Biblical Meditation Challenge, Part 1

We spend a lot of time talking about prayer and Bible study, but the Bible is clear—meditation is an important tool for knowing the mind of God. After listening to this wonderful sermon by Patrick McKee (https://www.ucg.org/sermons/returning-gift-love-god-biblical-meditation) we accepted his 21-day biblical meditation challenge. (The two hand outs from his message are linked below.) What makes this challenge different? It’s just 3-5 minutes a day of reading and thinking about a single passage of scripture out loud. Does it feel odd at first? Yup. Has it started some remarkable journeys of drawing closer to God? YES. We invite you to join us for the next three weeks as we jump into this biblical meditation challenge.

[Transcript]

Hey, welcome back to Stir. I’m so excited that you're here with us because we're beginning a whole section on the idea of biblical meditation and this really comes from a sermon that I listened to by a guy named Patrick McKee out of Houston, Texas. We're going to link that message in all of our content so you can listen, too.

I was really inspired when he suggested beginning the practice of biblical meditation for a 21-day period, three to five minutes a day. And you probably know me well enough to know that even I can do that, right? So I jumped in and picked a passage… and I have to tell you, it kind of changed my spiritual life. It felt like unlocking another level with my relationship with God. So we became very passionate about it here at Stir and we would love to share what our experience has been with you.

How is Biblical Meditation Different from Eastern Meditation?

So just to get you started, sometimes we kind of shy away from the idea of meditation because it is very associated with Eastern meditation, which involves emptying your mind of everything, all of your concerns, and then reaching a transcendent state. Well, biblical meditation is pretty different. The word that is often used in the Bible when it talks about meditating is “hagah” (https://biblehub.com/hebrew/1897.htm). Meaghan did a video on this some time back (about the unexpected meaning of some biblical words) and it can actually mean to chew over. There's usually a murmuring sound with it. And it's akin to the sound a lion makes as it's devouring its prey. You know, this whole thing—[sound of a lion chewing]—which can be off-putting, right? But the idea is that there is a verbal component to reviewing the word of God. And that can be very different. I don't spend a lot of time reading the Bible out loud. I mean, maybe I did to my kids when they were little, but day to day, it's mostly very silent internalization. But the concept of biblical meditation is to repeat a passage of scripture out loud until you internalize it.

Getting Started

So I picked my first passage, and the passage was about relying more on God rather than on myself, right? And it is very awkward when you first begin. You just think, How many times am I going to say these words? But then you spend a little time looking up the various roots of the words and thinking about the meaning, and then you hit your groove, and before you know it, the timer dings, and your three to five minutes is up. So the next day, same thing. I have a little bit of willpower so I can do things for a couple of days in a row, right? And it's repetitive and you're just kind of cruising and you're not sure anything's really happening. But then for me, like the third day, I start having these aha moments and I start connecting this idea to other ideas in scripture. And I’m thinking, Wait, what does that mean for my life in this setting?

A Few Days Later

By day four or five, I've got to tell you, the scripture was popping into my head multiple times a day. I would start thinking about something else and then I'd think, Wait… or I wouldn't even think; it would just come into my brain. And let me tell you, scripture doesn't just come into my brain randomly. I'm not that righteous. I'm just not. So it was a game changer, like I said. Thinking deeply and carefully about scripture… maybe it happens for you naturally; for me, not so much. So having a set dedicated time for this meditation then turned into a natural outflow into prayer sometimes because I wanted to talk to God about what I had been pondering deeply. Then sometimes it spun right into deeper Bible study because I wanted to go look up that scripture or I wanted to find that other connecting point and I found myself more engaged and present for all the different types of interacting with God that I had at my disposal.

Barriers to Meditation

What are the barriers that you might find beginning this idea? One thing that I've come across a couple of times now has been people say, “Oh, I would love to do that, but I have to find just the right scripture.” Ummm, you're listening to yourself, right? It's all good. There's not a bad scripture in the Bible. I mean, there'd be some weird ones that you might dwell on, but honestly, you pretty much can't go wrong. So it's less important, I think, which scripture you choose, although you should pray about it and think about it before you pick one—but don't get hung up on finding the perfect scripture. That way kind of lies craziness, right?

Shifting from Darkness to Light

When my mind is left to its own devices, which you know is most of the time, I can go to some pretty dark places. I can ruminate on very negative things. So the habit of (for three to five minutes a day) forcing my mind to stay on one concept, one passage, one thought from God, then changes everything else about my day. Inserting scripture [into my life] in that way—diligently, purposefully, yearning to know God's mind—has been one of the best things I've done this year. So I hope you'll join us for our adventures in biblical meditation. I hope you're not put off by the word “meditation.” And I hope you dig into our study guide this week and explore just a little bit about how the Bible uses the term and where we can take it.