HUGE men gather in Marysville for prayer, recovery and scripture

MARYSVILLE — A group of about 200 men come together to study the Bible, pray, listen to music and mostly be there for each other every Tuesday night at Word of Life Church in Marysville.

The weekly meetings (which also take place at Christ the King Church in Burlington) are gatherings of HUGE Men of God, a men’s ministry and outreach group affiliated with a dozen churches in Snohomish and Skagit Counties.

HUGE — the name is a quasi-acronym for Honor God, Unify men, Grow in Christ, Equip disciples — isn’t a church, but focuses on bringing men back to church and into a closer relationship with God.

Unlike national movements like Promise Keepers and Iron Sharpens Iron that put on stadium-size events, HUGE is home-grown in the Northwest and works to foster strong and close connections among the men, said James Brooke, the group’s founder and president.

The key is coupling larger gatherings of events with smaller breakout groups of 10 or 12 men, Brooke said.

“That’s where they share, that’s where they get a chance to talk,” Brooke said. “If you have 100,000 guys, you can be lost in that crowd.”

Darren Bailey, HUGE’s vice president, said there are two types of men who typically get involved.

“They’re either very active and engaged in their faith, and want to grow in their faith,” Bailey said. “The other end of the spectrum are people who find themselves in circumstances and they just don’t know what to do.

“It’s similar to the types of people at the gym: the fitness nut who works out regularly and eats well and takes supplements, or the person who is so is so unhealthy they need to be there,” he said.

He counts himself among the latter category. His tried to live as a good Christian, but he struggled with prescription drug and alcohol addiction, infidelity and domestic violence and didn’t understand why his life wasn’t going well. He realized he needed God back in his life, and not just in church, he said.

“Church shouldn’t happen in the four walls of the church. It should happen in daily life,” he said. Bailey, 47, has been coming to HUGE events for eight years.

“It saved my life and saved my marriage and my family, so I show up every year,” he said. “I was that weekend gym guy who had a heart attack.”

Operating on a shoestring budget, the group puts on a series of weekly meet-ups in the spring that focus on certain themes like prayer, recovery, scripture and question-and-answer periods with local pastors. The main event is a three-day retreat, Men’s Advance, at the Warm Beach Camp and Conference Center in March.

The group also holds a few less formal events, such as a bowling fundraiser.

American men are statistically uninvolved in church, Bailey said, and they are not trained to deal with life problems related to love, anger and substance abuse.

Brooke started the group with one other man about 2003. They’d been struggling — Brooke said his issue was infidelity — and didn’t know where else to turn.

“When I was at my rock-bottom, I was thinking, ‘Where are the other guys?’”

That led to a series of informal meetings in living rooms, and then in a church. By 2008, they started connecting with other churches, and HUGE was formally incorporated in 2010.

“It never dawned on me that it would be what it became,” Brooke said. “We just wanted to be available when that next guy has a hard time.”

Bailey said that HUGE showed him that he needed that openness in order to deal with his problems, and that he’s realized that the Bible encourages this.

As HUGE has grown, more men respond to that message, he said.

“When guys come and find, ‘I’m not the only one struggling with that,’ it can be very inviting,” he said. “It’s all about removing the impurities from life and learning how to do life better.”

Chris Winters: 425-374-4165; cwinters@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @Chris_At_Herald.

HUGE Men of God events

HUGE Men of God is holding weekly “Men’s Forum” meet-ups from 6:45-9 p.m. at Word of Life Church (9028 51st Ave. NE, Marysville) on Tuesdays and at Christ the King Church (988 Fountain St., Burlington) on Thursdays. The meet-ups run through Feb. 26. The Men’s Advance retreat is scheduled for March 6-8 at Warm Beach Camp and Conference Center. For more information, go to hugemenofgod.org.