I thought that Rick Warren’s Purpose-Driven Life book was a decent introduction to the Christian life. I’ve listened to Mark Driscoll on youtube, and what I heard him say was exactly what I read in the Bible. I even thought The Prayer of Jabez by Bruce Wilkinson, if read as written, had some good insights on serving God and asking for Big Things from Him. So, what I’m saying is that I tend to give Christian nonfiction writers the benefit of the doubt and not be overly critical and picky. (Fiction is another matter.) I figure we’re following the same Jesus, and if something sounds a little off or immature, maybe the author just hasn’t gotten there yet or maybe I haven’t.
So, although I know I read something, somewhere, that made me think I wouldn’t like Blue Like Jazz, that it would be some kind of New Age reinterpretation of Christianity that made Jesus unrecognizable, I actually loved it. Mr. Miller was a bit disingenuous at times, acting as if he just didn’t understand what in the world those “fundamentalists” were thinking when they didn’t like his take on this or that, but I still thought the book was a revealing and mostly honest (as honest as any of us get) look at what being a Christian is like, at least what it’s like for Mr. Miller. (The idea, however, that changing the name of what we believe in from “Christianity” to “Christian spirituality” is going to do anything except confuse the issue is also rather simplistic and disingenuous.)
A few quotations to give you a taste if you haven’t read it already:
“I grew up going to church, so I got used to hearing about God. He was like Uncle Harry or Aunt Sally except we didn’t have pictures.”
“God is not here to worship me, to mold Himself into something that will help me fulfill my level of comfort.”
“Satan, who I believe exists as much as I believe Jesus exists, wants us to believe meaningless things for meaningless reasons. Can you imagine if Christians actually believed that God was trying to rescue us from the pit of our own self-addiction? Can you imagine?”
“If the supposed new church believes in trendy music and cool Web pages, then it is not relevant to culture either. It is just another tool of Satan to get people to be passionate about nothing.”
“If loving other people is a bit of heaven then certainly isolation is a bit of hell, and to that degree, here on earth, we decide in which state we would like to live.”
“The most difficult lie I have ever contended with is this: Life is a story about me.”
That last one, especially, is profound. Think about it.
yep, I liked it too. I didn’t think it was so liberal or new age, and was reassured by his chapter that talked about the danger of wanting to be “cool”… glad he recognized that.
I didn’t like this one. It’s not thought it was new-agey or anything, although it was kind of superficial. My main complaint was the writing style.
I was also pleasantly surprised by this one. My mom bought it for my husband, and I often disagree with books my mom loves (Captivating by Staci Eldredge was also a gift from her). My husband never read Blue Like Jazz; I did.
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If you think Donald Miller was being honest or more honest than the rest of Christianity about the realities of life you need to read this article. He made stuff up to bash evangelicals and, yes, to look cool.
http://townhall.com/columnists/MikeAdams/2010/06/22/white_like_lies