Seth just finished reading the short version of Blue Like Jazz which is appropriately called Jazz Notes. Seth likes short versions, because you get the major ideas without having to spend as much time reading. Seth is a slow reader.

Enough with the third person. Here’s my initial reaction:

The book recognizes a problem we’ve had in the church: that a lot of Christians tend to keep their faith in their heads and never let it have any effect on their lives and hearts. True.

In response, Jazz Notes makes some great points about how Christianity (or, as the book calls it, “Christian Spirituality”) is not something that can be explained – God is too big for that – and how being a Christian is all about falling in love with Jesus. True.

However, I think the book overreacts and swings the pendulum back too far. The author (Don Miller) bases his points (most of which are pretty good) on his own feelings, needs and random observations. In doing so, Miller does more than correct an unhealthy over-emphasis on our heads – he essentially denies reason a valid place in “Christian Spirituality”.

But what if I feel that I need reason in my spirituality because I have observed that reason is a beautiful part of the human experience? What then?