Week 10 – Meditation as Communion with God

Celebration of Discipline Bible Study

Prepared by: Rev. Willetta Ar-Rahmaan

Week 10 – Meditation as Communion with God

     In our lesson last week, we defined meditation and briefly explained the difference between Eastern Meditation and Christian Meditation. This week we will dig deeper into Richard Foster’s book and the chapter on meditation. In the beginning chapter, Foster reinforce the meaning of meditation as “listening to God’s word, reflecting on God’s works, rehearsing God’s deeds, ruminating on God’s law, and more….which stress upon a change behavior as a result of our encounter with the living God” (p. 15). Therefore Christian meditation is asking and allowing God to enter into our lives, our most inner places and communion with us.
     When we are in communion with God we have the “ability to hear God’s voice and obey God’s word” (p. 17). In order for God to have communion with us we must be in a position to listen and hear God’s voice. Often the busyness of our lives causes us to be distracted by the world we live in that we block out communion time with God. Let us not get communion confused with the practice for the ordinances Jesus left for the church to do. This communion we are referring to is a holy relationship with God. A relationship in which we talk to God and God talks to us in our most intimate inner place. This type of intimacy is where are vulnerable to God and we allow God to enter into the places of our secret desires, dreams and dysfunctional behavior.  When we must bare all we find ourselves not worthy to be in God’s presence, therefore we act just like the Israelites in Exodus 20:18-21 “18 When all the people witnessed the thunder and lightning, the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking, they were afraidd and trembled and stood at a distance, 19 and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, or we will die.” 20 Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid; for God has come only to test you and to put the fear of him upon you so that you do not sin.” 21 Then the people stood at a distance, while Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God was.”1
     So many of us are afraid of communion with God because it requires intimacy on a level we have not experienced or rather not experience because we do not believe God’s grace is sufficient. What we ought to realize and understand is that we, “God’s people continue to learn to live on the basis of hearing God’s voice and obeying God’s word” (p. 18). Our mediation should allow us to become familiar with God that we can see God move and hear God’s voice constantly. God’s desire is to have a “perpetual Eucharistic feast in the inner sanctuary of the heart…we cannot burn the eternal flame of the inner sanctuary and remain the same” (p. 20). What Foster is saying is that as we partake of the bread and wine in remembrance of Jesus Christ sacrifice for us, God wants our heart to be a never ending communion feast in our hearts.  As Christians meditation is allowing God to dwell within us forever (Revelation 3:20, Romans 14:17). When we commune with God and reflect on the name Immanuel we are saying, God is not only with us, but God is in us. When we are willing to listen to God let us open the inner sanctuary of our hearts to God.


Going Deeper:
1. How do you describe your communion with God? Is it shallow or deep?

2. Do you continue to have others to intercede on your behalf before God?

3. What type of centering moment would you prepare for your communion time with God?



Next Week: Foster’s Book pp 25-26 (Sanctifying the Imagination for Meditation)


d Sam Gk Syr Vg: MT they saw
1 The Holy Bible : New Revised Standard Version. Nashville : Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1989, S. Ex 20:18-21