Who needs room lights when you have this many Christmas lights?
Stories
Donald Miller is a bit of a hero of mine. So when a friend handed me a CD of an interview with him, I listened to it that evening.
I’ve read one of his books before, Blue Like Jazz and I found it refreshingly honest. It’s a great book and definitely worth a read. I’ve not read any other books of his but I think I will now!
There were several bits of the interview that impacted me.
Firstly, when Don was talking about how some people approached him about making Blue Like Jazz (effectively his life story) into a film. When they sat down to start writing it, it quickly became clear that his life wasn’t actually that exciting, and that they’d have to make things up to make the film work. This was a bit of a reality check for him; realising that his life wasn’t actually very interesting. So he decided to do something about it. He talks about how all good stories have certain things. They have a main character who has a desire, a purpose, a vision. It doesn’t matter if this character is flawed or not. Good stories also have conflict. It forms their character. Don talks about how in Church we tend to seek comfort. We’re bombarded by adverts and products that promise us comfort, and the Church has bought into that market. Following Jesus doesn’t bring comfort, it tends to bring us into conflict with the World. He uses the story of the Israelites in Egypt. They held onto a hope of a promised land. They wanted to be free from slavery for ever, but God didn’t just snap his fingers and deliver them from this. He took them into conflict. They had to endure 10 plagues, then they spent 40 years wandering in the desert until they’d learned what God was trying to teach them.
I recognise that in my life, I often seek out the comfortable option. I look to God for comfort, when maybe he’s calling me into conflict. When I do go through a difficult time, I always think it’s the enemy trying me. But maybe it’s God trying to teach me, to discipline me. I know that I run from conflict, I dislike it, I don’t know how to do conflict well. Maybe God wants to teach me how conflict works?
Good stories don’t always end well. The hero either completes his purpose, or dies trying. But either way, they’re still a hero.
Don spoke about a couple of things he’s been doing now because he wants to make a difference. He’s recognised that there are 27 million young men in the USA without a positive father figure. He’s also worked out that there are 360,000 churches in the USA. He’s done his maths and worked out that if every church provided 10 mentors who would be positive role models for young men, in 25 years a whole load of social problems linked with fatherless young men would be radically changed. Crime, teenage pregnancy, unemployment, dropping out of education and abortions would all drop significantly.
The Pastor of the church Don goes to had a great idea. They decided that they’d do Christmas differently. They asked people to sign up and make several pledges. First, that no one would go into debt because of Christmas. This meant they cut down on buying gifts massively. Instead of buying gifts, they set about making gifts. So in their church in the run up to Christmas they did classes on making gifts. They also put out a manual showing how to make several useful gifts. Then with all the money that they would have spent on gifts, they put it together and gave it to a project who dug wells in Africa, providing fresh drinking water to those who previously didn’t have it. They got a few other churches together, and over a couple of years were giving millions of dollars to dig wells. So effectively, they gave a important Christmas present to hundreds of people in Africa, clean drinking water. That’s the kind of thing I only dream about doing! How big was that guys vision?!
Another part of the interview that impacted me was when Don posed the question: if your life is like a movie, and someone picks up the case and looks at the back, what do they read? And what would their reaction be? Are they excited and interested by the twisting, turning excitement within? Or are they immediately bored of another 9-5, settled-down, work, sleep, eat, family story? I think I need some more excitement in my life. I think I need to set bigger goals than I have.
Like Bahati spoke about at Gateway recently, I need a vision for my life. I need a clear purpose.
Well… time to get praying…!
