November 16, 2022
Author: Pastor Gordon Cook
November 16, 2022
“Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor
stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his
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 that yields its
fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does,
he prospers. The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind
drives away. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor
sinners in the congregation of the righteous; for the LORD knows the way
of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.”
Psalm 1:1-6
Everybody has a world view. They might not be able to articulate
it, but they look at life through a certain lens, or with certain
presuppositions, or what you could call fundamental beliefs. That
affects their everyday choices and values, and the Christian worldview
is shaped by the bible. John Calvin called the bible the spectacles in
which every believer sees the all of life, and should take full
advantage of their bible to answer every question. That's why we need
to hear the bible preached. We need to read the bible. We need to
study the bible, and as someone said, that section that was read
earlier, meditate upon the bible. Day and night he made good use of his
bible. The Apostle Paul picks up that word meditation in Philippians.
He says, meditate upon the things that are true, and on Wednesday nights
we often have a short meditation to prepare our hearts and minds for
praying. One of the puritans by the name of George Swinnock said
meditation prepares the heart for prayer and there are many things we
could meditate upon.
But the let me give you 4 major topics or
subjects of meditation that should regularly shape our prayers: Number
one, meditate on your sins, meditate on your sins. That should be the
easiest thing in the world to do, because we are sinners, and we, and
every day the bible has a lot to say about sin. The bible defines sin
as a transgression of God's law, and it also talks about original actual
sin, reigning and remaining sin, and the need to confess our sins. And
Jesus makes it very clear in that prayer of prayers, the Lord's Prayer
that we have to get honest about our sins. Forgive us our debts as we
forgive our debtors, and we have that wonderful promise by John, if we
confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins. So
one of the reasons why we pray is to confess our sins, and the bible
says, there's two ways to deal with your sins. You can cover it, or you
can confess it. Proverbs 28 says “Whoever conceals his transgressions
will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain
mercy.” So that's the first matter of meditation when we think of
praying is to meditate upon our sins.
A second matter that we
need to keep in mind or keep regularly meditating upon is to prepare our
hearts for prayer by meditating upon the mercies of God. The God we
worship is abundant in mercy and most every day we are showered with his
mercies such as mercies of protection, mercies of deliverance, and
mercies of help. Every breath we take you could say is the mercy of
God. We don't deserve anything from God except wrath and judgment.
Lamentations 3:22-23 is a wonderful text that says “The steadfast love
of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new
every morning; great is your faithfulness.” The very last verse of
Psalm 23 ends on a wonderful note of mercy. “Surely goodness and mercy
shall follow me all the days of my life…” So when we come to prayer,
we should meditate to prepare a heart for prayer. What should we
meditate upon? We should meditate upon our sins. We should meditate
upon mercy, divine mercy.
Thirdly, we should meditate upon Christ
Jesus. He should be the chief part of our meditation--his life, his
death, his resurrection, and his ascension. The only reason we have
access to God by prayer is because of what Christ accomplished on that
cross. This is a blood bought privilege. I don't know who said that.
But I've often thought of those words. Prayer is a blood bought
privilege in the bible and teaches us that we are purchased by his
blood. We have been reconciled by His blood, justified by his blood,
cleansed by his blood, and we have been freed by his blood, in
everything because of His precious, so precious blood.
The fourth
thing we should meditate upon is the church. Jesus taught us to pray
“Our Father, which art in heaven…” That's a corporate prayer, plural
from top to bottom. It's a family prayer. It's a church prayer. We
are to pray for one another. We always have sick people who need our
prayers. We always have weak people who need our prayers. We always
have people who are in danger of wandering from God. Sometimes the
bible uses the word disorderly for people falling prey to open sins such
as giving into temptation and backsliding. We always have people who
are struggling emotionally with depression, guilt, doubt and fear. They
need our prayers. We all are poor and needy, and we need one and
another's prayers. Meditate upon sin. Meditate upon God's mercy.
Meditate upon Christ. Meditate upon the Church. I would say again that
this is not and exhaustive list. Now the fifth thing to meditate upon
is the lost. Meditate upon those who don't know Christ. Meditate upon
those who are without hope. Meditate upon those who are lost in
darkness of false religion, whether it's the false religion of Romanism
or Islam or Hinduism. They won't pray for themselves. It was Spurgeon
who said this about the church. The church is the world's priest this
way. We are the intercessors on the on behalf of sinners, and some of
you can trace your conversion back in terms of one of the instruments
that God used to save you. It was through someone’s prayers for you
whether it was a mother, a father, a grandmother, a brother or sister.
And so we need to pray for lost sinners. Thy kingdom come is a prayer
petition for lost sinners.
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