Lovely Little Shelf

The Book: Blue Like Jazz: Nonreligious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality, by Donald Miller

The Story: Donald Miller grew up in a vaguely Christian environment, going to church and hearing the stories but never quite wrapping his head around it.  This is the story of him fleshing it all out.

He kind of “comes to age” in Oregon and is just kind of this hippy guy and attends Reed college and has friends that he gives strange nicknames to.  He goes to a church that focuses strongly on community and ends up living in a house full of guys.

This book is just about that journey.  He doesn’t go into the deep or very controversial issues, but more so what the Bible says and what that would look like lived out.

What I Thought: Let me preface this by saying I read this book when it first came out and was just blown totally away.  This was when the “emerging church” was just emerging and I thought it was refreshing and amazing and great. By now, that movement has been taken to the extreme.  I think that they started off on the right path and just went too far. I think that this book was maybe the start of that.  I know at the time I was part of a huge Christian community and people were obsessed with it.

That being said, I love Donald Miller’s honesty.  It’s striking.  Most Christian books slap you around a little for not believing and tell you to get into the word and pray. Which is good advice, but it is nice to hear from someone that that’s ok to stumble and we’ve all been there.  He talks a lot about his insecurities, with women and writing and friendships and just life overall. Not only does this make him relatable, it touches a place inside that isn’t frequently touched.  Even with close friends I rarely hear this kind of honesty and it is just nice. That is the part of his character that I really love and admire.

I feel like this book is pretty much a bound blog.  It is just these little sections of rambling on about one topic or another.  The chapters aren’t really cohesive or chronological or anything, so sometimes it becomes a little hard to follow and keep track of what he’s even talking about.

The part that I loved the most the first time I read it and this time was the part where they set up a confession booth at Reed.  People laughed at them, but then when students went in, instead of having to confess their sins, Donald and his friends confessed that as Christians we’ve screwed up and confessed to different occasions and people were truly touched.  I like that story. I love that they were willing to do that and the reactions were priceless I thought.

Conclusion: An interesting take on Christianity, but I think it should be taken with a grain of salt.  Not much balance here…