"No one practice (or book) will solve our generational battle against distraction. . . . But this book offers me hope that we can join Jay, and Ignatius, and so many others from the Way of Jesus, in slowing down from the helter-skelter speed of the modern world, and walking at the pace of peace." — from the foreword by John Mark Comer, founder of Practicing the Way
Receive the Gifts of an Examined Life with God
"So much to do, so little time," so the saying goes. For many today, our attention is stretched thin by overextended schedules, unmanageable calendars, and an impossible to-do list.
But what if the more we try to do everything, the less we are doing anything truly meaningful?
In The Pace of Peace, pastor Jay Y. Kim invites you to fight distraction and focus your attention by examining your life with God. Drawing on the Prayer of Examen developed by Ignatius of Loyola as a framework for all of life, Kim guides us through the movements of this ancient prayer practice—invitation, gratitude, reflection, confession, and looking forward—to point us toward the antidotes for the aches of our distracted age.
In The Pace of Peace, you are invited to move:
- from the toil of absence to the gift of presence
- from the striving for more to the gift of gratitude
- from the wreckage of reactivity to the gift of reflection
- from the shackles of pride and shame to the gift of confession
- from the futility of self-will to the gift of God's will
A deep life is incongruent with a fast life. God invites you, instead, to live with your mind at ease, setting your life to the pace of peace. Free to be fully present. No longer straining to prove yourself. Settled and secure in the presence of God.
Encounter God in all of life and discover the peace and ease of being present, known, and fully loved with The Pace of Peace.
Table of Contents:
Foreword by by John Mark Comer
Introduction: The Myth of Multitasking and the Gift of Examen
1. The Toil of Absence
2. The Gift of Presence
3. The Striving for More
4. The Gift of Gratitude
5. The Wreckage of Reactivity
6. The Gift of Reflection
7. The Shackles of Pride and Shame
8. The Gift of Confession
9. The Futility of Self-Will
10. The Gift of God's Will
Conclusion: Panic Attacks and Nothing Is Everything
Acknowledgments
Notes
About the Author :
Jay Y. Kim serves as lead pastor at WestGate, a multicongregational church in Silicon Valley. He is the host of IVP's Digital Examen podcast and the author of several books, including Analog Christian, Analog Church, andListen Listen Speak. Jay serves on the board of Practicing the Way and has spent two decades in local church ministry, all in the San Francisco Bay Area, serving as a teaching pastor and church planter over the years. Jay lives in Silicon Valley with his wife Jenny and their two children.
Review :
"Put everything down and read this book by Jay Y. Kim—if you can. Our attention is being so divided and so fragmented that we don't even know how to read a book like this. But when we do, we are reminded that what God has to say often comes into our hearts and minds only by putting other things aside to receive it. If we can learn to see once again, then all of life will walk us past the burning bushes God has put all around us. Read this book and be transformed."
“With Jay Y. Kim, what you see is what you get. And what you get will not leave you disappointed but refreshed. The Pace of Peace is not merely an idea from the author but the stuff Jay lives from. He is a trusted guide who is living into deep wisdom and inviting us to join him out from the noise and into God’s space.”
“Day after day, stress, lack of time, hurry, feeling overwhelmed, and anxiety fill our minds and hearts. Unless we stop, reflect, and decide to do something, the pattern just continues over and over again. By reading The Pace of Peace, we find a plan and a clear way to see the change we need to happen and to experience life the way Jesus would want for us as we serve him in this world.”
“So many of us are doing all the right things and still feel far from Jesus. Jay Y. Kim diagnoses that chasm with pastoral wisdom and theological depth. The Pace of Peace is a wake-up call for every follower of Christ who senses that God intended more for their life than the exhausted version they’re currently living. He brings Ignatius’s Examen off the monastery wall and makes it accessible and practical for today’s everyday living. If you have felt disconnected from the presence of God, this book will give you the language and tools you need to activate your faith afresh.”
“In a distracted age, many of us move quickly through our days while remaining strangely absent from our own lives with God. In The Pace of Peace, Jay Y. Kim offers a wise and gracious invitation to rediscover the ancient practice of the Examen. With pastoral insight and practical clarity, he helps us notice God’s presence in the ordinary moments of our day and respond with gratitude, honesty, and trust. This is a welcome guide for anyone longing to live more attentively with God at the pace of grace and peace.”
“In The Pace of Peace, Jay Y. Kim (assisted by St. Ignatius) leads us from chaos to simplicity of heart. Here we learn why distraction is demonic and attachment is divine. Here we find the God who meets us in panic attacks as well as burning bushes. Read and be changed.”
“Jay Y. Kim has written a beautiful, timely, and deeply needed invitation for our distracted age. In The Pace of Peace, he exposes the myth that faster is better and guides us into the slower, deeper way of Jesus. With pastoral wisdom and remarkable theological depth, he reminds us that what we give our attention to ultimately forms our lives. Rooted in the practice of the Examen, this book offers more than just insight. It offers a pathway to presence, wholeness, and peace. If you feel stretched thin or spiritually scattered, this book will help you recover what matters most.”
“Jay Y. Kim mines the wisdom of the Ignatian Examen and masterfully integrates it with the truth of Scripture, insights from neuroscience and psychology, and the vulnerability of his own story. Writing with remarkable tenderness, he invites us out of the frantic churn of a self-ordered life and into the presence and peace of God. With a spiritual director’s attentiveness to the soul and a storyteller’s eye for the details of ordinary life, he exposes the destructive habits of our age—absence, striving, reactivity, pride, shame, and the myth of control—and gently leads us into practices of presence, gratitude, reflection, confession, and surrender that re-form us as beloved sons and daughters. If you have ever wondered whether there is a different way to live, this ancient wisdom applied with striking relevance to our world is the medicine we need—the medicine I need—to help us move at the speed of God's love.”
“What a lovely and needed book! With his genuine and winsome style, Jay Y. Kim confronts us with the myth of multitasking and how destructive it is to the minds and souls of human beings. At the same time, he invites us to consider the gift of an examined life, describing concrete practices that are a powerful antidote to such destructive forces: attention versus distraction, reflection versus reactivity, confession versus shame or pride, and surrender to what God is doing here and now versus constantly being driven by human striving. As this important book is birthed into the world, I find myself praying fervently that we will heed Jay’s urgent warnings about what the culture of distraction, reactivity, and continual striving is doing to all of us and that, by God’s grace, we will be able to enter into the practices that contribute to the examined life he describes. A life in which the kingdom of God is always coming.”
