Blue Like Jazz...Beginning...

So I started Blue Like Jazz for the second time, and this time I’m going to write some stuff as I go…thoughts…ideas…heart-felt movements…You know, the good stuff, just being real and going from deep inside…Any one who has read the book and feels a need to correct or comment on me, please do so, as I am no genius… :)
At the beginning, the author, Don Miller, is mostly giving an overview of the first twelve or so years of his life, how in childhood God was more the boss of things like commandments and strict about things, instead of someone you could relate to and talk with. Miller then goes into how religion is something you can hide behind, something that waters down what really is going on. The feeling of having to redeem yourself keeps nagging at you…Anyone can walk around inside religion and miss the fact that God is a person, a Being with thoughts and feelings. It waters Him down to an idea. The term Miller uses for God like that is a slot machine, a “set of spinning images that dolled out rewards based on behavior and perhaps, chance.” This God will provide relief for immediate guilt and a sense of hope that your life will get organized. This pretty much is me most of the time. I simply pray for forgiveness, thinking it will all work out and the slot machine will spill out tokens of goodness. Miller says this is more like superstition than spirituality. What happens is that every time a good thing happens, it’s God, and every time a bad thing happens, you kneel in prayer, pulling the lever again. It’s really easy actually, because you never have to talk to this God and it won’t talk back…“But the fun never lasts.”