(wrote this during Lent, so I’m posting it now)

After reading Blue Like Jazz probably…a year ago (or more :P), a couple of months ago I picked up Don Millers next book, Searching for God Knows What. And by “picked up,” I actually mean I took it off my brother’s shelf. He’s built up a nice small collection (sort of) of Christian books that I like to help myself to when he’s not around hahaha. Anyway, after reading it, I thought I’d share some thoughts about it:

“Being a Christian, is more like falling in love than understanding a series of ideas.” –Don Miller

Formulas vs. relationships. When I think about what Don talked about in the book, that’s what it felt like it came down to. The dozens of books and devotions that tell you that if you do a-b-c-d then you’ll be closer to God, or you won’t experience x-y-z or overcome this or that and be happy etc. Formulas vs. actually living out relationship with Christ; experiencing and growing in Him instead of looking for the one or two sure-fire ways to have the “best” relationship with Him. To be fair, Don didn’t say that our desire for these things were “wrong” per-se or unnatural. On the contrary, I think agreed that it’s an innate desire for us to look to others for concrete answers (be it people or books and whatnot). But Jesus told us to “follow” Him (take up our crosses and follow Him), He didn’t say “hey! here’s some stuff in a book I wrote, follow these and you’ll have an awesome life!” nah.

It’s funny, cause while I was reading this book I also attended a lecture/talk with Tony Costa about “world religions” vs. “Christianity” at my youth fellowship. And I distinctly remembered him saying (and I talked to another youth afterwards about it too), that “believing and following Christ, isn’t a feeling! It’s something you know, it’s a fact” (I’m totally paraphrasing here). When I heard that, I kinda laughed in my head because Don Miller kinda said the opposite (but not really as I read on). When I really thought about it though, and even more so when I finished reading Searching for God Knows What, I agreed with both (Don and Tony, though I guess Don also eventually said it loll).

Like I said, Jesus told us to “follow” Him. You know, walk with him, talk with him cause He’s the God that’s ALIVE. He told us to love and worship Him, and if there’s anything I’ve learned about love, genuine love, is that when you think about, when you live it out, it really is irrational sometimes. This is where I feel fact and “formula” (I’m saying that very very loosely) come in, love, specifically human love is imperfect (my love is far from perfect alasssss), if we left everything up to that (human love) we’d be an emotional mess. I say that mostly as a girl but I’m sure guys experience it too to some extent :P. Facts and “formulas” and I mean mostly scripture (and sure books and devotionals too, but not more than scripture) I think can help us keep our faith grounded and concrete (plus, I think it’s in our nature to like things that are logical). After all it’s the thing that God left for us, so why not use it? 😛

So what have I learned really? That I’m in a RELATIONSHIP with God, with Christ, and that there are things, facts lets say (i.e. scripture) that I hold true and live by. It won’t per-se answer everything, but our lives are meant to be lived, lived to the fullest in Him. 🙂

Maybe you’ll agree, or disagree, maybe you’ll be challenged by the thought. Anyway I encourage you to read Don’s thoughts and reflect on it yourself, what it means to live out your relationship with Christ as a relationship between two people.