Steep Your Soul with Christian Meditation

And when I say meditation, I'm not talking Eastern meditation.

You know what Eastern meditation is? Basically, empty your mind.

Try to achieve some sort of peace in the nothingness.

Biblical meditation is, what do you say, precisely the opposite? Fill your mind with what God himself says and how God himself leads your mind and soul with the guidance of his word and his Holy Spirit.

dwelling in you, that you might find peace and joy in the filling.

And this Hebrew word for meditate that we have here in Psalm 63, verse 6, it means something like to ruminate, to reflect on, to muse on.

You might say in a positive sense to stew on something.

Sometimes we use that language in a negative way.

He's stewing on it.

He's focused on it.

He can't get beyond it.

Be a positive stewing.

If you stay on something, you keep your mind stayed on something or abide.

Your mind might abide, remain, stay on something for a few moments.

Instead of continuing to move, you pause and you stay on it.

That's the command that's given to Joshua in this amazing transition moment in the history of Israel.

I mean, Moses, the great Moses is off the scene.

Joshua is now supposed to lead the people.

And his directive in Joshua 1.8 is, this book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night.

And I hope that some here, and I remember pastors, When we talk about meditation, think about the first Psalm.

This is the way the Psalter opens, and that the key word in Psalm 1, verse 2, blessed is the man whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.

So biblical meditation involves meditation.

Fixing the mind's attention on God through his revealed word that we might stir up God honoring affections.

So this thing's terminating on the heart.

That's where it's going.