Searching for God Knows What Description:

Searching for God Knows What review:
2 stars (Uh... yes I will, actually) - One of the soundbite reviews on the back cover of SFGKW claims, 'For fans of 'Blue Like Jazz,' I doubt you will be disappointed.' Well, squelch that doubt, soundbite-reviewer man, for I was most certainly disappointed with this offering by Don Miller.



Let me say, for the record, that I LOVED 'Blue Like Jazz.' That book, to me, did an amazing job of reflecting not only a relaxed writing style, but also a relaxed theology, less encumbered by Evangelicalism's general desire to fit God into its 'understandable box.' Miller is a great storyteller, and he allows his stories to communicate his ideas about spirituality. It works gangbusters. Yo.



SFGKW, admittedly, addresses a subject which would be difficult to communicate wholly through narrative. But I found myself wishing that Miller would at least try! Any time he would begin to tell stories, I was hooked... and then the writing would spin out into a very orthodox version of evangelistic theology.



Miller, again and again, criticizes the 'formulaic theology' so prevalent in the still-Modernistic American church. But one gets the sense that the author is not (yet?) willing to embrace a theology divorced from categorizing, step-outlining, and bullet point divisions. While Miller's loose style FEELS different, it represents seemingly little more than a stream-of-consciousness veneer on a familiar set of principled beliefs.



The book does have some good things to say, by the way. Miller's lifeboat analogy, in which he describes our culture's obsession with the popularity/success cult, is helpful. His critique of misplaced energy in the chapter on 'Morality' charged me up for fighting the right battles (rather than the tired ones against homosexual marriage or abortion). But overall, I don't know that there's much new here. Perhaps the free-flowing format would appeal to new believers (and that may be Miller's intended audience), but, for longer-time progressives in the Church, 'Blue Like Jazz' is a far superior meditation.
5 stars (I should start "searching") - I bought this book because a friend of mine was buying Blue Like Jazz and we were going to trade after reading them. I soon discovered that Miller drew me into his narratives quite effectively and I found myself wishing that I had more non-Christian friends to have meaningful relationships with. The more I read the more I wanted to read.



I hope that this book inspires its readers to have meaningful relationships with their God, their friends, and those they are yet to meet.
5 stars (Review) - I picked this book up on a whim while visiting Powells Books in Portland, OR. It was just sitting there on the shelf, and pretty much summed up what I was thinking to myself at the time: I know I'm looking for something, but God knows what that might be. I picked it up, put it back down, continued browsing, and then saw it again on my way out the door, and decided to buy it.



I don't know why it never dawned on me that it was a Christian book written by a Christian writer (It's not like the word GOD is in the title), which may have been a blessing, since in general I feel that most of that genre is stuffed with preachy type self help books trying to save you, or get you to come to Church. Once I started reading it and figured out that it WAS a Christian book, I had to pause and convince myself to keep reading, though I felt sure I would run into some of that convert or go to hell rhetoric, so popular among hard core Christians. To my amazement and delight there wasn't any of that in this book at all.



It is, quite simply, a young man ( I assume, there is no picture), well versed in scripture, and theology, talking about why the human race is where it is, and why we are never satisfied with what we have. Not only that, but he never makes you feel guilty about anything. He stresses the relational nature of the stories in the Bible, as opposed to the formulaic nature of the people who generally interpret the Bible for their own means.



The main point that Mr. Miller tries to pound into your head, is that people have become estranged from God (the fall in the garden) and that they no longer have the awesome glory of God within themselves. When we lost this link to God, we needed something outside of ourselves to show us that we have value, friends, loved ones, etc. We were no longer sure that we were worthy of love, and no longer sure of our own self worth since God was no longer there to tell us that we were loved. It is Mr Miller's belief that all the tragedies of human history, from cliques in high school to WWII all stem from this separation that now exists between humanity and God.



Mr. Miller also talks in detail about Jesus, and his role in the salvation of mankind. He again focuses on the relationship with Jesus as the important part of the message, and not any rules or guidelines setup by some organization somewhere. He even takes right wing conservatives, and holier than thou Christian ministers to task on the Gay marriage issue, reminding them that homosexuals would probably have been among Jesus' closest friends, along with the prostitutes, tax collectors and other characters that Jesus generally associated with, and that Jesus' message about loving one another extends to all people, sinners and saved, alike, and not just to those people who agree with your agenda.



All in all, this was an excellent book on Christian faith, which I enjoyed reading tremendously.