This is my second post about the one day conference that I went to where Erwin McManus presented. One of the things about Erwin that is pretty impressive is that he is a consultant to people in the business world and media industry – giving advice about how to help people connect more to the “human story” (as he puts it). As he shared, he told us there were three things that every good story has (movie, book, etc.), and three main cravings that the Bible points out that all human beings share:
- Intimacy – he said that all people, everywhere, want to be a part of something bigger than themselves. That’s why we are so big into: nations, cities, communities, teams, etc. When people give up on intimacy, they move towards immortality or isolation – even when people are wounded in LOVE, they still have the desire to be loved and to love.
- Meaning – humans have found endless ways to communicate – we create ways to find meaning. When people give up on meaning and move to a place of doubt and despair – becoming superstitious (we give meaning to meaningless things).
- Destiny/Progress – we are designed to believe that tomorrow can be better than today. When this is thwarted we move towards apathy or anger – and mental illness.
Erwin said that as we communicate to people, the more we can address these issues of the heart, the more effective we will be – both in preaching and in evangelism. Oh, and just a quick side note, the three cravings are the core content of his book Soul Cravings – a great read if you haven’t read it yet.
