awaken, o dreamer

this past sunday i was flipping through the new issue of relevant magazine, one of my favorites, and came across an ad and review of erwin mcmanus‘ new book, wide awake: the future is waiting within you.

as i skimmed the short interview about the book with mcmanus, i read this:

“relevant: do you think people ever feel guilty about pursuing the life they want?

mcmanus: yes. absolutely. i think strangely enough, most people live under obligation.  they’re doing what they think other people expect them to do or want to do or demand that they do rather than what they really would have done.  i meet with people whose only goal is to pay their bills, because they think beyond that is greedy and they forget that they don’t have to keep it all.  most people in the western world don’t really understand that to optimize your opportunity is to create hope for the rest of the world.  you can actually provide housing and find cures for diseases.  to me, one of the greatest and most selfish acts among people is to just make enough to survive.”

wow.  after reading that i could not get in my car fast enough and drove to barnes & noble to buy this book.  i’ve been in it for a few days now and it is rocking my world, and it is so right on time for me.  you can check out a sample chapter here.

here’s a great excerpt from the book:

“for centuries now, Jesus has been a focus of every kind of research, from theology to history to philosophy.  his approach to ethics left an undeniable mark on humanity.  what has been significantly underappreciated is how Jesus changed the way his followers actually engaged life.  he launched a movement that unleashed previously untapped potential in those who believed in him.  he created an environment where his disciples began to believe the impossible and soon found they were turning dreams into reality.  his became a movement of dreamers and visionaries called and compelled to dream of a better world.”

there is also a dvd release of wide awake:the short films coming next week that has several short films along the themes of the book. can’t wait to get that!

dangerous men

“all men dream but not equally.  those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity; but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes to make it possible.” - t.e. lawrence

expectancy

// becoming… expectant \\

I have come to the conclusion that some people don’t experience more because they don’t expect more. Ephesians 3:20 says that God is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think. For so many years, I have heard that scripture read and quoted, but the emphasis was always put on God doing ‘exceeding abundantly’, and not so much on the “above all that we ask or think”.

Maybe we don’t receive the ‘exceeding abundantly” because our “asking or thinking” is missing the mark. It would appear that God is asking us to give Him something to work with. I tend to dream big. Huge, in fact. And I believe with everything that is inside of me, that the more I dream, think and ask BIG, the more God is going to blow my mind and will come through with “exceeding abundantly” more than I could even dream.

I heard Pastor Brett Fuller preach a message once called “Encouragement & Destiny”. In it, he said it is vital to realize that God lives beyond our expectations and that He wants to take the limitations off of our expectations and cause us to become something that we never thought we could be.

If God lives beyond my expectations, then I can conclude that the more I expect, the more I will find God dwelling in a place that is further reaching than what I originally expected. The more I ask and think, the more my expectations fuel the exceeding and abundant working of God in my life. It is not the more I “hope” (the desire for a certain thing to happen), but the more I expect (an earnest faith that I will see the thing I am looking for).

Expectation is hope with a seed. A woman who is pregnant does not hope to give birth to a child, she expects to give birth because there is a tangible manifestation of what was once just a hope. That is why women who are pregnant do not say they are “hoping”, but rather they are “expecting”. For while she once hoped to have a child, once a seed had been planted her hope took root and became an expectation, an assurance that she will soon see the fruition of the process taking place inside of her, and now she knows it will only be a matter of time. It is what T.D. Jakes calls “the outworking of the internal.”

I don’t “hope” for these things, because I know the seed has been planted and they are are already available to me. I expect them. I expect big things. I expect divine appointments. I expect favor. I expect “chance encounters”. I expect unseen opportunities. I expect influence. I expect strategic, purposeful and divinely orchestrated relationships. I expect the unexpected.

I wonder what would happen in our lives today if we really began to expect God to do something big?