MEDITATION

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MEDITATION
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What is Meditation?

• The action or practice of profound spiritual or
  religious reflection or mental contemplation
  (OED)
• Meditation is the tongue of the soul and language
  of our spirit
• Jeremy Taylor

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Just as you do not analyse the words of someone
you love, but accept them as they are said to
you, accept the Word of Scripture and ponder it
in your heart, as Mary did. That is all. That is
meditation. Dietrich Bonhoeffer
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• But Mary treasured up all these things
• And pondered them in her heart
• Luke 219

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Meditation is focused thinking. It takes serious
effort. You select a verse and reflect on it
over and over in your mind... if you know how to
worry, you already know how to meditate Rick
Warren The Purpose Driven Life
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Biblical PerspectiveOld Testament

• Fix these words of mine in your hearts and
  minds tie them as symbols on your hands and bind
  them on your foreheads. Teach them to your
  children, talking about them when you sit at home
  and when you walk along the road, when you lie
  down and when you get up
• Deuteronomy 1118 - 19

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• Isaac went out to the field one evening to
  meditate --- Genesis 2463
• Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your
  mouth meditate on it day and night, so that you
  may be careful to do everything written in it.
  Then you will be prosperous and successful ---
  Joshua 18

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The Psalms

• Blessed is the man whose delight is in the law
  of the Lord,
• and on his law he meditates day and night.
• He is like a tree planted by streams of water,
• which yields its fruit in season
• and whose leaf does not wither.
• Psalm 1 2-3

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Psalm 119

• I meditate on
• your precepts (15)
• your decrees (23)
• your wonders (27)
• your statutes (99)
• your law (97)
• your promises (148)

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New Testament

• Jesus in the Temple
• Jesus in the desert
• Jesus and Creation
• Jesus and daily life
• Jesus and solitude

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Pitfalls and Pointers

• Identity in Christ not loss of identity
• Life-transforming not life-avoiding
• Divine not supernatural guidance
• 1 Peter 58 vs 1 John 44

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Meditative Prayer
I just look at God And He looks at me And we
are content
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Lectio Divina

• We read under the eye of God until the heart is
  touched and leaps to flame
• Abbot Marmion
• 6th Century Benedictine Monk

• Lectio
• Reading
• Meditatio
• Meditating
• Oratio
• Praying
• Contemplatio
• Contemplating

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• If you read quickly, it will benefit you little.
  You will be like a bee that merely skims the
  surface of a flower. Instead, in this new way of
  reading with prayer, you must become as the bee
  who penetrates into the depths of the flower. You
  plunge deeply within to remove its deepest
  nectar.
• Madame Guyon

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St Ignatius of Loyola
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Spiritual Exercises

• Week 1
• Our sins in the light of Gods love
• Week 2
• Life of Christ
• Week 3
• Passion of Christ
• Week 4
• Resurrection of Christ

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Ignatian Meditation

• Imaginative Contemplation
• Explore with our mind
• Respond with our feelings
• Interact with our imagination
• Reflect in solitude
• Influence our choices and commitments
• Senses

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Ignatian MeditationPlacing God in Charge

• Readiness Prayer
• to ask God our Lord for the grace that all my
  intentions, all my outward acts, all my inward
  operations, may be directed purely to the praise
  and service of His Divine Majesty
• Spiritual Exercises Ignatius of Loyola

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Imaginative Meditation

• Who do you identify with in the story?
• What is the weather like?
• Who else is there? Who isnt there?
• What is the atmosphere like?
• Do you want to speak to anyone?
• What do you want to say?
• What do you feel?

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• To see the world in a grain of sand
• And heaven in a wild flower,
• Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
• And eternity in an hour
• William Blake

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Contemplating the Created World

• For since the creation of the world Gods
  invisible qualities his eternal power and
  divine nature have been clearly seen, being
  understood from what has been made, so men are
  without excuse
• Romans 1 20

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Meditation Without Words

• We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the
  Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that
  words cannot express. And he who searches our
  hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the
  Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance
  with Gods will
• Romans 8 26, 27

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Practicing the Presence of God

• The time of business does not with me differ
  from the time of prayer and in the noise and
  clutter of my kitchen, while several persons are
  at the same time calling for different things, I
  possess God in as great tranquility as if I were
  upon my knees at the Blessed Sacrament
• Brother Lawrence

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Signposts and Markers

• Set up road signs
• put up guideposts.
• Take note of the highway,
• the road that you take.
• Jeremiah 31 21

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Resources

• The Lost Art of Meditation Sheila Pritchard
• Taste and See Margaret Silf
• Prayer Richard Foster
• Eyes to See, Ears to Hear David Lonsdale
• The Lion Christian Meditation Collection
• The Life Youve Always Wanted John Ortberg
• Sadhana A Way To God Anthony de Mello