Your Greatest Need?

I’m increasingly convinced that for all of us, our greatest need is to know God better. Not to have more money, a better job, to be fitter, skinnier, smarter, prettier, healthier, cooler, have more influence or anything else, but to know God in all his fullness, love, holiness, power, mercy, wisdom and majesty. 

And that if we have a right understanding of who God is and how he views us, then everything else will fall into place, and we’ll be more than able to deal with anything life might throw at us.

Please take a moment to stop and ask yourself whether you agree with what I’ve just said. If you don’t then I’d love to talk about it. If you do then it stands to reason that getting to know God better should be one of the highest priorities in our lives. 

But how? How do we get to know God better, and God as he really is rather than us just amplifying our own version of who we think he is. Well one of the primary ways we get to know God better is through meditating on his word. Tim Keller puts it this way:

“While deep experiences of the presence and power of God can happen in innumerable ways, the ordinary way for going deeper spiritually into prayer is through meditation on Scripture.”

Rick Warren makes a similar observation when he says:

“No other habit can do more to transform your life and make you more like Jesus than daily reflections on scripture”. 

Psalm 1 tells us that blessed (happy) are those who day and night meditate on God’s word. That word for mediate means to ponder, to speak, to mutter, to imagine and to study. Not necessarily reading big chunks of scripture (though that is important too) but stopping long enough to allow one verse, one phrase or even one word to speak to us and sink deep into our souls. 

So in 2019 I want to encourage each of us to spend more time meditating on God’s word. To help that I’m going to put up a daily post on my Twitter, Facebook and Instagram accounts with what I’m calling a #5minutemeditation. This will be a short scripture along with a couple of questions. I want to encourage you to try to find five minutes every day where you can stop and meditate on the scripture. It might be first thing in the morning, last thing at night, as you wait for Pointless to start, while you drink a coffee, as you walk to school or work or when it comes up in your feed. Ask God to speak to you, read the scripture slowly and repeatedly, and listen for his voice. Then respond. It might be to worship God, to be thankful for something, to pray for someone, to send an encouraging text or who knows what else. 

Let me know how you get on. I’ll be praying for you!

Happy New Year :)

Simon