Minutes to Memories

I'm anti-trendy. If there's a must-see movie or reality show, a hot new band or must-read book, or, oh, let's say an iPhone, you can count me out. I want nothing to do with it.

There's a positive side to this. I have chosen to follow the way of Jesus, and Jesus seemed anti-trendy. "Counter-cultural" is the term I've read most. I mean, did Jesus have an iPhone? I rest my case.

But I wish my motives were that pure. Instead, I think I'm just a snob. Kind of a reverse snob, but a snob nonetheless.

Anyway, when Blue Like Jazz was the hot new book to read, I didn't read it. It was trendy, and in case you haven't heard, I'm anti-trendy.

Well, somewhere along the way I determined that this "emerging church movement" was interesting after all, mostly because... well... it was the first thing ever to somewhat describe ME to myself. And Blue Like Jazz, from what I understood, was sort of the theme song for the movement. So I began to read.

I told a couple of brilliant, Bible-scholar guys at Pepperdine ("Hi, Bobby!" if you're reading this...) that I was just getting around to reading it during a conversation about Shane Claiborne's book, The Irresistible Revolution. I absolutely loved Claiborne's book (since I read it before it became trendy, you know). Both of these Bible scholars (heck, I'll just say: Dr. Gary Holloway and Bobby Valentine) said that they "got" Claiborne, but they just didn't get Blue Like Jazz.

Well, now I'm motoring through Blue Like Jazz (two months after I told them I was about to start reading it), and falling in love with it. Donald Miller is Anne Lamott with a LOT less cussing, and Anne Lamott's writing is phenomenal in my opinion. And I think I can see why those guys didn't "get" it. Mostly because I don't think it's something you "get." Blue Like Jazz seems appropriately named: jazz is more something to be appreciated than understood.

[Side note: I really like how Miller names his friends in the book: Andrew the Protester, Tony the Beat Poet, Mark the Cussing Pastor... Don't be surprised if I don't start doing the same on my blog: Bruno the Liberal, Troy the Mega-Pastor, Hezekiah the Harmonica Player...] :-)

So far Blue Like Jazz has been a much-needed read. For one, Donald Miller is hilarious. But more than that, he is refreshingly honest, admitting aloud a lot of the ways I think. I may change my mind, but I don't think he's trying to convince me of anything. He's just telling me the story of his life, and the appeal of the book may just be that a lot of us find our lives sidle up to his quite nicely.

The changing world is more into "story" and being "real" than the few centuries prior, and because of that I can see why Blue Like Jazz became trendy. The kind of trendy I'm discovering I like.