by Jim Miller
Learning My Name
Pete Gall
Zondervan (July 1, 2009)
What if Karl Marx was right? What if religion is the opiate of the masses? Newcomer Pete Gall seems to think so. He begins his book, Learning My Name, by saying, “Maybe Karl Marx has a point, whether it was intended or not.” By that he means, “For the most part we don’t really follow God. Instead we build our lives around what we think we know of God and what we think he thinks of us and less around who he really is. What a loss that is, to live in relationship with our religion instead of our God.” Religion, like any other opiate, can be numbing and addictive and we can become obsessive about it. We get caught up in trying to find God’s approval in our righteous acts, our faithful tithing, our charitable deeds, and regular attendance at worship services, but somewhere in the busyness of our Christianity we lose God. He becomes distant and demanding, impersonal, “a frustrated taskmaster who is perpetually disappointed in our performance.” Perhaps he resembles the overly-strict parent you had … or are. In another chapter, Gall writes, “I think most fanatics, or ‘true believers,’ as they’re also called, are motivated by deep shame and fear that their best efforts will not be enough.” Religion as it is often practiced becomes a toxic drug, an opiate; not all the freedom faith is supposed to give us.
But Gall wants us to see God for who he truly is; that, “while it is his prerogative to demand complete and immediate obedience and submission without regard to how his commands impact us, our God is willing to ‘take it on the chin’ for the sake of being in relationship with us.” He will hold us when we cry and argue and shake our fist at him. In fact, according to Gall, God invites it and runs to greet his returning prodigals. He is the parent we can only hope to be.
In making his case, Gall chooses to use anecdotes and stories (parables, if you like) rather than tediously citing scriptural proof texts to validate his points. Most of these stories are reflective and personal and for some may be a bit too candid. Being the anal type that I sometimes am, I found myself squirming at his frankness. I kept saying to myself, “I don’t want to hear this,” yet kept turning the pages, riveted by his stories. That is not to say that Gall dismisses scripture. Far from it. Even the strictest biblicist will appreciate his use of scripture in retelling the events and parables of Jesus’ life, paraphrasing them in a manner that accentuates their relevance to contemporary life. Gall’s view of Jesus is not as distant, either in life or in story, from our postmodern world as one might think. His imaginative chapter-long recounting of Jesus’ healing of the ten lepers was especially insightful for me.
Pete Gall has a remarkable gift for communication and writes in the spirit and charmingly irreverent style of two of my favorite authors, Anne Lamott and Donald Miller. Admirers of Lamott and Miller will understand immediately what that means before they finish the preface of the book.
Artist Bio
Pete Gall is an author, speaker, freelance copywriter, brand strategist, and passion-driven gadfly whose clients range from Fortune 50 corporations to national denominations, tech start-ups, nonprofit organizations, and local churches. Pete and his amazing wife, Christine, live in Indianapolis with their two dogs.
Pete Gall’s website can be found at www.petegall.com.
