Customer Reviews

A Life With Purpose: The Story of the Man Behind The Purpose-Driven Life

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

This book is just plain wrong -- no interviews with Warren were conducted, Mair used conjecture to fill in gaps, and most of the book really doesn't even have anything to do with Warren.

And most troubling is the fact that where Mair DOES talk about Warren, he makes mistakes all over the place.

How do I know??? Because I have attended Saddleback Church for nearly 10 years, know Rick Warren personally, have listened to hundreds of his sermons, and I have even had dinner with not only he and his wife, but his father, Jimmy.

Believe me, this book is no biography of Rick Warren. Pass on it, and wait for an authorized bio.

The author does NOT know Rick Warren and evidently did very little research on the man who wrote The Purpose Driven Life. In the second chapter alone, there are 15 factual errors. For example, Rick's father was not called "Jimmy, Sr.", East Texas and New Mexico (where Rick's parents were from) are not in the "southeastern United States", the family never lived in Sausalito, etc. Other chapters contain more factual errors or omissions. This book fails to detail Rick Warren's life and what it does include is riddled with errors.

For a book that is suppose to be about Rick Warren, there is too much filler about other people, church growth movement and Saddleback Church teachings.

Publishers Weekly review: ""It's not about you." That is the now-famous depersonalization that opens Rick Warren's self-help guide The Purpose-Driven Life. Unfortunately, they are apparently words that his biographer took to heart, because despite its promising subtitle, this portrait tells readers almost nothing about the man behind the bestseller. Mair spends most of the book superficially exploring the phenomenon of megachurches and introducing some of Warren's role models for ministry. What information he does give us about Warren's life is sparse and blandly hagiographic:..."

This book does not merit even one star. Save your money. It's is clear the author is just trying to cash-in on the Purpose Driven Life movement.

INACCURATE! POORLY WRITTEN! A WASTE OF TIME! REDICULOUS!, April 20, 2005

Reviewer: Robert Faraday "Book Reviewer" (Columbus, Ohio) - See all my reviews

It is so obvious this guy never talked with Warren, or anyone even remotely associated or related to the guy. It is laughable all of the errors in this book. Warren's life has been well-chronicled in tapes, articles, and even tons of doctoral dissertations on Saddleback church and the purpose driven movement.

Mair was obviously just trying to make a buck on Warren's name. Publisher's Weekly and every other published review has panned this book as a rip-off. Don't waste your money.

I know that Schuller tried to jump on the TV bandwagon and claim that he influenced Warren (how?)but I asked Warren's staff and they pointed out that Saddleback was 6 years old before Schuller even met the guy. And Warren once wrote Schuller a note publicly distancing himself from the dear Dr. because Schuller was having all sorts of anti-Christian speakers on his TV show, and Warren disagreed with his theology. And Warren is ANYTHING but N.V. Peale- whom he has never met, never read, and disagrees with.

Stupid errors like saying Warren and his wife went to high school together, that Warren has one child instead 3, and a hundred other factual bloopers show this book was never researched but a cut and paste job from media reports that got it wrong the first time

The dangerous thing about this book is that is is gushingly positive, so some may be tempted to believe it is accurate. It is not at all. Anyone who builds an impression of Warren from this book either unbelievably gullible or just want to believe total fiction. Wait for a reputable biographer. Save your money.

This book says nothing new about Rick Warren. Through it comes to over 200 pages, mammoth spacing and blank pages actually make up much of the book.

Mair makes many obvious mistakes. He even mistitles a book of the Bible, calling "Revelation" "RevelationS" Unless you know nothing about Rick Warren, you probably already know most of the information Mair has to share. It is painfully obvious that he got few interviews, did little research and shares no deatails about Rick's life. The book could just as easily be called Robert Schuller's Biography.

This book is not well written, poorly researched and leaves me wondering: Who proofed this?

Considering the wild popularity of Rick Warren, as pastor, author and leader within Evangelicalism, we know surprisingly little about the man. It would seem that he has deliberately withheld information about himself, which of course, fits the theme of his bestseller The Purpose Driven Life which is, "it's not about you." A Life With Purpose, subtitled "Reverend Rick Warren - The Most Inspiring Pastor of Our Time" is, as far as I know, the first published biography of Warren. It is not a strictly chronological biography, but instead is more topical. I have to admit that I felt quite skeptical as I began this book, knowing that it was written by George Mair, an author whose previous titles include, Paris Hilton: The Naked Truth, Inside Hbo: The Billion Dollar War Between Hbo, Hollywood, and the Home Video Revolution , Excelsior! : The Amazing Life of Stan Lee and Under the Rainbow: The Real Liza Minnelli. I was interested in seeing how an apparent tabloid author approached Rick Warren.

This book is surprisingly light on biographical details, primarily because such information is not widely available. I would estimate that truly biographical facts would comprise only 20 pages of the book. Mair conducted no interviews with Warren or anyone close to him. Instead, he seems to have relied primarily on secondary sources, collecting whatever details he could find in books and publications. The book contains no footnotes or list of sources cited. A Life With Purpose, then, represents less of a biography and more of a collection of the facts about Warren that are publically available. It also contains extensive commentary on the programs and books Warren has written.

Allow me to address the author's commentary. After reading the book I am still uncertain as to the author's religious background and beliefs. Generally when I read a biography of a Christian personality, it has been written from a professed Christian and the perspective is clear. In this case it seemed that Mair was perhaps even professing to be a believer. He lavishes praise on Warren throughout the book and often speaks positively of evangelism and other facets of Warren's programs. However, he makes many clear doctrinal mistakes and rash oversimplifications that seem to cast doubt on his understanding of Christianity, both in history and theology. For example, the book begins with a short introduction to Christianity in America that immediately betrays the author's ignorance. He mixes Christianity with New Age, and often oversimplifies. "Protestants experienced a divide between modern thinkers, who identified with modern Bible critics, and fundamental thinkers, who followed the Bible literally" (page 17). Later, when addressing "change vs status quo," he writes, "But if we assume that everything, including religion, needs to be able to change in order to survive, then it becomes clear that status-quo churches are only destroying what they are so desperately trying to hold on to. Though the success of the mall church model can't be completely equated to Rick Warren's success at Saddleback, they share the passion for growth and change that some older churches lack. They are willing to take risks, to challenge the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" crowd" (page 122-123). He portrays traditional churches as blindly clinging to tradition, and thus to the status quo, rather than more accurately clinging to the instructions of the Bible. A final example is within the author's commentary on Week 3 of The Purpose Driven Life. "Although God creates us all, we don't immediately become a part of His spiritual family. We must have a second birth through baptism to truly become children of God" (page 145). This is neither a traditionally Protestant understanding of baptism, nor would it be Warren's understanding. Beyond these concerns, the author also makes several factual mistakes and I was often left with the impression that he had filled-in details about Warren's life where such information was missing.

Having addressed my concerns, allow me to comment on the book's positive aspects. Mair rightly identifies Robert Schuller as being a profound influence upon Warren, and Norman Vincent Peale being a primary influence in Schuller's life. He briefly traces the confluence of theology and psychology through Peale and Schuller and suggests that Warren has taken the models developed by those two men and brought them to new levels of popularity. Though he provides only a cursory examination of the topic, I have little doubt that many others will address this topic in detail in the future. He also examines other formative influences, such as Donald McGavran and Gilbert Bilezikian. Second, Mair did enough research that he was able to collect many facts that were previously unknown to me, and surely to many others. As such, this book does provide as much information about Warren as we are likely to know until the publication of an official biography. Finally, I enjoyed the author's secular perspective. He lauded many of the aspects of Purpose Driven methodology that concerned Christians highlight as being more secular than sacred. Having read far too many Christian examinations of Warren's ministry, it was interesting to read one that seemed to be written from outside the church.

While far from a perfect biography of Rick Warren, I still found this book interesting and somewhat informative. I am not convinced that the research is entirely honest, nor that the author truly understands Warren and, even more importantly, Christianity. Yet if you are interested in knowing more about Rick Warren, this is the only show in town, and for that reason I will provide a tentative recommentation, but a recommendation premised on the warnings above and founded more on my interest in the subject matter than in the quality of the publication. The book is quite short, at 210 pages (but with large font, wide spacing and many blank pages) and easy to read, despite poor editing for a major publishing company. In the end, it seems that this is a book designed to cash-in on the success of The Purpose Driven Life, but it is one that is not entirely without value.

This is a difficult book to review. While being fairly well written, A PURPOSE DRIVEN LIFE doesn't really explain much about the subject, Rick Warren. I was hoping to find something out about Warren's leadership techniques and "team-building" methods, if you will, but found very little. In fact, I really don't know much more about Rick Warren now than I did before I read this book.

The author certainly gives high praise for his subject, touting accomplishments on virtually every page, but that's about as far as it goes. Overall, a dissappointment.

The top of the book cover says "The story of the man behind the Purpose-Driven Life. Well, sort of. As you read this book you get the idea that the author never got an interview with Rick Warren and had to find something besides biographical details to fill the pages.

The resulting book is really an overview of the Church Growth Movement in North America. I was surprised to find that there is almost as much biographical information about Robert Schuller as about Rick Warren.

The examination of principles of church growth will be interesting to many readers. They will also appreciate Mair's indepth look at growth programs at Saddleback Community Church.

But if you're looking for an intimate look into the spiritual growth of Rick Warren and stories of God's guiding hand in his ministry, you will be disappointed. The bulk of the biographical information about Rick Warren can be found on pages 33-35, 49-55, and 68-78.

"Mair tells us that when Saddleback Church was founded, the Warrens had an infant daughter, but she's never named or even mentioned again-nor is the fact that the Warrens went on to have two more children. If these perfectly basic elements to include in a life story are missing, it goes without saying that Mair also reveals no conflict, no difficult struggles and no rough edges to Warren's personality that could make him a real person instead of the smiling, guitar-playing, Hawaiian shirt-wearing cardboard cutout depicted here."

Rick Warren and his Purpose Drivel © Corporation are all about covering up any warts and blemishes that would hamper his Disney-esque business - Saddleback Church. As with this book, Warren ignores those of his church "family" in order to worship what is really important - the almighty dollar. That's why he has created a "church" with lot's and lot's of flash, great shows for those that attend, glitz and star-studied affairs, etc. - he's a great showman. The only problem is, it's all show. Jesus didn't put on shows - he showed them love - and He did it personally.

It would be great if someone wrote a story about what really happens behind the façade of Saddleback Church. Let's only pray that God will allow that to happen.

I found this book to be very interesting and informative. I give a lot of credit to the author for his investigative reporting and depth of insight. It is obvious that he spent countless hours researching his topic and this clearly makes the book very enjoyable and credible.

Definitely recommend not only this book but all books by this author.