Tag: Paul Miller

“A Loving Life: In a World of Broken Relationships” by Paul Miller

~ Bob Hayton

A Loving Life by Paul MillerBook Details:
  • Author: Paul E. Miller
  • Category: Christian Living
  • Book Publisher: Crossway (2014)
  • Page Count: 172
  • Audio Publisher: christianaudio (2014)
  • Audio Length: 6 hours – unabridged
  • Read by: Arthur Morey
  • Format: audiobook
  • ISBN: 9781433537325
  • List Price: $12.99 / $14.98 (audio)
  • Rating: Must Read

Blurbs:
“I’m not exaggerating when I say that this is the most honest, timely, and helpful book I’ve ever read about the costly and exhausting demands of loving well. And at the same time, A Loving Life is the most faithful, alluring, and encouraging presentation of God’s love for us in Jesus I’ve fed on in years. These two themes go hand in hand. Through the biblical story of Ruth, Paul Miller gives us hope, not hype—the freedom to suffer well, stay present, and live expectantly in all of our relationships. Thank you, Paul, for making the gospel more beautiful and believable to me.”
—Scotty Smith, Teacher in Residence, West End Community Church, Nashville, TN

“The word love is often either a vague sentiment or just another four-letter word. But in Paul Miller’s hands, the quiet, compelling reality emerges. You will witness how love is thoughtful, principled, courageous, enduring, and wise—all the things you know deep down it should be. And even more than those fine things, you will be surprised and delighted at how true love is grounded in God.”
—David Powlison, Christian Counseling and Educational Foundation

“A Loving Life is a worthy successor to Paul Miller’s much-appreciated book on prayer. It is a careful, thorough analysis of the book of Ruth, understanding it as a love story and making good applications to our own experiences and needs for love. Paul here shows not only a deep understanding of God’s Word, but also a rich knowledge of human nature, both in the ancient world and today. He offers biblical responses to many of the misunderstandings and problems we have with love of all kinds. May the Lord give this book a broad readership!”
—John M. Frame, J. D. Trimble Chair of Systematic Theology and Philosophy, Reformed Theological Seminary

Overview:
Like he did with A Praying Life, Paul Miller once again has given us a book that doesn’t fit the mold. This is not just any old book on Christian love. This book turns love inside out and gives hope and help to readers at all stages of their Christian life.  A Loving Life: In a World of Broken Relationships describes the perils and pitfalls, as well as the promise and pleasure of love.

Miller begins with a personal story from a man he has counseled. The man was a former elder at a conservative evangelical church who walked away from his wife and dove headlong into immorality. Stories like this, and the counseling insights Miller shares illuminate this book. Miller’s insights into love and the human heart, stem from Scripture and ring true. His application is always poignant and helpful. ANd the stories of real one-on-one ministry flesh out the theory of his approach with real tangible spiritual fruit in the here and now.

But Miller’s book is not about his own experiences. He anchors it all on a careful exegetical look at the book of Ruth. Ruth’s story, of course, may very well be the greatest love story ever told. And it has much to teach us about what it means to love unconditionally, and to live in Christian hope.  Miller’s account is shaped and ruled by the gospel, and he brings us back over and over again to the importance of gospel-centered living.

Quotable:
“Whatever the source of the broken relationship, the result remains the same—the loneliness of a fairy tale gone bad. What do you do when you are abandoned by your husband? How do you survive when no matter how much love you pour into your wife, she becomes more demanding? How do you endure in love? How do you endure without love when you long to get married? How do you keep your spirit from shutting down?

To these modern widows and widowers, I write this book—to en­courage you, to give you a hope and a future. We’ll pursue that by joining two ancient widows, Ruth and Naomi, on their journey. The book of Ruth is an ideal narrative for our post-Christian world, where breaking covenants—not enduring in love—is the new norm. Ruth offers a tem­plate for love that understands both the craziness of our modern world and a way forward. Ruth is all about surviving and even thriving in a collapsing world.” (p. 14)

See also this excerpt from Crossway.org.

Evaluation:
Having been incredibly blessed by Miller’s previous book, A Praying Life, the format of A Loving Life took me by some surprise. But as the book developed, I found myself enjoying the account of Ruth more and more, and seeing how it truly dovetailed with Miller’s thoughts on love and his counsel for dealing with broken relationships and living out our faith in this broken world. This book may be a slower and harder read than the earlier volume, but it repays any effort spent to mine its riches. Miller’s wisdom and insight into the struggles of human suffering shine through its pages. His personal experience of ministry (including to his own autistic daughter) give a depth to his thoughts. You feel like you are sitting down over a cup of coffee with an incredibly open and helpful friend as you read this book. And this friend repeatedly points you to a greater walk with Christ and a deeper understanding of yourself and the glory of the gospel.

I listened to the Christianaudio.com version of this title, and found it a blessing to tune into Ruth’s exciting story on my drive each day to work and back. The reader of the audiobook was easy to understand and hear, and his voice was warm and encouraging. I didn’t miss endnotes (if there were any) and it was easy to follow along even though the book was broken up into smaller pieces than it  may have been if reading the book in another format.

Recommendation:
If you haven’t read anything by Paul Miller before, I encourage you to give this title a try. His approach is similar in spirit to what you may get from Timothy Keller or some of the authors connected with the Christian Counseling and Education Foundation (CCEF). This is biblical counseling at its gospel-centered best. I highly recommend it.

About the author:
Paul E. Miller is executive director of seeJesus as well as the best-selling author of A Praying Life, among other works. With the help of his ministry staff, Miller creates and conducts interactive discipleship seminars throughout the world. He and his wife, Jill, live in the Philadelphia area and have six children as well as a growing number of grandchildren.

Where to Buy:
  • christianAudio.com
  • Westminster Bookstore
  • Amazon
  • Christianbook.com
  • Crossway.org

Disclaimer:
This book was provided by christianaudio.com. The reviewer was under no obligation to offer a positive review.

Book Giveaway: A Praying Life by Paul Miller

~ Bob Hayton ~ 7 Comments

Courtesy of Michelle Bennett and NavPress, I have 2 free copies of Paul Miller’s A Praing Life to give away. I’ve decided to use a form from Google Docs to help with this contest. Just fill out the form to enter.

If you subscribe to my blog or follow me on Twitter, you get an extra entry. Of course you can become a subscriber today by clicking here, and follow me on twitter here. Then if you create a blog post linking to my giveaway, or if you link to my giveaway on a Twitter or Facebook update, you can get an additional entry. The contest runs through 6pm (Central) on September 9th.

I’m looking forward to blessing 2 lucky people with a really good book. Don’t forget to read my review of A Praying Life, to see why you really will want to enter this contest!

Contest is now closed.

“A Praying Life: Connecting with God in a Distracting World” by Paul Miller

~ Bob Hayton ~ 4 Comments

Author: Paul Miler
Publisher: NavPress
Format: Softcover
Pages: 288
ISBN: 1600063004
Stars: 5 of 5

As a lifelong Christian, I’ve heard a great deal of teaching about prayer and read a good many books on the topic. I’ve been taught to model my prayers on The Lord’s Prayer. I’ve learned the ACTS method (Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication). I’ve been encouraged to trust God for impossible answers, and above all, I’ve been made very aware of my spiritual shortcomings with regard to the discipline of regular, personal prayer.

Like many, I have tended to view prayer as a spiritual discipline I need to accomplish. So I try harder to do this prayer thing — this spiritual event accompanied by certain kinds of emotions and feelings. When I fail, I am overcome with guilt. When I don’t pray, I find it hard to start praying again. It seems I just never measure up to my perfect ideal of what my personal praying should be. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve enjoyed wonderful seasons of prayer. I’ve had many spiritually high moments in prayer. I’ve seen God work through my prayers. But I don’t have the level of spiritual stamina at praying that I would like.

Given this context, I jumped at the chance to receive Paul Miller’s A Praying Life: Connecting with God in a Distracting World, by NavPress, for free. The specific challenge was to read the book, and post about the results of a personal 30 days of real prayer, implementing the principles from the book in my own prayer life. Thanks again, Michelle Bennett for that challenge. I’m so glad I read this book.

A Praying Life is easily the best book I’ve read in the past several years. Miller speaks with an uncommon grace, and his book plants the spiritual discipline of prayer squarely upon the truths of the Gospel. A praying life is the goal, not regular disciplined moments of spiritual ecstasy. Miller’s book is distinguished from others I’ve read in that it stresses prayer’s connection with the gospel, it explains how a lack of prayer betrays a lack of dependence on God, and it illustrates through Paul Miller’s own personal family stories, how prayer connects with all of life. In short, the book makes a praying life seem real, and possible.

I wish I could say after these 30 days, that my prayer life has been completely revolutionized. But after reading the book, I can definitely say my thinking about prayer has. I want to share a few of the principles that came home powerfully to me as I read this book.

First, I was reminded that Jesus invites us to pray. And our prayer is part of a life lived in confidence in the Gospel.

Jesus does not say, “Come to me, all you who have learned how to concentrate in prayer, whose minds no longer wander, and I will give you rest.” No, Jesus opens his arms to his needy children and says, “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28, NASB). The criteria for coming to Jesus is weariness. Come overwhelmed with life. Come with your wandering mind. Come messy….

We know that to become a Christian we shouldn’t try to fix ourselves up, but when it comes to praying we completely forget that. We’ll sing the old gospel hymn, “Just as I Am,” but when it comes to praying, we don’t come just as we are. We try, like adults, to fix ourselves up.

Private, personal prayer is one of the last great bastions of legalism. In order to pray like a child, you might need to unlearn the nonpersonal, nonreal praying that you’ve been taught. (pg. 29-30)

Prayer mirrors the gospel. In the gospel, the Father takes us as we are because of Jesus and gives us his gift of salvation. In prayer, the Father receives us as we are because of Jesus and gives us his gift of help. We look at the inadequacy of our praying and give up, thinking something is wrong with us. God looks at the adequacy of his Son and delights in our sloppy, meandering prayers. (pg. 53-54)

Second, I was challenged to see that when I don’t pray, I am basically telling God I’m good enough that I don’t really need him. Ouch! This point has really revolutionized how I think about prayer. I have more of a desire to pray, even though I’m still not “good enough” at it. Although I’ll never really be good enough, still I want to show my dependence on God in praying constantly for specific help.

If you are not praying, then you are quietly confident that time, money, and talent are all you need in life. You’ll always be a little too tired, a little too busy. But if, like Jesus, you realize you can’t do life on your own, then no matter how busy, no matter how tired you are, you will find the time to pray. Time in prayer makes you even more dependent on God because you don’t have as much time to get things done. Every minute spent in prayer is one less minute where you can be doing something “productive.” So the act of praying means that you have to rely more on God. (pg. 47)

Third, prayer really is about being helpless. We come to Christ in the gospel as a helpless sinner. We are to have faith like a helpless child. We should pray as helpless Christians. We really do need our Savior’s continual help! This last line should get the “duh!” award. But so often we live like we really don’t. The more mature we become as Christians, the more aware of our sinfulness and helplessness we should be. And thus we should pray more.

Fourth, I learned that “we don’t need self-discipline to pray continuously”. Instead “we just need to be poor in spirit”.

Poverty of spirit makes room for his Spirit. It creates a God-shaped hole in our hearts and offers us a new way to relate to others. (pg. 64)

If we think we can do life on our own, we will not take prayer seriously. Our failure to pray will always feel like something else “” a lack of discipline or too many obligations. But when something is important to us, we make room for it. Prayer is simply not important to many Christians because Jesus is already an add-on. (pg. 57)

A big theme of the book is how suffering is often the context where we learn to pray. It grows us and shows us our true need. It helps make prayer important.

Fifth, prayer is not about some special feeling or perfect spiritual experience.

Instead of hunting for the perfect spiritual state to lift you above the chaos, pray in the chaos. As your heart or your circumstances generate problems, keep generating prayer. You will find that the chaos lessens. (pg. 72)

Too often we seek the perfect spiritual state, when we really should just pray to God out of a heart full of need.

Sixth, I learned that prayer changes things. As we pray we should look for ways our prayers are having an effect. We should seek to use prayer to change the hearts of those we love. Our problems and all of life’s difficulties can be shaped and met with prayer.

When you stop trying to control your life and instead allow your anxieties and problems to bring you to God in prayer, you shift from worry to watching. You watch God weave his patterns in the story of your life. Instead of trying to be out front, designing your life, you realize you are inside God’s drama. (pg. 72)

That’s the secret of the praying life. It’s not your own story, it’s God. He becomes the One in control. By prayer we see Him working. By prayer we let Him into our lives.

Seventh, I was given a practical method of prayer which I’ve begun to adopt. He explains how to have a prayer card — a 3.5″ note-card — for each major area in life that you pray about. Have one for each of the members of your family and pray a specific verse for them. Add individual requests to the card over time. Keep track of answers to prayer. I’ve slowly begun to create cards and I find them easier to use than a prayer list. It’s more personal and focused on the subject or person at hand.

I’ve only scratched the surface of what is contained in the book. It is very readable, because Paul Miller interweaves personal stories of his children and life together with various prayers he has. He shows how prayer helped him deal with situations and persons. How prayer was answered slowly over time in the lives of his children. How prayer allowed him to parent well, and love others rather than react negatively.

I’m confident that if you pick up A Praying Life, your prayer life will improve as well. May God challenge us all to have praying lives.

Disclaimer: this book was provided by the publisher for review. The reviewer was under no obligation to provide a positive review.

This book is available for purchase at the following sites: Westminster Bookstore, Amazon.com, or direct from NavPress.

30 Days to A Praying Life

~ Bob Hayton ~ 3 Comments

I just finished Paul Miller’s A Praying Life: Connecting with God in a Disconnected World. I have to say it was the best book I’ve read in a long while, both from the standpoint of a well written work, and a book that hits close to home. I’ve never been more challenged, convicted and at the same time encouraged in my life regarding prayer.

Along with receiving the book, I was asked to try a 30 day challenge where I pray for 30 days using some of the principles in this book and come back and report to everyone on the impact the book is having in real life to me.

Today is Day 2, and I’m looking forward to the challenge. I’ve already posted an excerpt from the book, and I will post more about the book over the next several days. At the end of the challenge, I’ll also be holding a book giveaway here on the blog. If you have the book, or have read it, feel free to join me on my 30 days to a praying life!

Quotes to Note 10: On Parenting and Prayer

~ Bob Hayton ~ 5 Comments

I’ve been reading through Paul Miller’s new book A Praying Life (NavPress). Its a great read that challenges me concerning my prayer life. He’s giving real life examples of how prayer shapes his parenting. I found this extended quote on the relationship between prayer and parenting very helpful.

It is surprising how seldom books on parenting talk about prayer. We instinctively believe that if we have the right biblical principles and apply them consistently, our kids will turn out right. But that didn’t work for God in the Garden of Eden. Perfect environment. Perfect relationships. And still God’s two children went bad.

Many parents, including myself, are initially confident we can change our child. We don’t surrender to our child’s will (which is good), but we try to dominate the child with our own (which is bad). Without realizing it, we become demanding. We are driven by the hope of real change, but the change occurs because we make the right moves.

Until we become convinced we can’t change our child’s heart, we will not take prayer seriously. Consequently, repentance is often missing. When we see, for example, our son’s self-will, we usually don’t ask, How am I self-willed? or How am I angry? We want God’s help so we can dominate our son. We forget that God is not a genie but a person who wants to shape us in the image of his Son as much as he wants to answer our prayers.

Increasingly, parents in our culture are moving to the opposite extreme and becoming passive. Parents say things like “My son has always been angry” or “Even when he was a kid, he was throwing temper tantrums.” This passivity is reinforced by pop psychology’s tendency to make descriptions of childhood stages into rules. For instance, if a two-year-old is bad, the mom may shrug her shoulders and say, “She’s going through the terrible twos.” This mom is trapped by psychological descriptions. Her passivity is further reinforced because she’s talked to her little girl and even disciplined her, but nothing worked. This mom pushed against reality, but it didn’t budge. She tried praying, but nothing much happened. She ran into the power of another person’s self-will and surrendered. She has passively accepted the world as it is. Like the ancient Greeks, she is trapped by the Fates. When we do this, life takes on a fixed, given quality. Payer becomes pointless….

If you are on the road of Good Asking, you have also given up “” but in a good way. You’ve given up on your ability to change other people. Instead, you cling to God and watch him weave his story. Frankly, Jill and I do our best parenting by prayer.

From A Praying Life by Paul Miller  © 2009, 166-167, 168. Used with permission of NavPress, Colorado Springs, CO. All rights reserved. www.navpress.com.