I want to build a tree.
A tree that will remind the world that great things happen with a little vision and a whole lot of commitment.
A tree that will awaken an entire city to the creativity that lies within it.
A tree that will unite friends and strangers to light the world.

I live in Orlando, FL where I’ve been the Creative Director at a church for the last four years. It’s been an incredible journey alongside a true family who is willing to step out in faith and try just about anything. Out of those relationships of freedom have been birthed countless expressions of individual and collective creativity and a new depth in the mystery of God.

And as we’ve seen more of God, there’s been this stirring to shape culture in our city.
Not the easy kind of shaping where we walk around, point out the broken things and ridicule it for what it is.
No. We want the creative kind. The God kind. The beautiful moments where – just like God – we look into the void and speak into existence that which was meant to be.

So, a few weeks ago, I sent out an email to several friends, sharing with them some of my ideas, and inviting them to help me imagine how we can create culture in this vacant, forgotten space at the intersection of two main thoroughfares in the heart of downtown Orlando.

There, in the responses – among the dozens of illustrations, diagrams and written descriptions – was my friend, Josh’s, “Tree of Light.”

Late, one Saturday night in September, the tree will be constructed from planks of wood.  Dozens of lights with on/off pull cords will be hung from the branches of the tree.  And a simple invitation to passersby to “Turn on the light” will be projected on the walls of the surrounding buildings.

And the tree is just the beginning.  Over the following weeks and months, we’ll bring to life the dozens of other interactive art installations that have come from our collaboration.  Some of them, with an overt theme.  Others, simply existing for the sake of art and beauty.  But always, we will be in that space contributing to the picture of culture and beauty and life and truth in our city.

It’s not the “Four Spiritual Laws” written in a small booklet.  But, maybe the things we’ll make and the conversations we’ll have will be a glimpse of the enormous heart of God.

And sure, maybe there will be some bumps along the way – permission to use the space, getting people engaged, money and resources to bring it all to life and maybe some relational conflict.  But all that is easily overcome in the light of vision.

So this is a better story for me because I’m ready to help Orlando awaken to the creativity that lies in the hearts of its people.  I’m ready to help the world remember that Jesus wasn’t about yelling at the adulterers or drunks or sinners.  He was about coming alongside them and showing them who they could be.  I’m ready to live the life of love and beauty I was created to live, and I want to bring my friends, some strangers and this city along with me.

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Donald Miller’s latest book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, is about living a better story.  It’s a call to understand that living a life full of stories worth telling doesn’t just happen.  It’s chosen.

He’s having a conference about this very thing in September.  You can learn more here :
www.donmilleris.com/conference
Or take a look at this video.

I think this conference will be a great opportunity to learn some of the practical steps of bringing a story to life.  So often, we think stories are about going somewhere far away or doing something crazy.  But in a world where the wild west has been tamed and the world has been mapped, how are the stories birthed deep in our souls lived out right where we are?