Searching For God Knows What

When I heard that Donald Miller had another book, I was stoked on life. I loved reading Blue Like Jazz, and it's up there on my list of favorite books. I was recently thinking about why I like his writing, but I'll get to that after I talk about this book.

Searching for God Knows What is Donald Miller bringing up thought-provoking ideas to make you rethink your mindset on God, the Gospel, and the Bible.While that may sound blasphemous or something to some of you, I assure you it reshapes your thought process in a great way.

I'm contemplating doing an extensive review of this book, but I don't think I'm going to because A) I REALLY want you to read this book. I may like this one more than Blue Like Jazz, which is saying something. and B) I don't think I could convey these themes in as a honest and funny way as Miller. It's probably why he writes widely famous books and I'm just starting a blog. I will, however, go through bits of the book and share my thoughts on them. There's a good chance I get on a roll, so this may will be a long post. My bad

For those of you who don't know, Miller writes stories and how they relate to the chapter's theme. For instance, his first chapter is about a Christian writing seminar on how to write successful Christian books. The main speaker at the seminar lays out a formula to create a compelling book, which got Miller thinking about whether or not the Bible is laid out in formulas and steps. Rather, it's a whole life process that transforms you. No one book is going to have the perfect 8 steps to a wonderful relationship with God, or a 5 week process to pastor-material. No. It's about the relationship. Miller says it better than I could, so here is a nice, long quote:

The truth is there are million steps, and we don't even know what the steps are, and worse, at any given moment we may not be willing or even able to take them; and still worse, they are different for you and me and they are always changing. I have come to believe the sooner we find this truth beautiful, the sooner we will fall in love with God who keeps shaking things up, keeps changing the path, keeps rocking the boat to test our faith in Him, teaching us to not rely on easy answers, bullet points, magic mantras, or genies in lamps, but rather in His guidance, His existence, His mercy, and His love.

Aaaand that is why I don't want to try and summarize a Donald Miller book.

There are plenty of other stories and thoughts throughout this book. In fact, every chapter is a new thought and story, which all come together beautifully for this book. I want to share one more idea that rocked my world.
Chapter 5 is titled "Naked: Why nudity is the point." As you can imagine, I was ready for a good chapter and a great laugh. What I got was my Sunday school thoughts getting turned on their head.

In the same vein as earlier, Miller was talking about how he always read the bible looking for a formula and what the "moral" of the story was. After taking a class on the writings of Moses (Job and Genesis through Deuteronomy), Miller began to look at the bible as deep literature and not just text, and during a trip to Yosemite, he began to rethink the story of Adam and Eve. Now I know the story of Adam and Eve, I've spent enough Sunday school classes having felt board recreations of the Genesis story that I could probably make a full production of it. Yet this next thought still rocked me.

Adam and Even didn't hang out in a little country garden for a few weeks with God. No, they spent a ton of time in a MASSIVE area living in perfect relationship. Well maybe not both of them, but Adam sure did. Remember, there was a river big enough to split into 4 huge rivers, so I'm thinking Amazon river status, or maybe the Nile.

So much for a small garden....

Then he continues with Adams time in the garden. I'm going to use a long quote again, but I'll put it in context by saying that there were probably between 1 and 50 million species of animals when Adam had to name them. Every single one...

I never thought of Adam the same again. The image of the man holding the fig leaf over his privates seemed nearly crude. Rather this was a man who, despite feeling a certain need for a companion, performed what must have been nearly one hundred years of work, naming and perhaps even categorizing the animals. It would have taken him nearly a year just to name the species of snakes alone. Moses said that Eve didn't give birth to their third child till Adam was well into his hundreds, which means they would have had Cain and Abel some thirty or so years before, which also means that either it took Adam more than a hundred years to name the animals, or he and Even didn't have sex for a good, long, boring century.

What? Adam spent 100 years alone? That gives it is not suitable for man to be alone (Genesis 3: 18) a lot more meaning. No wonder Adam was so excited to meet someone like him. As much fun as it would be to be like Dr. Doolittle and hang out with animals all the time, it would probably get pretty lonely after, oh, I don't know, a month. Now multiply that by 1200. Yeah, Adam was lonely.

After reading this, I, like Miller, had a new respect for Adam. In addition, it made me rethink the way I read the Bible. Am I looking for formulas or a list of dos and don'ts? Or should I be reading it to dig down to the depths of the Word of God? I had my biblical literature rocked in the first 3 chapters. Imagine if I rethought the rest of the bible. Yeah, I think I'm going to get a lot more out of it.

Now I could go on with more great stories from the book, but I'd rather share my thoughts with you. First, I think one of the biggest reasons this book stuck with me so well was that I am so quick to look for formulas from God. I'm kind of an impatient person, so my goal is to make everything as efficient as possible. I also love reading, especially Christian books, aka Christian formula books. Now don't get me wrong, those books are great and have value. I just know now that a lot of times I would use those to get formulas (just look at some of my older posts), and that's not right. There are so many better ways to dive into the depths of God other than make lists and formulas. I'm going to continue reading books like that, but I'm also going to read them in a different light. It's amazing how God will take passions and shape them so they glorify Him even more. He used a Christian "self-help" book to better direct me in my walk with Him. Touche God.

Back to Miller. Like I said before, I was trying to think why I like his writing so much, and I think I have a couple of reasons. First, he is blatantly candid with his struggles. He tells his readers when he was struggling with God, including to the point of telling God He doesn't exist (Chapter 2/3 of this book). I think that honesty and vulnerability makes him much more approachable and relatable. Secondly, he has fun with his writing. He uses hilarious stories and makes little quips that just make you laugh. He criticizes himself in a fun way. I mean, who else writes "self-help" books that say self-help books aren't the best? It's great. I really appreciate the humor and fun he has in seeking deeper relationship with God. God isn't only dark room worship sets and private prayers; He is also the creator of joy, and that includes humor and fun and laughter.

I think the biggest reason I like Miller's writing is that he writes in stories. I was at a college group in Calvary Chapel Oceanside last week, and the pastor talked about how the bible is all about stories, and how Jesus spoke in parables; stories. God didn't make the bible a bunch of lists; He made it a lot of stories that come together to make a bigger story. People like stories more. Our lives are stories, and God is the writer. Look right above. I hear about how God uses stories, it clicks with me, and two days later I'm writing about one of my favorite writer, who just happens to use stories. God is good.

Here's a story. Last night I accidentally left half of a breakfast burrito in my car instead of putting it in the refrigerator, so I didn't have breakfast this morning. And then I found $5.

Anyways, go read Searching For God Knows What. I highly recommend it. Also, if you want to read more from Donald Miller, go to http://donmilleris.com/ and read his blog. It's quality.