Erwin McManus' Wide Awake

A bit off schedule this week, with posts a little later. Forgive me on that.

I've digested just about everything Erwin Raphael McManus writes. He is one writer (along with some like John Eldredge and Brennan Manning and a couple of others) that I buy the books of without checking reviews. When his Wide Awake came out as his first book in some time, and given the topic being one near and dear to my heart, I eagerly anticipated reading it.

And I must say, I was disappointed in this book. It does have a strong start -- making a inspired case that we are to be creative and we are to impact our world. But when it moves to giving direction on discovering what that is for yourself, what impact you should have and how to get there, it reads like so many good sounding sermons -- sounds good, but how do you live that? Or as one of my favorite characters in Braveheart, Stephen, says "Fine speech, now what do we do?". In the end, when it comes to this book, I think William Wallace's response is more useful than anything this book offers "Just be yourself".

But God is an amazing God. An author I've grown more and more to appreciate, Bill Johnson, put out a book awhile back called Dreaming With God that covers similar subject matter. I'm about midway through it, and so far I've found it more useful. We'll see if Johnson's writing keeps it up through the rest of the book, and either way, I'll post a review when I've finished it.

As for McManus, I'll likely pick up his next without recommendations or checking reviews. No author can score a home run every time, call this one a single from an author I'd say has previously never hit anything less than a triple.