Hey all,

What's up? My cousin tuned me into this guy who's writing turns out to be not half bad. (understatement...I like it a lot!) The recent deep thoughts of DJ, his questions of the day and everyone's responses to them, and people like JT jumping off the diving board into a new and unknown part of his life, have really whetted my appetite for more of it. Donald Miller has posted a few excerpts from books...I liked this one particularly and thought some of you might too. I couldn't find it, but the intro to his latest book, "Through Painted Deserts," is INCREDIBLE and will motivate you to do anything you've been feeling like you should (mostly anything that would involve too much change for you to stomach)...without fear! His style can be somewhat gritty, so it's not my intention to offend anyone...but sometimes gritty makes you think.........

cool... just what I needed... more distraction to keep me from my note-writing I'll have to take a gander...

*seriously seeking ways to procrastinate*

Alien Philosophers, Lovesick Teens and the Gospel of Jesus

u can tell by the title this should be interesting

He's gifted at catching your attention...and better yet, keeping it.

Oh, and good luck procrastinating! Lemme know if you have any tips, cuz I'm trying the same thing.

Seriously!! This guy is great! I read part of Blue Like Jazz and totally loved it! I'm about to pick it up and finish it off.

I swear he has ADD which is great because I have a hard time reading books. I tend to get too distracted, but he keeps jumping around so much that I keep reading trying to figure out where he is headed with an idea. He's definitely a cutting edge read. Well worth it! Be careful though...if you are not ready for change you might want to wait, he's definitely going to challenge you on your reasoning for where you currently are and will challenge you to make some amazing and drastic changes!

I hope a few of you are able to spend the time and read at least one of his books!

kfmeyers (don't know your true name) thanks for posting this!

Hey DJ maybe we should have a topic listing some 'suggested readings' and keep updating the list, kinda like the blog topic. I know you and Dane have a number of books that you two suggest others to read.

JT, this is a great idea, as I've just tried searching the forums for some good reading material that was suggested by several OSP'ers.

DJ? How about it? Might be worthy of a sticky.

Yay a reading a list! Thats a GREAT idea! And I have to jump in on the Donald Miller discussion because I've read his books and LOVE them. Blue Like Jazz has to be one of my favorite books ever, along with Searching for God Knows What. His writing style is just amazing. He came to Cal Poly last year and spoke at our Veritas Forum, and was probably one of the most eloquent speakers I have ever heard. If you go here then you can download some of his talks in mp3. He spoke on Narrative as Spiritual Exploration as well as The Theology of Romeo and Juliet. They were so great, I highly recommend listening to them, and reading his books! I gave Blue Like Jazz to a friend and they said it totally gave them a spiritual 180. So cool.

How 'bout his newest...Through Painted Deserts. It's a rewrite of his first. If anyone's interested in the author's note I can send it to you in .pdf...totally inspiring.

Thanks for the .mp3 link by the way! He goes to the church I do up here and it's funny to see people step up to him in awe. You can sense that..."I'm just a normal guy...can't I just be a normal guy?" body language.

Yeah, please send me that link, I would love to read it. I was SO close to getting that book last time I was down the hill and got a Brennan Manning book instead.. but Through Painted Deserts will probably be the next one I buy after I finish this one. Thanx!

This is the first time I've posted a document to the web...so let me know if it doesn't work. I have to admit I cheated too...this is a photocopy from the book I made for some friends of mine so I'm completely busting copyright law.

Try this.

Kevin

Great idea you guys! I'll get on it! U guys rule!!!

Workin' on the post right now!

I read that copyright violated version and WOW... I love his prose. Can we qualify that as a MUST READ? Because it is.

Isn't that incredible? I re-read it every couple weeks to refresh that mindset. I'm switching up careers which is something I've been afraid of. But that makes me anticipate the growth and all the other great things that will come with it.

What's Blue Like Jazz like?

Kevin

Don is so great I just heard him do a book reading last week from his new book that isn't even finished and I can't want to read it. I've read all of his books and I am so in love with the way he writes. And the fact that he is asking so many questions that so many people haven't been bold enough to ask, well it kicks me in the butt to keep pursuing holiness.

Hey Fletch - time to resurrect this thread. Thought of that "illegal" PDF you sent over a year ago today and had to go hunting for this. It's a public excerpt now so I'll repaste it here. So good Kinda makes me wanna go on a road-trip...



"HERE IS SOMETHING I FOUND TO BE TRUE: YOU DON'T start processing death until you turn thirty. I live in visions, for instance, and they are cast out some fifty years, and just now, just last year I realized my visions were cast too far, they were out beyond my life span. It frightened me to think of it, that I passed up an early marriage or children to write these silly books, that I bought the lie that the academic life had to be separate from relational experience, as though God only wanted us to learn cognitive ideas, as if the heart of a man were only created to resonate with movies. No, life cannot be understood flat on a page. It has to be lived; a person has to get out of his head, has to fall in love, has to memorize poems, has to jump off bridges into rivers, has to stand in an empty desert and whisper sonnets under his breath:
I'll tell you how the sun rose 
A ribbon at a time...
It's a living book, this life; it folds out in a million settings, cast with a billion beautiful characters, and it is almost over for you. It doesn't matter how old you are; it is coming to a close quickly, and soon the credits will roll and all your friends will fold out of your funeral and drive back to their homes in cold and still and silence. And they will make a fire and pour some wine and think about how you once were . . . and feel a kind of sickness at the idea you never again will be.
So soon you will be in that part of the book where you are holding the bulk of the pages in your left hand, and only a thin wisp of the story in your right. You will know by the page count, not by the narrative, that the Author is wrapping things up. You begin to mourn its ending, and want to pace yourself slowly toward its closure, knowing the last lines will speak of something beautiful, of the end of something long and earned, and you hope the thing closes out like last breaths, like whispers about how much and who the characters have come to love, and how authentic the sentiments feel when they have earned a hundred pages of qualification.
And so my prayer is that your story will have involved some leaving and some coming home, some summer and some winter, some roses blooming out like children in a play. My hope is your story will be about changing, about getting something beautiful born inside of you, about learning to love a woman or a man, about learning to love a child, about moving yourself around water, around mountains, around friends, about learning to love others more than we love ourselves, about learning oneness as a way of understanding God. We get one story, you and I, and one story alone. God has established the elements, the setting and the climax and the resolution. It would be a crime not to venture out, wouldn't it?
It might be time for you to go. It might be time to change, to shine out.
I want to repeat one word for you:
Leave.
Roll the word around on your tongue for a bit. It is a beautiful word, isn't it? So strong and forceful, the way you have always wanted to be. And you will not be alone. You have never been alone. Don't worry. Everything will still be here when you get back. It is you who will have changed."
***FULL EXCERPT***