A Few Good Men

By Robin Caldwell

“…while I was still searching but not finding-- I found one upright man among a thousand, but not one upright woman among them all.” (Ecclesiastes 7: 28)

Three friends of mine, Maurice, Terrance, and Derek, are on a mission to evangelize the good news of the ordinary brotha, the nice guy who rarely receives credit for being everything women dream of but do not seem to really want or recognize.

God only knows we women don’t make their evangelism of the good guy easy.

I’ve come to the conclusion that most of us women who say we want godly men wouldn’t recognize him if he walked up to us with a glass of water. But I’m thinking that we wouldn’t recognize Jesus either if came bearing a glass of water in the hot desert.

Good guys who don’t beat or cheat, cuss at or in reference to a woman; who make commitments and keep them, change our flat tires, paint our houses, mow our lawns and shovel our snow, take out our trash, listen to us complain ad nauseam about the men who have done us wrong are not exciting enough! I’ve heard some of us say so.

“He’s nice but he’s boring. I need some excitement, girl. He just does not do it for me.”

Pookie, the bad boy who has more women than the law allows, is worthy of the wait, the time, and the energy it takes to hope for a transformation, and a choice that could potentially lead him to the altar – for marriage – is more exciting.

His cousin, Ray Ray, is another exciting story. Ray Ray goes to church every Sunday, in fact, he is even on the Deacons Board, sings in the choir, and washes the pastor’s car. His problem is obviously not church attendance; it’s abiding by the Word of God. He hadn’t read that part of the Bible that mentions lying with a harlot or anything remotely dealing with accountability to women in general.

And Ray Ray isn’t in a hurry to get married because he already reaps the benefits –meals, prayer, the laying on of hands in the middle of the night, and no commitment. He, like the women in the congregation, is waiting on the Lord to deliver his mate, however in the interim – until she comes – he’s having a good old time at the expense of the desperate women who accommodate him in their endeavors to get a man.