Man Up: A Winning Review

It's a not-so-hidden secret that men struggle with identity and how to succeed at being godly men. 

We end up striving towards goals that society tells us are important and becoming successful in ways that don't really matter. Men climb a ladder that they believe leads to the fulfillment of their goals & objectives to only find out that we are still left feeling bereft of genuine accomplishment. The book Real Win by Colt McCoy & Matt Carter directly addresses this gap and bring us into this quandary together by stating, " All of us know the awkward feeling when we start to wonder if we've got our ladder up against the wrong wall."

McCoy & Carter partner together with unique backgrounds as a star athlete and a highly successful pastor to write an excellent book intended to help men focus on what matters most. They are able to offer a fresh perspective from different experiences that speaks directly to the heart of what men are searching for and how we choose to conduct our lives. The book is sprinkled with real life applications from two distinctly different viewpoints of success that end up highlighting a shared need for God's direct influence. They open up by quickly establishing what a real win is ultimately based on: "The real win for a man is built on two simple but strategic components--who you trust and who you serve."

There is nothing earth-shattering about this book & no brand-new, previously unknown truths are revealed. Despite this I found myself nodding in agreement throughout the book and feeling encouraged by their plain statement of what a godly man should look like. Their simple, yet powerful premise is "Every man has things in his life that he's either pursuing or that he turns to in an an attempt to feel fulfilled, valued, satisfied, or relieved. Yet God has designed us in such a way that the only thing that can satisfy that place in us is Him." This describes the futility of man for generations--recognizing that there is a greater call on our lives and the emptiness we find when we settle for anything less than God.

I found this book to be challenging without being confrontational. McCoy and Carter wrote honestly from their own experience of mistakes and never alienated me as a reader. It felt like a journey of discovery as we found out what it means to pursue the right goal as God-driven men. I would recommend this book to men at multiple stages of their faith discovery & would even recommend that wives read it with them to gain better insight into the faith journey of their spouses. It's the most effective way to find McCoy & Carter's ultimate definition, "The real win means trusting The Lord, walking with Jesus, and living your life in the way He defined it."

I received this book for free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review.