I Pray for Change

"Christian mediation has nothing to do with emptying out minds.  Christan meditation engages every part of us"

"Christian meditation involves, not emptiness, but fullness.  It means being attentive to God.  Th purpose of this attentiveness, this reflecting and this pondering is, among other things, to see ourselves in the light of God' revealed word."

"The more you focus on the creator's fullness, the more you perceive your own emptiness." (Super Ultra,Our Culture, Discipline p. 8)

"For to be in the presence of God is to change."

Reading about meditation reminds me of grace.  Of the life changing and altering effect grace has on our lives.  That meditation is the "ability to hear God's voice and obey his word."  We spend disciplined time simply listening.  Relaxing into the gentle whispers from our true love.  And out of that time spent in meditation comes obedience.  The result of being in the presence of God is change (as Foster put it), life altering obedience.

I am reminded of Darrel Johnson's words on grace in direct accordance to this resulting change from time spent in meditation.  "Yes, grace welcomes us just as we are and grace forgives us again and again and again when we have fallen.  But grace transforms us or it isn't grace.  Grace metamophosizes us and begins the process of repentance.  Grace begins to transform our minds about the way reality works."  In the same way, time spend experiencing God's unimaginable fullness should result in change.  A change in the lens from which we view the world, our friends, baristas at Starbucks, screaming campers, and ultimately ourselves.  

"To be in the presence of God is to change."

As we continue each week to prepare for the journey laid out for each one of us this summer I pray that as a result of disciplined time spend listening to the gentle whispers from the father, we are changed.  We are radically changed.  That our reality is flipped upside-down as our views of this world become more in line with our Father's.  That we may spend increasing amounts of time reflecting on our creator's fullness and unconditional love for every person throughout time.