By Bishop Emeritus Donald N. Bastian
Meditation lays a solid foundation for a healthy prayer life.
The advice on what to do to stay in the best of health can be reduced to two points: 1) Feed your body a proper diet – a broad daily spread of fruits, vegetables, whole grains and nuts, and modest portions of carbohydrates; and 2) exercise vigorously 30-60 minutes each day.
The “diet and exercise” mantra does not take into account our souls or spiritual natures. Man was formed by our Creator from the dust of the earth, but so are the lions and hippos. However, the Scriptures add that for us, God breathed into that physical formation the breath of life and “man became a living soul” (Genesis 2:7, KJV).
Consequently, to say, “I am a body and I have a soul,” as though our bodies are the more significant aspects of our beings and our souls are merely attachments is not good. It is better to say, “I am a soul, and I have a body it inhabits.” In saying this I acknowledge as precious as our bodies are to God and to us, it is our indestructible spiritual natures that deserve our more careful attention.
To keep a soul in good health one must 1) nourish it and 2) exercise it daily just as we do our physical bodies. With regard to nourishing the soul, J.I. Packer writes in his book, “Knowing God”, “There can be no spiritual health without doctrine.” Doctrine means organized Christian teaching. So we must always be seeking to grow in Christian understanding.
After writing on nourishment, Packer calls us to the spiritual exercise of meditation. “Meditation,” he writes, “is the activity of calling to mind, and thinking over, and dwelling on, and applying to oneself the various things that one knows about the works and ways and purposes and promises of God.”
Meditation, like good dining, takes time. It’s often suggested that 30 minutes taken first thing in the morning is ideal. Just as an orchestra tunes its instruments before a concert, it is better to take time for meditation at the outset of the day, rather than after the day’s concert has been played.
If you can’t make the early morning challenge work, choose another time. A college student complained to me that she couldn’t effectively meditate in the mornings because she still felt too drugged from sleep. I asked, “How long do you take for lunch?”
She was a very sociable person and replied that she usually took 90 minutes. I suggested, “Cut that time in half and slip away for a quiet time of meditation as a daily practice.”
For all of us, as the saying goes, “Where there’s a will, there are 20 ways.”
Meditation usually works best as a time to refocus on God, not our problems. This can be done helpfully when we set ourselves to reflect on His attributes — that is, those revealed characteristics or features of God’s being through which with growing clarity we see Who He is.
Any good Bible dictionary will list most if not all God’s attributes. Today, consider just one and take time to meditate on it. Consider the attribute “omnipresence,” meaning our God is present everywhere.
Psalm 139 takes us into the wonder of God’s omnipresence better than any other. This Majestic God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, is familiar with all my activities (verse 3). He knows what I am about to say before I say it (verse 4). I was not hidden from His all-seeing eye even during my pre-birth existence (verse 15). All this moves us to pray to be kept from any hidden wickedness, while at the same time being led in the ancient ways of righteousness (verses 23, 24).
Our culture considers staying on the move important, so stopping to meditate may strike us as wasting time. We want to plunge into the business of whatever we are doing – including even our praying. But if we take time for meditation on this great truth of God’s omnipresence to nourish us, the result will be improved health for our souls, and channels will open for periods of effective prayer!
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