Enjoy fast, free delivery, exclusive deals, and award-winning movies & TV shows with Prime
Try Prime
and start saving today with fast, free delivery
Amazon Prime includes:
Fast, FREE Delivery is available to Prime members. To join, select "Try Amazon Prime and start saving today with Fast, FREE Delivery" below the Add to Cart button.
Amazon Prime members enjoy:- Cardmembers earn 5% Back at Amazon.com with a Prime Credit Card.
- Unlimited Free Two-Day Delivery
- Streaming of thousands of movies and TV shows with limited ads on Prime Video.
- A Kindle book to borrow for free each month - with no due dates
- Listen to over 2 million songs and hundreds of playlists
- Unlimited photo storage with anywhere access
Important: Your credit card will NOT be charged when you start your free trial or if you cancel during the trial period. If you're happy with Amazon Prime, do nothing. At the end of the free trial, your membership will automatically upgrade to a monthly membership.
-44% $11.19$11.19
Ships from: Amazon.com Sold by: Amazon.com
$8.00$8.00
Ships from: Amazon Sold by: Martistore
Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.
Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.
Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.
OK
Image Unavailable
Color:
-
-
-
- To view this video download Flash Player
- VIDEO
Audible sample Sample
Searching for God Knows What Paperback – May 24, 2010
Purchase options and add-ons
With equal parts wit and wisdom, New York Times bestselling author Donald Miller invites you to reconnect with your faith. Miller shares what he's learned firsthand--that our relationship with God is designed to teach us about redemption, grace, healing, and so much more.
Searching for God Knows What weaves together timeless stories and fresh perspectives on the Bible to capture one man's journey to discover an authentic faith that's worth believing.
Along the way, Miller poses his own questions about faith, religion, and community, asking:
- What if the motive behind our theology was relational?
- What if our value exists because God takes pleasure in us?
- What if the gospel of Jesus is an invitation to know God?
Maybe you're a Christian wondering what faith you signed up for. Or maybe you don't believe anything and are daring someone to show you a genuine example of genuine faith. Somewhere beyond the self-help formulas, fancy marketing, and easy promises, there is a life-changing experience with God waiting for you--it just takes a little bit of searching.
Praise for Searching for God Knows What:
"Like a shaken snow globe, Donald Miller's newest collection of essays creates a swirl of ideas about the Christian life that eventually crystallize into a lovely landscape...[He] is one of the evangelical book market's most creative writers." --Christianity Today
"If you have felt that Jesus is someone you respect and admire--but Christianity is something that repels you--Searching for God Knows What will give you hope that you still can follow Jesus and be part of a church without the trappings of organized religion." --Dan Kimball, author of The Emerging Church and Pastor of Vintage Faith Church, Santa Cruz, CA
"For fans of Blue Like Jazz, I doubt you will be disappointed. Donald Miller writes with the wit and vulnerability that you expect. He perfectly illustrates important themes in a genuine and humorous manner...For those who would be reading Miller for the first time, this would be a great start." --Relevant
- Print length272 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherHarper Horizon
- Publication dateMay 24, 2010
- Dimensions5.5 x 0.75 x 8.5 inches
- ISBN-109781400202751
- ISBN-13978-1400202751
The Amazon Book Review
Book recommendations, author interviews, editors' picks, and more. Read it now.
Frequently bought together
Similar items that may deliver to you quickly
From the brand
From the Publisher
Editorial Reviews
About the Author
Donald Miller is the CEO of StoryBrand and Business Made Simple. He is the host of the Coach Builder YouTube Channel and is the author of several books including bestsellers Building a StoryBrand, Marketing Made Simple, and How to Grow Your Small Business. He lives in Nashville, Tennessee with his wife, Elizabeth and their daughter, Emmeline.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
SEARCHING FOR GOD KNOWS WHAT
By DONALD MILLERThomas Nelson
Copyright © 2010 Donald MillerAll right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4002-0275-1
Contents
Author's Note.....................................................................................................ixIntroduction......................................................................................................xiChapter One: Fine Wine: The Failure of Formulas...................................................................1Chapter Two: Impostors: Santa Takes a Leak........................................................................17Chapter Three: Feet of Trees: What Do We Really Want?.............................................................35Chapter Four: Free Verse: A Whole Message to a Whole Human Being..................................................49Chapter Five: Naked: Why Nudity Is the Point......................................................................61Chapter Six: Children of Chernobyl: Why Did God Leave?............................................................75Chapter Seven: Adam, Eve, and the Alien: How the Fall Makes You Feel..............................................91Chapter Eight: Lifeboat Theory: How to Kill Your Neighbor.........................................................105Chapter Nine: Jesus: Who Needs a Boat?............................................................................119Chapter Ten: The Gospel of Jesus: It Never Was a Formula..........................................................151Chapter Eleven: A Circus of Redemption: Why a Three-Legged Man Is Better Than a Bearded Woman.....................165Chapter Twelve: Morality: Why I Am Better Than You................................................................179Chapter Thirteen: Religion: A Public Relations Campaign for God...................................................197Chapter Fourteen: The Gospel of Jesus: Why William Shakespeare Was a Prophet......................................215Afterword.........................................................................................................233The Genesis Theory: Why People Do What They Do....................................................................235About the Author..................................................................................................245Acknowledgments...................................................................................................247Sample from A Million Miles in a Thousand Years...................................................................251Chapter One
Fine WineThe Failure of Formulas
Some time ago I attended a seminar for Christian writers. It was in a big hotel down South and hotels always make me uncomfortable because the bedding is so fluffy and the television swivels, and who makes coffee in the bathroom? But I felt that I needed to be at this seminar. I was wondering how, exactly, to write a book for a Christian market, a book that people would actually read. I had written a book several years before, but it didn't sell. It was a road-trip narrative about me, a friend, and God, and how we traveled across the country in a Volkswagen van, smoking pipes and picking fights with truckers. God wasn't actually a character in the book the way my friend and I were; God more or less played Himself, up in heaven, sending down puzzling wisdom and answers to prayer every hundred miles or so.
But even though the story had God in it, which I believed made it prime for Christian bookstores, sales were less than holy. The book limped along for about a year and then, suddenly, died. God led the publisher to take the book out of print about the same time sales dipped into negative figures. The publisher called and asked if I wanted to buy a few thousand copies for myself at twelve cents each and I ended up buying four. I believe the rest of the books were sold to convenience-store distributors who shelved them next to three-dollar romance novels at the back of the potato-chip aisle.
The only positive thing that happened in all this was that for the next year or so I received enjoyable and sultry e-mails from women who had recently begun to consider themselves spiritual. And while I certainly enjoyed the correspondence and still keep in touch with many of these women today, the career path was not as respectable as I would have liked. I have always wanted to be a sophisticated Christian writer and not somebody who has books on the close-out aisle at Plaid Pantry. That is why I signed up for this seminar, the one I was telling you about that was in the hotel with the bathroom/cafs.
I arrived the evening before, and so the morning of the seminar I woke up very early, about six, and I couldn't fall back to sleep. I opened the curtains and watched planes land at the Memphis airport for an hour or so, trying to guide them in with my mind and that sort of thing. And then I went into the bathroom and sat down and had some coffee and read the paper. After an hour I started getting dressed, and the whole time I was ironing my clothes I was wondering whether this would be the weekend I would be discovered, whether this would be the start of a long career writing adventurous, life-changing books for my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. I sat on the edge of the bed in my suit and tie and watched television for an hour. Katie Couric was interviewing a fellow who had written a book about how Donald Rumsfeld was actually the Antichrist and I confess, I practiced answering all her questions, knowing that I, too, would some day be interviewed by Katie Couric:
You really make Mr. Rumsfeld out to be a monster, Mr. Miller. This seems unfounded. How did you come to these conclusions?
I had him followed by a private detective, a high-tech guy I found at Radio Shack. Everything in the book is documented, Miss Couric. Or may I call you Katie? Or may I just call you?
When the interview was over I turned the television off and lay back on the fluffy bed and stared at the bedside clock, trying to speed up time with my mind, but time went on as usual and so I fell asleep for exactly nine minutes and then woke up and tried not to blink till about twenty minutes to eight, which is when I headed downstairs. In the lobby I asked the man at the front desk which room the seminar was in. I leaned against the desk as the concierge, a twenty-something fellow with a goatee, searched for a room schedule among his papers. "Capturing literature for the glory of God?" the man asked suspiciously, reading the name of the seminar from a sheet of paper, looking up at me as if to ask whether or not this was the seminar I was interested in and also, perhaps, why God was trying to "capture literature for His glory." "That's the one," I said to him. "Interesting name for a conference, isn't it?" he said, looking at me with a smile.
"We can't have literature running around doing anything it wants now, can we?" I told him.
"I don't suppose so," he said after a long and uncomfortable pause.
"And where will we be capturing said literature?" I asked. By this I was asking what room we were in. He looked at me, puzzled. "What room are we in?" I clarified.
"Oh," he said as he looked back at the sheet. "You are in conference room 210, which is just down the hall across from the restrooms."
"Perfect," I said, adding that if he saw people in the lobby reading pagan literature to please notify me.
"Certainly," he said to me, confused, but kind of standing at attention all the same.
I remember having a very good feeling that morning, walking down the big hall toward the conference room, once again believing I was on my way to becoming the next great spiritual writer, a sort of evangelical Deepak Chopra crossed with Tom Clancy, or that guy who wrote Jonathan Livingston Seagull, or Ansel Adams, or whoever, just somebody famous. I had terrific ideas; I really did. I was going to write a story about a nun who takes over small third-world countries by causing their evil dictators to fall in love with her, leaving a trail of megachurches and democracy in her wake. The book was going to be called Sister Democracy, Show Some Leg!
I had another story about a guy whose father, a psychology professor at a prestigious university, raised his son in a maze, rewarding him when he crawled down dark hallways and disciplining him when he crawled down lit hallways, thus teaching him to do everything in life counterintuitively. In the story, the kid grows up to be a kind of genius with an enormous following; people hanging on his every word. The book was going to be called Maze Boy: How One Man Brought Down the United States Postal Service! And if it were a Christian novel, and I could easily turn it into a Christian novel if the money was right, I was going to call it Maze Boy: How One Man, with God's Help, Brought Down the United States Postal Service!
* * *
I stocked up on bagels at the back of the conference room because I was the first one there. I chose a chair somewhere near the middle, and soon fellow writers began shuffling in, perhaps twenty or so over the next ten minutes. Everybody was being very quiet, looking over their notebooks, but I made small talk with a woman next to me about why we were there and where we had come from and what sort of books we liked to read. Some of the nicest people you could ever hope to meet will be at a Christian writers seminar, I'll tell you that right now. Very small people, though, mostly women, not the sort of folks you would imagine taking literature captive for the glory of God, but kind and others-centered nonetheless.
The lady sitting next to me was writing a wonderful series of Christian devotionals for girls who were taking ballet classes, and the lady on the other side of me was writing a series of devotionals you could read while drinking tea. When she told me this, a lady in front of us turned around and smiled because she was working on a series of devotionals you could read while drinking coffee. I told them their books sounded terrific, because it is true that some people like tea and some people like coffee, and for that matter, some people dance in ballets.
The ladies asked me what I was working on, and I told them about the nun in South America and described a specific scene in which the nun actually ponders whether or not she has fallen in love with a dictator named Pablo Hernandez-Juarez, and I had the ladies lean in as I told them the part where the nun is standing on a balcony overlooking a Pacific sunset, painfully considering whether she should go back inside to be with Pablo or whether she should scale the side of the dictator's castle, thus escaping to move on to the next country, the next dictator, and the next story of passion and liberation. You could tell the ladies really liked my story, and all three of them told me it was a terrific idea. I told them about how, in my mind, it was actually a musical, and I whistled a few bars from the love theme. I was going to tell them about the kid who grew up in a maze and brought down the United States Postal Service, but that's when the lady who was going to teach the seminar showed up.
She was also a small woman, but she knew her stuff. Three of her books had been published: a series of devotionals you could read while eating chocolate, a book about the hidden secrets of fulfillment found in end-times prophecy, and a book about how to make "big money" painting "small houses." Three different genres, she told us, but each one had been a success. She told us that there are, in fact, formulas for writing successful books, and that if we followed one of these formulas, we, too, could write books that end up on subcategory Christian or Catholic bestseller lists, not the monthly ones, but the annual ones, which also consider backlist titles and total sales, including sales to ministries and radio stations as promotional giveaways. Of course I was interested, and I elbowed the lady next to me and lifted my eyebrows.
"The first formula goes like this," our seminar instructor began, holding a finger in the air. "You begin with a crisis. This can be a global crisis, a community crisis, whatever kind of crisis you want. This isn't a problem, or a nuisance, mind you, this is a crisis. This must be something terrible that is going to happen to the world, to our country, to the church, or to the individual unless the reader does something about it. The reader must be taken to the point where they fear the consequences of this crisis. Second, there must be a clear enemy in the crisis, some group of people or some person or some philosophy that is causing the crisis. You must show examples of how these people are causing this crisis, simply because they are the enemy of all that is good. Third, you must spell out the ramifications of the crisis should it go unchecked, and also the glory and beauty of the crisis if dealt with. You must paint a picture of a war against evil forces that are trying to cause this crisis, and you must enlist the reader in this war, painting a very clear picture of the reader as the good guy in the war against the crisis. Fourth, and finally, you must spell out a three- to four-step plan of dealing with said crisis." And with this she took a breath. "Is that clear?" she asked, and as she delivered this last line, she more or less stood up straight, her petite frame putting out the confident vibe of a drill sergeant. I knew, then and there, that these were the women to take literature captive for the glory of God, and that, in fact, standing before me was the archetype of my South American nun. But as excited as I was, I confess I began to wonder how I was going to work this formula into Sister of Democracy, Show Some Leg! or Maze Boy: How One Man Brought Down the United States Postal Service!
"Now, there is another recipe!" she said, which gave me hope that there might be a more compatible formula for one of my stories. "First," she began, "you must paint a picture of great personal misery. You must tell the reader of a time when you failed at something, when you had no control over a situation or dynamic. Second, you must talk about where you are now, and how you have control over that situation or dynamic, and how wonderful and fulfilling it is to have control. Third, you must give the reader a three- to four-step plan for getting from the misery and lack of control to the joy and control you currently have."
As wonderful as I thought this formula was, and I confess that I thought it was wonderful, once again I felt that it was going to be difficult for me to wrap a story around one of these recipes. I thought perhaps there would be another formula, perhaps one with guns or a midnight parachute drop into a small African village, but there wasn't. It turns out there were only two formulas. Our instructor went on to tell us that during the next two days, for eight hours each day, we were going to walk step-by-step through these two magical formulas, and by the end of our time we were going to have them mastered; that, essentially, we would be able to approach any topic and hook the reader from the very first paragraph.
I sat and listened attentively, taking copious notes, learning to look for the misery that is hiding beneath the surface of life, the misery that many people will not feel until you tell them it is there, and to identify the joy we now feel because the misery has been overcome by taking three steps, and how these three steps are very easy and can be taken by anybody who has fifteen dollars to spend on my book.
When it came time for lunch, I let the room empty out except for our seminar instructor, and feeling defeated and confused because I didn't believe these formulas were necessarily compatible with my stories, I approached her and asked about how I might fit one of these formulas into a book about a nun with a machete. She looked over my shoulder into the empty room, tilted her head, then looked back into my eyes and asked whether I realized this was a nonfiction rather than a fiction seminar. At the time, I confess, I didn't know the difference between fiction and nonfiction, so I slyly inquired about the delineation. "What," I began, "do you feel is the largest difference between a work of fiction and a work of nonfiction?" And again she looked at me, confused. "Well," she said, "I suppose a nonfiction book would be true, and a fiction book would be made up."
"For example ...," I said, motioning with my hand for an example.
"Well," she began, looking at the floor and smiling before looking back at me, kind of sighing as she spoke, "a novel, a story like the one you are talking about, would be considered a fiction book. But a self-help book, the sort of book we are discussing at this seminar, would be considered nonfiction, because we aren't really making up stories so much as we are trying to offer advice."
"I see," I said, kind of looking at the ceiling.
"I get it," I said, looking back at the floor.
"Indeed," I said, looking back at my instructor.
"Does that help?" she asked, smiling and putting her hand on my arm.
"It does," I said. "It helps a great deal. I like to get people's perspective on fiction and nonfiction. I find the various opinions intriguing."
"I am sure you do," she said to me after a long and uncomfortable pause.
I ate lunch at the Denny's across the street from the hotel, feeling the entire trip to Memphis had been a mistake. And then I remembered a little song, something about making lemons from a lemon tree, and I realized that what I needed to do was write a nonfiction book, something that helped people who were miserable become happy. Only mine would be a Christian self-help book, and I would start each reading with Scripture, then break down the formula the Scripture spoke of. I would call it Devotions You Can Read While Eating Ice Cream, Soy Ice Cream, and So On!
There is no question I was the best student at this seminar. Women under one hundred pounds lose energy in the late afternoons because they do not eat enough and they miss their families. I returned home and began poring over the Bible, looking for formulas I could use for my book of daily devotions. And I have to tell you this was much more difficult than you might think. The formulas, in fact, are hidden. It seems when God had the Bible put together, He hid a lot of the ancient wisdom so, basically, you have to read into things and even kind of make up things to get a formula out of it. And the formulas that are obvious are terrible.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from SEARCHING FOR GOD KNOWS WHATby DONALD MILLER Copyright © 2010 by Donald Miller. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Product details
- ASIN : 1400202752
- Publisher : Harper Horizon; Expanded edition (May 24, 2010)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 272 pages
- ISBN-10 : 9781400202751
- ISBN-13 : 978-1400202751
- Item Weight : 9.2 ounces
- Dimensions : 5.5 x 0.75 x 8.5 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #373,361 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1,840 in Religious Leader Biographies
- #3,377 in Christian Self Help
- #9,109 in Christian Spiritual Growth (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
Videos
Videos for this product
1:58
Click to play video
Watch a trailer for the book
Merchant Video
About the author
Donald Miller is the CEO of StoryBrand and Business Made Simple. He is the host of the Coach Builder YouTube channel and is the author of several books including bestsellers Building a StoryBrand, Marketing Made Simple, and How to Grow Your Small Business. He lives in Nashville, Tennessee with his wife, Elizabeth and their daughter, Emmeline.
Customer reviews
Customer Reviews, including Product Star Ratings help customers to learn more about the product and decide whether it is the right product for them.
To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Instead, our system considers things like how recent a review is and if the reviewer bought the item on Amazon. It also analyzed reviews to verify trustworthiness.
Learn more how customers reviews work on Amazon-
Top reviews
Top reviews from the United States
There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.
If you're looking for a book to help you find God, you have and have not found it here.
You've found an author who has properly and courageously expounded on the real heart of Christianity. That is, the heart. You've found a book that will make you fall in love with Jesus. Like, literally fall in love. A love beyond your wildest imagination.
You have not found an author who has mapped out the perfect time of day to pray, the correct way to pray (to get them answered), or the right denomination to join.
Written with honesty, Donald Miller exposes his own short comings and sins, relating to every reader, all the while modeling his devotion to Christ and the real message of Christianity. The Bible is a love letter to you. Seemingly inspired by the widespread reckless authorship of hundreds of "Christian self help" books, corrupted theology and truth represented on TV and all of our social media, Miller takes a stand that not many Christians would be brave enough to do.
"The road to hell is paved with good intentions."
Christianity has slowly been veiled in different categories; each misrepresenting it in a catastrophically disfiguring way. Whether created out of good intentions of pastors, authors, speakers or society, or perhaps it is malignant effort, we have lost sight of the Truth of God. The truth is, He loves us. He loves us with a passion and you cannot see or feel that love until you come to know Him through the Bible. Miller bravely throws the curtains back, exposing the ugly attempts we have made in creating a god that fulfills our needs rather than forming a relationship with Jesus.
His writing and thinking is philosophical and poetic, leaving in the dust the hundreds of trendy Christian self-help books that sell out quickly, pacifying readers with their prayer-by-numbers methodology. He brought me back to "Confessions" (St. Augustine), which I read earlier this year (and which floored me), and it's evident that Miller has a calling to uncover the evils that have infiltrated the heart of Christ's message, purpose, and gift.
I may need to revise this review because this book changed me. He spoke all the Truths of God that I have been feeling while reading through the Bible, and it was something of a gift to see these thoughts and provocations in a beautiful written word. I could not put it better myself, so quoting Miller, "Being a Christian is more like falling in love than understanding a series of ideas."
The Bible is SO NOT written like a Salvation pamphlet or doctrinal treatise. This to me this is an embarrassingly obvious detail for any theological analysis or discussion. As a trinitarian (a view I believe is solidly supported in scripture), I can not ignore the simple fact Jesus never explains THAT doctrine in a dialog.
No, He says things like John 6:53b: “...Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in yourselves."
Talk about getting your attention. I can not imagine a more powerful visual for forcing someone to look at you squarely in the eyes to see if you are sane. "Truly truly". It is so in your face, and so unlike any normal conversation, it instantly exposes your beliefs about the speaker.
I love how Mr. Miller reminds us of Isa 53:2b "...He has no stately form or majesty That we should look upon Him, Nor appearance that we should be attracted to Him."; or the implication that His time in Nazareth left Him with a "hick" accent.
I do have some disagreements (his view of politics and flawed leadership leave many unanswered questions), but overall believe this book helps to focus on the person of Christ as revealed in His Word. I have found the insights very helpful in approaching God sincerely, and helpful in valuing others more freely.
I've been looking for a book like this for a long time: an apologetic that argues for a faith that is based on relationship rather than rules. While there is much here than some readers may find objectionable in terms of theology, it is the general overarching theme of the book that is startling, breathtaking and, ultimately, deeply liberating.
For the last couple of years I've been wondering what the "message" of the Emerging conversation/postmodern movement might be. While no single book can capture all of the layers and complexities of the conversation, I think Miller does a wonderful job putting forth a summary of what may be the main point: that we are created for relationship with our maker and restoring and living in the relationship is what we should strive for as human beings.
While some of the theology of the book by put some readers off, the greater message of the work is more than worth the time it takes to read it. I strongly recommend this book to all who are searching for a deeper faith. I plan to buy copies for a lot of people that I know are asking the types of questions this book speaks to.