Donald Miller's Blog, page 70

Sunday Morning Sermon — What Would You Do With $25,000

When Ally and I were first married, and really poor, we loved to dream about what we would do if we had money.

I think we have all been there before. As you drive down the expressway and see the amount of money you could win if you got the lucky Powerball ticket, you begin to dream about what you would do with the money if it were right in front of you.

Money can be a tricky thing. Jesus warns us of how the love of money can keep us from the kingdom of God, while at the same time we know that that money can be a powerful tool for good.

What If I told you that I would give you $25,000 right now. What would you do with it? Would you use it to buy a new mini cooper, or would you do what this guy did and try to help someone in need? How we use our money says a lot about us. This is meant to be a tool of guilt or shame, but rather a tool to help us align our hearts and our checkbooks. If they are out of sync, we may need to adjust.

Think about this today: How could you have agency in your life with the things you have been given; and partner with God to save many lives?

Sunday Morning Sermon — What Would You Do With $25,000 is a post from: Storyline Blog

Saturday Morning Cereal: The Best of the Internet This Week

On the weekend we pour a little more cereal in your bowl. We hope you enjoy some reading from our regular contributors, some viral videos and other great finds from the internet. This is what we loved this week. Share your favorite articles and videos in the comments below.

The Best From Our Contributors

Making time for what matters by Allison Vesterfelt

You’ll Reap What You Sow by Pete Wilson

Why Buying Stuff Won’t Make You Happy (and One Thing That Might) by Joshua Becker

The Best From Around The Web

This Wednesday was the beginning of Lent. I didn’t grow up in a Christian tradition where we practiced Lent, but I have come to appreciate what it stands for. Here is a great guide for understanding Lent and some ideas of how you can participate in this season. My wife and I have a saying in our marriage: the journey is the reward. In other words, when you make a sacrifice, the reward you get is often not tangible but still valuable. I am choosing to believe that this Lenten season.

The Best Viral Videos We Found

Last week, the 100 year old BFFs won the majority vote. What about this week? Vote for your favorite below in the comments.

Saturday Morning Cereal: The Best of the Internet This Week is a post from: Storyline Blog

What Is Faith?

Jennifer Clinger is a survivor of trafficking, abuse, addiction, and about a million other things. She is also a teacher, a seeker, and a professional writer for Thistle Farms. I asked her what question she would want me to address in a blog for Don Miller. Here is a few of the more than a dozen questions she wrote back in about an hour:

“Is faith the beginning of something or the result of something? Is it more than believing in the unseen? Can you smell it? Is it in the bitter crisp air? Can you taste it? Is it a warm peppermint tea to soothe a sore throat? ​ ​Can you feel it? Is it a fearful courage to take a leap from a cold, ​ ​unclean, unholy heart into an unknown space and to believe that it will change the heart into something pure, lovely, warm and Holy? ​”

*Photo Credit: SodanieChea, Creative Commons

​Yes Jennifer, that is all faith, it is the beginning and the end, it is living into our ideals more than our doubts, it is doing the work even when we are uninspired, it is as practical as a healing tea and as tender as beating heart.

Yes, Jennifer, it is all the questions that swim in our heads and stir our longings.

​Jennifer’s words remind me that faith is a long series of questions that are not answered but resolved as we live our whole lives for the sake of love. Jennifer’s life is like witnessing what faith is.

Jennifer has taught me that faith is getting up in the morning with a prayer. It is letting our morality be grounded in gratitude so that we don’t mind stopping on the way to work to give someone a dollar who is out in the freezing cold. It is welcoming new people, even when you feel preoccupied from the personal stress of raising a family and trying to stretch dollars to meet the growing costs of living a sober life. It is being graceful with yourself when you get depressed for all the years you missed while you were in a drug fog and getting in touch with all the hurt from buried scars.

It is leaving work with a commitment to take care of our bodies, even as we feel the signs of aging in our bones. It is going to bed with an idea of what we need to do the next day and a prayer that we can lay down in peace.

Jennifer, you look like faith to me.

It’s in the way you curl your hair, the way you cross yourself when you pray, and in your laughter that comes as easily as your tears. I am not sure why I asked you to write me a question to answer for this blog.

I think I really just needed to be reminded of how faith is all around me if I can just pray to have the eyes to see it. Thank you Jennifer, for answering so many questions that I keep pretty well hidden from myself.

Today faith feels like a willingness to flow down the river that carries us to deeper truth rather than keep swimming as hard as I can against the current of my own doubts and worries about what it all means.

I feel faithful today.

What Is Faith? is a post from: Storyline Blog

Want to Make Better Decisions? Here’s a Mental Trick

HERE’S THE MENTAL TRICK: To make better decisions, imagine your life one year from now. From that perspective, look back on where you are now and think about how you wish you would have handled your current situation.

I was talking with a friend recently who was going through a tough breakup. He was angry, to be honest, because his girlfriend hadn’t been faithful.

It’s easy to get caught up in a moment like that. Our subconscious, squirrel brain takes over and we want to react, vent, seek vengeance, and basically trade pain for pain.

As I talked with my friend my advice was simple.

“A year from now,” I said, “when you’ve mostly healed from all this, and perhaps seeing somebody new, how will you have wanted to deal with your current situation?”

*photo: Oleh Slobodeniuk, Creative Commons

The question was sobering for my friend. He realized he was making all sorts of mistakes. He realized immediately he was reacting and his reactions were going to make things worse.

Humans have the unique ability to self reflect.

We are not like other animals, always being motivated by pre-programmed instincts. We have those, for sure, but we also have the ability to override them. And those who practice overriding their base instincts are considered wise.

Instead of reacting, we took out a tablet and wrote some words he could live out of for the next month or so. Words like strength, kindness, truth, forgiveness, resolution and so forth.

My friend realized a year from now, he would likely no longer be angry, but instead would feel sorry for his ex-girlfriend. She certainly had a lot of issues to work through and was in no shape to be in a healthy relationship.

It wasn’t easy, but my friend decided to live out of that wise, one-year removed place rather than in reaction. He was tempted to react, of course, but when tempted he returned to his notepad and read the descriptors, and every conversation he had with her, including e-mail and text messages, came from a place of strength and forgiveness and also resolution. He didn’t take her back, but he also didn’t seek vengeance.

Because of his strength, his ex realized she’d lost a great man.

And she grieved and made some changes. If my friend would have reacted like an animal, it’s doubtful she would have changed. She would have just felt like they were even, both hurting each other.

I know most of you aren’t going through a breakup, but what are you going through that could be helped by removing yourself from the situation ? My advice would be to imagine yourself a year from now and look back to ask how you’d do things differently. Get out a notepad and write down some words and maybe even a few phrases you can use in your interactions with key people and live out of that wise, one-year removed place.

Wisdom can see the present in hindsight. (tweet that)

We can all learn from each other. Even if you aren’t going through a breakup, what would you want to have done differently in this season of your life if you were looking back a year from now? Would you want to have finished a project, faced some conflict you were avoiding, been more devoted to a cause? Share what you’d want to have done differently in the comments section to stimulate more thought for the rest of us, would you?

Want to Make Better Decisions? Here’s a Mental Trick is a post from: Storyline Blog

The Most Underrated Sound in Our Society

A few months ago, my wife and I took our kids on a short weekend trip to the mountains. As we pulled out of our neighborhood and merged onto the four lane highway, we suddenly realized an important detail for the trip had not been accomplished.

Kim and I both assumed the other person was going to make the necessary arrangements. As a result, neither of us had accomplished the task. And now, the trip had already begun.

The problem would ultimately be fixed with a little extra time and money. But in the moment, our conversation abruptly ended. Tenseness ensued. And both of us stared silently out the windshield in disgust.

*photo: Partha, Creative Commons

After a few short minutes, one little voice called out from the backseat, “Umm, are you guys ever going to talk again?” Clearly, the silence had become unbearable.

I was reminded again how silence has become a difficult atmosphere in our society.

In our homes, we turn on our televisions. In our cars, we turn on the radio. When we exercise, we put on our headphones. Even when waiting in elevators or on hold with customer service, sound fills the void.

We have become uncomfortable with the presence of silence. We speak of “awkward silences” in a room full of people. We fear that brief moment when we meet someone new and aren’t quite sure what to say. And I remember being on countless dates growing up where any lapse in the conversation meant the entire relationship was doomed forever.

My family even pokes fun at me when I mute the television during commercials—as if the idea of sitting in quiet for 2 minutes is too long.

But in a world that becomes increasingly filled with noise, silence is even more important.

It is no secret we are bombarded everyday with countless messages.

Advertisements from every flat surface and frequency tell us what to watch, where to go, and what to purchase. Countless artists fill canvases, screens, and printed paper hoping to convince us of their worldview and beliefs. Political pundits from every aisle and experts from every imagineable field speak boldly about how we should think about the most important issues of our time.

Meanwhile, silence quietly calls for our attention. And only in extended periods of solitude, can we rediscover our hearts and the voice of God in our lives.

The benefits of silence and solitude in a noisy world are significant and life-giving. In quiet moments of reflection:

We remove the expectation and influence of others.

We hear our heart speak clearly.

We become more attune to the sound of God’s voice.

We find rest and refreshment.

We reflect on our past and chart our future.

We break the cycle of busyness in our lives.

We become better equipped to show patience and love to others.

While anyone can experience silence at any time by finding a quiet place to sit for an extended period of time, I have found solitude does not occur naturally in our noise-centered world. It must be intentionally pursued by each of us.

But for it to be pursued, it must first be valued and desired.

Be reminded of the importance of silence and solitude. Make its presence a habit in your life. You’ve got nothing to lose. And your whole life to gain back.

The Most Underrated Sound in Our Society is a post from: Storyline Blog

The Right Way to Praise Your Kids

Not long ago a study was released explaining kids are negatively affected when we tell them they’re good at something. It sounds crazy, I know, but the article said if we say to our kids they’re good musicians or good athletes, they feel an enormous amount of pressure to live up to the expectations we’ve unknowingly set. The study found kids are much better off if we say great job scoring that goal or you sounded really good in practice today.

The difference, the study suggested, is we’re praising what a kid did rather than praising his or her identity based on select criteria. In other words, when we say you’re a good musician what the kid hears is you only matter if you’re a good musician and you should fear losing that status but when we say you sounded great in practice today what the kid hears is you sounded great in practice today, nothing more and nothing less. Their identity has nothing to do with whether they’re a good musician or not.

*Photo Credit: Ivan McClellan Photography, Creative Commons

Most parents mean well, of course, but the article had a great point. When our identity gets tied up in success, we begin to fear failure or the loss of that status, and fearing failure is one of the reasons we begin to hide our real selves and project a false identity.

I could trace a similar dynamic through my own career.

My first book was reviewed decently but nobody told me I was a great writer so I didn’t feel much pressure writing a second book. After my second book came out, people were much more kind and I started believing, without realizing what was happening, that I had to measure up to their expectations. I didn’t want to let them down with my next effort. And so the time it took for me to write a book was longer and longer with each new project. My first book took a year to write, the second took a year and a half and now it takes four years or more for me to finish a book. Why? Because the pressure to measure up has compounded.

Where there’s much to lose, there’s much to fear. And I was paralyzed by the fear.

Once people start telling us we’re good at something we can feel it and we wrongly believe we have to produce something better or we’ll fade away. And this idea affects more than just our careers. Anybody who has built their identity on being beautiful is probably terrified to grow old or gain weight. Anybody who has built their identity on being rich might be afraid of losing money or status.

Anybody who controls people with power might be afraid of being seen as weak. (Tweet This)

Once we believe we matter based on certain conditions, we become a slave to those conditions.

The Right Way to Praise Your Kids is a post from: Storyline Blog

The Best of Storyline San Diego 2014 Day 1

There are a group of 1700 of us in San Diego this weekend for the Storyline Conference. We have heard from a great group of speakers, and we are all learning what it means to live a meaningful story. We didn’t want to leave the rest of you out, so we are sharing the best quotes from the conference.

To continue to follow along with what is happening at the conference, you can follow us on twitter at @Storyline, or check out the official conference hashtag #Storylineconf

The Best Quotes from Storyline San Diego Day One

“All heroes fail. Without failure there is no story” — @donaldmiller #storylineconf

— Storyline (@Storyline) February 28, 2014

I can't compel good pages of writing, but I can show up @randall_wallace @Storyline #StorylineConf

— Jenny Rain (@JennyRain) February 28, 2014

Many times our stories are swimming in an ocean of loss & pain and we need grace to throw us a life raft. —@MikeFoster #StorylineConf

— Storyline (@Storyline) February 28, 2014

When you come to the end of your dream and have nothing to show for it, you realize what matters is what you had all along. #storylineconf

— Allison Vesterfelt (@allyvest) March 1, 2014

"You don't get to experience the good parts of the story without the bad parts." — @JonAcuff #StorylineConf

— Storyline (@Storyline) February 28, 2014

Sometimes to stabilize and correct the wobbly parts of life, we need to hit the gas, not the brakes. – @donaldmiller #StorylineConf

— Jason Wood (@thejasonwood) March 1, 2014

Even before the fall of man, God gave Adam a job. @donaldmiller #storylineconf

— Paul Colligan (@colligan) March 1, 2014

Check This Out

Another exciting thing we have to announce is that we have partnered with the popular App called Over. Over is an amazing resource for you to put beautiful text over your photos. Don and the rest of the team at Storyline put together a list quotes around the theme of “Living a Better Story.”

You can download Over in your app store and create amazing images like the one below.

The Best of Storyline San Diego 2014 Day 1 is a post from: Storyline Blog

Why Being Alone Scares Me

This Friday night I had nothing to do. I waited for a text. From anyone. To do anything. None came. I waited for a call. None came. Couldn’t my mom even call me? Nope. I had nothing to do with anyone. I sat on my couch and tried to relax but my thoughts turned dark like they do when I’m suddenly aware of my alone-ness.

I begin to wonder if I have any friends. I start to count them and then find reasons that none of them are actually my friends. I mean, if I had friends, wouldn’t I have plans on a Friday night? I have no friends, I never have and never will. I wish I could say I’m exaggerating about my thoughts but I’m not. They actually go there. They actually get that dark and desperate.

*Photo Credit: Ivan McClellan Photography, Creative Commons

I’ve been this way ever since a “social life” becomes possible in middle school. I always had plans. Friday night, Saturday night—I wanted to be out with people and doing things and I didn’t want to come home until curfew, which I consistently broke. Having plans and being invited to things is what made me feel a part. I belonged if others thought to include me. Feeling lonely and being left out were barely tolerable for me in school and in college and even in the few years after college, when your social life can change so drastically that not having friends may actually be the reality and not an exaggeration.

My family teases me for being a social butterfly.

You wouldn’t think it if you met me. I’m on the quiet side, I can be shy, I’m not exactly the life of the party. But I am always at the party. And I’ve always felt more secure if I knew the right people that would get me to the party. And I’ve always felt hopeless if I didn’t. It comes down to one adolescent and sad thing, really: popularity.

I’ve come a very long way in my pursuits of popularity, but I relapse on occasion, like this past Friday night. I sink into the alone-ness and I forget why I feel alone. The reason is because I’m seeking acceptance from people around me in order to fill my acceptance void. And we all know what happens when we try to force people to fill our voids, right? We get let down, every single time. I’m holding others to too high a standard: “Include me always! Call me! Don’t forget about me! INVITE ME TO ALL OF YOUR PARTIES SO I CAN MEET MY QUOTA FOR THE MONTH.” I’m annoying myself even writing this.

For me, the only way to begin to move past this need for others’ inclusion, was to recognize the existing acceptance of God.

Romans 5:8 says, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” It is basic, Gospel truth, but without it, popularity would continue to determine my worth.

I know it’s not always helpful on a Friday night alone, sitting on your couch to remember that God loves you. It’s almost too big of a concept to be able to grasp and find comfort in in the moment.

That’s why this understanding of God’s acceptance must be a slow, conscious and consistent realization. (Tweet This)

You have to study it, pray about it and practice the awareness of it: “Rejoice always; pray without ceasing; examine everything carefully; hold fast to that which is good.” (1 Thessalonians 5:16,21). This is the stuff that equips you for the dark moments, making them a little less dark each time.

Why Being Alone Scares Me is a post from: Storyline Blog

How to Give Your Home and Your Stuff Meaning

A while back 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.

*Photo Credit: AMagill, Creative Commons

I don’t have a ranch. In fact, I only have a house with a small yard. But I don’t want it to be a place just for me. I want the stuff in the house 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 this 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. (tweet this)

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.

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 once heard Dallas Willard say that we have been asked to rule for God, under God. I loved that picture. I get to manage God’s house 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?

How to Give Your Home and Your Stuff Meaning is a post from: Storyline Blog

How I Discovered I Wasn’t The Victim in Conflicts

Conflict resolution has not come easily for me in the past.

I’ve always waffled back and forth between avoiding arguments completely, so as not to be perceived as pushy or controlling; or confronting conflicts after the situation has already escalated beyond a simple misunderstanding, which of course meant I had a hard time controlling my temper and would lash out unnecessarily.

It was always hard for me to remain level-headed and objective during an argument, which mean conflicts in my relationships were rarely solved.

To be honest, my relationships have really suffered from this tendency. At times I know my friends have wondered if I’m the kind of person who is willing to have hard conversations. Other times, especially with those who know me best, I’ve gained a reputation for losing my cool during arguments, yelling and saying things I regret later—in the name of “just stating my opinion.”

A few years ago, I decided I really wanted this to change.

I was noticing that my relationships tended to either stay pretty shallow, or to dissolve into tension and fighting and then just disappear altogether. The other thing I noticed was that I would often lose myself in relationships. Because I overlooked problems more than I tried to fix them, eventually I would just find that the other person in the relationship didn’t know me that well.

*Photo Credit: Oleh Slobodeniuk, Creative Commons

Both in friendships and in romantic relationships, I never felt like anyone knew me or cared about me that much; and I saw a strong connection between this feeling and my inability to handle conflict.

So I decided to start intentionally learning how to deal with conflict.

I read a bunch of books, and spent some time talking with a few trusted people in my life, including my dad who is a clinical psychologist. I learned some good strategies for resolving conflict without fighting, but one has proved particularly effective in all kinds of situations. This advice, from my dad, goes like this:

Relationships are like mirrors. They reflect ourselves back to us. So, whatever you are feeling in a relationship, chances are the other person is feeling it too. In other words, if you feel angry at your husband, chances are he feels angry, too. If you feel ignored by a friend, chances are he or she feels ignored, too.

They might feel what they feel for different reasons than you, but the feeling is the same.

The beauty of this understanding is that it helps us see the two-sidedness of conflict.

Typically we think of conflict as fairly one-sided. Conflict comes because one person does something bad (the villain), and then other person gets hurt (the victim)—right? Not really. Conflict is usually much more complex and layered than the simple cause-effect way we think about it. But when our feelings get hurt, or when we’re angry, it’s so easy to believe we are the victim in the circumstances and the other person is the villain.

Suddenly, when we discover we have a mirror, we see sides of the conflict which would have otherwise been out of our sight.

Here’s an example of how the reflection principal might work to help you solve a conflict.

The other morning my husband and I were rushing around the house to leave for our morning commute. We share a car, and both often have meetings at different places in town, so we always have to be pretty flexible to make sure we both get where we need to go. The other day, as we were leaving, he asked me to “please hurry” in a tone that felt harsh and unnecessary.

In the past, I would have either 1) ignored the comment and secretly congratulated myself for “rising above it,” but later felt resentful; or 2) snapped back at him with something like, “how dare you talk to me like that!”

Instead, this time, I did something different.

I thought to myself: That comment really hurt my feelings. I wonder if I did or said something to hurt his feelings. So I asked him: “Did I do something to hurt your feelings?” Immediately, his demeanor changed. His face softened, and he admitted, yes, that he felt like I wasn’t taking seriously how much he was in a hurry that morning. We both apologized, and moved on.

And then we congratulated ourselves because, what could have turned into a fight for power or a silent reason to feel bitter, ended in resolution.

There was no animosity. No hidden agendas. No posturing. And no silent sulking.

We fixed the problem before it became a problem.

Of course, this is all easier said than done. The reflection principal, like anything, takes some practice to begin to understand, and you have to be careful not to assume you know exactly what the other person is feeling. But it’s been really helpful for me as I learn to become better at solving conflicts. My friendships are deeper and more satisfying. My marriage is stronger.

I’m far less afraid to confront conflicts and am far better at speaking my mind without exploding.

I’m taking one day at a time.

How I Discovered I Wasn’t The Victim in Conflicts is a post from: Storyline Blog