Heart Meditations 2 - Whatever is True - David Mitts
"Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, let your mind dwell on these things. The things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things; and the God of peace shall be with you." Philippians 4:8-9
This scripture is a foundation stone for successful meditation that empowers us to run the race of our calling in Messiah.
- The Truth- There is no peace in lies
- Honor- Restore the “wow” factor to your thinking
- Straight or Right- Discipline the mind to avoid distractions
- Pure thoughts- Avoid the corruption of lust
- Lovely - True beauty inner and outer
- Good Reputation- To be desired above riches
- Excellence- The enemy of good enough
- Praise Worthiness- Is God revealed and extolled in my life?
"there is nothing outside the man which going into him can defile him; but the things which proceed out of the man are what defile the man." Mark 7:15
By being intentional in our meditation we activate the peace of God in our heart. This is more than a list of nice thoughts or choosing to have a positive attitude. They are that but they are also activations, portals into eternity. Paul tells us to practice them as dwelling places in our minds.
Yeshua told us:
"In My Father's house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. "And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. "And you know the way where I am going."" John 14:2-4
This scripture may be about heaven when we die. Or it could also be about heaven when we live. By meditation on the qualities of the Kingdom, we attract the Kingdom's reality into our minds and hearts now. We dwell with Him now and He dwells with us. Yeshua dwells in our hearts which is the place He has prepared for us. He receives us into our own hearts. In this way, we dwell with Him for eternity and eternity dwells in us in our lives. This may be what drawing near to God actually is:
"Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded." James 4:8
God dwells in our hearts which are the temples of His Spirit. Our meditations are literally our inner worship of Him. By meditating on Him who is the Word we live with Him. Our meditations create a place where He comes into oneness with us.
"Jesus answered and said to him, "If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and make Our abode with him." John 14:23
We either bless Him by our meditations or grieve Him in them.
"Woe to those who scheme iniquity, Who work out evil on their beds! When morning comes, they do it, For it is in the power of their hands." Micah 2:1
Our meditations shape our lives. Let’s be intentional and activate God in our hearts and lives.
Let’s begin with meditation on truth.
Truth. God is truth. In Him, there are no lies.
"Every good thing bestowed and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation, or shifting shadow. In the exercise of His will He brought us forth by the word of truth, so that we might be, as it were, the first fruits among His creatures." James 1:17-18
We will begin our inquiry into meditations of the heart that are acceptable to the Lord with this one. The good gifts and perfect gifts that come from the Father of Lights are a description of our unique spiritual endowments and their ultimate fulfillment. You were created with a purpose and that purpose was endowed with good gifting. Those gifts are called perfect. In Greek “telos” because they contain their ultimate expression, their fulfillment in their encoding. You are engineered for greatness. It is built into your spiritual, mental, emotional, and physical DNA. Unlike human genetics, this is incorruptible and based on eternal truth.
The term variation and the shifting of shadows is a description of the unstable and shifting sands of human knowledge. What is true today may be false tomorrow. Once the Earth was flat and at the center of the universe. Today we think a virus infects us. These current thoughts will be changed tomorrow. The truths of man and his “science” cannot be trusted. They break down under pressure. Our vaunted technology fails us in the most difficult times. Yet God’s truth does not vary and is not a shifting shadow.
No! His truth is productive. It produces and is not void. It produces what it says. God says Light and there is light. God spoke you into your destiny and it will be produced.
God’s Spirit, His character is truth. Yeshua said of Himself, I am the truth. He leads us into all truth.
"God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth."" John 4:24
Meditating on the truth of God is worshipping Him in Spirit and in Truth. Everything in nature validates Him as truth. You can meditate on a sunset and see Him as the truth that birthed the sun and makes the sun set.
Looking at the blessings in your life and seeing Him as the source of them is meditating on Him as truth.
Receiving your identity as His child is receiving Him as truth. He is your Abba!
"And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, "Abba! Father!" Therefore you are no longer a slave, but a son; and if a son, then an heir through God." Galatians 4:6-7
Meditating on Him as truth makes all of His promises to you yes and amen.
"For as many as may be the promises of God, in Him they are yes; wherefore also by Him is our Amen to the glory of God through us." 2 Corinthians 1:20
The master key to all of His promises is the meditation that He is the truth! Satan, by contrast, is the father of lies.
"You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature; for he is a liar, and the father of lies." John 8:44
When we meditate on Satan’s lies we alter reality in our lives to align with falsehoods and this brings about death.
This is what we discover when we ask the Lord in the context of our trauma to reveal the lies we have believed as a result of trying to “understand” our pain. Proverbs call this leaning into our own understanding
"Trust in the LORD with all your heart, And do not lean on your own understanding." Proverbs 3:5
It is an illusion, the concept of our understanding. It is a shifting of sand. There is no true foundation that rests on our understanding. It isn’t understanding itself that is at fault. It is the “our own” part of the scripture that causes us to stumble. Our own understanding is an understanding that is self-directed. We experience things in our life that we cannot understand the why of them. This causes us to become confused, lost if you will. We hate this feeling of confusion and so we manufacture, with Satan’s help an understanding to relieve ourselves of the confusion. This understanding is the fruit of a lie that we believe that later will affect how we live our lives. The lie that we lean on as “truth” is unstable because it is not based on the truth of God, that He loves us.
"And everyone who hears these words of Mine, and does not act upon them, will be like a foolish man, who built his house upon the sand. "And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and burst against that house; and it fell, and great was its fall."" Matthew 7:26-27
It is only by trusting in the Lord with all of our hearts that we can build a life that is truly trustworthy. The foundation stone of trust is the truth.
In Hebrew the word for truth is Emet. It is 3 characters, Aleph, Mem, Tav. This is the beginning, the middle, and the end. By meditating on Emet, we can activate truth.
Activation: Dwelling in the truth. Think about what God has told you about your life. Meditate of that reality. He will never leave you or abandon you. There is nothing you can do to separate yourself from Him. He loves you!
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