Meditation: Functions

Driving home: Meditation is that exercise of religion whereby the mind is applied to the solemn contemplation of revealed realities for practical uses and purposes.

The analogy of a cow ruminating its food is used to explain how meditation involves recalling known truth to extract its nutritious parts for practical life.

Then the session turned into a rather extended analogy of the cow who burps up from stomach number one into her cud, the food, and that analogy was carried through in much of our discussion. But you'll notice that the common denominators in these two definitions, and in all of the definitions that you suggested, or parts of definitions, are these. Meditation, by way of definition, is a conscious, volitional mental activity. Daydreaming is not.

3:30 - 3:59 Read in full sermon

The point: Make sure that our meditation has as its constant object the word of God, even when meditating on the book of nature.

Martin uses the metaphor of a 'house heretic' in our own bosoms to describe the internal sophister and heretic that deceives us without the corrective of external light from God's Word.

We have a sophister, that is, one who pretends wisdom, but who has no true wisdom, and we have a heretic where? In our own bosoms. You have a house heretic. Yes, all of us do.

5:52 - 6:04 Read in full sermon

The point: Disturb the meditation of those relying on non-Christian therapeutic practices and enlighten their conscience with the word of truth.

The example of Christian Science healing is used to illustrate that some therapeutic effects of meditation are purely human and psychological, not Christian, as they lack roots in Christ and biblical norms.

One of the ways that we can take some of the current, redirect some of the current that's flowing over our emotional life and causing all our juices to flow and all the rest, is to engage in some form of meditation that redirects that current or shuts down the measure of that current. And that may have very wonderful therapeutic effect upon people, but that has nothing to do with what we're talking about. That meditation, which is an instrument in the hands of the Holy Spirit for the sanctification of the believer. Well, it's valid in terms of its therapeutic effect, the same way the healing t...

11:03 - 11:46 Read in full sermon

The point: Meditate upon the Son of God, specifically in the face of suffering and opposition, to prevent waxing weary and fainting in your souls.

The analogy of a Christian Scientist denying a lump on their knee is used to contrast genuine Christian meditation, which faces hard realities, with self-deceptive positive thinking.

You have not brought it into present recall. That exhortation that says God is dealing with you as sons and daughters and if so, he's going to chastise you. Here's a classic example of how meditation is the divinely appointed means to take circumstances that are fuzzy in relationship to God and myself and the things about me and to bring them into sharpness. You see, I'm like a Christian scientist who says, you know, I've got a big lump three inches high on my knee and it's black and blue, it isn't there, it isn't there, it isn't there, that's an illusion.

18:55 - 19:37 Read in full sermon

The point: Meditate upon the Son of God, specifically in the face of suffering and opposition, to prevent waxing weary and fainting in your souls.

Martin uses the metaphor of needing '20/15 vision' instead of '20/50 vision' to describe how meditation helps us see our circumstances clearly, as if putting on glasses.

We need to look at them with 2015 vision. Whereas we've been looking at them with what I have in this eye without the glasses, I think the doctor told me last time is 2050 vision. We need to put on the glasses, you see, to look at them all right. So this is the first or one of the great functions of meditation is that it helps us to get our circumstances, and when I use that, I'm not excluding God.

19:50 - 20:15 Read in full sermon

The point: Consciously think and study the various aspects of scripture to avoid despair and irrational actions, especially when distraught or unable to sleep.

Martin shares a personal story from his childhood about unconsciously imitating his father's walk, illustrating how we become like that which we behold with loving adoration, connecting to the transformation described in 2 Corinthians 3.

who was it that raised a hand back there just a little bit ago Gordon some sense of faith he said that we all with unbilled faith and rolling in the mirror of the glory of the Lord are changed into the same in the glory of the Lord even if by the grace of God and the spirit of the Lord so I think it's sort of a progressive kind of thing here as we behold the glory of the Lord and we are transformed as we more or less behold not just simply you know see it or something but I think as we apprehend it and appropriate it we are transformed in glory of the Lord all right when Jesus Christ in the gl...

28:32 - 30:00 Read in full sermon

The point: Consciously think and study the various aspects of scripture to avoid despair and irrational actions, especially when distraught or unable to sleep.

Mr. Brown's analogy of military training is used to explain how meditation provides inner conditioning, making unpremeditated daily behaviors conform to Christ's, becoming 'second nature'.

and the world etc. alright Mr. Brown I remember when we were in the when I was in the service we used to kind of a concept we employed training and I mentioned the thought was that you perform in the situation on the battlefield that you were trained to perform before that time and you wouldn't do anything other you'd do as you were trained and you were trained to go and you could perform and it's always been proven out and find this understanding of meditation and try to use that concept that comes to mind the vast majority of our activities during the day are quote unpremeditated as we drive...

32:58 - 34:27 Read in full sermon

Driving home: one of the holy fruits of meditation is that it provides this channel for the transformation ministry of the Holy Spirit that's what makes it so sacred that in the engagement of contemplation upon Christ

The analogy of a flu shot is used to describe the 'immunizing power' of meditation, where fresh awareness of biblical categories protects against non-biblical or anti-biblical thoughts.

alright could we call this the immunizing power of meditation every fall Mrs. Martin and I go to our family doctor and we get what our good British friends would call a puncture or a jab we call it a shot here I think puncture or jab is a little better when you think of somebody getting shot that's kind of devastating but we get a puncture and it's our flu shot and what we're hoping is that the body will be immunized against the flu strains that they anticipate will be floating around the air in the coming months now this is one of the functions of meditation there is an immunizing effect as t...

35:52 - 37:20 Read in full sermon

The point: Prioritize meditation over mere memorization, understanding that memorization serves as a means to the end of meditation.

The analogy of a magnifying glass focusing sunlight to produce intense heat and light is used to explain how meditation converges the general light and heat of God's truth upon specific points in our experience, making it burn and illuminate.

of God and as I was meditating on meditation the illustration came to me of the difference between some light passing through an ordinary pane of glass and some light passing through a magnifying glass now what happens when the rays of the sun pass through an ordinary pane of glass well they are simply diffused in the same direction as when they were this side of the glass and they illuminate and warm whatever is here be it your bald head be it the back of your hand whatever it be now what happens when the same rays of the same sun pass through a magnifying glass what happens to them they are ...

41:46 - 43:15 Read in full sermon