From Man in the Mirror to MAN ALIVE, author Patrick Morley hopes new book will help men leave “spiritual mediocrity” behind.

Best-selling author Patrick Morley says that the desire to make a contribution and leave the world a better place is a “primal” need. “We have a raw, restless energy that is different from women. It needs to be channeled, chiseled, transformed.”

Morley estimates that as much as 90 percent of Christian men lead lukewarm, stagnant , often defeated lives. And he believes these men hate the spiritual mediocrity they’re mired in. But the typical response, says Morley, is for men to lose heart, go silent, and anesthetize their pain.

According to his research, 80 percent of men are so emotionally impaired that not only are they unable to express their feelings, they are even unable to identify their feelings.

This statistic, one assumes, goes hand in hand with the next one reported in his book: Sixty percent of men are in financial trouble, paying only the monthly minimums on their credit card balances. In addition, readers learn that 50 percent of church-going men actively seek out pornography, and that 40 percent of men overall get divorced, which affects one million children a year. One third of America’s 72 million children live in a home without their biological dad.

The residual effect of this physical absenteeism of fathers, writes Morley, is a practical absence of mothers. “Essentially, one person must now do the work of two. As a young woman who grew up without a dad said, ‘When my mom and dad divorced, I didn’t just lose my dad. I also lost my mom, because she had to work long hours to support us.’”

Patrick Morley asserts that men who lead powerful, transformed lives do things differently than their lukewarm counterparts. “In business, we call these the ‘differentiated success factors.’” He continues: “Jesus made a direct connection between knowing the Bible and leading a powerful life.” Morley insists that the reason lukewarm men lead lives of error is that they don’t know the Scriptures to begin with. Not knowing the Scriptures, in turn, means these men don’t know the power of God.

“Their capabilities don’t equal their intentions,” writes Morley. “Without the right training, their soil becomes bare, stony, and full of weeds.”

Transformed men, on the other hand, “truly hear and understand God’s Word and produce a harvest.”

The author’s conclusion therefore, is that combing the Scriptures is easily the number one factor that differentiates men who have tapped into God’s power.

In the chapter entitled “Every Man has a Story” Morley examines the subject of community and how it affects the lives of men. “Most men live in isolation.” Patrick Morley is quick to distinguish isolation from being a hermit. While we talk to other men during the day, and may have a lot of acquaintances, our relationships tend to be shallow. When not talking about work issues, Morley says, men usually stick to news, sports, and weather.

To keep this real, he asks, “do you know the names of your friends’ children?” The author also asks his readers to think for a moment about the men in their lives they know best—the ones they call best friends. “Have you been in each other’s homes?”

The isolation, according to Morley, begins for men when they encounter the “ouch” factor that goes along with becoming a man. The “ouch” factor includes the put-downs, cut-downs, sarcasm, snarky remarks, critical spirits, disrespect, disloyalty, lies, insults, betrayals and jokes made at your expense. “We don’t need to go through these painful experiences before we think, It’s just not worth it. Then we shut down and become islands.” While Morley points out that some men become stronger islands than others, they all become emotionally isolated. “It just seems easier to go it alone. We live, work, play, and even worship in communities of strangers.”

Patrick Morley’s MAN ALIVE is set for release in March 2012.