Sermon Central
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How To Meditate The Word Of God
Contributed by Wincci Yin Chee on Jun 1, 2006 (message contributor)
Summary: Watch your thoughts; they become you words. Watch your words; they become your actions. Watch your actions; they become your habits. Watch your habits; they become your character. Watch your character; it becomes your destiny.
How to meditate the word of God:
Perhaps one of the most neglected disciplines in the Christian life these days is that of Meditation. I believe that very few Christians have been taught how important it is to pay close attention to what they think about.
Consider the following:
Watch your thoughts; they become you words.
Watch your words; they become your actions.
Watch your actions; they become your habits.
Watch your habits; they become your character.
Watch your character; it becomes your destiny.
We have all heard the expression, "you are what you eat", but is also true to say "you are (and are becoming) what you think." Here is a challenge for you. Consider the following questions.
• How much time do you spend worrying about this or that?
• How much time do you spend grumbling or complaining or feeling sorry for your self?
• How much time do you spend thinking about the TV shows you watched last night?
• How much time do you re-live the bad things people do to you?
• Do you list out all your misfortunes?
• Do you allow yourself to be angry for long periods of time?
• Do you think about bad things happening to the people you are angry with?
• Do you think about bad things happening to yourself?
• Do you dwell on lustful and impure thoughts?
Did you know that you are what you are right now - not what you would like to be, nor what you ought to be, nor are you what you used to be. You are what you are today. Today, the ’real you’ is shown by what you do and by what you think about in your heart - what you meditate on. Further, the things that you allow your heart to dwell on today is building what you will be for tomorrow and the tomorrow after that.
Let’s look at some verses which illustrate that you act out of and can be judged by the state of your heart.
Lk 6:45, Mt 15:18, Matt 7:20-23, Prov 27:19, Prov 4:23
Your ’inner life’ is an accurate representation of the real you. No matter what service you perform for God, or what you appear to be to others, the important thing is the purity of your inner self. Consider the words of Christ as he speaks to the Pharisees and the teachers of the law.
The Pharisees were an obvious case of hypocrisy. But not so obvious that they noticed. They spent all of their time making sure that they obeyed the letter of the law perfectly. From the outside, it appeared that they were keeping God’s law perfectly and were therefore righteous men. In spite of all their work, they are all dismissed as being filled with greed, self-indulgence, hypocrisy and wickedness. What a shock this accusation must have been to them.
You see, our God is not impressed with what we appear to be. We are all very good at ’playing Church’. No, God is most interested in what we are like on the inside. He wishes to change us from the inside out. His goal is to make us clean on the inside so that we would naturally be clean on the outside. If you are clean in your heart, then you will automatically be clean on the outside. Paul talks about the importance of having a loving heart
Meditate: to engage in contemplation or reflection, to focus one’s thoughts on: reflect or ponder over. to plan or project in the mind
Meditation is a function of the mind and the heart. It is what we think about in our hearts and it is something we each do every day. Whether we realize it or not, we all spend a large portion of our time in some form of meditation. The thing is, what we meditate on may or may not be worth while.
In fact, what we habitually think about is frequently unhealthy for our growth as Christians. Often it is simply sinful. This is why I asked you earlier to spend some time making notes about what you thing about. This is the first step in the process of training ourselves to think correctly.
Ps 143:5, Ps 145:5, Ps 104:34
The verses quoted above describe to us what we should be doing. But this type of meditation does not come naturally. By nature, we stir up and act out that which is in our hearts. If your heart is filled with good things, you will have a tendency to meditate on good things. If your heart is filled with bad things, you will naturally think about and meditate on these things.
Here are some comments on the thoughts of heart of the ’natural’ man:
