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The Attentive Life: Discerning God's Presence in All Things

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Leighton Ford's The Attentive Life is a work of grace and beauty, well worth multiple slow and attentive readings.

Coming from the mind and heart of a very wise man, this slender volume is redolent with truth and love. It's the kind of book that probably could only have been written by an older person, but that deserves careful consideration by people of all ages, especially young men!

Seventy-six-year-old Ford, a former world-trotting evangelist, recently a trainer and mentor of younger leaders, has stepped into the role of "artist of the soul and a friend on the journey." As an artist with words, he surely succeeds, with elegant, even poetic prose laced with pithy nuggets of his own and apt quotations from a wide array of skilled authors. Rarely has a Christian leader with such a well-earned reputation for character and spirituality revealed so much of his own weakness and shortcomings. One thinks of St. Augustine's Confessions.

As the back cover says, "Distractions and fear and busyness were keeping Leighton Ford from seeing God's work in an around him. So he began a journey of longing and looking for God. And it started with paying attention."

Under the rubric of "attention," Ford includes concepts like listening, alertness, and the contemplative life. Chapter One, "Paying Attention," would have been, as the saying goes, worth the price of the whole book, for it highlights how critical is attentiveness for finding "the way to clarity of heart," which is "the path to seeing God."

Seeing God, after all, is the proper goal - or end - of our existence, if we understand by "seeing" that culmination of all our longings and desires in the full and final, but never-ending, embrace of his love for which we were created.

The author wants to help us be "clear at the center" (his preferred rendering of "pure in heart") "and so with true attentiveness `to see God in all things, and all things in God.'" Such a quality mirrors the nature of God himself, who is a "Father who watches with careful attention." After all, God is love, and "love is focused attention."

By contrast, we learn how deadly distraction and inattention can be, not only in our relations with those around us, but in knowing either ourselves or God. "Perhaps inattentiveness is our greatest sin - not only against [God] but against ourselves."

How, then, do we overcome inattention? Ford follows the "hours" of the monastic rule to paint a portrait of a life which stops, looks, and listens seven times a day. Each of these "hours" is related to a time of day, a state of mind, and a phase in our journey through life, until death itself approaches.

I am hard pressed to describe either the loveliness of this book or the depth and relevance of its central message as the theme unfolds and develops with a remarkably organic flow. A banquet of gourmet delights, pleasing to the palate, delightful to the eyes, and nourishing to the soul. A diamond with dozens of facets, each reflecting and refracting light in dazzling variety. A tapestry of rich colors of every hue, complex but coherent. A bouquet of flowers. A symphony of ideas and images, with theme and variation, ending in a quiet but deeply moving climax.

But I cannot do justice to the variegated richness of Leighton Ford's style or the content of this highly-autobiographical guide to the attentive - and finally contented - life. You must read it for yourself. Soon. Repeatedly. Attentively.

G. Wright Doyle
August, 2008
The Lord's Healing Words: Six Months of Daily Readings from the Bible On Physical, Mental, and Spiritual Health (With Commentary)

Leighton Ford will be a familiar name to those who remember the heyday of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. From 1955 to 1985, Ford served the organization in a number of capacities, including associate evangelist and vice president. He has spoken to millions of people in 37 countries on every continent of the world, is Honorary Life Chairman of the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelism, and has been singled out by TIME magazine as being "among the most influential preachers of an active gospel." Active indeed.

So when Leighton Ford writes a book around sitting still, it's worth sitting up and taking note.

Ford confesses that he wrote THE ATTENTIVE LIFE for himself as much as anyone, but he's also alert to the broader issues of perpetual hurry in modern life and the potential this has to wreak havoc on spiritual life. He writes, "Hurrying from one thing to the next we do not stop, look, and listen to God's voice right now. I wrote this for myself in part, because with a very busy mind I found myself not really listening to God, others or even my own heart. And one of the consistent themes of Scripture is God calling for attention. As Jesus said, 'Give your full attention to what God is doing right now.'"

To focus his attention, Ford has adopted the practice of observing the hours. Observing the hours is an ancient Christian ritual developed by St. Benedict wherein specific prayers are offered at specific times during the day, serving the purpose of keeping the devotee's mind focused on Christ through whatever the day brings. It's perhaps a testament to the truth in Ford's observation that modern life isn't conducive to reflection (and the risks of this) that almost every time you look up these days, another book is being published that "rediscovers" the quiet power of Benedictine spirituality, and specifically St. Benedict's practice of observing the hours. Many are finding this way of ordering one's life around God a welcome antidote for the pressures of the world, in which multitasking is the norm.

Ford's insights about stages of the day and stages of life are keen, and especially poignant given his already long and rich experience of both. He writes about joy and grief as one who has been doubled over by both. And still he is trying to pay attention. He writes, "The most vital way to measure our lives is not by chronological time --- chronos time, to use the Greek word --- but in terms of kairos, the word often used in the Bible to speak of those opportune times that become turning points. Kairos is the word Jesus often used when he said, 'My time is not yet,' or 'My time has come.' To be fully alive is to pay attention to kairos encounters. As Paul wisely counseled his readers, 'Be very careful, then, how you live --- not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity because the days are evil' (Eph. 5:15-16).

"I like to think of the attentive life also as the contemplative life, for contemplative literally mean 'putting together.' We connect the dots between the chronos and the kairos of our life, relate the hours that we measure by the clock to the hours and seasons of our souls."

While he does point to the hours frequently as a framework for thinking about paying attention to God, Ford is not so much concerned that you stick to a schedule. Instead, he hopes to stoke an awareness of God's presence that pervades all things at all times. To this end he offers examples of those who have inspired him with their ability to attend to the important things --- everyone from Simone Weil to C.S. Lewis to his dog prove that different personalities have different ways of engaging the presence of God and others, and that we too can learn to make this a part of our own daily (and seasonal) rhythm.

Ford is clearly thinking about using time well at this stage of his life, but his observations are perhaps even more apt for those not looking back on the bulk of their life's work. This is truly a book, and a life, worth paying attention to.

--- Reviewed by Lisa Ann Cockrel

I was given this book by a lady very much older than me who is still discovering life every day (I am 61). The man who led me to the Lord is a friend of Leighton Ford and I have met Leighton Ford some years ago. This book became better and better as the chapters progressed. I also read it slower and slower as I neared the end. Since I am an evangelical Pastor and Bible Teacher I was suspicious at first of Leighton's attendance at a monastery. But I need not have worried. If you are young read the chapters past your time of life with anticipation. But since I am closer to the end than the beginning I was emotionally and spiritually moved by the chapters closer to the close of the book. I can only say that this book has drawn me closer to Christ and made me more determined to slow down but keep moving - to pay attention but keep learning and to long for heaven but keep living on earth. I wish I could go for a walk with Leighton to the top of Grand Father mountain. I can only thank God for a life still being well lived and a book that has lifted my soul toward eternity.

This book is for the spiritual seeker. I didn't want the book to end...I read it outside, to be "closer" to God...I actually got my copy from the library but will purchase it because I want it in MY library, to be read again and again...Your spirit will draw closer to God and be more in tune with (attentive to) the present moment and God's presence.

Insightful, practical, and inspiring message that encourages one to truly "pay attention" in both our spiritual and our secular lives. It is well written and understandable. I will reread this book and strive to use it in my daily walk.

Leighton Ford writes with rare honesty and clarity as he approaches the task of spiritual formation. Less "how to" and more "why" --- this book shows all of us how to cease from our multi-tasking, overcommitted work and world, centering ourselves in God's holy presence.

Less is more. Less noise, less hurry, less programs. More contemplative time, more quiet time, more time in the Word. Ford writes especially for those in later seasons of life, yet his advice is practical and helpful for the "fast-laners" who are still climbing ladders at 30 or 40.

Carefully crafted; a great read for a quiet evening or a vacation spent being, rather than doing. All meat, no fluff, filled with wisdom.

Dr. David Frisbie
The Center for Marriage & Family Studies
Author of The Soul-Mate Marriage: The Spiritual Journey of Becoming One

"The Attentive Life" by Leighton Ford is a delightful and insightful read on our need to pay attention to God's presence in our lives. The author, a brother-in-law of Billy Graham, writes from a decidedly Christian worldview.

Among the many excellent points covered include:

1. We are a distracted people living in a distracting world.
2. God wants us to be attentive people because He is an attentive God.
3. Instead of blaming a noisy and busy world for distracting you, take responsibility yourself.
4. In a wealth of information, there is often a poverty of attention. Even our highly organized religious lives can distract us.
5. The good can keep us from the best. Hurry is the great enemy of the live of the spirit.
6. Distractions are a blessing when God sends them. Many Bible characters' lives were changed when they paid attention to God's interruptions.
7. Ruthlessly eliminating hurry will keep us spiritually strong. Jesus Christ never seemed to be in a hurry.
8. We know so much about so many things yet know little of who we are as people.
9. Most of us need a spiritual jolt to listen long enough to pay attention to what God is saying to us.
10. We spend the first part of our lives finding our role and the second part finding our true selves.

Indeed, in this crazy and hectic world, we need to slow down and listen to that "still small voice" within us and pay attention to what God wants to do in and through us. Ford shares that he sometimes goes to the North Carolina mountains and be still and quiet. I have often been to those same mountains and enjoyed the peace and stillness. I also enjoy that same peace and stillness at North and South Carolina beaches. Other places I enjoy God's presence are historical places and battlefields. To each his own!

I will refer to this title many times in the future for encouragement and an excellent challenge to slow down.

Read and enjoy. Highly recommended.

It is so refreshing to read a book that embraces both the Evangelical tradition as well as the spiritual tradition of praying the hours. In this book, Leighton Ford invites Christians from all traditions to embrace a spiritually rich prayer life which will draw us closer to God. Using his own faith journey, Leighton shares how he has been blessed to combine the best of his Evangelical theology with the practice of prayer that some may have never explored. Leighton has been enriched and so will be the reader.

I appreciated the reminder to be attentive to the movement of God's Spirit in our lives as well as being attentive to my loved ones and the people with whom I come into contact each day. I also appreciated the author sharing his faith journey at different part of the book. I had heard of Leighton Ford, but never read any of his writings. I recommend this book wholeheartedly.