Wide Awake

The alarm sounds. Your feet hit the floor and carry you into another day. But what does that day hold for you? Will you be punching your card at work, catching up on TV at home, and crashing into bed before you rinse and repeat the next day? Or will you dare to dig deep and discover the incredible potential lying dormant within us all?

In Wide Awake, renowned speaker and church visionary Erwin Raphael McManus challenges us to put an end to all the sleepwalking and settling, for each of us was created by God for a reason. He has called you to live as Jesus did—a heroic life, void of monotony, teeming with danger, adventure, and the unknown. Living wide awake is about realizing that the world desperately needs you to live up to your potential.

There is a future that needs to be created, and it is waiting for us all to wake up and get out of bed. The alarm has sounded, and it is time to shake off the slumber.

It’s time to live, to create, to imagine, to dream . . . Wide Awake.

Emergent church pastor McManus (Soul Cravings) encourages readers to dream wide awake—in other words, to live their dreams. From McManus's perspective, the salvation that Christianity offers is not only redemption from sin but also an invitation to a much bigger life. Each chapter focuses on a skill dreamers need, including focus, creativity, the urge to discover, a willingness to adapt and joy for life. He encourages readers to get out of jobs that simply pay the bills and do something meaningful—which may mean moving to Tibet or maybe India or South America. There's nothing new here, and McManus relies on clichés, though he writes simply and with energy. Christian readers attempting to figure out how to pursue their dreams would do better with Max Lucado's Cure for the Common Life. Some readers, though, may be more comfortable with McManus's pop psychology approach to the scriptures, where Daniel becomes the poster child for adaptability, Jesus represents a focused life and Isaiah's prophetic, Arise, shine; for your light has come becomes a call to [live] up to your potential. (July)
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