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The Purpose-Driven Life Journal by Rick Warren
Book Summary InformationAuthor: Rick Warren Edition: Hardcover Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published) Published: 2002-11-01 ISBN: 0310807182 Number of pages: 160 Publisher: Zondervan
Book Reviews of The Purpose-Driven Life JournalBook Review: An Extreme Makeover in Just 40 Days Summary: 5 Stars
This book has generated a lot of buzz for a good reason: 10 MILLION READERS CAN'T BE WRONG. Give the Lord just seven weeks, and your life can be transformed, with two full days to spare:
Rick Warren: "The Bible is clear that God considers 40 days to be spiritually significant. Whenever God wanted to prepare someone for His purposes, He took 40 days."
As explained in the Bible, whenever the LORD purposely exterminates a city or nation, He gives 40 days advance notice, or takes 40 days to do the killing, or both; but not always...
Rick Warren: "Noah's life was transformed by 40 days of rain..."
The true story, as told in the Holy Bible:
Shortly before the Great Flood, "the LORD repented that He had made man on the earth, and it grieved Him in His heart." Only "Noah was a righteous man and perfect .... According to all that God commanded Noah, so did he .... So Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD." Then came those 40 days of rain, which transformed Noah into a lecherous drunkard who lay around naked and cursed his own grandchildren, condemning his descendants to a life of bondage, driven by slavery (Gen. 6:7-8, 22; 9:21).
Rick Warren: "Moses was transformed by 40 days on Mt Sinai..."
Okay, one little slip there. As told in the Bible, it was the LORD, not Moses, who was transformed: The LORD had decided to exterminate the people of Israel, once and for all. Moses spent 40 days on Sinai arguing with Him, warning Him that if He failed to bring His people into the Promised Land as promised, the Palestinian tribes would poke fun at Him, and ridicule God's name. Thanks to Moses' clever line of negotiation, "the LORD repented of the evil which He thought to do unto His people" (Deut. 9:25-29; Exod. 32:14). He patiently deferred His evil until the Christian era.
Rick Warren: "The spies were transformed by 40 days in the Promised Land..."
As told in the Holy Bible: The spies left on their adventure full of hope, joy, and high expectations. Forty days later, they returned to Moses with a report that the so-called "Promised Land" was utterly worthless real estate, even by the Middle East's standards; whereupon God killed the spies with a plague; and then punished the people of Israel for another forty years, inflicting one year of punishment in the desert on them for every day that those Hebrew spies scouted out the Promised Land (Num.13-14).
Rick Warren: "David was transformed by Goliath's 40-day challenge ..."
Sort of. According to the Holy Bible, David heard nothing of the challenge until it was over. Granted. But in the 40-day interim, the spectacle of a real-life Giant, "uncircumcised," transformed Israel's armed forces so that "all were dismayed and greatly terrified" (1 Sam. 17:1-24).
Rick Warren: God's prophet "was transformed when God gave him 40 days of strength from a single meal."
The story, as told in the Holy Bible: God commanded the prophet to eat muffins made with human excrement: "thou shalt eat barley cakes, and thou shalt bake it with excrement that cometh out of man." God then made the prophet to lie in the street for 40 days and 40 nights; and God tied him up so that he could not turn from one side to the other until the 40-day bondage was over; during which time, the prophet did not eat -- presumably because, after just one serving of those chocolate-chip muffins, he was in no mood for a second helping (Ezek. 4:6-12). (Here's a testimonial: Having read THE PURPOSE DRIVEN LIFE, stuntsman David Blaine recently duplicated the prophet's feat, without any lunch at all!)
Rick Warren: "The entire city of NIneveh was transformed when God gave the people 40 days to change..."
The actual story, as told in the Bible: Jonah, inspired by the Holy Spirit, obediently prophesied, "Yet forty days from today, and Nineveh shall be destroyed by God" (Jonah 3:4). But his prophecy was not fulfilled because the LORD changed His mind: "God repented of the evil that He said that He would do unto the people of Nineveh; and He did it not" (Jonah 3:10). Jonah was not happy. But then, a few years later, the LORD changed His mind and did it anyway: "'Behold, I am against thee,' said the LORD of hosts [to the people of Nineveh]; "and I will lift thy skirts over thy head, and I will show the nations thy nakedness, and the kingdoms thy shame. And I will cast abominable excrement upon thee, and make thee vile, and will set thee as a laughingstock. And it shall come to pass, that all who look upon thee shall flee from thee, and say, Nineveh has been transformed to waste!" (Nahum 3:5-7). So the LORD did all of that. Next, He killed the inhabitants, making the city of "Nineveh a desolation, and dry like a wilderness," i.e., just like the Promised Land (Zeph 2:13).
Rick Warren: "Jesus was empowered by 40 days in the wilderness."
Holy Bible: "After 40 days in the wilderness, Jesus was very hungry."
Rick Warren: "The next 40 days will transform YOUR life ... one chapter a day"
I totally believe that!! In 40 days with THE PURPOSE DRIVEN LIFE, your whole life can be transformed as easily as Rick Warren has transformed those weird Bible stories into New Age self-help advice!
Okay, so maybe the transformation will be less than a complete makeover. But why not give it a chance? Why not swap your passive, neurotic self for one that is truly PURPOSE DRIVEN? At best, it will be $10 that you didn't spend on Netflix.
You can be transformed, even if you are a homosexual Darwinist feminist pro-choice liberal atheist. And if you are a poor person, like those Old Testament prophets, maybe you can learn to eat your crappy food, for once, without complaining.
--L.
Summary of The Purpose-Driven Life JournalThe perfect companion to The Purpose Driven Life! Features include Scriptures and quotes by Rick Warren, taken from the bestselling trade book, plus space to record reflections, prayers, and goals while seeking God's plans for life.
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