You are listening to Abide in Jesus, the podcast for women who want to experience Christ’s healing, touch and their lives. I’m your host, author and Bible teacher, Carolyn Rice. And in this episode, we’re going to talk about how to meditate on the word.
I Started growing as a Christian, when I was 21 years old. I’d been told about Jesus from a neighbor when I was six, but I did not grow up in a Christian home.
And I didn’t really start attending church until after I was 21 years old. So I learned how to read the Bible and be discipled. But one thing that I kept hearing again and again, is that we are to meditate on the word, and coming from a place of not learning the word as a child and not being brought up in that.
I didn’t quite know what meditate the word meant. And how to do it. As I grew through attending Bible studies and reading books, I learned how to meditate on the word. The Strong’s lexicon defines meditate as to speak, to imagine, to study to mutter. One of my favorite verses on meditating the word is
Joshua 1:8 in the NKJV.
This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night that you may observe to do according to all of it is in it for then you will make your way prosperous and then you will have good success.
How Do We Meditate God’s Word?
So how do we meditate the word of God for ourselves? And through the verse that we just read and the strongs lexicon that we looked at, we can see that meditate in the word means to speak it.
Psalm 46:10 in the NKJV says Be still and know that I am God.
Speak the Word
And one way that I meditate on the word through speaking, the word is I’ll close my eyes, and I’ll think on the verse of scripture, I sit still and I just breathe in. And as I breathe out, I speak the word of God.
Imagine
Another way that we can meditate the word is to imagine.
Picture that Word in your mind, you can picture the words themselves, or if it’s a scene in the Bible, you can picture that scene in your mind and just let the Holy Spirit work with you. Ask him to show you the truth of that word, as you imagine it in your mind.
If you were reading the gospels and you wanted to meditate on one of the verses about Jesus healing someone, and you just pictured that in your mind, what you think it may have looked like and asked the Holy Spirit to work in you as you meditate and think about and imagine what that scene would have looked like.
So, we see that we can speak the word. You can imagine the word. And we can ask the Lord, make this word real to me, show me Father your truth through your Holy Spirit and through your word.
Study
One of the other ways that it said was meditating on the word is study. And so you can go deeper into studying the word through a site like Bible gateway or blueletterbible, or you can get a study Bible, and the study Bible will have footnotes where you can look up cross-references and other things that will help you to understand the verse that you’re looking at.
So meditating on the word is also study.
Remember
Now there’s things to remember when you’re meditating on the word, especially when you’re using just one verse isyou to always keep the word of God in context, you always want to read the verses around the word that you’re meditating so that you’re not taking it out of context. You’re not lifting a verse out to mean something that it doesn’t really mean.
So this week, I would just invite you to read a chapter of the Bible that really speaks to your heart. Keep it in context and look at one verse that you would like to meditate on.
Speak that verse over yourself.
Imagine that verse happening in your mind.
Ask the holy spirit to speak to your heart about that verse to make it real to you and study that verse, go deeper.
Find some cross references to look at, look at the footnotes and things in your study Bible to go deeper.
That is how you meditate on the word of God.
You take it in and you chew it.
It’s Ok to Go Slow when you Meditate God’s Word
And one thing I want to leave you with is when I first started studying the word I wanted so badly to be healed, I just kept going and going and going. And finally the Lord was like, you know, you can really only take it one bite at a time if it’s going to make any kind of impact in your life.
It’s like learning. If you’re learning all of this new stuff, um, really, you can only hang on to some nuggets, so it’s okay to go slow.
A lot of people would like you to think that you must rush through the word, but it’s okay to go slow. It’s okay to go slow and to let the holy spirit really work on you on one scripture for a while.
You need to read the Bible, how it works for you, not how it works for somebody else.
Can I pray for you today?
Father God. I pray for my dear sister in Christ, I pray as she begins to meditate the word of God and go deeper in study, I pray Father that you would help her to realize who she is in Christ by speaking the word of God, over herself.
I pray that your truth would permeate her heart. I pray father that as she imagines the word of God in her mind and asks you to work in her heart, that you would meet her there, and you would speak to her, but you would go down into the deep places of her heart and you would give her exactly what she needs today.
Father, I pray that as she takes in, you would show her that it’s okay to stay in one scripture or one chapter for a while that she doesn’t have to hurry through the word. I pray, father your purposes and your plans would come forth and that as she studies the word, she would grow deeper in you, and that you would do a mighty work in her heart, in Jesus’ mighty name. Amen. Amen.
Well, I wanted to let you know that I will not be on next week because I am going to be teaching at the right now writers conference. So I will be back the week after.
Thank you for listening to Abide in Jesus. You can find show notes for this episode at Carolynsbooks.com. Do you know, someone who you feel would enjoy Abide in Jesus, share the love, and send them a link to this episode.
