Customer Reviews

Listening to Your Life: Daily Meditations with Frederick Buechner

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Frederick Buechner is one of our greatest treasures--a wonderful prose writer, a great story-teller, an insightful theologian. His body of work is as diverse as any writer I've ever heard of--fiction, myth, sermons, lectures, memoirs, lexicons, humor, etc. This book provides a great overview of 30 years of his writing--all in brief daily doses. While some of the exerpts suffer from being pulled out of their contexts, they have been well and carefully chosen, and stand alone well. Buechner's recurring theme is that God exists and acts in our lives today--we just have to learn to listen for him and recognize those acts. Read as a devotional, this book provides many flashes of insight and understanding, and many gentle reminders of the Truth that undergirds our lives.

Most daily devotionals that I have worked with in the past have often been sentimental drivel.

Buechner's excellent, concise and often poetic writing boldly confronts the daily battles a person of faith encounters. Eschewing simple HALLMARK CARD sentimentality and post-modern sound bite obsession, Buechner lays out a series of daily meditations that comfort, challenge and re-enforce as well as affirm one's faith.

I particularly admire Buechner's constant celebration of the purity of silence- the need for listening and contemplation.

An excellent daily devotional written by one of our finest contemporary theologians.

I return to this book again and again. It doesn't ask that you believe anything in particular. It ranges over all kinds of topics. Buechner gives us his wisdom, wonder, doubt and love in equal and generous measure.

I have found his works to be deeply liberating because there is no dogma... mostly there is hope, poetry, some new visions of faith, room to doubt, room to soar...

Mostly, he shows us his deep deep humanity.

Thank you, Mr. Buechner.

This is a devotional/meditational book I keep coming back to. It is deep, and stimulates long-lasting reflection upon my life and my God.

Sometimes his writings are too intellectual for me to grasp, but this is Buechner in an accessible form. Here I get bits of wisdom and perspective that I can grab onto. With this book I have found myself contemplating some really big thoughts about a really big God and His hand of providence.

"Listening To Your Life" rarely gathers dust on my bookshelf. I pull it out frequently and am a better person for doing so.

I generally find daily devotionals fall into one of three categories: (1) entries that are nice and short but incredibly shallow, more like a "thought for the day" than a real devotional; (2) entries that have some depth but are hopelessly misaligned with my spiritual outlook, so they mostly irritate me rather than inspiring me; (3) entries that are far too long for me to use on a daily basis, whether they have value or not.

Fortunately, "Listening to Your Life" doesn't fall into any of these categories. The entries have spiritual depth and stunning emotional impact, as well as being very thought-provoking. But they are short enough to take in relatively quickly (while having enough content to continue ruminating on them over the course of the day).

The only reason I rate this four stars rather than five is because of the novel excerpts, which in many cases I found didn't really lend themselves that well to devotional use (whether because I just don't care for his novels or because the excerpts didn't work when taken out of context, I'm not sure).

I have read and re-read this book several times, and I always find new ways to relate to it. He writes with a compassionate, nonjudgemental, and understandable way. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants a deeper, more spititual look at life.

I move in a number of Christian circles, and it shocks me when people claim they have not heard of Buechner. That's hard to fathom, because, to me, he stands head and shoulders above many. He knows how to get to the heart of a matter both eloquently, concisely, and with a dash of wit or humor. This editor does a good job of gathering a sampling of some of the greatest things he has written into one volume. Very much worth purchasing.

The meditations are excerpts from various works, but it's too disjointed. Because they are taken out of context they often don't make sense to me and are therefore not inspiring at all. If I was very familiar with his work and a big fan, then I'd possibly like it. If you're looking for some good daily food for thought or a daily devotional, I'd choose something else.

I have read this book every day for the past fourteen years. It has yet to be dry or rote or inapplicable to my life. I have underlined, dog-eared, and wept over passages in this book. I highly recommend it to everyone who wants to take a long, loving, hard look at their own life. I absolutely love Frederich Buechner!

I have many different devotional books that I use from time to time. However, this one is the best and the one to which I always return. Those who are already Buechner fans will love it AND it is a great introduction to a wonderful writer for those who have yet to discover him. I've lost track of the number of these that I have given away as gifts. Buy it for yourself or someone that you care about!