Not long after I graduated from high school, i found myself leading a college group at a large church outside Houston. I cherished the role, at first, because it was a place of  honor. I studied the Bible for hours, putting talks together that students enjoyed. It started as a substitute teaching job. The college minister couldn’t be there one week , so he asked me to fill in When i was ask to speak again, i jumped at the chance like Homer Simpson at a donut. Pretty soon I was teaching all the time. I swam in the attention and the praise, I loved it, I lusted for it, I almost drowned in it.

The more attention I got, the stranger I became. I was on my way to having my own religious television show. Okay, that’s a bit much, but you know what I mean. I was a smiler, a hand-shaker, a baby-kisser, a speech-giver. I said things like “God be with you,” and Lord bless you.” I used cliches like a bad novelist.

I led the college group for a couple of years and enjoyed it at first, but it wasnt long before I felt like a phony. I got tired of myself. I didn’t like to hear my own voice because i sounded like a talk-show host.

One afternoon i made an appointment with my pastor and told him i was leaving, that i was going into the world to get my thinking straight.

“How long will you be gone?” he asked.

“i don’t know.” I shrugged.

“are you okay?”

“i think so. Maybe,” i told him.

………

“can you tell me how you feel?”

“No. I’ve tried t put words to it, you know, but I can’t. I’m just really tired. Mentally drained. I feel like I am jumping through hoops or something. I don’t feel like God is teaching through me. I feel like I am a fake person, you know. I say what i need to say, do what i need to do, but i don’t really mean it.”

“what does the real you want to say and do?” he asked me.

………

“No. I don’t have any doubts about God or anything; its just me. I feel like I am constantly saying things i don’t mean. i tell people they should share their faith, but i don’t feel like sharing my faith. i tell people they should be in the Word, but i am only in the Word because i have to teach the Word. I said to a guy the other day, “God bless you.” What does that mean? i have been saying that stuff all my life, but what does that mean? then i started thinking about all the crap I say. All the cliches, all the parroted slogans. I have become an infomercial for God, and I don’t even use the product. I don’t want to be who i am anymore.”

“So you think you should go away,” he clarified.

………

“Because i can’t be here anymore. I don’t feel whole here. I feel, well, partly whole. Incomplete. Tired. It has nothing to do with this church; its’ all me. Something got crossed in the wires, and i became the person i should be and not the person i am. It feels like i should go back and get he person i am and bring him here to the person i should be. Are you following me at all? Do you know what i am talking about, about the green lumpy places?”

The conversation went on like this for about an hour. I went on and on about how the real me was out in the green lumpy places. I wasn’t making any sense. I can’t believe my pastor didn’t call the guys with the white coats to take me away.

——Blue Like Jazz, chapter 9.

this whole book is just so incredibly, REAL. i am hoping that by the end i still feel like that. because as of right now, i want to buy this book for every non christian i know. its just so, so, straightforward, and you can love the guy and appreciate his earnest search for God, without all the wishywashy terms and making sure he says it just right. and whats cool, is he really is covering EVERYTHING about the gospel.

there are a bunch of different things today, that are really lining things up for me. oh yes.