Wide Awake with Special Guest Erwin McManus

good morning good to see you wow this is amazing I've never been in this area it's it's cold and it's beautiful I see I see mountains and snow and I'm so glad to visit here and fly home to LA and suffer through my own winter we all have our own winters we have to suffer through as God chooses and so this is the way he chose for you I'm really great for the shame for inviting me I feel really old when someone says I've been listening to him since I was a teenager Wow I am so near death it's almost terrified but I'm glad I'm still standing I'm breathing and I have never had a church by 6,000 copies of any of my books this is the first time I have never done that at our church and so I think it's a good idea I think we should do that at Mosaic and I I do hope that this journey has real significance for you there's an irony for me I I wrote wide awake around six years ago it was the last book I wrote as a writer in the Christian world or at least I thought it was around that time that I sat down with my wife and I told her honey I I'm gonna take a course adjustment in my life and I want to become an artist and just create art for the next 20 years and I started a fashion company and a film company and and while we're having coffee having that conversation she said sure go right ahead she's always been really supportive and and and then a year later when I had a fashion company and a film company she said we need to have a conversation and I said about watch because it seems like you've started this other life I'm not aware of and I said what do you mean she goes well it seems like you've left the ministry and now you're like this artist we need to talk shouldn't you bring me into this and I said honey we had this conversation a year ago and you said sure go right ahead and she said that doesn't count I didn't think you could ever succeed that's and a part of it was writing this book and going deep and asking what are the deep dreams that are burning inside of my soul what are the things that that are waiting to be translated into life in LA you have a city where people come from all over the world with great dreams huge ambitions aspirations bigger than the universe and they're usually the best-looking most talented most celebrated people in their small towns all over America every Angelino comes from Michigan or from Alabama or from Boston or from Colorado and they come from Tokyo and Sydney and they come to Los Angeles a common theme they have the same exact dream but there's only room for certain number of people in that dream and so I began watching over and over again thousands of incredibly talented people come with huge dreams and aspirations and then watching those dreams crash and burn and crumble all around them and they're 24 years old and they have lost their dreams and you would think that people with that kind of dream would immediately find another dream but oftentimes they do not they almost become vacuous Souls empty and lifeless and I began noticing a familiarity between the people in Los Angeles and the people I would meet in churches all over the world I think one of the great tragedies in the church is that we haven't really understood how God unleashes the future inside and through human beings we don't understood the nature of a dream and why it's so important some people seem to be almost naturally day dreamers and there are people who are deeply connected to the dreams and they translate that into real life I think most of us have latent dreams unfulfilled hopes and aspirations I think most of us have a sense that there's something wonderful something beautiful something extraordinary maybe even something great inside of us that we can never seem to unlock unleash or actualize in our lives most of us sleep through our dreams rather than to make our dreams our life and so I wrote wide awake in hopes that that perhaps I could awaken inside of each of us this dream that God has placed in us so that we could become not simply people who dream but people who live out those dreams but I think some of it is our own sense of discomfort with being human we don't know what it feels like to be human and what it looks like in relationship to God and so we end up creating a superstitious relationship to how we live life in this world you hear us say things as if they're from the scriptures and the Scriptures never thought of them like god helps those who help themselves it's probably the most quoted verse in the Bible that's not in the Bible and we have all these things well if God wants it to happen it's gonna happen have you said that I mean I've been in terrible meetings where no one shows up and the person gets up and says well we know that everyone God wanted here is here and I think no I think this is just the result of bad planning I and a lot of our language is is actually superstitious rather than spiritual and I became a person of faith as an adult and I I didn't know the rules of our spirituality and so when someone would do something kind for me I would say thank you Nate's they don't thank me thank the Lord and as well I could thank you both I have plenty of them available and and then they would always follow it up with it wasn't to me it was the Lord have you ever said that and I'm a really pragmatic person about things and and I would look at them and say I don't know it looked like you you were the person in the room I thought it was you I'm so confused if it wasn't you and and I know that it's an attempt to become humble and to express humility but these frameworks actually us from accomplishing everything God wants us to accomplish I think one of the more difficult ones is when we act as if if it's good God did it and we didn't do it because see this is what we've been taught I didn't do it God did it it's a little disturbing for me when I hear that from an artist have you ever heard a really bad song and people oh you know just thank the Lord I'm not thanking anybody and I'm really you know because I've talked to people who've written books or written music or created art they go I love that so good and they go oh I didn't do it God did it then going on uh hey you did it cuz if got it done it it would have been a better song I mean it was it was a good song it had real merit but it just wasn't that good I think you've misunderstood my compliment and I think even if you were Picasso God would be better but when we say these things and and what I hope we can do is extricate from our faith our superstition so that we can actually begin to live freely the life God created us to live as I began an intense search for what it means to be uniquely human this is what driven both wide-awake which was the last book I wrote for six years and the newest book I've written called the artisan soul they're in the same conversation what is it that makes us human different than every other species and then to add it to that what does it mean to be created in the image and likeness of God because if we are created in God's image as the Scriptures tell us then it means that every human being is created in the image of God even those who do not believe in God so there has to be some expression of that reality in us if it's true so what is it about us that makes us different than a gazelle or a rabbit or a hyena or a cheetah I want to read to you a passage of Scripture and I want to dive into this more deeply in Hebrews chapter 11 verses 1 through 6 but I want to talk to you about faith and I'm having to live in it because I can't read the Bible anymore because the type is so small so I have to put it on my iPad and make it larger because I am 57 and there are consequences to that but I thought I'd charged my phone my iPad last night and it's on 6% so I'm up here living it by faith and so we read now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see this is what the ancients were commended for by faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible by faith Abel brought God abettor offering then Cain did by faith he was commended as righteous when God spoke well of his offerings and by faith Abel still speaks even though he is dead by faith Enoch was taken from this life he did not experience death he could not be found because God had taken him away for before he was taken he was commended as one who pleased God and without faith it is impossible to please God because anyone who comes to him a boat must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek Him now I know there's always a great danger of using a passage that everyone already knows completely but I want you to just step back for a moment and not read this passage from a theological perspective I want you to listen to it and look at it from an anthropological perspective now what does it say about God but what does it say about us as human beings are there implications to what it means to being human now I'm gonna start from the back because this is the way sort of work in my own life in verse 6 it says that it is impossible to please God without faith now I think that's just unfair it's an unfair amount of pressure on us as human beings that God puts on no other species on this planet there are not rabbits out there going am i living my faith run by faith there are no coyotes going I believe I can catch them I'm living by faith roses don't have the pressure and my rosing light there's nothing else the cactus are not in the desert going conditions desperate but I have cactus-like faith I can do this but it says that it's impossible for a human to please God without faith why is that why is that criteria based on us and on no other species in this creation I think we've used faith as this almost angel dust that moves us into this magical supernatural space but actually if we cannot please God without faith what it means is that faith that restores to us our original intention and makes us human again now do you ever read a passage and what it says doesn't really make any sense but you pretend it makes sense because everyone around you is pretending it makes sense so you're all just nodding in fact those are the ones you usually cheer them on because the less clear it is the more we believe it and that's what verse one is like now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see now I don't know about you but I have work conference and what I have then what I hope for and I have more assurance in what I can see and not what I can't see in fact I'm fairly certain that you're the same way and so if faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance in those things we cannot see it means that faith causes an internal shift inside of us that moves us to a level of actualizing our lives it doesn't seem natural to us anymore because we all have more confidence what we have than what we hope for and I it every day have you have you known anybody who's dating someone they don't really like I mean you think they complain about him all the time I just hope he's just so insensitive they just he just forgets my birthday forgets everything forgets we're dating I think it's just terrible and you heard a guy I mean I just don't like her you know but you know she's what a guy that you ever wondered why people stay with people that they don't like it's because they are more confident to what they have and what they hope for in fact while you're telling her he's a jerk she's here but I can change him what she's actually saying is he's not what I hoped for but he's what I have so I have a plan to make him what I hope for so I can still have them but some of you are married go he's what I got not what I hoped for but here's what I have so I'm committed and I've lost all hope the reason we stay in relationships that are beneath our longing is because we have confidence what we have and not in what we hope for it's the same way with jobs have you been around someone who just hates their job are you that person you complain about your job on time complain about your boss command class conditions I see some reveals I just hate my job I just hate going to work hate would have to do and they go well here's a solution quit get another job gone I can't do that economy's bad times gonna be bad for ever hung up at you no idea they'll give you a thousand reasons why they should keep their job you know why they keep the job they don't want because they have confidence in the job they have and not that a lot in confidence in the job they hope for and there's some of you here you're gonna live all your life with the job you have because you don't have confidence and the one you hope for have you ever been around someone who just hates their life they just hate their life everything about it in fact I think it's funny the questions yes I travel people go if you could live in any city in the world which would you live in III can live in any city I am a free man I can live in any city I want and that's why I live in lost I say lost angels go yeah I see I live there because I want to live there see I have chosen my life it sounds wrong doesn't it we're not supposed to choose our life were a little posed to let other things choose our life for God choose our life which usually means other things choose our life they see if you don't like your life choose a different life why would you keep the life you have when it brings you no joy it's because you have confidence and what you have and not what you hope for but faith changes that now it's also says that we have assurance in what is unseen but the truth is we have more assurance and what we do see see if you see if you offered me or one I'll give you $10,000 you can't see or ten million dollars you can't see it's called the lotto which one which is juicy you might think I don't have a lot of faith that I'm gonna take the $10,000 I can't see I'm because I'm generous I'm gonna give you the ten million we can't see if you offer me two chairs when we can't see what we can't see and one of us is gonna sit in one one's can sit another I'm gonna believe you have greater faith in me and then you can have assurance of what is unseen but me I'm just I'm just not at that level of faith so I'm just gonna sit in the chair I can see because I have more assurance and when I can't see then what I can't see how about you see when I get on the plane today I'm gonna get up on a plane I can see not what I can't see I'm flying home with maybe less than faith because I I can see it but why would we choose to have assurance and things we can't see if faith drives us up see what's supposed to happen is that hope only exists in the future Pope doesn't live in the past that's called regret hope does not exist in the present hope only exists in the future so if you have confidence and things hope for it means that you are a future-oriented creature and if you have assurance and things unseen and things that you're supposed to somehow live in the invisible we humans are supposed to be future invisible creatures but because we've disconnected ourselves from God we've become present material creatures and so we get trapped in time rather than to live eternal lives and then it says by faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible and this is interesting you ever notice that a lot of our beliefs are not always the same as our truths and it's painful to give up our beliefs when the truth demands it see well here's interesting work science tells us that everything comes out of something and something comes of nothing and that's called the Big Bang and I love science and what can be proven empirically is that everything comes out of something and what cannot be proven empirically is that something comes out of nothing but that's what we're taught everything is that of something something comes out of nothing but actually what Christians actually say is that everything comes out of something and something comes out of nothing but God created out of nothing Akili Oh we even have language for it and so ironically we believe the same thing science believes we just think God was there and then nothing but here's the crazy thing science and Christianity are both in disagreement with the Bible the Bible does not say that everything came out of something the same thing came out of nothing the Bible actually says that everything came out of something and all that's something that is visible came out of something that is invisible is that's where it says by faith we know that the universe is created by God's command so that everything that a scene comes out of that which is not seen you see something that is not seen is that something that is nothing see the oxygen in this room is not visible but it does exist and if it did not exist you would know right away it would change the quality of your life and the length and we keep confusing nothing with something that is invisible he says that God did that create out of nothing it says that God created out of that which is not visible or what could that be what's the material for which God created that's not visible but is something Wow I remember when I wrote my first book I sent in the subtitle and the subtitle was becoming the people God dreams of and the publisher actually in Colorado said we can't use that and I said why and they said because God doesn't dream so he doesn't no he doesn't and I say I think he does but no he doesn't no I think he does it doesn't matter you can't use that because Christians don't believe God dreams and it won't sell I said well that's a I'd like for it so I dream of that and uh and so I sent another title/subtitle that said becoming the people God had in mind little tricky becoming the people God dreams of becoming the people God hadn't has in mind and they said we love it perfect that's the subtitle that's funny Christian's don't mind God having something in mind but it's really disturbing that thing that got dreams what is something in mind if it's not a dream we're we're a really really tricky group of people see the reason we're okay with God having a mind is cos were more influenced by the Enlightenment than we are by the scriptures and the reason we are afraid of God's dreams is because we're afraid of our own we trust reason but we do not trust imagination we trust intellect but we do not trust our dreams and yet it is the scriptures that tell us the movement of Jesus will be driven when young men have visions and old men dream dreams God seems to put a lot of weight on our dreams do we God created out of nothing and I want to submit something to you today that what it means to be created in the image of God what makes us different than every other species on this planet is that humans materialize the invisible in the same way God imagined and then created he gave us this capacity to imagine and then create the Jeremiah God said before you were born I knew you do you hear what he's saying you are a dream in the might of God before you were fetus in the womb of your mother or an infant in the arms of your father God imagined you he dreamed you up and he knew you they just think of you he knew you have you ever a dream so vivid it was as if you knew the people in the dreams can you imagine how God dreams would be dreamed of you before you took your first breath but if we were a dream of God before we took our first breath we live out the dreams of God before we take our last breath this is what it means to live by faith to become future invisible creatures several years ago I was invited to go to Columbia University for a debate although III they didn't tell me it was a debate until I got there and and they didn't tell me the subject until I got there either and so it did put me at a small deficit and then didn't realize that the two people I would be debating was the senior scientists from the department of science it was an atheist and the head of the Department of humanities who was a Content philosopher and then I was there to represent Christianity or God in more general or Jesus and I apologized and and the subject was what can be known wow there's so many things that could have been known that would made this better and and the senior scientist read out his prepared speech in his introduction what can be known is what it's empirically provable that that's good I'm with him on that and then the content philosopher the head of the department of humanity said what can be known as human actions ethics and I thought that's true too I'm with you there was my turn and I said well what can be known is I should have been far more prepared ya say but the problem is I'm not an expert on knowing I'm more like an expert on mystery or the unknown in fact I Chih see I agree that you can know things that are empirically proven you can know human action but I think we know things we're not supposed to know I think humans are so layered we know all kinds of layers of things that we don't even know how we know I think we know two plus two equals four and we know that there's blue and green and red I I think we know that the Broncos are gonna win and I think that we are we just we just know things right we just know things until we uh know them later and uh and I know my wife loves me even though I I'm in Denver I know my wife in Los Angeles loves me how do I know that in fact I know things I don't even know how I know even as a man I know things which we men are not really known for knowing I never was out of town for a week or so traveling and I came home and and when I walked in my wife said Oh should let your home he would take out the garbage and that's the way she says I love you I know that and and I said I've got a tired guy just sit for a minute and and that's why I said I love you too and then she was I'm so sorry and I sat down and then I got a phone call and was like my boys and and I love playing basketball and and they said hey we got a gym you want you wanna play ball but let me let me let me let me talk to him first and so I hung up the phone and went over to my sweet beautiful wife Kim and I said honey after I take out the garbage okay I was wondering like can I go play basketball with the guys and oh no I would never do that to you you are so tired the Javan it's like a miracle I like I'm it just renewed I'm invigorated I got I have sold myself over energy chuckles unexplainable and that you know no no issues but let me let me be clear let me understand this she goes you've been gone a week you just got home and you want to go play basketball with the guys rather than be home with me I mean when she put it like that it sounds so wrong but well what do you think and she said sure go right ahead and I knew she didn't mean it because I'm a human I am nuanced I can know things that I'm not supposed to know and so I told these people at Columbia University we humans we know things were that supposed to know we cheat all the time and when Jesus asked Peter who do you say that I am Peter said you're the Christ the Son of the Living God and Jesus said flesh and blood have not revealed these things to you but my father who is in heaven and what Jesus saying is Peter usually you're wrong but this you got it right but you cheated my father gave you the answers and I said this is the problem with humans is that we know two plus two equals four but we also can move to the deepest level of knowing and know God and this is the dilemma and at the end there was a whole list of questions and a question for the scientists and a question for the philosopher and their stack of questions for the Christian but I'll never forget this question when you were a child you had imaginary friends Santa Claus the tooth fairy God why did you get rid of your other imaginary friends and keep God isn't that a great question I love questions like that in front of a live audience at an Ivy League school there's just nothing that makes you feel more alive and and so I chose that question because I liked it so much and and I said first of all you clearly don't know me if you think I've given up my imaginary friend it's just never gonna happen they're the closest friends I have they're the only people who understand me you know humans come and go uh-huh in fact my wife and I took a 20 year anniversary 10 years ago to Ireland and we traveled have you ever had a perfect time you thought and that three days I was like for him the time our life I'm driving on the opposite side of the road seeing this beautiful country my wife is Irish so you know she was just loving and after three days she said I can't take this anymore and I was like I was confused because you know and I thought is this her way of saying I'm having the time of my life I'm not sure and I said what and she goes I can't take this circus has been like three days of silence you haven't said a word for three days I know you probably can't tell this I'm an extreme social introvert and I am and I'm clearly incredibly reclusive I lived in my imagination I was in a hospital by time others twelve years old because they didn't know what to do with me because I would just disappear in this inside world and and and I said what were you is this what my life is gonna be like but the children are gone and I go yeah it's like you and me babe traveling the world you know and because I can't take it you're not talking said but honey it's been like this all of our lives is for the last 20 years you and the kids have been doing all the talking and I've been the listener that's my role and our family and and she was like I need a conversation I need you to have the conversation and I looked at her and I said oh but I bet I have been having a conversation with all of my friends said if you want to join us all you have to do is ask and it's an open community and in here so I never gave up my imaginary friends but then I told him I call me I said you know my son when he was 3 he wouldn't eat his food he wouldn't eat his broccoli or his peas or his carrots put him in the backyard take our eyes off him he starts shoving dirt and rocks in his mouth and this is often week after week month after month and he he just would not eat Kim's cooking and then he would eat the dirt and rocks he would force his mouth closed I could get the food in and he was force his mouth closed I couldn't get the rocks out after a few months I said to Kim I said honey have you noticed that our our son like he'll eat dirt and rocks but he will not eat your cooking and it's just an observation you know I wasn't trying to be mean I was just saying this is just an observation and I said I have an idea and she said what's that and I said why don't we just throw the food in the backyard and put him outside the play let's just see how it goes and I mean the percentage is going to go up and and she looked at me she said you should not be a parent but what we didn't give up on our son eating because he couldn't distinguish between what was good for him and what wasn't we just taught him what made him strong and what actually caused great pain in digestion and now he eats well at 27 see I had imaginary friends Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy and the giant rabbit who hid in my closet at night and God on occasion would slip in and visit me but just because I had imaginary friends that I knew I needed to leave behind I wouldn't leave behind my imagination because just because you have imaginary friends doesn't mean you don't have a friend who created it the imagination see if there's a God the imagination makes perfect sense because this God who's all-powerful no knowing in our present this God who is beyond time and space this God who was beyond wonder and glory he needs a place where he can call the playground of God to meet us and talk to us about what he wants to do in us and through us and for us what else could he do but create this kind of space where you could meet with us to give us the smallest divine thought in our tiny little human brains you may have been under estimating why you've been given an imagination why you've been given dreams and visions that it is by faith that you are a future invisible creature and that God puts those dreams in our hearts and they were to translate them in the reality and what humans do is materialize the invisible it's like a superpower everything that you see here everything that a human has ever created is a reflection of the human imagination it began in the invisible and then it turned into the visible and what is God pouring into your invisible space that he wants you to transfer into the visible world it's a tragedy when we dream only when we're asleep and then we spend our awake hours sleepwalking rather than living out our dreams and it may be that inside of you there is something that God is placing there that is disturbing you have you ever noticed how destructive God is with his dreams in our lives so you can't even feel guilt except that you can imagine yourself as a better human being you cannot feel shame except you could imagine yourself making a different choice you cannot feel regret except that you can imagine yourself having lived a different life human ideals are just the shadow pain of being connected to God and living the life we were created to live I had this Chinese um engineer come up to me at this event and he said you talked about God's voice what does God's voice sound like anybody pre cursed it by saying I'm an atheist and I said you're an atheist he said yes I said well then God's voice sounds like nothing because you're an atheist so God doesn't exist oh I know that's what it sounds like for me but where's it's not like for you I said well why are you here he what do you mean why am I here so why are you here you're an atheist you want a friend invited me I say well that's why you're here but why are you here talking to me as an atheist because I'm worried about what God's voice sounds like I said but that doesn't make any sense that you'd want to know what God's voice sounds like when you're an atheist you should already know that God doesn't have a voice if he doesn't exist can you just tell me what God's what sounds like huh so the dilemma is like I have all these voices in my head I mean so many it's so crowded in here some days I just want to open a window and say jump cuz they're all in there you have them too you just wanna admit it the different artists and everyone else is you an artist acknowledges their insanity everyone else pretends they're saying all these voices was sometimes God's voice sounds like well like my voice it's just as like my voice calling me to the highest self sometimes God's voice sounds like my mom when he's mad and I said but you know most of the time God is that voice inside of me that refuses and to allow me to forget what it looks like to be truly here right it's that voice it always calls me up said the voice it always calls me that to more but it's also the voice that speaks hope in my despair and beats courage into my fear and brings light into my darkness I said but you're an atheist right he goes yes and I said well yeah right you have a little voices in your head that you don't know how they got in there he goes yeah I said but you have a little voice in your head that's saying to you there's a God there is a God and you know there's not a god you're an atheist you're a scientist you're an engineer you know there's no guide but there's a low voice in your head saying there's a god and you don't know how that voices in there because that place is supposed to be your voice all those voices ahead are supposed to be all voices that are you so much voice of you is disagreeing with you what voice isn't cooperating say is there like a little voice in your head it's like a parasite just keeps eating away eating going and your reason just keep eating away at your brain and then when you say there's no God there's no God that low voice just eats away like a parasite saying there's a path there's a path there's gotta go talk to the guy you might actually find the God you don't believe in and he goes yes it's like a it's like a parasite in my brain I can't get it out I said that's God see when you connect to the God who dreamed all of this up who dreamed up the universe who dreamed up solar systems and black holes and dark matter and dark energy who dreamed up atmosphere and oceans who dreamed up you and breathe into your soul and made you a living being when you connect to the God who dreams this big how in the world could you settle for so small the dream I could never be inspired by God what is the dream that you're supposed to live wide awake god bless you have a great day

Channel: Cherry Hills Community Church

Views: 11,871

Rating: 4.8769231 out of 5

Keywords: religion, evangelical, church, christianity

Id: qvbYNUwy9X4

Length: 37min 27sec (2247 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 18 2016