You can use a formula, although I think it's not too difficult to just go through the steps. I would draw a picture first:
You are given that $\vec{p} = (1,0,1)$ and you already found $\vec{m} = (1, -2, 4)$ and $\vec{l}_0 = (1,2,-1)$. Now it's a matter of writing an expression for $\vec{l}(t) - \vec{p}_0$:
\begin{align}
\vec{l}(t) - \vec{p}_0 =&\ (\ (t + 1) - 1\ ,\ (-2t + 2) - 0\ ,\ (4t - 1) - 1\ )\\
=&\ (\ t\ ,\ -2t + 2\ ,\ 4t - 2\ )
\end{align}
Now you dot this with the original slope of the line (recall that $\vec{l}(t) - \vec{p}_0$ is the slope of the line segment connecting the point and the line). When this dot product equals zero, you have found $t_0$ and thus $\vec{x}_0$:
\begin{align}
\vec{m} \circ (\vec{l}(t) - \vec{p}_0) =&\ (1,-2,4)\circ(\ t\ ,\ -2t + 2\ ,\ 4t - 2\ ) \\
=&\ t + 4t - 4 + 16t - 8 \\
=&\ 21t - 12
\end{align}
Setting this to $0$ gives that $21t_0 - 12 = 0 \rightarrow t_0 = \frac{4}{7}$. This gives the point $\vec{x}_0$ as:
\begin{align}
\vec{x}_0 =&\ \vec{l}(t_0) = (\ \frac{4}{7} + 1\ ,\ -\frac{8}{7} + 2\ ,\ \frac{16}{7} - 1\ ) \\
=&\ \frac{1}{7}(11, 6, 9)
\end{align}
So finally the distance would be the distance from $\vec{p}_0$ to $\vec{x}_0$:
\begin{align}
d =&\ \sqrt{\left(\frac{11}{7} - 1\right)^2 + \left(\frac{6}{7} - 0\right)^2 + \left(\frac{9}{7} - 1\right)^2}\\
=&\ \sqrt{\left(\frac{4}{7}\right)^2 + \left(\frac{6}{7}\right)^2 + \left(\frac{2}{7}\right)^2} \\
=&\ \frac{1}{7}\sqrt{4^2 + 6^2 + 2^2}\\
=&\ \frac{1}{7}\sqrt{56} \\
=&\ \frac{2}{7}\sqrt{14}
\end{align}
...or perhaps $\sqrt{\frac{8}{7}}$ is more appealing.
Extra Info
There's no need to worry about whether or not my 2D picture is really representative--it is. No matter how high the dimensions of the problem, the problem itself can always be mapped to exactly 2 dimensions unless the point is on the line--then it's a 1 dimensional problem--which of course we can represent in 2 dimensions just as we can represent this 2 dimensional problem in much higher ones.
Best Answer
I assume you are referring to the shortest distance between a point in $\mathbb R^3$ and a plane. This is given by the orthogonal projection of a line into another line, i.e., projecting a line from the origin into the plane into the normal vector of the plane. The formula for this orthogonal projection uses the dot product.
Here is an example: http://mathinsight.org/distance_point_plane_examples
In this graph, you are projecting the vector $QP$ joining the yellow point $Q$ in the plane with the red point $P$ , into the normal vector $n$ of the plane. This projection gives you the shortest distance, and (the length of) this projection is given by the formula $$\frac {||n.P||}{||n||} $$, where $||(x,y,z)||:=\sqrt{(x^2+y^2+z^2)}$. This is where the dot product comes into play. For more on the ortho projection:
http://www.cuil.pt/r.php?cx=002825717068136152164%3Aqf0jmwd8jku&cof=FORID%3A10&ie=UTF-8&q=orthogonal+projection&sa=Search