Chad's spot for various thoughts, musings, poetry, ideas and whatnot

Tuesday, November 07, 2006

I thought I'd write a brief review of Don Miller's "Searching for God Knows What" to supplement my brief review over at Amazon. In short, this book can be thought of as Miller's apologetic for a relational faith. What's an apologetic? Webster's defines it as a defense by speech or writing whereas the Greek roots of the word mean literally to "speak away from". To me an apologetic is an explain of why someone holds to an opinion or point of view. In "Searching", Don calls out the recent evangelical tendency to treat God and the Bible like some sort of formulaic, self-help book designed to get us into heaven. Instead, he calls us to read Scripture from a relational perspective and thus approach God relationally rather than transactionally.

One of the big metaphors used in the book is that of the "Lifeboat Game." You remember it from school; it was the game where you were in a lifeboat with a certain number of people and the lifeboat couldn't keep that many alive so you had to decide who got to stay and who had to die. Miller contends that we spend a lot of time and energy playing this sort of game in the brokenness of our lives and in the practice of our faith. He goes on to convincingly argue that such a perspective robs us of our humanity and cheapens the faith that we claim to live by. In a sense, the Lifeboat Mentality is exactly the same as Stephan Covey's explanation of "scarcity mentality" where people behave in terms of only their self-interest when they think resources are limited. If we think that God's grace is somehow limited then we have to go around showing that we have more value in His eyes than someone else or some other group.

The book is definitely written from Miller's own evolving theological perspective which I believe makes the book simultaneously both more authentic and more difficult to swallow. In places he states academic discourse as fact and fails to acknowledge the diversity of opinion and practice in things ranging from the authorship of Genesis to the nature of the sacraments (and their number). While I disagree with the perspective from which these statements flow (more or less from a fairly conservative, protestant, reformed perspective), what I found truly beautiful is that the tenor of the writing is much more strongly influenced by the mystical traditions of the Christian faith. Miller doesn't try to explain exactly who it all works but instead appeals to a spiritual response to the inherent truth of what he is writing.

For me, this book will be set beside C.S. Lewis' Mere Christianity as an explanation of the Christian faith. Where Lewis is more rational in his discussion, Miller appeals to the desire we all have to be in relationship with the God who made us in both His likelness and image. I really strongly recommend this book to all those who find Christianity appealing but wish there were other voices besides the Christian right in the conversation.

Thanks for Reading.

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