some thoughts after hearing Mr. Blue Like Jazz speak this morning

the man himself, Donald Miller

Overall, I've really been enjoying these Tuesday morning talks that the men of our ministry have been going to over the past three weeks. Yes, it's tough to get up before 6 am, but it has been so worth it. Greg Laurie, Rick Enloe, and now Donald Miller brought some solid word to the men of Seattle who are following Christ. I'm hoping I can find these talks online sometime so that we can share it with the sisters of United Life as well.

Here are some thoughts from Donald Miller's talk today. By the way, if you've never read his bestselling book, Blue Like Jazz, I recommend giving it a spin.

- Where you are at now, who you are now is enough to make an impact for the Kingdom of God. You don't need to go fit some mold before God can use you. Be who you are, be where you are, be obedient to Him, and great things are going to happen. 

- Our times of pain equip us to have sympathy with the pain of others. 

- Male passivity can be devastating: Father's who don't take the initiative in investing and actively supporting their daughters' lives are basically sending the message: "You are not worth it." Same can be said of husbands who don't take initiative in their wives' lives.

From Miller's own life: his father walked out on his family and Miller grew up thinking his dad had died. But when he found out his dad was alive he went to go visit him. Turns out his father walked out on his mom because he felt his mother was being controlling and emasculating. Miller's point - whether that's true or not, basically his dad's message was that Donald and the rest of the kids were not worth dealing with a controlling woman. Perhaps that's better than abusing his children and wife, but that passivity led to some incredible damage of another kind in Miller's life. 

- Miller used the story of Joseph in Genesis as his talk's framework, and one of his key points was Negative Turns in our stories should not be enough to keep us from "kicking butt for God" in whatever situation we're in. Joseph experienced the worst kind of discouraging negative turns: thrown into a well immediately after his God-given dream, sold into slavery, after rising up to be Potiphar's chief servant being sent to prison for no fault of his own, then after saving Pharaoh's cup bearer spending two more years forgotten in prison...if anyone had cause to give up, it was Joseph. But all of that pain, all of those negative turns did not keep God from fulfilling his promise. 

- Miller left us with a great question: What are your daydreams, what thrills you, and how can you use that to, as Joseph does, follow God's heart and "save many lives"?

Kind of cool note: we were sitting one row behind Donald Miller and had a chance to get to know him a bit before he spoke. He signed Max's book, and he asked Oliver about his iPad. 

Here's the promo video for the event that we've been attending: 

Man Up Video from Shawntel Hatch on Vimeo.