Holy Noticing: How A Christian Can Practice Mindfulness Sample

 What is Holy Noticing (Mindfulness)? 

Mindfulness is a big deal in today’s culture. Businesses such as Apple, sports figures such as basketball player Kobe Bryant, and the popular press such as Time magazine have all given it their stamp of approval. Governments are spending hundreds of millions of dollars researching it,[i] and it has become a billion dollar a year business. In fact, Apple chose a mindfulness app as their app of the year for 2017.

But should Christians embrace it just because everyone else is doing it? No. Much about mindfulness in popular culture has nothing to do with God, Jesus, the Bible, or Christianity. And “Christianizing” the latest fad dilutes the faith and can lead us astray.

However, does God’s Word support and does Christian history illustrate Christians using some of these techniques as tools for spiritual growth? Yes. It’s a lost spiritual discipline that believers should reclaim. And well-known Christians are embracing practices like mindfulness.

In a TV interview a few years before his death, Billy Graham was asked what he would do over if he could do things differently. In his inimical way, he said, “I’d spend more time in meditation and prayer.”

But just what is mindfulness? 

I call it Holy Noticing, being fully present and mindful in each moment God has given us. I’ve defined mindfulness as the art of Holy Noticing, noticing with a holy purpose, God and His handiwork, our relationships, and our inner world of thoughts and feelings.

In this short 7-day devotional, you’ll learn a simple way to practice mindfulness in the Christian tradition. You learn this practice through the acronym BREATHe. Each letter stands for a simple practice each day’s devotion will unpack. The final letter, ‘e’, stands for engage, to engage your world with a mindful perspective. In other words, Holy Noticing may start in your devotional time but it should be lived out each day. Try one of these exercises each day and then try two in a day and then three, until you can practice all six together.

When Jesus visited Martha and Mary, Martha was in a frenzy. Mary was not. She understood how to be mindfully present to Jesus, and Jesus affirmed her mindful choice. And the prophet Isaiah understood how important holy noticing was when he wrote, “Be still.” Holy Noticing can help us be still long enough to notice the Lord and His work in a deeper way.

Discover the lost spiritual discipline of holy noticing today and learn to engage the world like Christ over at holynoticing.com