Blue Like Jazz - The Movie

Personally, I'm not much of a culture warrior. With Blue Like Jazz (the book), I never saw the cause for alarm that many others saw. Similarly, I anticipate that as this film releases, there will be many minute-by-minute, point-for-point critiques of the film's content, theology, and worldview. I'm not entirely interested in engaging it on that level. Instead, I want to talk about the film's (and Miller's) place in Christian culture.

When the book released there were several months of chatter and debate surrounding it. Many in my city identified Miller as a reactionary liberal trying to make Christianity cool and marketable. The book was sliced open and picked apart; every questionable glimpse of doctrine, every ethical grey area, every shady interaction with an unbeliever was dissected and deconstructed.

But I think this kind of critique misses the point. In the book and in his subsequent works, Miller has never claimed to be a theologian. He doesn't labor at making precise theological statements; he labors at telling compelling stories, at being truthful about life. He's a storyteller whose gift takes us into the uncomfortable world of Christians living in exile. I don't get the sense that his stories are prescriptive; they describe his life and experience, and the success of the book demonstrates that something about his life resonates with readers.

[http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tgc/2012/03/12/blue-like-jazz-the-movie/]