How to Improve Your Spiritual Meditation: Joshua 1:8
“Do not let this book of the law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.” – Joshua 1:8
Introduction: All throughout God’s word, we are commanded to meditate on God’s word. Meditation involves studying a passage of scripture, memorizing it, praying about it, and exhorting oneself to fulfill it. Many Christians say they are meditating in the Word when they are simply reading it. As crucial as that is, it is not meditating. It is wonderful to just read through the different stories of God’s Word, but to meditate is more emotionally deep.
Spiritual success depends on the constant study and application of God’s Word. The Bible tells us in Duet. 6:6-9, “These words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontals on your forehead. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”
The Hebrew word translated "meditate" speaks of what a cow does after grazing all day. As she chews the cud over and over again, she extracts every nutrient. In other words, to meditate means to ponder a section of the Word day and night, extracting more from its inexhaustible supply each time (Jon Cursor). We are to memorize God’s word for the transformation of our minds. These verses are telling us to read it, teach it, speak it, and live it. We are to do this in the morning, night, through our day. The way to do this is have the Word stored in your heart. When you are presented with certain situations through your day, the Holy Spirit will pull these words out of your memory bank for you to help you assess the options.
Here are 17 principles that will help you improve your spiritual meditation.
1. Commit: Commit yourself to the goals of scripture. Choose and stick with certain key verses that will help guide, assure, convict, and provide insights into important decisions that you will need to make. The psalmist wrote, “Delight yourself in the Lord; and He will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord, Trust also in Him, and He will do it.” – Psalm 37:4-5
2. Trade: Trade your own perceptions, thoughts, doubts, and fears for the promises of scripture. Paul wrote the church in Rome, “For the mind set on flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, because the mind set on flesh is hostile towards God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.” – Romans 8:6-8. Try not to approach your Bible reading with your own perceptions of what it might mean. Let the Spirit guide you in your understanding to what God will have you to take away from the Scripture. Many times throughout Jesus’ ministry, He would be speaking of the spiritual aspect, but the Pharisaic Jews could not elevate their thinking above the fleshly aspect of life. Let us ask God to elevate our thinking. The mind set on flesh is death!
3. Look: Look for ways that you can immediately apply the holiness, righteousness, love, power, and purposes of Christ in your life. Ask God if He would transform you to be more like Christ. Christians need to be sure to live as if they have the hope they claim. Do not just claim your hope, but live in it!
4. Evaluate: Evaluate your life according to the beatitudes given in the Sermon on the Mount, by Jesus in Matthew 5:3-12. These are specific characteristics given by Jesus Himself for Christians to put into practice and live out.
5. Share: Share the insights given by God from His word with others, both Christians and non-Christians. Paul wrote these words to Timothy, a young pastor at the time, “I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead and by His appearing and His kingdom: preach the word, be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction.” – 2 Timothy 4:1-2. Always be ready to give a reason for the hope that is in you. It is important that we share our insights with others and listen to theirs.
6. Write: Write down your observations, interpretations, meditations, evaluations, and applications of the scriptures in a notebook. It is a big help to look back and read something that you may have written in the past that could help out in a present situation. God will use these records to His benefit of helping you to know Him more.
7. Expose: Expose the deeds of darkness with the scriptures. The writer of Hebrews tells us, “The word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword…” Hebrews 4:12-13. I had a breathing problem for years before I finally went in to see a specialist. The doctor had to use this instrument called a laryngoscope to invade the deepest darkest parts of my nose and throat, which exposed all of the damaged tissue and blockage. God’s word works the same way. It invaded the deepest, darkest, areas in your spiritual life and exposes the damaged spiritual tissue. Do not become prideful and stray away from God’s word. When we stray away from reading God’s word, we are in essence saying, “I don’t need it.” Trust me, we need it.” Let it expose the damaged areas of your spiritual life and then allow Jesus Christ to pour His mercy and grace into your life.
8. Pose: Pose questions of Scripture. These are some questions that help to evaluate what is being read.
a. Are there any guide points for my decisions?
b. Errors to avoid in my conversations?
c. Sins to forsake in my thinking?
d. Commands to obey?
e. Attitudes to eliminate?
f. Attitudes to develop?
g. Examples to follow?
h. Things to be thankful for?
i. Promises to assure for success?
j. Definitions of key words?
k. Motives for certain actions?
l. Any attributes of God seen?
9. Let: Let God talk to you personally through scripture. So often we expect God to ring our phone with a divine message. God’s phone number is Jeremiah 33:3, “Call to me and I will answer you, and I will tell you great and mighty things, which you do not know.” When you read the scripture, take time to pause and call on God. Let Him talk to you through the scriptures. Allow silence to avoid distraction. Read a verse and then think about it. Let God use the verse to speak to your specific situation.
10. Visualize: Visualize yourself thinking, feeling, and behaving as scripture suggests. Just like we visualize fulfilling certain dreams and accomplishments, we need to do the same with scripture. This will help to achieve it.
11. Put on Christ: Put on Christ like qualities and put off the behaviors of darkness. We cannot merely say we trust Christ. You must put on Christ. Imagine going down in a plane crash and you have a parachute. You wouldn’t just merely say that you trust in the parachute, you would put it on to insure your safety. Put on Christ and insure your salvation rest as well as eternal rest.
12. Ask, Seek, & Knock: Do this as often as you would like on God’s door to obtain your blessing. Jesus said, “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.” – Matt 7:7. The people of the Old Testament could never run to the high priest or to God whenever they had a concern. The high priest would only enter into the Holy of Holies (the holiest place in the Jewish worship center), once a year to bring reconciliation between God and the nation’s people. The curtain that surrounded the Holy of Holies, separating God’s presence, has been torn down with the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Jesus is our Great High Priest and our ultimate sacrifice. Every believer is not only welcomed, but encouraged to “boldly come to the throne of grace.”
13. Laugh & Sing: Sing along with others about the goodness of the Lord. Are you someone who while everyone is praising the Lord Jesus Christ in your worship service, you stand or sit there like a frog? The whole point of coming together as a church family at one time is for fellowship with other believers and to give praise to our Lord Christ Jesus. Ask the Lord to give you the desire to praise Him for His goodness. Why would a non-believer want what you have if they see absolutely no hope or joy in you while visiting your church? We are to reflect the love of Christ. Don’t be a frog, but laugh and sing praises to the only one who is worthy of it.
14. Overlook & Overcome: Overlook and overcome the problems and obstacles in your path through the promises of scripture. Paul wrote to the church in Rome, “Do not be overcome with evil, but overcome evil with good.” – Romans 12:21. Remember that the believer’s heavenly calling does not hang on their own righteousness. “For al have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” – Romans 3:23. It hangs on the Lord Jesus Christ. Do not let deceit harden your heart. God tells us, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.”
15. Organize: Organize your thoughts according to scripture. King Solomon wrote in his wisdom, “By wisdom a house is built, and by understanding it s established; And by knowledge the rooms are filled with all pleasant and precious riches.” – Proverbs 24:3-4. He also wrote, “…in abundance of counselors there is victory.” Let God’s word be your counselor.
16. Work: Work at understanding the deeper truths of scripture. Make sure you look at all the facets of the scriptures. Sometimes the message is right on the surface and we try to read to deep into it. On the other hand, sometimes you half to study deeper to understand the truth being taught. Jesus, while speaking to the Pharisees, said, “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about me.” – John 5:39. The Pharisees, just like some today, thought that by reading scripture and religiously following the law they had eternal life. Jesus is saying, “Look, you dummies! The Scriptures testify about Me.” Jesus said in John 14:6, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no one comes to the Father except through Me.”
17. Yield: Yield your rights to God. “Every good thing given is from above…” – James 1:17. Everything you may think you own was given to you. You don’t have the right to anything unless you first yield that right to God. Your house was given to you by God, your health, your wisdom, your talents, your money…it’s not yours.
