One of my favorite superheroes is Captain America because he represents so many of the biblical principles by which I try to live. This comic book champion symbolizes freedom, hard work, courage, loyalty, and selflessness, and he holds to some vestige of biblical morality.

Captain America, in other words, is the extreme opposite of soft. He is hardened and strong from top to bottom and to his very core: not just physically speaking, but emotionally and mentally as well. One of my favorite quotes of his is from a pep-talk he gave in The Amazing Spider-Man:

“Doesn't matter what the press says. Doesn't matter what the politicians or the mobs say. Doesn't matter if the whole country decides that something wrong is something right. This nation was founded on one principle above all else: the requirement that we stand up for what we believe, no matter the odds or the consequences. When the mob and the press and the whole world tell you to move, your job is to plant yourself like a tree beside the river of truth, and tell the whole world: 'No, you move.'”

Just for the record, in an attempt to appear wokefully relevant, this line was delivered by Agent Peggy Carter in Captain America: Civil War, but originated with the Captain himself.

The point is that not being soft means you courageously stand for truth, no matter what and no matter who is coming against you. Like Christ, one must set his face like flint toward persecution instead of cowardly running away and hiding in our spiritual bunkers.

One of Captain America’s greatest qualities is his resilience to never back down. In most instances, the Captain’s moral compass points north towards God’s standard of truth, and he always seems willing and ready to lay his life on the line for his convictions.

When faced with a moral dilemma, such as the one he stared down in the aforementioned film, he often seems to accurately represent the spirit of the Pine Tree Flag used by men under General George Washington’s command during the American Revolution. The flag was emblazoned with the words “An Appeal to Heaven.” In other words, whether fighting tyranny, deciding where to shop, or generally choosing between right and wrong, we should always petition God’s Word for the answer. This is what respectable men do, and this is what they die for.

Soft men do the opposite. They determine what is morally right and wrong by their fleeting whims. They easily back down and submit to the woke mob without putting up a fight, because it is the easy thing to do. Men who lack courage and integrity fold like a piece of paper when even the slightest amount of pressure is applied. They have no moral backbone because their standard of truth resembles a feces ball being rolled around by a dung beetle choosing the path of least resistance.

Soft men are not rooted in anything objective or meaningful, and they certainly do not know where to find the river of truth, because they are forever lost in the treacherous swamp of despair. Sure, they may have built something pleasing to the eye, but in the end this beauty is short-lived because it is built on the foundation of subjective muck and mire that reeks of death and destruction.

Finally, to tie everything together like a fine rug, consider this quote from Major Dick Winters, a real-life World War II hero whose life was the main focal point of the television series Band of Brothers:

“The key to being a successful combat leader is to earn respect, not because of rank, but because you are a man.”

If you want to know what courageous men once looked like, then be sure to watch this series. The fictional fortitude embodied by Captain America is represented by these historical men of courage. Major Winters rightly understood that respect is earned rather than given. If you watch the series, you will see that his rank was not given to him. He had to earn his stripes like any other enlisted man, and he earned them over time because he earned the respect of his peers and the officers ahead of him in rank. He earned them because he acted like a man.

Our nation was once a strong nation because it bred strong men. If you desire this once again, it starts with you and it starts with me. It starts in our homes by raising up our boys in the admonition of the Lord, teaching them to be honorable men of valor.

It starts with you planting yourself like a mighty oak of Bashan or a cedar of Lebanon next to the river of truth and telling the world: “No, you move.”