Book Commentary: The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren

Jan 24

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  • Some thoughts on Rick’s approach to the question of God’s purpose for our lives…
  • His criterion for truth appears to be the Bible. This works at least two ways. If he can find any part of the Bible – using any translation – to confirm one of his points, then the conclusion must have merit. Conversely, if he finds anything in any part of the Bible – using any translation – then it must be true at face value.
  • On page 325, he explains his reasons for using 15 different translations. While most of those listed are accepted as developed with some reasonably legitimate scholarly effort, The Message (which is one of his favorite choices to quote) was written by a pastor, Eugene Peterson, to make the Bible easier to understand for his congregation. http://www.crossroad.to/Bible_studies/Message.html
  • What prompted my inquiry was coming across a scriptural reference that I was pretty certain was NOT in any Bible I had ever read. Sure enough, a quote from The Message.
  • In common with all writers or speakers trying to make a point, Rick does not hesitate to quote only a few words – completely out of the context of the rest of the text or situation.
  • Having chosen this approach, it is inevitable that Rick will generate seemingly contradictory points of view – because he can find Biblical quotes for each side.
  • So, we will be presented with a God who has pre-planned every detail of our lives, without our input, before our conception – who then somehow tests us daily – the results of which determine our everlasting place in or out of God’s presence.
  • We will have described a God who is constantly present with us to guide us and love us and… who sometimes “leaves” us to test us.
  • Rick is strong on the concept of “specialness.” We are special because we were “chosen” before the foundation of time. Jesus tells us to love our enemies and forgive those who persecute us and crucified him. I believe that God’s love is so inclusive and all-reaching that it includes everyone. We can feel a special connection with God and His Love without assigning a lesser connection to other people.
  • It seems contradictory that “before Abraham was I AM” or that “you were chosen before the foundation of creation.” If we consider time differently, these statements make more sense. God is not confined or limited by the flow of time as we perceive it. God is so “connected” with his creation that “he is already there” and doesn’t need time to cover some spatial distance. Physicists describe a theoretical particle called a Transcendental Tachyon as a particle which travels at infinite speed and is therefore “everywhere at once.” From that point of view, the “kingdom is at hand.” It’s interesting that when God was asked his identity, he responded “I AM” – not “I used to be” or “I’ll see you later.”
  • On Day 5, Rick quotes Anais Nin: “We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.” I would suggest that Rick strongly assists us in doing that with God: we don’t see God as He IS (I AM), but we see Him as we are and project all kinds of human characteristics and personality flaws onto God.
  • I’m looking forward to the Holy Spirit’s blowing among us whither it will and bringing us more completely into an awareness of the Christ in each of us and the God we never really left.
  • Some further thoughts…
  • A. Are we trying to divine THE individual purpose God has planned for our lives?
    B. Is this a result? A measurable thing or event that can be judged as accomplished or not?
  • C. Could we have been working on the “wrong” thing all this time – despite God’s pre-determined,micro-management of our every move and circumstance?
  • D. Will we then receive some “eternal consequence for our inability to use our free will to produce this Divine Objector Purpose (hidden slyly behind one of the curtains?) in our “brief-as-a-blink” lives?
  • E. “God has emotions too.”(page 64) Warren also quotes Nin to remind us that, “We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.” Attributing human emotions to God because the description can be found somewhere in the Bible doesn’t make them reality. How else were those writers supposed to describe their spiritual experiences?
  • F. The first key question is: What is God’s nature? If God is Love it’s the most Awesome Love we can imagine. Such a Love is Oneness and Unity – not Chosen and Un-chosen. His Love is already connected to all His Creation – all that is Reality—in the Holy Instant or the Eternal Now. God’s Love does not depend on our limited sense of “time” to “make the connection.”
  • G. If God is not One with His Creation through His steadfast Love, then is Evil a piece of creation that “got away from God’s control?” Does God thus struggle to “love His enemies” and “forgive those who persecute Him” while “battling these runaway forces?” We have found ourselves in this apparent predicament – not God.
  • H. Perhaps God is as oblivious to “evil” as Light is to darkness because “in the Light” darkness is illusory. Darkness is the “absence” of light yet appears to “flee before it.”
  • I. Like darkness, evil certainly seems real, even palpable, to us. Perhaps we “see through a glass dimly” and without a “single eye.” We are not “tempted” to buy the house IF we see it clearly as built on the shifting sands. Perhaps it is ignorance of God’s Reality.
  • J. Imagine a God united/connected with all creation (including each of us) in Love and Oneness. There seems no place in that amazing Peace of God for wants or needs. He is All. We (our egos) are the ones who want and need judgment, control and being right.
  • K. This book is full of “specialness” where God’s Chosen get special treatment. Of course if I see myself as Chosen, the absence of “special” treatment is “testing”—which is also “special.” God’s vast love and oneness doesn’t play favorites. That’s my ego’s game.
  • L. God’s name is I AM, not I Used to Be, or I’ll See You Later.(Prather) God’s Loving Presence isn’t something sent 2nd-Day Air for future delivery. God and His Love are Present This Moment. The Kingdom is “at hand.”
  • M. From God’s perspective “time” is one. Already connected means He needs none of our “time” to travel through our “space.” Being ONE, He need “wait,” “hope” or “want” for nothing. In similar fashion, looking at a parade from a tall building captures the entire parade in the “now” while the people on the sidewalk experience a past, present and future. In this same sense of an Eternal Now, “before Abraham was I AM”and“I am the Alpha and the Omega” and “you were in my care even before you were born.” Eternity is so much more than just “a really, really long (boring?) time.”
  • N. Since “the sun shines equally on all” our “purpose” is to come in to the Light – and remain there “praying without ceasing.” By listening more consistently to the Holy Spirit and Christ’s guidance, we are better able to discern God’s Love and Present Reality from the dream of suffering from which Adam never awoke.
  • O. We usually think of the “Will of God” as some preference or choice on God’s part – as if I AM would rather go by “ I AM THAT BUT NOT THIS.” So we are taught to pray for God’s will about which job to take, spouse to marry, house to buy, or whether someone will be healed, etc. – and discern His Answer. It’s multiple choice with no options for “all of the above/none of the above/wrong question.” While we ask God whether we should go right or left, in or out, up or down, His message is Go in Peace and Love.
  • P. Imagine what our actions – our Lives – would be like, if we all intentionally sought first the Peace of God in our hearts and minds – and then acted from that place. Consider that our Purpose is BEing aware that we are Children of God and letting our DO-ing flow from that – as delightfully unpredictable as those actions might be.
  • Day 15: You were formed for God’s Family [My comments]
  • “Every human being was created by God, but not everyone is a child of God. The only way to get into God’s family is by being born again into it. [Once and done or like Paul’s “I die daily”?]
  • You become part of the human family by your first birth, but you become a member of God’s family by your second birth. God “has given us the privilege of being born again, so that we are now members of God’s own family.” (1 Peter 1:3b LB)
  • The invitation to be part of God’s family is universal, {Mark 8:34 Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.
  • Act 2:21 & Romans 10:13 quoting Joel 2:32 And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.
  • 2 Peter 3:9 The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.
  • (preceding verse not referenced 2 Peter 3:8 But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. NIV}
  • but there is one condition: faith in Jesus.”
  • Recap of previous chapters…{Day 1: It’s not about me. Day 2: “I am your Creator. You were in my care even before you were born.”[in my care just not in my family?] Day 5: Life is a test and a trust. Day 7 “For everything comes from God alone. Everything lives by his power, and everything is for his glory” It’s all for him. Day 8: I was planned for God’s pleasure. Day 9: God smiles when I trust him. Day 10: The heart of worship is surrender. Day 11: God wants to be my best friend. Day 11: I’m as close to God as I choose to be. Day 12: God wants all of me. Day 14: God is real no matter how I feel. “For God has said, ‘I will never leave you; I will never abandon you’”[except when you lack “faith in Jesus”??? Does anyone find it strange that “unbelievers” could fully practice the “2 greatest commandments” given by Jesus without having heard of Jesus? Are they thus “excluded” from God’s family?]
  • Day 16: What Matters Most
  • “Of course, God wants us to love everyone, but he is particularly concerned that we learn to love others in his family.” (p 123)
  • “Why does God insist that we give special love and attention to other believers? Why do they get priority loving?” (p 124)
  • [and the “unbelievers” who we are to love with less “priority” because they are not part of God’s “family” via the one condition of “faith in Jesus”…would be people like the ones Jesus specifically told us to love as we love our selves: our “enemies?”, the good Samaritan?, our “neighbor?”
  • God-like Love, Agape Love, is unconditional. Period. It is GOD’s LOVE. How can it be “less than” perfect, whole and complete?
  • WE are the ones who feel a need for specialness. To be part of a special family while others are excluded due to the “rules of the club.”
  • The relationship of God with His Creation and humanity-made-in-His-Image is far above and beyond this petty word play using “our” (Christian) labels vs “your” (non-believer) labels. God is “inclusive” by definition… God is “in whom we move and breathe and have our being”! Absent some set of magic words, are we or were we ejected from this state of intimate Being with God? By Whom? Our Loving Creator?
  • “They will know we are Christians by our love” (do we now add “of each other”?)]

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