Donald Miller's Blog, page 135

An Update on Making History! Blue Like Jazz the Movie Presses on…

Once again, we are beyond grateful for your contribution to save Blue Like Jazz, the movie. It's done. The movie is saved, and we are moving forward! Steve is busy calling all donors to thank them, along with choosing the supporting cast and lining up production. We will start filming on October 28th, in Nashville, TN. We will likely also film in Portland, Houston and Los Angeles. If you've donated, you will be on an exclusive, behind-the-scenes e-mail newsletter that tells you where we will be and when, along with constant updates about how things are going. You will truly be in the production loop, along with all the principal cast and crew.

If it weren't for your contributions, the movie would have been dead. It's amazing to think what can be done in two weeks.

That said, we are still a very low-budget movie. None of the principals who have been involved with this movie, from the very beginning of the writing stages, have been paid anything. We are rolling everything into the film with you. In the industry, it's called "putting the money on the screen." With our film, the more money we bring in, the more well-known talent we will be able to hire, and the more the crew will be able to be paid (people are discounting their services left and right to help us out.)

What's more, the attention the campaign has received has brought much more than financial contributions. People are donating equipment and locations because they've heard about the campaign. And the larger the campaign gets, the more likely people are to join in the production process.

In the near future, we will be letting you know what we could use from you in the way of extras. I know Steve already needs a lot of 18 – 26 year old college-like students dressed as robots at one location in Nashville. It's stuff like that that we will use this blog to keep us all on the same page. How cool would it be to actually be in the movie?

And so, we continue to need your help. If the amount of donations top $200k, (and some change) we will be the largest project ever funded on kickstarter. While there have been other movies that have used crowd sourcing, we can solidly say this will be the first full-length theatrical release ever crowd sourced in America. It doesn't sound like much, but it's the sort of thing that gets written up in Variety. This movie went from dead to front-page news overnight, because of you.

If you've not donated yet, there are some really great incentives to do so. A donation of only $10 gets you a digital download package that includes wallpaper, a ten-page sample from the shooting script, a digital movie poster and a few more things we intend to throw into the grab bag. No matter what you donate, as long as you donate more than $10, it's all yours. And the incentives go up from there. For $25, you get our movie poster, signed by both me and Steve Taylor, the director. Donations of $50 get you a t-shirt, along with the digital download, and a $100 gets you listed in the credits as an Associate Producer. For $200, I'll be recording your personal voicemail message, and for a donation of $300, you get to come to a huge party in which we will watch the movie at a theater here in Portland. That's going to be one heck of a celebration, I assure you! We already have 11 backers who have donated $1,000 and so will be included as extras in the movie. No looking at the camera! And 2 more of you donated $3,000 and will be invited to a dinner with me and Steve. I'll be waiting the table, no doubt. And there are even more incentives on top of all that.

But the real incentive is that when the movie comes out, and you're sitting there in the theater with your friend, you get to tell them you saved it, and you caused it to make history.

On a personal note, I want to thank my Mom for pitching in $100, and Marshall Allman's mom, too. We've heard from so many friends and family who have contributed. I'm reminding myself each day that this is a once-in-a lifetime experience, and to soak it in and write down everything I'll want to remember later. The story behind the story continues to be just as great as the story itself. I can only imagine the magic that is yet to come.

For those of you who have contributed, thanks. We have a special treat coming to all of you on this blog all week. Follow me on twitter (@donmilleris) and you'll be notified. Pretty fun stuff.

Take some time and donate today!

And now, some frequently asked questions with our director, Steve Taylor:

Ask The Director (FAQs):

Why are you still raising money? Didn't we reach the goal?

- When the Kickstarter idea was pitched to me by Zach and Jonathan, they asked me how much we needed. I gave them the absolute minimum amount to turn our screenplay into a low budget indie movie. They suggested we set the Kickstarter goal higher – at $200K. I checked the site and decided that would be impossible, since it had never been done before – the biggest raise I could find on Kickstarter for a movie was $50K. Oops! Oh me of little faith… I've since asked forgiveness from God, Zach, Jonathan and Don; in that order.

Where will the additional money go?

- Where to start? Cast (we'd like to get a few more "name" actors)! Extra shoot days! Music licensing! A better sound mix! Did I mention that movies are expensive?

What are you guys getting paid to make this movie?

- I'm completely in favor of the concept of getting paid money for four years of work. But in order to "get the money on the screen," Don and I have deferred any payment until after the movie has paid back its investors and turned a profit.

Shouldn't the money we've donated to Kickstarter be considered an investment?

- I hear you, but rules are rules, and Kickstarter's are very specific: Investment and loan solicitations are forbidden, as are lotteries, raffles, and sweepstakes.

Isn't there a way that all of the funding and good will generated by the Save Blue Like Jazz campaign can benefit something besides the movie?

- We've talked about that at length since we surpassed our goal, and here's what we've come up with:

1) We like that idea!

2) We've all agreed that 10% of the movie's profits should go to a worthy non-profit organization. But we don't want to be the ones to decide where it goes. So…

3) When the campaign ends on October 25th, we're going to notify all of our thousands of Kickstarter backers and give you a list of recommended non-profits to choose from. Then you'll VOTE on where the money goes. (And If it's a close call between a handful of orgs, we'll figure out a way to split it up between them.)

Is there a way to help besides donating money?

- Yes!

1) Pray for us. Often.

2) Spread the word.

3) As we get closer to the beginning of the shoot, we'll have more opportunities to get involved. (Who knows – we may even throw a party or two and invite all of you who are making this movie happen…)

Sunday Morning Music, The Weepies

It's been a while since I've created a Sunday Morning Music spotlight, but driving toward town yesterday I saw The Weepies on the billboard at The Aladdin in Portland. Just bought my tickets this morning. I see a lot of bands on that billboard, but that's the fastest I've picked up tickets. I don't want to miss them.

If you're not familiar with The Weepies as a band, there's a good chance you've heard their music anyway. The married couple stopped touring in 2008 when their son was born, but their music was all over television and the Obama campaign even picked up one of their songs for an ad, growing their underground following. As songrwriters, they seem more interested in creating a soundtrack to their pleasant, simple life than in becoming famous. Their commitment to stay off the road for two years is proof of this, and that simplicity and disinterest in things show-business plays out in their songs. It's sunday morning music. Here are The Weepies.

How to Give Your Home and Your Stuff Meaning

This past week a friend hosted several pastors and I for a hunting trip on His ranch in Central Oregon. We were there for a few days, but while we were there our friend treated us like Kings. He guided us up and down the mountains, making sure each of us got a buck. He and his team paddled us across the lakes on his property, making sure each of us caught a trout. All the while, he never fired a shot or put a hook in the water. One early morning while watching the sunrise from on top of a hill, scouting for deer, he mentioned he'd only shot at one buck the entire time he owned the ranch. He simply said I like guiding more than hunting. It's more fun.

The experience got me thinking, once again, about how Jesus told us He'd gone to prepare a place for us, a place where we could some day be together. I imagine Jesus preparing a place for my friend, a place for Him to hunt, to cultivate land, to entertain friends. Jesus is creating an existence, a material place for wonderful things to happen.  It made me think about how cool it was that my friend, in preparing a ranch for others to be together and to be with God, was imitating the heart of God without, perhaps, even realizing he was doing it. As he planned his ranch, his lakes and ponds and fields for deer and elk to graze, he wasn't thinking about himself, he was thinking about others.

I don't have a ranch. In fact, I only have a small condo. But I don't want it to be a place just for me. I want the stuff in the condo and the food in the pantry and the furniture in the guest room to be for others. I've been able to do a little of that in the last year, convert my home into an imitation of God's place, and in so doing, I've discovered a little secret my friend with the ranch must have discovered a long time ago: Managing God's stuff for the enjoyment and comfort of the people God loves is a blast. It gives meaning to your things, and a feeling of importance to the places you get to live within.

My friend with the ranch has a simple home outside Portland, but it's a home with a barn attached, and he's built another barn, not for himself, but so he and his wife can host weddings and events for youth groups. How much better would our homes feel if the living room were the place where that pastor and his family from Eastern Europe came and shared a meal and interacted with our neighbors, or the yard was the place where the soccer team from the school across the street had their barbecue? Our homes would be charged with meaning and character and, well, life! Our entertainment center wasn't designed so we could watch movies, but so neighbors could come together and watch football while we serve them hamburgers. What if we managed our homes like little meeting places God used to bring people together?

I heard Dallas Willard say recently that we have been asked to rule for God, under God. I loved that picture. I get to manage God's condo for God, according to the desire of His heart, that many lives would be saved, enriched with meaning and special moments and community.

What are the things you've done to convert your home into God's home, a place you get to manage for Him?

YOU DID IT!!!

Unbelievably, you saved Blue Like Jazz! Incredible. I went to the Save Blue Like Jazz website and Jonathan and Zach, our fearless rescuers had posted a terrific thank you video. Just some clapping and dancing, but it pretty much sums up how we are all feeling! I'll blog more about all of this soon, but for now, raise your glasses friends, because WE ARE MAKING A MOVIE!

We did it! from Save Blue Like Jazz on Vimeo.

Steve and I talked tonight and are figuring out our plan on how to make a return on your investment go to a non-profit. Essentially, the money you made would be returned to help somebody else, plus some interest as an investment. So the story may just be getting started. We are making the movie, and if the donations keep coming, we may make history. Unbelievable. Thanks for all your support. We are busy making calls to thank people, but there are hundreds of you, so give us some time and grace.

Grateful,

Don Miller

You are Changing Everything, Right Before Our Eyes…

Artist's Rendering of Quad Scene From Blue Like Jazz Movie

Last week about 500 people came to Portland for our first Storyline Conference, a conference for people who want to tell stories rather than simply consume them. I was amazed by our time together, but at the same time, I was coming off of a four-year failure, and while you always have stories that don't work, this one hurt.

Four years before, Steve Taylor, Ben Pearson and I started writing the screenplay for Blue Like Jazz. We decided to make a movie that obeyed a story rather than a message, and the story was about a kid transitioning out of a faith that had all the supposed right answers, to a faith that stayed with him through the confusion and the doubt. He's an arrogant kid at the beginning, willing to walk way from the "hypocrites" all around him, but after some very hard things happen, he's humbled, and has to reconsider his own motives.

A page from the script (click to read)

That said, it's not the typical story arc of a "Christian" movie. To be honest, I have a lot of respect for Christian film. The evangelical church is a subculture, and despite most people thinking I have a problem with it, I honestly don't. A subculture that protects families and marriages, that loves God, that does more work for justice around the world than any other institution, is a perfectly fine subculture with me. But it's not a subculture where a lot of us find a home. We just don't fit. And this movie is a movie for people who identify with the faith of the church, but our questions and our journey doesn't seem as clean or neat.

But movies are very expensive to make. A low-budget movie costs about 2 million to create. And we started raising money. And a year went by and we didn't have the funds. Then another year. We'd hear over and over that we should have the money next month, next quarter, and Steve would start lining up the production teams, even telling people not to take other work because our film would be in production. But it all fell through. Time and time again, it fell through. So when it was more than obvious we weren't going to make the film yet another season, I wrote a blog that announced the movie was dead. We'd tried for years and it was time to quit.

Director Steve Taylor, Practicing a Mime?

I was feeling gloomy about the story of the story. I wrote that blog and moved on to the conference, switching my focus, pulling half-nighters on another project I found equally as exciting. I even told Steve that we'd told a terrific story in the screenplay, and we'd told a terrific story in the writing of the movie, but our story of raising funds wasn't great. We'd told it without heart, without finding people who understood and identified with the plight of the characters. While we found a few terrific investors, their money and support were not enough.

People who invest in Christian movies want the movie to tow a kind-of party line: A character who is really screwed up battling demons is helped by a message he hears at church and turns his life around. That wasn't our movie. In fact, our movie was nearly the opposite: A kid who gets really turned around by the hypocrisy he sees associated with his faith walks way and finds it again in a place he'd never expect to encounter God, proving that God lives outside our systems and structure, that He lives where justice and the saving of lives is taking place.

Artist's Rendering of Scene from Blue Like Jazz Movie

So right before the conference, a couple guys in Nashville (Jonathan Frazier and Zach Prichard ) launched a campaign to save the film. You can learn more about it here. This happened literally while we were at the conference, while I was on stage. Jonathan was even at the conference, attending. They launched a Kickstarter campaign, and to our amazement, within a few days, had raised more than fifty-thousand dollars. If we got to $125k, we'd be able to shoot the film on a shoestring budget, everybody lending their resources either for free or well below market value until we got the film done and returned funds to our investors. Nearly everybody on board would either be a volunteer or working on the cheap, but we could get it done.

And now, only days after pronouncing the film dead, it is very much alive. We may just raise the money and make this movie, and the investors will not be a few people who "get it" but hundreds and perhaps thousands who donate because they want their story told in a film. The investors who didn't think you existed are now convinced that you do.

But that's not even the coolest part of the story. The coolest part of the story is, just after telling Steve "our fundraising story wasn't very good," God orchestrated the best story possible; a miracle, last-minute effort pushed by thousands of people, making this not only a film that says you exist, but a film that makes history. It will be the first crowd-sourced theatrical release of its kind, and if the Kickstarter campaign goes over 200k (and some change), it will be the largest crowd-sourced project ever. It's the kind of stuff that leads the national news.

It's Saturday (I'll post this on Monday morning) and football is on television and I'm sitting at my computer, reading pages from the four-year old screenplay that we've edited and gone over a thousand times, laughing at scenes and wiping tears away at others, and while I think our screenplay is great, I have to confess it's not as great as the story you are currently telling about raising money for the film. You are living proof that the telling of the story is even more fun than the story itself, that it's better to produce than consume.

A page from the script (click to read)

At one point earlier this year, I wondered whether God didn't want this movie to be made. I told God, look, it's your movie, and if you don't want it to be made, just kill it. I thought He had, and we were all confused but had to let it go. But what has happened since is a God-sized miracle, and speaks more to the beauty of our community and it's heart than a thousand stories told on a movie screen. Everything changes after this. People will know they can be honest, they can tell the truth, they are safe living their own story rather than conforming to a "role" that has been written for them.

All that to say, thank you. I am having a shirt printed that says "thank you" and I intend to wear it everywhere I go (Maybe I will get a few so they don't smell) because I just can't say it enough. Thank you. Thank you thank you thank you. Thank you. Thank. You.

We aren't there yet. As I write this, we have a long way to go. At $125k we can shoot the movie, as long as none of us order a coke or break a lightbulb. At $200k, we make world history. If we get anything over $200k, everybody in Hollywood will wake up and read about us in Variety, and wonder what in the world this Blue Like Jazz Movie is about, and who in the world are the thousands who grouped together to make it happen. They will no doubt follow our lead. How's that for a story, Hollywood following our lead for a change?

Every small donation helps. If you can, give $25 or even $10, we move an inch closer. You only get charged if we make it to $125k. But when this movie hits theaters, and I hope it does, you'll know you took part in history, that you made this film, that you told the world a story, and the world watched because it was a story told with heart and risk and without cynicism.

What we could not do alone, we are doing together. There's a story in there somewhere.

To learn more about what Jonathan and Zach have done, along with thousands of others, please visit their site. www.savebluelikejazz.com.

Here are some practical ways you can help:

1. Donate if you haven't. There are plenty of terrific incentives that are lots of fun. You could even get your name in the credits.

2. Tweet about the campaign. And tell your friends in person.

3. Share about the campaign on your blog or on facebook.

4. Pray and ask God to be with us, to make something meaningful and beautiful happen on set, just as it has behind the scenes. Pray for our lead, and for Steve Taylor, our fearless leader and director. Pray for a great story.

Thanks again. I'll keep you posted as we move forward.

Sincerely,

Don

P.S. BECAUSE I WILL BE TRAVELING IN CENTRAL OREGON I WON'T HAVE PHONE OR INTERNET AND WON'T BE ABLE TO MODERATE COMMENTS. I'LL GET RIGHT TO IT ON WEDNESDAY NIGHT! THANKS!!

FAQ's From Zach and Jonathan (taken from the Kickstarter page.)

What happens if the money isn't raised in time?

Unfortunately nothing. If our goal isn't met before the deadline, no money changes hands and no movie is made. We want to avoid this scenario at all cost!

Can we exceed the goal?

YES! What an amazing problem to have. Kickstarter will allow as much money as is given before the deadline. Maybe that would mean a more widespread theater release, or more unique physical copy packaging. The possibilities are endless.

How do we contact you?

Glad you asked! You can contact us directly at savebluelikejazz@gmail.com. We check it. We will get back to you. We promise!

Is Save Blue Like Jazz a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization?

Unfortunately neither this movement nor Blue Like Jazz is set up as a non-profit. Donations are raw gifts. Non-tax deductible.

If I donate, when can I redeem the incentive?

All incentives, big and small, will only happen if our goal is met. If we do meet our goal, immediately after our deadline we will start to manufacture and ship all physical merch directly to you. It will be our priority to schedule the more personal incentives as soon as possible. You will hear from us. (More on this as we get closer to our dealine)

Who does the money go to?

Every penny (minus the fees for Kickstarter's involvement) will go directly to Director Steve Taylor's movie budget – i.e. Your money goes directly to the funding of this film.

$125,000 seems like a low number for a movie budget. Doesn't it?

You are correct. Fortunately, there are still very important investors involved in this film. The $125,000 figure is the remaining balance of a larger total budget. Our goal is imperative for the film to be a reality.

Any other questions? Just ask us. We'd be stoked to answer them. savebluelikejazz@gmail.com

– Zach Prichard + Jonathan Frazier –

Storyline, An Open Letter to Attendeees!

All of us involved in the conference are so grateful you came to Portland, and are even more grateful you are choosing to tell stories to the world rather than simply consume them. One thing I wasn't expecting is to meet so many people who were in such very difficult places, still in very real pain, and yet trying to figure out how to give back to the world. I was blown away by that.

The best part of the conference was meeting and talking with all the people we'd been praying for for months. It was surreal for us. Processing our first Storyline Conference has been interesting. There are things I love about the conference, the fact that even with 500 people in the room it felt intimate, and the fact that we got to hang out in places other than the Armory. I am already wondering how we duplicate those dynamics for our next event.

We live in a world of open dialogue and I'd love your help. As I process, though, I also know the notebook needs to be made more robust, and the points need to be more clear. In addition, the story examples I use need to be more diverse. The end goal is to inspire people and equip them to live great stories, and so we want to keep getting better and better at that. We need to talk more about how some stories don't work, and what to do when they don't. And there needs to be much more about how it is we share agency with God when we tell our stories, and what that interaction actually looks like. As a theorist, my liability is making things practical, and while I overcame some of that in the workbook, a Grinder or Keeper would contribute a great deal more, so I will be think-tanking with them to make the tools better and better.

Lori is doing well. She's still in Oregon but goes back to Denver soon. We will be working with her closely to help her get organized and Live a Better Story. But I also told her today, that lots of stories don't work out. Most screenplays never get made, most books never get published. That's just part of the process. You keep writing, you get up every day and you keep putting something on the plot, and if it doesn't work, you start another story. In my life, about half the major stories work out. That was a point in my notes, but I rushed over it because I was running behind.

Talking to Lori today on the phone helped me understand, once again, how important each of our stories, and by that I mean our lives, actually are. Our lives set the moral compass of the people around us. If it weren't for some of the stories my friends are telling with their lives, I'd have no guidelines for my own, no moral or creative reference with which to tell my story to God and to the world. I know that our stories matter, and if they didn't, God wouldn't have placed us into the epic.

I am so grateful for you and I can't wait to hear your stories.

We are doing Storyline again, on January 23rd and 24th, and we are hoping to make it better. Would you mind telling us what you got out of it, what was helpful, and what would could do to be even more helpful? It's terrifying putting all this online, because the natural tendency is to focus on the negative, and the feedback we got so far is overwhelmingly positive, but at the same time, we want to make the tools better and better to give real-life storytellers more and more to "live" about….

Here are very specific questions we need answers to. It would help a great deal to know:

1. Which tools in the notebook were most helpful?

2. How could the notebook be a better take-home tool to process the conference?

3. What points needed more emphasis?

4. What points were not helpful to you?

5. What ideas were confusing?

6. What was the most inspirational?

7. What was the most practical and applicable?

8. What would have made the experience better?

9. What made the experience good?

Feel free to add your own questions and of course your own answers. These are the questions we are starting to ask ourselves as we prepare for January!

Thanks so much!

Don

P.S. BECAUSE I HAD A TRIP TO CENTRAL OREGON PlANNED, I WON'T BE ABLE TO MODERATE COMMENTS…BUT BELIEVE ME, WE ARE READING THEM AND TAKING NOTES! THANKS FOR YOUR INPUT!!!

Fundraising Update: Creating History

The writing of the book was a fun story. The book itself, I hope, was a fun story. The writing of the movie was a fun story. But the fundraising effort is not just another story: It's world history. As we speak, enough small donations are coming in, one at a time, to fund a full-length feature film. And at the pace the campaign is moving, it will be the largest project ever funded on Kickstarter.com, and certainly the most people who have ever donated to fund a film. It's a news story worthy of any news outlet on television. And we are watching it happen live.

So many investors didn't think you existed. Christians who wanted to be open and honest about their struggles, about their pasts, about their lives. It's simply amazing. The world will know you exist, not just because of the movie, but because of the incredible story of getting this movie made.

Steve and I are beside ourselves. We just don't know what to say. Thank you is not enough.

Blue Like Jazz gets Saved?

Ever seen something come back to life? I hear it's happened before, but I've honestly never seen it myself. Until now, perhaps. Last week I blogged about the death of Blue Like Jazz the Movie, and Steve Taylor, Ben Pearson and I were encouraged by the outpouring of grief. If misery loves company, we had plenty of company. Honestly, that really meant a lot. When you are letting a dream go you can't help but feel like a bit of a failure. And yet there was some talk about crowd sourcing, about raising money amongst thousands. To be honest, it's not something I'd really heard about, but a couple guys in Nashville decided to take matters into their own hands and see if they could make something happen. The rest of the story is, well, amazing.

Zach Prichard and Jonathan Frazier read the book years ago and had been looking forward to seeing the movie some day. When they read my blog, they got together with a friend of mine, Randy Williams, and began talking about starting some ground-swell support. They pulled a few half-nighters and launched an incredible campaign on Kickstarter complete with a film, a twitter identity and a bunch of other social networking tools. They interacted with Steve Taylor and I to come up with some incentives for potential investors and they launched the campaign. And almost immediately we had 10% of the funds raised, and it's climbed much higher than that now, only two days into the campaign. Steve and I talked today and he was giddy. He was more excited than I'd known him to be since we first started writing the screenplay.

And the news has already spread. It was even covered by a local Nashville television station. Simply amazing.

So, if you want to know more about what we are all trying to do, please visit: www.savebluelikejazz.com. You can also get a twibbon and share about the campaign on facebook and tell your friends on twitter, too. There's an outside shot the movie is not dead. And if we can bring it back to life, this movie will show the world that people like us really do exist! Jonathan, Zach and Randy, thank you thank you thank you…and to the hundreds who have already donated to the cause…I'm a writer without words.

Don't Ask, Don't Tell the Church

Don't ask don't tell is  an attractive philosophy about homosexuality for the church in America, which is why so many Christians favor the policy in the military. But I don't want to talk about the military, I want to talk about the church.

Homosexuality is a closet issue in the evangelical church. With the fall of Ted Haggard, and now the accusations against Bishop Eddie Long (as I write this, a week before it will post, 4 men have accused Bishop Long of sexual misconduct, and he has denied those accusations while he is stepping down from his position.)

What is so striking about the Bishop Long and Ted Haggard connection is their strong stand against homosexuality from the pulpit. When I saw the movie Jesus Camp (I'd not heard of Ted Haggard before the movie which came out right before the scandal) I thought to myself, that guy sounds like he is covering something up. I don't know very many straight, sexually healthy men who talk about having sex with their wives or brag about their sexual prowess. Straight men just have sex, they don't intentionally project a straight image so people will know they are straight.

That's not to say every pastor who comes out against homosexuality is a homosexual. That simply isn't the case. But I've always spoken my mind on this blog, and when a pastor seems preoccupied with talking about his own sex life and making sure everybody around him knows he only likes women, I can't be the only one thinking I wonder if that guy's gay?

As the Catholic church deals with it's own deplorable sex scandal and does so, in my opinion, in a deplorable, coverup, secretive, non-helpful, the-image-of-the-church-matters-more-than-the-hearts-of-it's-people way, evangelicals are on the heels of a sex scandal of their own. And the primary problem is, well, our don't ask don't tell policy. In other words, pastors can't talk about it, and when they get caught, they have to deny it, and why, well, because if they don't, they will be obliterated in their communities. But who's fault is that? Is it ours, or theirs?

In my opinion, the reason Christians become marginalized for being open about their homosexuality is because of people like, well, Ted Haggard and Eddie Long. And not because both men have been accused of being gay. It's because both men actually created the attitude that judges them in the first place.

Both men, perhaps acting out of insecurity and self deception, trained the mobs that attacked them. They are the ones who brought a black-and-white, judgmental attitude about the issue to the table, and then got cut on the knife they sharpened.

I heard Ted Haggard speak at a conference in Austin two years ago, and he got a round of applause when he took a stab at his staff back in Colorado, saying he only did one thing wrong, and they wouldn't show him grace. Mr. Haggard, with all due respect, buying drugs from a prostitute and having sex with him while leading the nation in a stand against homosexuality and also being married yourself is not one little thing, and also with due respect, that no-grace attitude amongst your staff came into existence under your leadership. You taught them to think that way. If you would have taught them grace, they would have shown you grace. Who exactly was their leader in the first place?

Would Ted Haggard and Eddie Long have been open about their struggles from the beginning, if they would not have adopted a "don't ask don't tell" policy, neither man would be in as much public dismay today. Instead, Haggard rallied against gay marriage. Eddie Long continues to deny the allegations from the four, unrelated young men, and recently led a march against same-sex marriage.

After getting caught, Ted Haggard opened up about his past. He was sexually abused as a child. He was molested. And in an evangelical environment, having his power, his financial security and his relational security hinged on his heterosexuality, he covered his his many issues. I feel for him. But at the same time, he did not do the bold thing. The bold thing would have been to be open and to get help and to lead his congregation through their own secret sins and public grace.

The lessons: Got a struggle? Talk about it. If people condemn you, move on to actual followers of Jesus who will not. If you are gay, stop acting like you are not (Ted Haggard, after having sex with a prostitute, denying it, then coming clean, then being accused of making sexual advances with a student at his church, now publicly denies being gay. Really? And nobody is looking him in the eye and telling him he's full of it, and telling him he's perfectly safe telling the obvious truth?)

If you have misunderstood me, please don't. This is not a rant against Eddie Long or Ted Haggard regarding homosexuality, it's a rant against rampant hypocrisy and outright deception. It's a rant against the "stick your head in the ground and pretend the world is black and white" mentality adopted by the church. It's a rant against letting a jury of peers so fill you with fear that you lie to them to gain their approval, rather than proving the grace and love of Christ by living out the truth, the opinion of the jury (which has no real agency) be damned.

For Those of You Coming to Portland, Welcome

It looks like the weather is going to warm up and stay dry for the Storyline Conference (see below about the name change) this Sunday and Monday. We can't wait. We've been working for months on this, and it is by far the most preparation we've put into any event. Here are some things to expect:

1. Registration begins at 5 on Sunday. There's a matinee of Sunset Boulevard in the theater, so we will be doing a changeover on the stage as registration takes place. The lobby is large and there's an ...