Clenching Control and Sipping Soyia Miel

When I like something or am excited, you can bet that the whole world, or at least every single one of my friends (which is pretty close to the world’s population), will know about it.  We read Donald Miller’s Blue Like Jazz in my Honors class last semester and I quite frankly fell in love.  I made a monologue and Oral Interpretation piece from one of the chapters.  I could not tell you how many times I have referred to this book since reading it.  For a Christmas gift exchange Brandon Hanson bought me Searching for God Knows What, another masterpiece of Miller’s.  My face lit up upon unwrapping it and I started schpeeling, “Ahhh!  This is the same guy who wrote Blue Like Jazz!  I picked out a monologue and Interp piece from that book!  I love Donald Miller!”  Brandon told me that he knew I would like it because I had already told him all of that…multiple times…

I have been anxious to start reading but busy with other books, however this morning’s service at The Ransom inspired me to go for it.  So I made my way to Coffea, hold up, I am gonna go order a drink.  Ok, back.  The guy who took my order was super sweet, I am borderline in love.  I always get a Soyia Miel (soy milk, chamomile tea, and honey) here but was craving something iced.  He told me that he has never turned it into an iced drink, but upon watching my face drop he said, “You know what?  Let’s try it!”  Then we both got really excited and started laughing as the other girls looked on enviously.  Ok, so no girls were watching, but whatever.  Anyway, I am super excited for this new concoction and, wow!  It is here!  That was fast.  It tastes amazing!  Ok, drop the “borderline”, I am officially in love.  J

Oh, back to the book.  So I am on the first chapter and a sentence that stood out to me was, “It makes me wonder if what we really want is control, not a relationship.”  Miller talked about having a “formula” with God and how this perverts who God is.  How people follow a set of rules and then expect God to answer their prayers.  He compared it to rubbing a genie’s lamp and making wishes.  If this is the case, then “what we really want from the formulas are the wishes, not God.”  How can we think that God is this simple?  He gave us free will, so who are we to make wishes and expect him to fulfill every single one of them?  This would put us in control of God if he chose to satisfy our every selfish want.

Rather, why not choose to be in relationship with Him?  I think that if we chose to take the time to get to know Him, our wishes would change.  They would be more in line with His will.  We would pray for guidance and thus have a clearer view of who we are and who we should strive to become.  Kind of a side note, but still related; I work front desk at a hotel.  “You need TWELVE extra blankets?!”  I hear stuff like this all the time and as hard as I try to remain professional and helpful, sometimes there is going to be an unhappy guest.  At times I get annoyed by needy or outrageous requests, but I am sure that this is nothing compared to the amount of requests that we give God.  Yet, He shows us patience.  He pursues us through our stubbornness and gently pries apart our clenched fingers from the control that we crave.