Ps. 1:2
He Meditates in His Law
Pastor Martin undertakes a thorough study of what it means to meditate in the law of God day and night. He explains that the Hebrew word for 'meditate' means to mutter or mumble, connecting verbalization with focused thought. He identifies the object of meditation as the Word of God, the proper time as whenever the mind is free, and the great benefit as spiritual digestion -- bringing the general Word into direct contact with one's personal situation. He uses the analogy of the stomach in physical digestion and the art gallery illustration to show meditation's transforming power.
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A full transcript is available on the tab. 152 paragraphs, roughly 62 minutes.
Review: The Blessed Man's Delight Leads to Meditation
Let us turn again this evening to the first psalm, Psalm 1.
Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season. His leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.
The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away. Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish. In our studies of this psalm, we have said from week to week that this is perhaps one of the most basic of the didactic, that is, the teaching psalms.
As Psalm 51 and Psalm 32 and Psalm 6 are most basic of the penitential psalms, psalms in which we learn how to confess our sin to God, so this psalm is one of the most profound in teaching us something about God and about ourselves and about the way God would have us walk. The theme of the psalm is introduced in the very first words, blessed is the man. It's describing the way of blessedness in terms of a man who is blessed and how he finds blessedness, how he attains to blessedness, how he finds that great pearl of happiness and delight which all men seek by nature,
but which so few find because they seek it not in the way that God has ordained. In our study of the psalm thus far, we have seen that the blessed man is described, first of all, in a negative way. There are certain things he does not do. And then in verse 2, he is described in a positive way.
Having spent some four or five studies on the negative, we began last week to consider the positive. And both are always present. At the end of this study, if you forget everything else, I hope you won't. I do hope you will not forget this principle, that the way of blessedness means there are certain things you won't do and certain things you will do, and you cannot extract either one of those without missing the way of blessedness.
The blessed man is one who does not walk in the counsel or advice of the ungodly. He does not stand in the way of sinners, that is, identify himself with affection and with delight in the course of action of men who do not regard the law of God. Nor does he sit in the seat of the scornful, that is, those who take the place of a judge over the word of God rather than a disciple of the word of God. But in contrast, we see in verse 2, his delight is in the law of the Lord.
And we tried to understand a little bit of what that phrase means in our study last week. To delight in something is to find your joy in it. To find, well, you can't, it's hard to get a synonym for the word delight, because delight just means delight. And so the blessed man is one who is found reveling, finding great joy and inner satisfaction in the law of the Lord, that is, in the word of God.
and we concluded our studies by trying to find out why he delighted in the law of God. The principle being you delight in that which is pleasing to your nature. The bird delights in the air because he's made for the air. The fish delights in the water because he's made for the water.
The truly blessed man delights in the law of God because he has been made by the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit at home in the element of the word of God. By nature he would not delight in the word of God. He hates the law of God according to Romans 8, 7. But when the Spirit of God has made him a new creature and joined him to Jesus Christ, he delights in the law of God because in that law he sees the God whom he loves.
In that law he sees the truth by which he has been begotten again. And he has this affinity for that truth. In that law he sees something more of his duty and he loves the path of duty. In that law he finds the sanctifying work of God carried out and longing to be holy and like Christ.
He delights in that which is an instrument unto holiness and sanctification. Now tonight we come to the last part of that second verse. The way of blessedness is a way in which a man is found delighting in the law of God, a delight which leads him to meditate in that law day and night. Now as we seek to understand something of what the psalmist meant, of the way of blessedness being the way of day and night meditation in the law of God, may we pause for a moment of prayer to ask God the Holy Spirit to help us in our study of this most basic element of the way of blessedness, but one that is so difficult for us in the jet-set age.
So may we confess our need and ask the Lord to help us in our need. Let us pray.
Lord, we would know what it is to be those blessed men and women. We thank Thee for the Lord Jesus, who was the one true blessed man, who perfectly refused the counsel of ungodliness, and who perfectly delighted in Thy holy law, and perfectly meditated in it day and night. and we pray that by thy Spirit we may more fully understand what it means to meditate in thy law day and night that we too may be more like our Savior and as a blessed consequence may know more of true blessedness in our lives. Hear us, O God, and teach us by thy Spirit
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
The blessed man meditates in the law of God day and night. So mark this down in your own thinking that if you are a stranger to meditation, you're a stranger to blessedness.
I think that's a just inference from the text, isn't it? Blessed is the man who walks not, stands not, sits not, but delights and meditates, clearly implying the man who does walk and does sit and does stand and does not delight and does not meditate is not blessed.
And I think it's also accurate to say the degree of our blessedness will be proportionate to the degree that we learn the holy art of meditation. For if a man is blessed who meditates in the law of God to some degree, the man will be more blessed who meditates in the law of God to a greater degree. And yet to talk in this day of meditation, the age of the jets, airplane, and the computer, the age of the Reader's Digest mentality, where we want everything in capsule form, to speak of meditation is to speak of something that seems as outdated as the model A Ford or dresses that reach down to the ankles. Now that's outdated, isn't it?
And so to even touch the subject of meditation almost label someone as someone who perhaps crept out of an Egyptian mummy case somewhere and came back to give us a lecture on something that belonged to the ancient past. But though it may seem that way, the word of God has not been changed. And if we in the 20th century have become so busy that we can't meditate, then we become too busy to know the way of blessedness. And the breakdown, even within the realms of professing Christians, on every hand is witness to the fact that no meditation, no blessedness.
So we're dealing tonight with something which is a life and death issue. This is not some little whipped cream extra that may or may not adorn and flavor the Christian life. We're dealing with bedrock essentials to the way of blessedness. Now I hope that has secured the attention of your mind to realize that we're dealing with a vital subject.
Question 1: What Does It Mean to Meditate? The Word 'Mutter'
Now to think our way through it, I'm going to ask and then seek to answer from Scripture as we study together several very basic questions. First of all, if the psalmist says the blessed man is one who delights in the law of God and as a result of that delighting meditates in the law of God, we must ask the question, what is meditation?
Now the word used here is a very interesting word and I understand when Dr. Clowney was here and sometime in my absence he dealt with some of this, but certainly it's an area that bears repetition and since I didn't hear his sermon, I just might have an original thought or two. And if I'm repeating him, why I'm not doing so, because I've been lazy, but simply because studying the same Bible and I trust taught by the same Holy Spirit, we will sound the same note. The word used here is the word which is translated in other places as mumbling.
Turn to the book of Isaiah for a moment and we'll see two passages in which this same word is used and is translated to mutter. Isaiah chapter 8 and verse 19.
Israel in its apostasy had copied the ways of the nations about them, idol worship and also witchcraft. and we have in verse 19 a reference to this practice of witchcraft and when they shall say unto you seek unto them that have familiar spirits we call them mediums in our day, spirit mediums and unto wizards that peep and that meditate that's the same word it says that the wizards, these mediums they peep, they make funny little squeaky noises and they meditate, they mutter, they mumble. They give their magic incantations we call mumbo-jumbo, you know, abracadabra.
Well, there's the picture you see of that person who's supposed to be a spirit medium mumbling out his or her little string of phrases that are supposed to bring the evil spirits to do their bidding. It's the same word used in Isaiah chapter 59 and verse 3. Isaiah 59 and verse 3.
For your hands are defiled with blood and your fingers with iniquity. Your lips have spoken lies and your tongue hath meditated, hath muttered perverseness. Same word, muttering, meditating. Now, for the first time, I think I understood Joshua 1.8.
It always bothered me that in Joshua 1, God says to Joshua, and this is the same word used here, Joshua 1 in verse 8, This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth, but thou shalt meditate therein day and night. I always thought, well, I should have read, This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mind or out of thy heart, but thou shalt meditate. But it says it shall not depart out of thy mouth for thou shalt mumble therein day and night. Thou shalt mutter therein day and night.
Joshua, when you go out to battle, when you're sitting by your tent, I want you to be muttering over the word of God. I want you to be mumbling over the word of God so that mumbling over it and keeping it there in your mind and so much in your mind that you're actually using your lips to speak over the thoughts of the Word of God, you will then keep your duty and the path of obedience clearly before you. For there's a relationship between the mind and the mouth. We all experience this, or most of us, I'm sure, in the matter of prayer.
I've had people come to me at times thinking that they were terribly backslidden and in a terrible spiritual condition because their mind wandered when they prayed and they couldn't keep their mind on the Lord. And I ask this simple question. Do you mutter when you pray? You may not be able to pray out loud.
You may be in situations where if you prayed with a full voice, you'd disturb others or you'd be embarrassed. Your prayer life is a private thing. But do you just mumble softly? Do you verbalize your prayers?
They say, no, I haven't done that. I say, now you try that for a week and then you come back and see me. And time after time, that's cleared up their whole problem with wandering thoughts in prayer. There's something about verbalizing the thoughts that fixes them and keeps them from wandering off in a thousand directions.
You see, you find it much harder to keep from wandering thoughts while I'm preaching than I find it to keep from wandering thoughts while I'm preaching. Why? Because my mouth must be active in verbalizing the thoughts of my mind and it acts as a safeguard to wandering thoughts. You may have to fight wandering thoughts as I preach.
I hope you fight them. I hope you don't give in to them. I hope you fight them when they come. And I'm sure they do come.
But now if you will begin to verbalize. You see, this is why in a class I use a lot of give and take, because that keeps your mind from wandering. When you've got to mutter and verbalize the actions of your mind, there's an inseparable relationship between the mouth and the mind. And it's just that way.
And I'm not purporting to be a psychologist and to understand the relationship, but it's there and Scripture recognizes it. So when the man of blessedness or the blessed man is described in Psalm 1 as a man who delights in the law of God and meditates in that law of day and night, David uses this word which means to mumble or to mutter the word of God. The word of God is so fixed in this man's mind and he's so determined that it shall be fixed in his mind that he mutters and mumbles it whenever it is convenient to do so in order that he might keep the word of God central in all of his thinking and in all of his acting We find this same concept in Psalm 77 where the same word is used Psalm 77 verses 11 and 12
And notice how the mouth and the activity of meditation are joined together. Psalm 77, verses 11 and 12. I will remember, that's an activity of the mind. I will remember the works of the Lord.
Surely I will remember thy wonders of old. I will meditate also of all thy work and talk of thy doings. Now it would seem that you have here what's called the Hebrew parallelism, where in Hebrew poetry you'll have two phrases that are sort of looking at things from two different angles. And in verse 11 he says, I'll remember the works of the Lord, I'll remember thy wonders of old.
These are parallel thoughts. Verse 12, I will mumble also thy work, I will talk of thy doings. So that you have the activity of the mind viewed from two directions in verse 11, and then the activity of the mouth in verse 12, meditating, mumbling, and talking of the doings of God. You find essentially the same thing in Psalm 5, verses 1 through 3.
This will be the last example we'll look at. But there's something so basic here that I feel we should spend a little time trying to get hold of it. Psalm 5, 1 to 3. Give ear to my words, O Lord.
Consider my meditation. There's the word. Consider my mumblings. Hearken unto the voice of my cry.
See, here you have meditation connected with the voice. Hearken to the voice of my cry, my King and my God. for unto thee will I pray my voice. Shalt thou hear in the morning, O Lord, in the morning will I direct my prayer unto thee, and will look up.
So you have this same connection. The word for meditation is the word which means to mumble or to mutter. Now the other word that is used for meditation or to meditate, both forms in the Old Testament, is a word which means to ponder or to converse with oneself. And that's the other standard word that is used in such well-known verses as, oh, how love I by law, it is my meditation all the day, used about seven or eight times in the 119th Psalm. And we will be looking at some of those verses. So in both cases, whether it's the peculiar word of Psalm 1, which can be translated to mutter or to mumble, or the general word used
in the other places, which means to ponder or to converse with oneself. This whole matter of meditation is something more than sitting out on a rock when the tide goes out and just thinking lovely thoughts of nothing as the seagulls fly by. The idea that meditation is sort of mental neutral, you know, you take everything out of gear and you just sort of toast is utterly foreign to Scripture. It's a most intense mental, spiritual activity that may even involve your faculties of speech. The whole concept of meditation is not one of passivity, but of the most concentrated form of mental activity. So, when the psalmist
describes the blessed man as the man who, delighting in the law of God, meditates in that law day and night. He's describing a very intense mental, spiritual activity. Therefore, we may conclude that the way of blessedness has nothing to do with the way of passivity. And the idea that the way of blessedness comes when you just let go and let God is utterly unfounded on Scripture and breaks down at every point of Scriptural teaching.
Question 2: What Is the Object of Meditation?
The blessed man is one who knows what it is to be found active in muttering, mumbling, and in pondering, talking with himself, reflecting upon the law of the Lord. All right, so much for the first question. What is meditation? Second question, what is to be the object of our meditation?
Is it to be the seagulls and the daisies? Well, not according to the psalmist. The idea that I'll go out to the golf course on Sunday and when I knock my ball into the water hole, I'll sit there and watch the frogs playing and think lovely thoughts of God. That's where I do my meditating.
You've heard this. I've heard it. Why, this is entirely unfounded upon Scripture. No, the blessed man has a very peculiar object of his meditation.
Here it is. And in his law doth he meditate day and night. And the law here, as we saw last week, refers to the word of God in general, and perhaps the precepts of God in particular. That revelation that has come down from God through the mouth and lips and pens of the holy apostles and prophets, the word of God, the term you ought to understand, it's a theological term, but you ought to know its meaning, and in scripturated revelation.
That is a revelation that God has embodied in words. This is to be the object of our meditation day and night. Not allowing our minds to run off and think any kind of fanciful thought about God or man or the world now or the world to come, but bringing our thoughts into that place where they are in subjection to this holy book, to use the term that will click with you ladies, it's taking your mind and letting it marinate in the word of God. Now when you're reading a recipe and it says you prepare such and such and you let it marinate for a few hours in whatever it's supposed to marinate, what happens?
Well, when that piece of food is being marinated, it is being permeated by that element in which it's marinated. Until that element of foodstuff bursts through and permeates and flavors that entire food stuff. So the word of God is to be the source, the object of our meditation. The word of God in general, Joshua 1a, this book of the law in its entirety shall not depart out of thy mouth, but thou shalt mumble therein day and night.
Joshua, this entire book of the law, that was the revelation up to that time, This book of the law is not to depart from being the object of your meditation. And then in specific ways, we read in Psalm 77, 12, where the psalmist says, I will meditate upon the doings of God. In Psalm 143, in verse 5, upon the ways of God. So the object of our meditation then is to be the Word of God, the Holy Scriptures, and nothing more and nothing less as far as the way of blessedness is concerned.
Question 3: What Is the Proper Time to Meditate?
Now, the third question. Having asked the question, what does it mean to meditate? Secondly, what is the object of meditation? Thirdly, what is the proper time to meditate?
scripture says there's a time to laugh a time to weep a time to mourn a time to love a time to dance now does it say there is a time to meditate well the psalmist says yes there is the blessed man is the man who has discovered that the time to meditate is any time you can meditate blessed is that man who meditates in the law of God day and night now does that mean that every hour of the day and night a man is to be sitting consciously mumbling over the words of God. Why, of course, that'd be a ridiculous interpretation. For one thing, God made a man who's got to get some sleep sometime. He might be able to do this for one or two days, 48 hours of the stretch,
but sooner or later he's going to drift off into dreamland. He's going to sleep. Adam, apparently, before sin entered, needed sleep. God made day and night, not after the fall, but before.
So this is a figure of speech. It does not mean that a man literally goes off into a monastery and by drinking black coffee and taking pep pills, he meditates day and night, literally. You say, well, I believe the Bible literally. That's right, but figures of speech are figures of speech, and we must interpret them as such.
Well, what then does he mean? If he doesn't mean monasticism, where we keep ourselves awake like this 24 hours around the clock, it means that we will meditate at any time when it is possible to meditate in the day, in the midst of its activities, or in the night when occasions should arise. Listen to the psalmist's own interpretation of his words. Turn to Psalm 63 for a moment.
Psalm 63.
This psalm, as you notice in the title, was written when David was being chased around in the wildernesses of Judah. He had already been set apart to be the king of the people of God by Samuel. But King Saul, you remember, is trying to destroy him, and David is being chased around like a fugitive. And in the midst of this, he longs for a revelation of the power of God, such as he had seen in the temple worship.
Now he says, in this situation where he's cut off from what we might call the public means of grace, verse 4, thus will I bless thee while I live, I will lift up my hands in thy name, my soul shall be satisfied with marrow and fatness, and my mouth shall praise thee with joyful lips. When I remember thee upon my bed, and meditate on thee in the night watches. In the night watches. See, there were times when David had to pull watch.
Maybe it was from 2 to 4 in the morning. Maybe it was from 6 to 10 or 10 to 2, whatever his watch was. But David, when he thought of his time when, in a military sense, he had to keep watch over this band of men who had gathered with him, and it came his turn to pull watch duty, he said he used this time when he had to be awake in terms of his responsibility not just to frit away the hours, but as his eyes were out looking for any signs of the approach of the armies of Saul, he was mumbling and muttering and meditating upon his God as that God was revealed in Holy Scripture. Psalm 119, verse 148, we find another verse that helps us to interpret his words day and night.
Psalm 119 and verse 148.
Mine eyes prevent. The word prevent there means go before. Mine eyes anticipate the night watches that I might meditate in thy word. In other words, David says, when I drift off to sleep, I almost can't wait until someone comes and chases me and says, Hey, David, time for you to pull watch.
He said, you know, I anticipate that time because that's a time when in the quiet of the night, without the din of the voices of my men and other responsibilities, I can think upon my God and his truth and his ways as revealed in Holy Scripture. So then to meditate day and night means that at every time when the mind can be directed to the truth of God and to the God of truth without sacrificing some clear duty, Whatever thy hand finds to do, do with all thy might as unto the Lord and not unto men. If you're a secretary taking dictation, you better not be thinking about today's sermon. You better be listening to your boss.
If you're working on a machine with close tolerances, you better not be thinking about Ephesians 1. You might get so blessed that you'd stick your hand in that machine and lose a finger or two, and that wouldn't honor the Lord, you see. But the moment the mind is relaxed from legitimate duty, whether that duty is spanking your child or putting shoes on him, or working at a machine or in the office, the housewife with her hands in the dishpan, the working man on his way to his place of business, the student sitting there in the lunchroom before the bell rings, not engaged in conversation, in those situations, whether night or day, awakened perhaps with a crying child in the middle of the night, and from that time to the time you drop off to sleep again,
the mind turning to the truth of God and to the God of truth, day and night meditating in the law of God. This is the sense of David's words in Psalm 1. Now we come to the core, what I believe to be the core of the whole message tonight. This, in a real sense, has simply been foundational, upon which we can erect the superstructure of the next question and its answer.
Question 4: What Are the Benefits? Meditation as the Stomach of Spiritual Digestion
what are the benefits of meditation? Why is the blessed man described as the man who meditates in the law of God day and night? Why do we dare say that no meditation, no blessedness? Having considered what meditation is, the object of our meditation, the proper time for meditation, our question now is what are the benefits of meditation?
And I tried to summarize them all under one basic figure. And because scripture uses homey analogies and figures, I do not shrink from using them either. I would say that the simplest way to describe the benefit of meditation to the way of blessedness is to say this.
Meditation is the stomach of the process of spiritual digestion. it. Now think for a moment, what function does your stomach have? Well, whatever function it has, it follows the function of the mouth and the teeth and the esophagus. It's into the mouth that the food is received. It's by the teeth that it's too masticated. Then by the action of the muscles in the esophagus it is swallowed. Then the stomach goes to work on it. Goes to work on it with a view to breaking down that food in order that the body might assimilate it and therefore experience the strengthening, invigorating,
therapeutic, all these other benefits that come from our food. It's the stomach that is then pivotal once the mouth has received it and the teeth have chewed it and the esophagus has swallowed it. From there on out, the process goes on without anything you can see I mean you can say what you put in there and whether or not you going to chew it or spit it out or whether or not you going to swallow it If you don believe this you just try to put certain kinds of medicine in children They have much to say. Now, once you get them to swallow it, well, then the stomach takes over rather involuntarily, and the work is accomplished.
Now, the function of the stomach in the realm of physical digestion and health is precisely the function of meditation in the life and soul of a child of God. And I might say there's no spiritual intravenous feeding.
You see, we've discovered, medical science has, that when a man can't eat or won't eat or has problems, he's sick or had an operation or something else, We've learned how to get nourishment directly into the bloodstream and into the body, but there's no way to do it spiritually. There's no spiritual intravenous feeding. It's got to come by way of spiritual mastication and spiritual assimilation.
Now, before the days of intravenous feeding, if a man didn't eat, or if he ate and the stomach did not function to break down and blend the process of assimilation, the man was either sick or after a process of sickness he died. And this is precisely the parallel we see in the life of the child of God. Now how does it do this? How does meditation act as a spiritual stomach in the spiritual life?
Well, in the first place, it brings the Word of God into direct contact with our own personal situation of life. It is impossible for a preacher, for a teaching ruling elder, for a Bible class teacher, whether it's the men's class, ladies' class, young people's class, it's impossible for that person to take every principle of Scripture that is taught and expounded and then, as it were, apply that thing in the areas, all the areas that every individual needs that particular truth. That's utterly impossible. Even if he knew everyone as perfectly as God knows them, he wouldn't have the time to do it.
So in a very real sense, every time you read the Scriptures privately, every time the scriptures are expounded publicly such as they are tonight or such as they were in Sunday school this morning and Sunday morning that's coming to the table and if you're listening if your mind is active if you're following the teacher or the expounder of scripture whoever it may be then in a very real sense you're opening your mouth and you are masticating you're taking into the mind that aspect of truth and if you are not consciously saying I don't believe that and spitting it out as it were. If you're consciously saying, yes Lord, I believe that's your word, I do receive it as your word, I take that as the word of God. Now that activity of taking into the mouth and chewing spiritually and swallowing
is about as far as you can go in any public ministry of the word and it's as far as you go when you read the word of God.
Now comes the all important process of the stomach. breaking down that food in order that it might be assimilated and this is the peculiar function of meditation and this is how it works. Look at Joshua 1 and verse 8.
Come back now to one of these key verses on the subject of meditation and we'll see how it works.
Joshua 1 and verse 8.
This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth, for thou shalt mumble, meditate, mutter therein day and night, to what end? That thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein. For then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success. Joshua, the book of the law does not have your name in it it does not say Joshua thou shalt do this and Joshua thou shalt do that it contains general directives for the people of God now Joshua you must take the book of general directives and so meditate and mumble and mutter therein day and night
that the words of general directive come to you with specific and personal direction for your life that in your will and in your experience you may know the way of blessedness.
Now notice the same thing in Psalm 119 and verses 23 and 24. Psalm 119 verses 23 and 24. So, princes also did sit and speak against me, but thy servant did meditate in thy statutes. Thy testimonies also are my delight, and my counselors, and the men of my counsel.
In other words, the psalmist says that regardless of what my situation is, even when tremendous pressure comes upon me from ungodly men of great standing, princes that speak against me, I continually marinated my mind in scripture so that my actions in that situation were determined not by my fleshy reaction, not by my natural disposition, but they were determined as thy word acted to me like a body of counselors with this specific problem giving me specific direction that I might do the will of God in this specific area. Now this is the way meditation acts as a spiritual stomach.
It brings the word of God into direct contact with my situation, where I live, where I move, where I think in that given circumstance. Notice verses 97 and following in Psalm 119. I'm reading a number of passages so that you see in the thinking of the psalmist that this was his understanding of the function of meditation. Oh, how love I thy law!
It is my meditation all the day. Through thy commandment thou hast made me wiser than mine enemies, for they are ever with me. I have more understanding than all my teachers, for thy testimonies are my meditation. Verse 101 I've refrained my feet from every evil way, that I might keep thy words.
Here the psalmist says, when I entered a specific situation of temptation, an evil way, because I was muttering, meditating, mumbling upon the word of God, it met me in that specific area of need and it kept me from a specific path of sin. Now you see, dear ones, this can only be accomplished by meditation. This cannot be done by the one who's expounding Holy Scripture. Now I take seriously the responsibility to apply the Word of God, and I seek to apply the Scripture to the young people, to the not-so-young people, to the old folks, who try to apply it.
But you see, one cannot think of all the possible situations, and it's in the area of the duty of meditation that the general Word preached and the general Word applied, swallowed down with relish, then becomes broken down in the stomach of your own personal meditation and assimilate it into your own life. Now, let me illustrate. If you meditated upon the sermon this morning, at least sometime during the day, this is what you should have done. He said, all right, we looked at those verses.
For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming? For ye are our glory and our joy. And the pastor made several applications of that principle.
One of them was this, and I remember that one. What is my hope or crown now that would look foolish then? Now, you couldn't answer that. I doubt you could really answer that honestly as I move right on to the next point and the next point.
Now, meditation then would lead you to take a little time Sunday afternoon, even a half an hour, 15 minutes, and say, now, Lord, help me to go down through my life. Help me to look back over the past week. What has really been my goal? What has really been the thing that brings me to life?
In what have I placed my confident expectation? Is it something that time can snatch from me? Is it something that will appear sane in the day of Christ?
Lord, certainly not this thing in my life. Lord, certainly not that thing in my life. And oh God, certainly. You see what happens?
As you meditate, that word which you have chewed and swallowed now begins to be assimilated into your life to meet your specific needs. And beloved, I can't meditate for you. I have enough to do to just keep my own head above water to meditate enough for myself. So you can preach yourself and teach yourself into a state of carnality and spiritual barrenness.
I have to fight enough to do enough meditation to keep my own head above water. I can't do yours for you. any more than I can digest your food for you. I can't do it.
You've got to. I may put some food on the table for you, invite you to my home, say, here's some food, but I can't digest it for you. And this cannot be done by proxy. And so this is how meditation works.
Meditation Keeps the Word in the Central Place of Thinking
Now, the principle that undergirds this would seem to be the principle focused in Proverbs chapter 4.
I should say another principle. It not only brings the word of God into direct contact with our situation, but it keeps the word of God in the central place of our thinking. This is why meditation is the stomach of the soul.
In Proverbs chapter 4, we have a very helpful directive that I believe fits into this subject of meditation. Proverbs chapter 4, verses 20 to 23. My son, attend to my words and incline thine ears unto my sayings. Let them not depart from thine eyes.
Keep them in the midst of thine heart. For they are life unto those that bind them and health to all their flesh. Keep thy heart with all diligence for out of it are the issues of life. Now how do you keep your heart?
Well, he tells us here the way you keep the heart is to keep the testimonies of God in the midst of the heart.
Keep thy words in the midst of the heart. Don't let them slip off to the fringe areas. For if the word of God is not there, dictating, shaping, and molding the thinking, the actions and reactions, something else will be there. And so the function of meditation is not only that it brings the word of God near us in given situations, that it keeps the word of God in that central place of the heart and the affections, and it's out of the heart that the issues of life flow.
So if my life would be a life that is marked by the government of the word, it must begin as there is the residence of the word of God in the heart by meditation. You see, God leads his children not by external force. He may occasionally do this. Occasionally does this.
He did it with Balaam. This man was determined to go prophesy where he shouldn't, and so God had a dumbass turn out of the way and talk to him. Now, God may do this like Jonah. He may prepare a great fish to swallow up someone.
He may lead us by strong measures. But generally, the way God leads his children into his will is by directing their minds to understand his will. As the mind understands, so the light then walks and follows the direction of the mind that is subject to the word of God. Therefore, the mind must be marinated in scripture.
And the only way it gets marinated in scripture is by meditation. That's why Peter says in 2 Peter 1, I think it neat, as long as I'm in this tabernacle, to stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance. I like to think of what happens with sediment in the orange juice. Once in a while I forget, and I go to the refrigerator in the morning after the orange juice has been sitting there all night, and I pour out a glass, and I think of that nice tangy orange juice, and all there is is that watery stuff at the top, and you go.
So what you do is pour that out and then shake the thing up a little bit. You get that sediment stirred up from the bottom until it's floating in the mainstream of things at the top. And then you've got good iron juice. Well, you see, the truth of Scripture has a tendency, because of the remains of corruption within, to continually settle to the bottom of the heart and the mind.
So that our reflex action, which comes off the top of the mind, many times is not scripturally directed. Our attitudes, our thinking about people and things, our reactions, instead of those reactions being the reflex actions of a heart and mind in which the Word of God has been stirred up and permeates the whole. It's that bland, tasteless reaction many times of a mind uninstructed by Holy Scripture. So as Peter wants his hearers to do the will of God, he says, the way I attempt to do that is to stir up your minds by way of remembrance.
to change the figure we might take the illustration of a fellow who's taking some pictures and develops his own pictures and he goes out here and sees a beautiful scene and he takes his camera and he clicks it and that little lens that's there the shutter behind it opens for a little bit and passes, clicks over light has gone onto the film well does he have that beautiful sunset or doesn't he? well he really doesn't have it he does but he doesn't because if you open this camera and let some light in, it's gone just like that. But if he takes that film and goes into the darkroom and immerses it in certain chemicals called developers and all the rest and the image is fixed upon paper then he can tag it out and hold it to the light hold it to the sun He got that sunset forever
as long as he's got that piece of paper. Now, the hearing of sermons, the reading of scripture, is like the light passing through the lens onto the film. But oh, how quickly other things can completely erased if it's not fixed in the chemicals of meditation. See?
But once we've taken that truth and had it fixed as we've bathed the mind and the spirit in meditation, that truth is ours. And we have a grip upon it because it now has a grip upon us. Now to use another figure. I'm fishing for all kinds of metaphors and figures because the whole matter of meditation is so foreign to our thinking in this day, I want to read something that I thought was so clear and so helpful along this very line.
The Art Gallery Illustration: The Difference Between Glancing and Meditating
This is small print. I need my glasses for this.
The word meditation has an antique old world flavor about it, as though it belongs to an age when men took slow measured strides and wheels of time moved leisurely. how many of us meditate hold the mind before a subject until it becomes steeped in it saturated with it through and through we live in an age of mental haste and gallop this is almost a hundred years ago imagine what he'd say today impressions are abundant you see light coming through the lens on the film impressions are abundant convictions are scarce you got that impressions are abundant people are impressed with something Oh, that moves me. But it hasn't become the kind of conviction for which they've shed blood yet.
See? It hasn't gripped them. Convictions abundant? I mean, impressions abundant?
Convictions scarce. Then he uses this beautiful analogy. Go to the academy in any of the summer months and see how the crowds gallop around the galleries. That is, an art academy.
Hastily glancing at the hundreds of pictures which adorn the walls with the result that the memory retains nothing in distinction but only the walls, but only a recollection of masses of color in endless confusion. The person who looks at a beautiful work of art here and jumps all around, when he comes away, all he knows is he's seen a lot of color and a lot of forms. That's all. How is it with the art student?
He goes early in the morning. He selects his picture. He sits down before it. He studies it.
It's perspective. its grouping, its coloring, the artist's mannerisms, every line, every light and shade, he meditates upon that picture. The picture becomes imprinted upon his mind and educates his taste. It steeps into his own soul and afterwards imperceptibly influences his own pencil and brush and becomes a part of the man forever.
That's how true artists are made. That's how true musicians are made. They will listen to real music until their minds and hearts and thought patterns are steeped, marinated in those concepts. Then he draws the analogy.
Well, in the four Gospels we have four picture galleries, and the different pictures are different phases of the mind of Christ. Christ is depicted in different attitudes and conditions, alone in a mountain at prayer, in the midst of a vast multitude, in the severities of temptation in a wilderness, in a quiet home in Bethany, facing the cross, the triumph of Calvary. The real student, the real disciple of the Master, wants to know the mind of his Master, and he sits down before one picture at a time and lingers before it and studies every line and feature of it, and beauty after beauty breaks upon his delighted vision. He meditates upon it, and the beauty of that picture steeps into his soul,
refines his moral taste, influences his hand and heart, and becomes a part of him forever. I tell you, we know almost nothing of the moral and spiritual loveliness of our Jesus, almost nothing of the mind of Christ, because we do not hold ourselves before it in lingering meditation. Why don't we? Why are we not devoted students of these pictures of the mind of Christ?
Let us be frank with ourselves. Is not Bible studying wearying and wearisome? To how many of us is it a delight? It is because so many put the virtue in the reading itself.
We think when we've read a chapter we've discharged our duty. People open their Bibles, read a few verses and close them and think that by their reading they've pleased God. You may have displeased Him. Some people think when they read their Bible the very act of reading is a kind of talisman to hedge about their lives with increased security.
Oh no, it may be that you're falling into the very snare of the tempter. John Ruskin says there's nothing which tends to destroy the accuracy of the artistic eye so much as a hurried gallop round the art gallery, even though it contains the works of the most eminent masters. May not that be equally true of the gospel gallery? Where the mind of the great master is exhibited in a hundred different ways, A hurried and half-indifferent gallop may only destroy the accuracy of the moral eye and impair rather than strengthen your spiritual vision. Bible reading, and I would add, hearing sermons is virtuous only when it leads to virtue. Isn't that beautifully stated?
now you see hearing the sermon is like going to the art gallery and taking a look and getting a general impression but now you must take that home and study its lines until its spirit and its power enters into the soul the same way with scripture I believe it's far more profitable to read one verse of scripture and truly meditate upon it and take it with us throughout the day so that at the ironing board and driving down Route 46, if you dare meditate in that situation, the mind can recall that word of truth and it reflects and applies to the heart and to the life. Well, I would close by just briefly asking this last question.
Prerequisites of Meditation: New Birth, Conviction, and Discipline
What are the prerequisites of seeking to perfect the art of meditation? If the blessed man is one who meditates in the law of God day and night, If meditation is what we've seen it is, and we've seen something of its function, what is necessary for me to learn to be one who meditates in the law of God? Well, it's obvious if I don't delight in the law, I won't meditate in it, and I won't delight in it unless I've been born of the Spirit. Now, some of you can never meditate in the law of God because you're strangers to grace.
For about ten years, this was my big problem. I read and knew enough of the Bible and heard enough sermons preached to know that Christians read the Bible. And so I tried my best to read it. And I think I've mentioned this on one or two other occasions.
I can remember just to ease my conscience, like he said, to say I did it, to say I'd read my chapter, I'd read Psalm 117, two verses.
I'm not kidding, I did this. It's a shame, but I did that. To say I'd read my chapter, I'd read my two verses. Now why was there no inclination to meditate in the law of God?
Well, because there was no delight in the law. And why was there no delight? Because I didn't know the God who was spoken of in Holy Scripture. And perhaps for some of you tonight, the problem is just that basic.
You're not savingly acquainted with the God of this Bible. And until you know Him, spiritual truths are foolishness. 1 Corinthians 2 and verse 12. And so I would give you a summons tonight to seek the Lord, to show you your desperate need of Him, to show you your condition, to show you His Savior, the Lord Jesus, and seek mercy from his hand?
Some of you will never meditate because that first prerequisite was not met in your life. Namely, you need to be born of the Spirit. But I'm thinking particularly of those of us who are joined to Christ. What prerequisites are there that we might be these kind of people who meditate in the law of God day and night?
May I suggest two of you. Number one, and this will be brief, the conviction of its necessity.
See, once you're convinced something is necessary, you'll go to any pains to get it or to do it.
Until you're convinced it's necessary, the first difficulty you'll face, you'll give it up. If you believed it was necessary for you to get a certain kind of pill before 8 o'clock tomorrow morning, or you'd be dead and we'd be having your funeral next Wednesday, you wouldn't just go downtown and say, oh, well, parked drugstore's closed, and now this one's closed. Well, we'll go some other time. No, no, my friend, if you're convinced of the absolute necessity of getting a certain pill to preserve your life, you'll do everything in your power right up to 7.59 tomorrow morning to get that pill.
If you are convinced of its necessity for life.
Right? Anyone debate that?
Would anyone debate that? Would you agree that that's it? All right. Now if you're convinced that to know the way of blessedness means that you must learn the art of meditation then you're going to be willing to take the pains to learn it and make any adjustments necessary in your life.
to learn it. But until that comes, forget it. You'll conk out. You'll come up with 101 excuses and the devil will give you another 200 and then the world will give you another 300 or you'll just have a list a mile long.
Well, I'm not the student type and I'm not giving much to God. I know all that. But listen, when God somewhere says, blessed is the man who meditates in the law of God, parenthesis, but there are a few exceptions, then you claim to be the exception. But until then, don't claim to be the exception.
That's the first principle to maintaining, attaining and maintaining the art of meditation, conviction of its necessity. Secondly, there must be spiritual discipline. In two areas particularly, number one of your time and number two of your mind. And those two things stand or fall together.
You see, we stand in one of the most peculiarly difficult ages to meditate. and I don't believe it's right to say well every age is as bad as the other it isn't true we have more clamoring for our time than any other previous generation can you imagine some of you fellows and girls you can't imagine how in the world people lived for thousands of years without television set and the radio people lived they lived pretty good did pretty well apparently lived a lot better than we're living with them but you see these things have become so much a part of our whole system our way of life and television is basically you see not an educational or entertainment enterprise it's basically a commercial enterprise television exists
to sell products to the American public anyone wants to debate that just go to the owners of the television stations and ask them what governs what programs they'll well it's the ones that keep up their Nielsen ratings why? because they're the ones that bring in the most money by the sponsoring people. Television is not an educational, primarily, or entertainment facility. It is a selling mechanism.
Now, how do they try to sell products to you? By getting enough of your time to inject some thoughts into your mind. And if they can get enough of your time, they don't ask for much. Thirty seconds?
To get a few little thoughts into your mind, they'll sell you products. That's why, as I mentioned a few months ago, when they knew that 70 million people would be watching the Pro Bowl game last year, people were willing for 60 seconds of time to spend $150,000.
They say, that's ridiculous. No, not the companies who invested it. Because they knew if they could have 60 seconds of the American public's time to get a few talks into the mind, they'd sell products.
And beloved, God has limited, as a general rule, the working of His grace to getting the time of His people to get truth into their minds.
So, if we don't discipline our time for serious exposure to the Word of God that can lead to meditation, forget it. We won't be meditating. There must be the discipline of our time. That involves our reading matter, our TV, what we're going to give our time to in the way of extracurricular activities, in the way of entertainment, in the way of recreation.
All of these things, there must be the discipline of time. Scripture says it in these terms, redeeming the time, buying up the opportunities. And then coupled with that, there must be the discipline of the mind. Scripture says, gird up the loins of your mind.
So difficult to keep the mind fixed upon anything. You leave this place tonight, your mind is perhaps in a little wave and shut in with God, and you're no sooner down in Bloomfield Avenue when there's some blinking light and there's some sign, immediately seeking to pull the mind away and fix it upon things. And we need to learn to treat with a holy violence all of these things that clamor for the attention of the mind. We need to gird up the loins of the mind.
We need to learn what it is to discipline the mind. and then the third principle we need to cry to God for the Spirit's assistance to learn the art of meditation the Lord Jesus said without me he can do nothing and if you don't believe that with regard to meditation you just seriously say alright I'm determined to start tonight no better time to start than tonight and I'm not going to go to bed until for 15 minutes I sat down and if necessary with paper and pencil I'm going to think on what I've heard today you ladies you're going to think back to the ladies class And you're going to think of that verse. You're going to open up the scripture. But sanctify him as Lord and be ready always to give an answer.
Closing Application: Begin Meditating Tonight
Now, what did Mrs. Starr tell us that verse meant? Now, what does that say to me? How, in my situation, can I sanctify him as Lord?
What am I doing that is hindering this? And you reflect upon, you take that which you've swallowed, and you allow the stomach of meditation to break it down, and then to begin to be assimilated. you take the sermon tonight and you ask yourself alright what am I doing with regard to my time that I must change in order that my mind will be steeped in scripture well but if you don't do that this sermon will go by way of all the other sermons no further than the Sothecites
Thank you.
This transcript was generated by automated speech recognition and may contain errors. It is provided for study and reference only; the audio recording is the authoritative source.
Passages Expounded
In his law doth he meditate day and night -- the core text being expounded
Key cross-reference linking meditation, the mouth, and obedience
Extended example of meditation producing wisdom and obedience in specific situations