Donald Miller (1) (1971–)

So I heard this was being made into a movie and since I've had the book on hand for quite some time, I thought I'd read it before the film was released.

Blue Like Jazz is about Miller and his spiritual life told in a series of chatty chapters. He keeps things a bit simpler than I'd like, using short sentences and building ideas slowly. I found this a bit annoying, especially since he's dealing with the some charged issues, primarily the difficulty of having lost faith, not in God or show more Christianity, but in the church. The American Evangelical church does have some serious issues. When the pastor of a megachurch can go on TV and declare that helping the poor is wrong and when a man in a position of leadership of a large group of churches feels comfortable making racist statements about the Trayvon Martin case, there's a problem. And the easiest solution for many is to walk away. It's how to turn around and find a sense of community and not to be angry that's difficult.

Miller managed to do this and I was very interested to find out how. He skirts the issue for much of the book, but he's too honest to avoid it. He's extremely careful with his words and his solution is to forgive, move on and find a church that doesn't look at others (gay people, feminists, liberals, etc...) with fear and loathing. Pretty easy for a guy in Portland, Oregon to say, but he's probably right.

Miller's a likable guy. Any guy who's had a crush on Emily Dickinson and who was able to successfully navigate moving from a hippie camp site to a religious summer camp job has to be. Blue Like Jazz is, despite the subject matter, entertaining and easy to read. Miller's being dumped on a bit for the mild criticisms he's written, and I'm sorry for that. show less

This book was not really written for me. A) I am a woman and B) I have a great dad. This book was written primarily to the staggering number of fatherless boys and men out there, who struggle with their identities and figuring out how they fit into the world. Something like 90 percent of men in prison come from fatherless families, and knowing this (and being a fatherless son who could have easily ended up in prison) Miller lays out some life lessons for those who find themselves without a show more dad to guide them.

Yet even though this wasn’t written for me, I loved it. The way Miller sees the world is so fresh and organic and realistic. It doesn’t feel like there is much to him that was shaped by an editor — it’s just raw conversations about a difficult subject. This is not a light-hearted book. He owns up to mistakes and his own insecurities and some of the stories will break your heart. He doesn’t have all the answers. But he does offer up a number of helpful things that young men can do to recognize that although they do not have fathers to guide them, they can still be men and get along in this world. He also covers God as Your True Father, but does so without seeming trite or rehashing ideas that so many other books with similar content cover.

I want to give this book to pretty much everyone who has lost a parent, whether through neglect, death, or other reasons. I think it has the power to change the way these people see themselves and their circumstances.

And then there was this random bit, which I loved:

I wondered if all the relationships we have — relationsionships with our lover, our mother, our friends — are not unlike blurred photos of our relationship with God, as though they are foreshadowings in the sappy prologue of an eternal novel.

I wondered if sliding our arms around a woman’s hips wasn’t a kind of infantile introduction to the metaphysical. If I allow myself, I can see God holding up flashcards as I fall in love with a woman, cards that say, “this is love, I am like this love, only better.”

“See?” God says, pointing at the flashcard with the word “love,” then pointing at His own chest while I move down the woman’s lips to her chin and her neck. “See?” God says, putting down the flashcard with “love” and picking up the word “oneness.” He says, “Get it? Do you see? It’s all living metaphors. It’s a hint of oneness — like My Trinity.”

Read my full review here: http://letseatgrandpa.com/2010/08/30/55-father-fiction-by-donald-miller/ show less

A very strange book. But it made me laugh a lot, and think about life even more. Apparently Donald Miller has another book called BLUE LIKE JAZZ which was enormously successful, and this book was inspired by his groping attempts, along with a filmmaker and cinematographer, to turn BLUE LIKE JAZZ into a movie. A journey which made him wonder about what makes writing work, and what constitutes a good story.

A MILLION MILES IN A THOUSAND YEARS, published by Thomas Nelson, is a Christian book, show more but only in the loosest sense of the word. What sets it apart from most 'Christian' books is its humor. Because Miller is a very funny guy with a very dry, self-deprecating sense of humor. He characterizes himself as this fat guy who was living his life rather aimlessly with no real sense of purpose. But he's a writer, and that early book made him famous, which got him to thinking about what he needed to do to make his life better, to give it purpose. And, in writing the screenplay - to his life, essentially - his fatherless youth came up, which caused him to find his father, who apologized for his absence and asked Donald's forgiveness. Miller admits that his dad had a few beers to make him brave enough, but he did forgive him, and they both felt better. There's a lot of rather sideways allusions to Miller's Christian faith, the importance of a few male mentors in his life from the church, but he doesn't make it the center of his story. Maybe that's why the book is as good as it is, why I liked it enough to finish it. It's not preachy or over-the-top evangelical the way so much of what we're hearing in the current Presidential election year. He keeps it light and entertaining. But it IS inspirational, the way he turns his life around, first by geeting into shape for a hike in the Andes, then a cross-country bicycle trip fundraiser, and, most of all, by founding an organization for kids in need of direction, called The Mentoring Project.

Miller never rubs religion in your face; he takes it with a grain of salt. In fact, here's what he says about Jesus -

"Growing up in church, we were taught that Jesus was the answer to all our problems. We were taught that there was a circle-shaped hole in our heart and that we had tried to fill it with the square pegs of sex, drugs and rock and roll; but only the circle peg of Jesus could fill our hole. I became a Christian based, in part, on this promise, but the hole never really went away. To be sure, I like Jesus, and I still follow him, but the idea that Jesus will make everything better is a lie. It's basically biblical theology translated into the language of infomercials ... I think Jesus can make things better, but I don't think he's going to make things perfect. Not here, and not now."

Reading this, I decided Miller had a pretty good handle on this Christianity thing, and that he and Jesus would probably be pretty good pals.

I noticed that the front cover of this paperback edition has an endorsement blurb from none other than Anne Lamott, a favorite writer of mine ever since BIRD BY BIRD. She says: "I love Donald Miller. He is a man after my own heart." Yeah. Mine too, Anne. Mine too. If you've been thinking about turning your life around; about how "to live a better story," try this book. You'll probably get some great ideas. Very highly recommended.

- Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir, BOOKLOVER. show less

Review first posted:
http://rarestgeneric.blogspot.com/2009/12/book-banter-blue-like-jazz.html

I finished reading Blue Like Jazz last Sunday evening, and I’m pleased to say I loved it. I’d heard some pretty interesting criticism of this book (sorry, Don, if you’re reading this) that made me a little nervous. But the things I heard also made me excited to read it. People were talking about the controversial ideas, or about the author and his “strange” beliefs. Me? I’ve struggled show more with “Christianity” as a religion all my life. That’s not to say I haven’t been a Christian for years—I have. It’s not the faith I’ve toiled with, it’s the religion. So when I saw the subtitle of this book, “Nonreligious thoughts on Christian Spirituality,” I was immediately intrigued. This sounded fresh to me. I didn’t recognize any of the names on the back of the book singing Donald’s praises, nor did I understand the title. I didn’t get the cover imagery. And I wasn’t sure what these “nonreligious thoughts” would turn out to be. But something about it, about the things I’d heard and what I felt in that subtitle made me want to read it. So I did.

I was right—the perspective in Blue Like Jazz is fresh. It feels raw. It feels honest. It feels like all those questions you’ve always wanted to ask but were always afraid to, because you knew your parents or your pastor would question you questioning your religion. It feels like all those times when you were frustrated that you didn’t understand God or the way this world works. It feels like somebody looking at you in the eye and telling you that you aren’t the only one who has these thoughts.

Here are the three most important takeaways I got from this book:

1) I am worth loving, and I know this because Jesus loves me. I have believed in Jesus for years. I accepted a long time ago that He is God’s son, that He died on the cross for all sinners, and that I believe in Him. I asked Him years ago to come into my heart and save me, and He did. But it wasn’t until Sunday night, after finishing this book, when I went to pray and think on the things I’d just read, that God revealed to me that I am worth loving. No matter what mean things I might say or think, no matter what terrible things I might do, I am still worth loving, and Jesus is proof of this. I felt so relieved and joyful when I realized this.

2) Christianity’s history is pretty ugly, and I’m not the only one who thinks so. In Blue Like Jazz, Donald writes about how he and his fellow students set up a “confession booth” on their college campus, not to take confessions from others, but to apologize for all the wrongs that Christians have done to humanity, from the violence of the Crusaders to their own lack of caring and loving of their fellow students. I’ve always felt defensive in the past when someone would address the evils in Christianity’s past, and even in its present. But it never occurred to me to face these problems and let people know that Christianity isn’t and never will be perfect. After all, this is why we need Jesus in the first place.

3) It is not my responsibility to change people, just to love them unconditionally. I felt so free when I realized this (and it sounds like Don did, too). God has taken the responsibility of changing people off of my plate! I don’t know why I ever thought it was mine to begin with. I’m such a judgmental person. I get it from my father. I’ve always grappled with it and, frankly, never liked it about myself! I want to be someone who can have her opinions without judging people who don’t share them. Instead, I will just love people, and leave the changing up to God.

I realize not everyone who reads Blue Like Jazz will have the same revelations I’ve had. I realize that many people probably already had all this together. But reading a book that is honest and that addresses Christian issues is refreshing and empowering. Many thanks to Donald Miller for his candidness, and to God for dropping this book in my lap. It has changed me. show less