Help for the Hungry SoulНамуна

Freshness with God

For years I had been using the same Bible reading plan. And it was a good one. It varied the genre of readings each day, dipping into both testaments and including psalms and proverbs along the way. But I was bored with it, and I was becoming bored with my Bible too.

Something had to change. But I had used the same routine for so long that I didn’t know how to make a change. And I didn’t know if I should. Was something wrong with me that I was struggling to delight in God’s word? Would it be wrong to abandon the plan? After all, it was getting me in my Bible. And if the plan was so good, then what was the matter with me?

I’m sure the answers to these questions are multilayered. We are whole people with complex, hungry hearts in complex human bodies, and we are up against many hindrances. Yet, however imperfect my intentions were, I genuinely wanted to seek Jesus through his word. I wanted to want to enjoy my Bible, and my Lord, again.

So, one evening when my senior pastor taught a class for our church on “a fresh, varied, and original walk with God,” I was all ears. I needed help. And what I heard from him felt like freedom.

My pastor said something to the effect of, “There is no one ‘right’ way to meet with the Lord in Scripture. And if you find yourself getting bored with your routine, then switch it up.” (All the type-A personalities in the room exhaled a sigh of relief.)

This was the wisdom and permission I needed to do something different. My pastor is a godly, older believer who has walked many decades with Jesus and spent many of his working hours in the word—and here he was advocating for creativity, not a one-size-fits-all approach to the idea of “quiet time.”

In other words, he was telling us to feed and not just read.

So, friends, consider this chapter a similar encouragement. If you are bored with your Bible and you don’t know why; if you are tired from following the same plan (like I was) and you’re wondering how to be hungry again for the word; if you feel discouraged from the pace of schedule, the needs of people, the call of distractions, and the overwhelm of possibilities; or if you are having trouble climbing out from the guilt hole of “supposed-to’s,” then this is for you.

Feeding, Not Just Eating

Moms are masters of creatively feeding themselves. Sometimes I’m shoving crackers into a plastic baggie for the road, while other times I’m eating my food standing up as I put lunch on the table for my kids. Dinnertime is usually when I sit down to eat.

When it comes to hunger, the point is that we eat. Because we must. We can’t function without feeding our bodies. As every mom knows, you can get by on thrown-together, quickly consumed and convenient snacks . . . for a while.

We need to eat, yes. But we also need to feed ourselves well. We need to savor meals, not just scarf down snacks.

Busy moms (and our kids) can get by on fast snacks and mini-meals for a time—but eventually our bodies beg us for something better. To operate, they need vitamins and nutrients, as well as a combination of protein, fat, and carbohydrates. The soul is similar: its health depends on both what we consume and how we consume it.

So far we’ve touched on the what: we do not live by bread alone but by every word from God’s mouth (Matt. 4:4). Our souls will not be truly satisfied unless we nourish ourselves with God’s life-giving words and feed our hunger with the goodness of his grace in Jesus (Ps. 107:9; John 6:57). We’ve also seen how appetite is a great indicator of the heart, and can be easily derailed by many worldly alternatives and hindrances.

What we consume on a day-to-day basis matters for our soul. Are we consuming God’s word, or are we taking in other things that cannot really satisfy us?

Second, and equally vital, is how we are consuming God’s word. Just as I can handle eating on-the-go for only a short time, so our souls can “snack on” Scripture only for a little while before they beg us for something more. Nibbling on Scripture isn’t bad or wrong; in my case, literal snacking keeps me alive! We will have days and seasons when snacking on Scripture is our lifeline, and that is fine and good—but we don’t want it to be final. We want our snacking to make us hungry for the full, well-rounded meal, when we feast with our church family and then feed on the Lord in his word privately.

We want it to whet our appetites for something better.

The Key to Feeding: Meditation

When my husband eats, he doesn’t just eat—he inhales his food. He says it’s a proper-temperature thing; he wants his hot food hot and his cold food cold. I just nod my head. But I think he’s missing out on a fuller enjoyment of his meals.

Like slowing down when we eat, meditation on God’s word is the Spirit-led process of enjoying it. It usually involves reading a verse (or a small chunk of verses), making observations about it, asking questions (even really hard ones), making connections (within a particular verse itself and within its broader context), and then applying its truths to our hearts.

Or, following our metaphor, meditation is feeding, not just eating.

Professor and author Don Whitney, who has taught and written extensively on spiritual disciplines, believes that “meditation is the greatest single devotional need of most Christians, even among those who read the Bible daily.” Here’s why:

So much processes through our brains that if we don’t absorb some of it, we will be affected by none of it. And surely if we should absorb anything that courses through our thinking, it should be the inspired words from heaven. Without absorption of the water of God’s Word, there’s no quench of our spiritual thirst. Meditation is the means of absorption. . . . I would encourage you to make it your general rule to “read big and meditate small” every day.

Whitney recommends spending 25 to 50 percent of our Bible intake in meditation. For example, if you have twenty minutes to read Scripture, you might take five minutes to read a bigger passage, ten minutes to meditate on a small portion of that passage (perhaps a verse or two), and five minutes to pray. This principle has encouraged me to slow down, which doesn’t come naturally to me, and to taste what I am consuming so I’m not just inhaling my spiritual food. It has helped me feed, not merely eat.

Whitney isn’t pulling this exercise out of midair, though. He is making a claim based on what the Bible itself teaches. Over and over again, God extols meditation, connecting it to the “blessing” (or satisfaction) of his people. We see this as a theme woven throughout Psalm 119, a song that is all about loving God’s word:

I will praise you with an upright heart when I learn your righteous rules. (Ps. 119:7)

I will meditate on your precepts and fix my eyes on your ways. I will delight in your statutes; I will not forget your word. (Ps. 119:15–16)

At midnight I rise to praise you, because of your righteous rules. (Ps. 119:62)

Oh how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day. (Ps. 119:97)

How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth! (Ps. 119:103)

When we taste something amazing, we can’t help but tell people about it. My husband and I love discovering restaurants and enjoying new foods and dishes together. If our experience is great, we usually end up praising the restaurant, writing a review, talking about how wonderful it was, and telling others about it. Our tasting leads to great delight.

This is what we see happening throughout Scripture (Ps. 119 in particular). Meditation on God’s word is connected to delight in God’s word. And delight in God’s word leads us to hunger more for it, which leads us to meditate more on it. This is a wonderfully gracious cycle of joy that God has designed for his people.

And it is ours for the taking, if we will only choose to meditate.

TASTE and Meditate

What does meditation look like for God’s hungry people with full lives?

I have been reading my Bible for years but still find myself pondering this question. Each of us will meditate differently depending on the season we’re in; sometimes, we will enjoy lingering, lengthy meditation by ourselves, while other times we will need to get creative with feeding ourselves on Christ’s word. Whether we are feasting with our church—a fantastic God-given means of built-in meditation alongside other hungry believers—or “snacking on” Scripture alongside our children, the point is that we feed our souls. I have personally benefited from Whitney’s 25-to-50 percent principle.

It has nourished my soul with more than a snack and helps me remember what I have read. Whatever season you’re in and however you are getting creative with Scripture intake, the following is one framework for meditation you might use. It follows the acronym TASTE: think about it, ask questions, seek Jesus, take away truth, and enjoy God.

Think about It

As you prayerfully read a portion of Scripture, whether a few chapters or a few verses, choose a key verse to focus your meditation on, something that stands out to you. You might choose to write a verse in a journal or journaling Bible, as writing helps us think more clearly. Repetition also promotes clear thinking, so you may want to reread the surrounding verses a few times. You are priming your mind and heart for what’s to come.

Ask Questions

Once you have your verse identified and/or written down, get curious about it. Who was it originally written to, and why? What does it tell you about God, yourself, the church, the world, or the spiritual realm? What don’t you understand about it? What connections can you make within the verse and with other parts of the Bible? What do certain words mean, and why did the author choose those words? After trying to answer your own questions, if you have the time you might consult a study Bible or commentary for added help.

Seek Jesus

In all our meditating, we want to remember that it is possible to search the Scriptures and miss the main character. And we don’t want to miss Jesus! We want to discover him in all of God’s word, calling upon the Spirit to help us see and love the Son. For he is the point of the whole Bible and all our meditation. You might prayerfully use the five questions to look for Jesus from chapter 3 as a guide.

Take Away Truth

This is what we might call application, or bringing the word home.6 We want God’s word to make a difference in our hearts (James 1:25), so we ask him to change us. You might take away a specific application from the Spirit; or you might rest in knowing that he is conforming you into God’s image by the word, whether you have a specific takeaway or not. The point, remember, is seeing and enjoying Jesus, and growing in our hunger for him.

Enjoy God

In everything, our ultimate goal is to hunger for God and be satisfied in him. This is what we were made for. Since our hearts are naturally dull to the most delightful reality in the universe, the aim of meditation is to awaken our hearts to truest delight, to fullest satisfaction—to the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ (2 Cor. 4:6)—so we would be discontent with anything less than him and hunger for him more. May our meditation on the Word, through the word, lead to love, praise, and increasing delight. May it lead us to enjoy God.