Donald Miller’s newest release, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years attempts to tell a story. It’s a story of how to live a story actually. Miller attempts to inspire the reader to re-write the story of their lives; to refuse to settle for the mundane and metamorphose into something greater.
I struggled with A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. I found it extremely egocentric. It seemed that Miller struggled with an accurate picture of God through-out his book. I understand who Donald Miller is and realize that he is highly respected with in the “emergent church” scene. His grasp of truth, or at least his relating of it, was much like wading in the surging tide of the ocean and feeling the sand getting sucked out from underneath your feet: I never knew if I would come down on solid ground.
Miller is a good author. Now, let me clarify what seems to be a contradictory statement from the above paragraph. What I mean is that he can write a good story. His anecdotes were interesting – sometimes seemingly disjointed – but interesting nonetheless.
I cannot really recommend this book because I think that Miller missed an opportunity to take advantage of his widely read audience. He does not communicate Truth in a fashion that it could be used to change the reader’s life. Instead of desiring to change my life for my sake, I wish he would have communicated the necessity to change my life for God’s glory & His pleasure
To read an excerpt from the book, click the link below:
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Filed under: book review Tagged: | book review, Brian McLaren, Donald Miller, Emerging Church, Gospel, Grace, Jesus Christ, Mars Hill, Max Lucado, post-modern, Pride, rob bell, story tellling, thomas nelson publishers, Truth
Chapter 15, “Listen to Your Writer,” is entirely about Don’s struggle to listen to the Spirit (he calls it “The Voice”) instead of making his own choices–for his own sake–in his “better story.” It is this “Voice” that leads him into the encounter with his father, an encounter he, himself, is resistant to.
Don writes, “I admitted something other than me was showing a better way. And when I did this, I realized the Voice, the Writer who was not me, was trying to make a better story, a more meaningful series of experiences I could live through” (87). Maybe I am making more of this than I should, but I think Miller is doing a pretty direct job of pointing his readers to God as the most-perfect storyteller.
David,
Thanks for taking time to read Grace Dependent and post a comment as well. I hope all Don’s readers are able to quickly discern what you have – not everyone would have necessarily equated “the Voice” with God’s Spirit. Leaving it somewhat opaque allows for a much broader interpretation. It also wades in dangerously close to allowing inner voices / feelings to be authoritative, rather than submitting to something as clear as God’s written Word (which should have led him to the same conclusion).
thanks again!
mark