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ACTS 29 TODAY

coming to the knowledge of the TRUTH

 

 

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The Benefits of Meditation on the Word

 

Meditation on God’s Word is one of the most important

guidelines I could give you for unlocking divine

mysteries through praying in the Holy Ghost. For more

than a quarter of a century, I have endeavored to pray

in tongues just as much as possible in my own walk

with the Lord, and I have reaped rich rewards. And

some of the greatest benefits I’ve experienced have

come from meditating on the Word as I pray.

What is meditation? Meditation is the process of

assimilating God’s Word into your soul and spirit. As

you meditate on the Word of God, the Holy Spirit takes

God’s counsel in the form of the Word and reconstructs

it in your spirit in such a way that it becomes your

insight, wisdom, and counsel.

Meditation can take you from simply acknowledging

that God’s Word is true to having the Word en-grafted

into your spirit. In other words, the Word not only

becomes a part of you, but as it becomes implanted in

your heart, you become a part of it!

 

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Meditation on the Word And Praying in Tongues

 

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I gave you some practical guidelines about what to do if

you only have three hours to spend with the Lord. But

that doesn’t negate the fact that the more you pray in

tongues, the more clear and definite the divine channel

becomes through which God communicates with you.

It is to your eternal benefit that you pray much in the

Holy Ghost, building yourself up on your most holy

faith.

As you pray in tongues, the Teacher of your new nature

uses the supernatural language He brought all the way

from Heaven to begin an illumination process inside of

you. Within that language resides not only the

mysteries of God’s plan for your life, but the

understanding of all Scripture.

Therefore, the Holy Spirit lives in hope of the day that

you’ll give yourself over to the meditation of God’s

Word. When you do, you make His ministry of

illumination so much simpler.

I consider it to be a blessing that my mind is unfruitful

while I spend three or four hours praying in tongues.

Why? Because I’ve learned to employ my mind with

God’s Word while my spirit is praying. It has become

automatic for me: When I sit down to pray in tongues, I

pickup my Bible and start reading.

My favorite practice is to take a book like Galatians,

Ephesians, or Philippians and just read that book over

and over again while I pray in tongues for hours. Often

I sit in a chair or lie on the floor and pray an hour or

two. Then I set my open Bible in a convenient place and

start walking around the room praying.

I pray for a while, my spirit listening in case the Holy

Spirit says something through that channel of

communication. Then I go back to the Bible and read

the entire book through again,still praying in tongues.

I’m glad that my mind and my spirit can receive from

God at the same time. The Holy Spirit takes all the

accumulated knowledge that I’ve deposited into my

mind through reading something in the Bible over and

over, and He uses it for the day-and-night meditation

process.This is where much of the revelation

knowledge I receive originates.

 

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Meditating on the Word In the Early Church

 

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Meditating on the Word while praying isn’t something

new or unique to me. Think back to the early apostles.

In Acts 2, the apostles were filled with the Holy Spirit

on the Day of Pentecost. Then in Acts 6, they faced a

problem regarding the fair administration of food

among the believers.

The apostles said, “Look, it isn’t right that we are

distracted from the Word of God to serve tables. Let’s

appoint some men who are highly esteemed among you

for this job so that we may give ourselves continually to

the Word of God and to prayer” (Acts 6:2-4).

Now, what part of the Word did the apostles give

themselves to? All of the Old Testament promises.

Remember, that’s all the Word they had at that time.

They couldn’t open a Bible and have the entire

foundation of the Church laid out before them on their

lap like you can!

So the apostles gave themselves continually to all the

Old Testament promises while at the same time giving

themselves to prayer. What kind of prayer would the

apostles be talking about? Well, what experience was

freshest in their minds? They had just received the

promise of the Father — the baptism in the Holy Ghost

with the evidence of speaking in tongues. So they were

praying in that new language the Holy Spirit had given

them!

The apostles prayed in tongues continually while

meditating on the promises of the Old Covenant. This

practice helped establish the foundation of the Church,

because God was able to bring forth the mysteries of

Christ.

We can also see the principle of meditating on the Word

while praying in the Spirit in the life of the Apostle

Paul. Remember, except for Jesus, Paul received more

revelation knowledge than any other man since Moses.

We already know one of his keys to receiving that

revelation knowledge: After he was filled with the Holy

Ghost, he made the statement that he prayed in tongues

more than anyone (1Cor. 14:18). But meditation on

God’s Word was another important key.

You see, Paul said he was a Pharisee, a “Hebrew of

Hebrews” (Phil. 3:5). That means he began to memorize

the Old Testament scriptures for seven hours a day

beginning at the age of three.

I believe that all of the Old Testament scripture stored

inside Paul, combined with his praying in tongues

“more than ye all,” were crucial in enabling Paul to

receive so much revelation knowledge for the

foundation of the Church. That revelation knowledge

brought the Old Covenant together with the New

Covenant.

As far as I can ascertain, Paul was the only apostle who

thoroughly understood the relationship between the

Law and our covenant with God through Jesus Christ —

the law of the Spirit of life: For the law of the Spirit of

life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of

sin and death(Rom. 8:2). Today that understanding

seems common place, but in Paul’s day, it was unheard

of. And two keys that enabled Paul to receive such a

depth of revelation knowledge was praying in tongues

and meditating on the Old Testament scriptures.

 

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UNTIL NEXT TIME

SERVANT LARRY