🛑 Stop Asking Men to “Just Open Up”❗️
They won’t.
💥 Not because they’re not broken, but because you’re asking the wrong questions.
When my last article, “A Third of Men Belong to Nothing. And It’s Killing Us,” dropped, the comments told me more than the article did.
Nobody argued with the conclusion of the article. Men are isolated. Everybody knows that. What they wrestled with was the cure. One reader said it plain: most men don’t trust anyone enough to open up.1 Another pointed out that this isn’t new news, it’s an old strategy, and the fix isn’t a better program, it’s men engaging in genuine community.2 A third named the actual structural problem: we’ve built discipleship as a mentor-to-mentee ladder when it was supposed to be lateral, side by side, like men sharing a table.3
Others agreed with the fact that just adding another program is NOT the answer.4
Real transformation happens when we shift from measuring attendance or event metrics to building authentic, high-trust relationships. True disciple-making requires walking alongside people intentionally rather than relying on one-off initiatives.
-Dr. B. Keith Haney (Becoming Bridge Builders)
So let’s poke around at the question the last article asked but didn’t fully answer.
Why won’t men open up?
And what do we do about it?
Photo by Tima Miroshnichenko
The Diagnosis Isn’t Cowardice
Nearly two-thirds of men say they’d hesitate to get professional help for stress, anxiety, or depression.5 That’s not “some men.” It’s MOST men. And it’s not because the problem isn’t real. Men die by suicide at roughly three to four times the rate of women, and of the men who are struggling with depression or anxiety right now, fewer than half will ever get treated for it.6
That’s not a generation of men who don’t care. That’s a generation of men who were taught, starting young, that weakness gets you mocked, and strength gets you accepted. That being a man means doing it yourself. And that survival of the fittest means the ones who can look toughest on the outside are still standing in the end.
Jesus Didn’t Build a Program. He Built a Table.
Look at how Jesus actually formed men. He didn’t put twelve guys in rows and preach vulnerability at them. He walked dusty roads with them, ate at their tables, let them see Him weep at Lazarus’s tomb (John 11:35), watched Peter fail in front of everybody, and restored him one-on-one over breakfast (John 21:15-17).
🚫 That’s not a men’s ministry curriculum.
🟢 That’s proximity over time, doing the everyday things of life and giving his men permission to fail.
David and Jonathan cut a covenant, not a curriculum.
Jonathan stripped off his own robe and armor and gave them to David (1 Samuel 18:3-4). That’s what real trust costs: giving something of your own with nothing guaranteed in return.
Paul told Timothy he remembered his tears (2 Timothy 1:4). Paul. The apostle who got shipwrecked, beaten, and imprisoned without a word of complaint, told his spiritual son he 💧remembered him crying. That’s the New Testament model, and it’s the opposite of what most men’s ministry looks like on a Saturday morning.
Why Your Men’s Ministry Isn’t Working
If your structure has one speaker and forty chairs, you’ve built an audience, not a brotherhood.
Audiences applaud. They don’t confess.
If your structure is one older guy “pouring into” one younger guy, you’ve built a hierarchy. Hierarchies protect image. The younger guy secretly manages what the older guy sees.
What actually gets men to open up is small, consistent, and side-by-side. Three or four men showing up with the same faces and same rhythm. Nobody performing for anyone else. Showing up to a place where nobody is above anybody and everyone brings their own naked walk with Jesus to the table. And the accountability flows in both directions.
Give Them a Low-Stakes Door In
Vulnerability doesn’t start at the deep end. It starts when people are given a place to belong, maybe even before they believe! A place where they have zero fear of being rejected. Where men are not surprised by other men’s failures.
Never Cringe When Another Man Confesses
Then you build the rhythm using the 59 One-Anothers, confess to one another, bear one another’s burdens, spur one another on. Not as nice aspirational values. But as weekly practices with the same three men.
Then you widen it to his oikos, the men he already lives, learns, works, and plays alongside, because the goal was never a healthier men’s ministry. It’s a healthier mission field.
The Application
This week, pick one man. Not the whole men’s group.
🏃🏃♂️ One man. And run with him!
Don’t ask him “how are you really doing.” He’s had thirty years of practice deflecting that exact question. Instead, tell him something true about your own week that cost you something.
Go first.
Every time!
Without exception, somebody has to go first, and it should be you.
Then invite him into something with a rhythm, not a one-time coffee. A standing invitation to walk together on the journey of faith-based manhood. At Disciple-Making Collective, we call this an X-group
Hit hard. Hold accountable. Stay biblical. Utilize the tools.
Name that man in the comments, first name only, and tell us what you’re going to say to him this week.
Let’s hold each other to it.
Want the full framework for building lateral, trust-first disciple-making relationships like this one? That’s exactly what we walk through inside the Premium Cohort, alongside the tools from Hand to the Plow.
Comment from reader Paul Christopher on “A Third of Men Belong to Nothing,” kevinebeasley.com. ↗
Comment from reader Isn't there more? on the same post. ↗
Comment from reader Trip Kimball on the same post. ↗
Comment from reader Dr. B. Keith Haney from Becoming Bridge Builders on the same post. ↗
Cleveland Clinic survey data, cited via Rula, “Why vulnerability matters for men’s mental health,” 2025. ↗
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), “Suicide Data and Statistics.” ↗
Jamie Winship’s Identity Exchange process has been an incredibly powerful process that’s been effective in gatherings of every type. Speaking to over 600 D-1 colleges coaches and staff at last years Final 4 he had a room full of Alpha males opening up about their commonality of underlying fears and effect of long held false beliefs about self, others and God. I’ve experienced it in 1-1 settings and small groups. The listening prayer serves to normalize a life of prayer as opposed to a life with daily quiet time and prayer,
This is excellent material, Kevin; I appreciate it. Christ became the table, so we must be cautious about the tables we choose to join. Jesus offers a path for us as men to cultivate healthier relationships we steward. Thank you for the thoughtful writing.