by Sharon Ely Pearson
I was given a copy of “Blue Like Jazz” several years ago by a priest attending one of my workshops in a congregation in Florida. He told me he gives a copy to everyone who is a skeptical Christian. Author Donald Miller begins:
I never liked jazz music because jazz music doesn’t resolve. But I was outside the Bagdad Theater in Portland one night when I saw a man playing the saxophone. I stood there for fifteen minutes, and he never opened his eyes. After that I like jazz music. Sometimes you have to watch somebody love something before you can love it yourself. It is as if they are showing you the way. I used to not like God because God didn’t resolve. But that was before any of this happened.
The book is about learning how to sing. Learning how to believe in a God that is bigger than anything else who loves us beyond all comprehension. On this Good Friday, that is enough to share.
However, Blue Like Jazz will soon be coming to a theater near you (April 13 opening). And my guess is that youth and others will go see it. And now some free discussion guides are available that you can use in your congregation.