when you don't think you could do another

00:11:54.200 | thing you lay hold on Isaiah 40.

00:11:58.640 | I promise you that if you stay faithful to your wife, God will re-enchant your marriage

00:12:06.640 | in ways you can't imagine.

00:12:09.160 | And the children, they're in his hands.

00:12:13.000 | You are not God.

00:12:15.320 | You are his emissary.

00:12:18.360 | Tell them.

00:12:19.360 | Tell them the truth every day from Scripture.

00:12:22.920 | Live it with love and meekness and lowliness and penitence and strength as best you can

00:12:30.240 | and put them in the hands of God.

00:12:32.720 | God is faithful.

00:12:33.960 | That's the bottom line.

00:12:34.960 | >>So good and helpful, Pastor John.

00:12:37.080 | Thank you for being willing to share about the season of your life and the lessons that

00:12:41.220 | we can take from it.

00:12:42.220 | I appreciate it a lot.

00:12:43.220 | Thank you.

00:12:44.220 | Thank you for listening to the Ask Pastor John podcast as well.

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00:13:13.720 | And if you have a question for Pastor John, send it to us through our podcast homepage

00:13:18.160 | at desiringgod.org/askpastorjohn.

00:13:22.440 | Well speaking of the dilemmas of adulthood, how does one climb the corporate ladder while

00:13:27.760 | on God-centered mission at work?

00:13:30.920 | That's the question on Wednesday.

00:13:32.880 | Very good, very important question.

00:13:35.160 | And we'll address it then.

00:13:37.200 | Until then, I'm your host Tony Ranke.

00:13:38.600 | We'll see you on Wednesday.

00:13:39.520 | [BLANK_AUDIO]

00:13:47.880 | you

My Midlife Crisis — and Counsel for Yours

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