So the beginning of this chapter says, beginning the habit of meditation. One of the points that is made over and over in the book is that in order to do meditation well, it should be very well bathed in prayer. If we seek to meditate without prayer, um it will be such a difficult task that it's not something that we're going to be able to continue so one of the points is to strengthen our walk and to be able to continue in in meditation you know all throughout our lives so the next part of The prayer is we are dependent upon Christ. We depend upon God to remove the myriad of barriers. If we're not dependent on God, we really have nothing. In Hebrews 4.16, It calls us to come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace in our time of need. So someone who wishes to regularly meditate, it's not a task to be accomplished or even attempted in our own strength. I think he points that out very well in the book, that everything we do should be bathed in prayer. And the reason for that is prayer draws strength from God. He is our strength. He is the only strength that we have. I'm pretty sure each one of us know that without Him we had no strength. One of the things that keeps coming out over and over as we read through is how many distractions there are, how many things that we have in the world around us that keep us from meditating. And so one of the questions is, In particular, why is it so difficult? So, I'm going to read this part out. And Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 3.5, not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves, but our sufficiency is of And spiritual meditation is a work of God's spirit. The believer in and of himself is not capable of this. So again, it goes back to why we bathe all of this in prayer. Our deceitful hearts seek to convince us that we have the innate ability to live a Christian life in our own power. And so only humble prayer can drive out that evil spirit. And he points out that the task and the duty of meditation may seem daunting to us, but we are not in this battle alone. The Lord Jesus himself promised to give us sufficient grace to live in a way that pleases him with all our actions and thoughts. One of the things that we have to be able to do is to willingly accept the difficulties of meditation. I can attest to the fact that I have, it is a difficult task. At the same time, the offset is it's a very rewarding task. And again, that's the way, one of the reasons that we wanted to do this series is to help each one grow in grace and grow in their spiritual life as we seek to be more like him each day. Some of the reasons that meditation is difficult is that the lack of visible accountability. And I was thinking about that. And because it is something that you do, you know, in your mind, you know, your husband or wife can help you with it, can help your children. But again, it is your mind and it, you know, we all know that Satan attacks us at our weakest points. And so it's, I was thinking about that, that is an interesting thought, that that is very much of an impediment. He says the visible accountability, the slipperiness of the mind, and another one is Satan's hatred of it. So why does Satan hate meditation? Because if you meditate on scripture and God long enough, the only logical conclusion is to worship God, and that's pretty anti-Satan. Very good. Well, that's what I was looking for. It is interesting that I don't think in our culture for sure, and even in most of the church culture, very few people have any regard for Satan. They don't think of him as being the enemy. They don't think of him as being a skilled warrior, so to speak. And so I think that it does, it helps us to consider that he is the one behind the fact that our mind is not focused on Christ as it should be. Another one is mental laziness. and the ever pressing burdens of life. I think that we all probably in our modern culture have a certain amount of mental laziness. I think I've even thought of it in the past as kicking my mind out of gear. But when you consider this book and consider the things that we know from scripture, that in and of itself does become a lazy mind. Instead of kicking my mind out of gear, I need to be focused upon Christ and the scripture that he has given us. So, we must resolve to be like a soldier, working continually to push back against all of the hostile enemies. Again, that's why it's named the Battle So the next question I have for y'all is, what do you think is the number one impediment to meditation? What is, of all of the things in your life, I feel like this will be an answer that'll be different for different people. I certainly know my answer. And there's some that'll be at the very top. So I'd just like to ask y'all what you think You know, in your life, the life of your family, what would impeach you the most? Okay. All right. The arrogance, thinking that I don't need it, which I can intellectually assent to the information, so I've got it. I think that's a good answer, but one quick comment on it. It's possible that that is the underlying part to almost all of the other things that are probably going to come out here. Mr. Russ. I was going to say, dizziness and distractions tied into that. We're so busy. We've got so much stuff to do. Well, as an encouragement against that, because I had thought about that some. One of the things that I think about when I think about that is 10 years ago, I was as busy as I am now. Do I remember what I did and did it have any impact on my spiritual life? So that might give us a little bit of a thought of knocking back that busyness. Anyone else? All right, I'm going to ask this table over here, put them on the spot a little bit. Tell me, okay, Luke. Devices. Ah. Talking about a lawnmower? Picking up hay? you know, phones or TVs or anything like that seem to draw you in. Right. I think we all know that one. That's a big one. And that, for me, I think probably the hardest one is any form of entertainment. Probably for me, it's just sort of what Mr. Rapp said with distractions. Not just not making time for meditation, but So does that tie back into what Mr. David said about arrogance? Would that be that maybe we don't think we need it? Or is it just more of a... Okay. Yes, Liz. Part of it's obviously a priority thing, not necessarily rooting back to arrogance directly, but rooting back to what our priorities are, what takes up the most headspace. Very good, that's a very good answer. Alright, Thomas? I know for me, a lot of my thought, I've always kind of had this inbred theory of everyone's my monkey and everything's my circus, which is not the healthiest theory, but so I know a lot of my thought Good answer. Yes, Miss Heather? And those things pop into my head. I write it down, and I say, I'll look at that later. I'll get to that later. Right now, I'm focusing on the work, and I don't need to worry about that. I don't need to spend any more thought on that. Not that I'm not arrogant. I just certainly have those moments when I'm like, do I really need to read this? You know, you have those moments. Thank you for pointing that out, because I totally agree with you. I've experienced the same thing. pointed this out probably maybe years ago, but certainly months ago, that you get up and you get straight into math, straight into chemistry, or whatever you think your hardest thing is, because you've got them sitting at their desks when they're doing the hardest subject. But the pastor pointed out that you need to give your best to Christ. And so the first thing we do is, Yes, Ms. Graham? For me, it seems like as I'm reading and I'm trying to meditate on the Word, I'll get kind of, I'll grab a trail, and I'll be thinking about it, but then as I try to apply it or whatever, I kind of go down this, and I realize, you know, I've just spent 15, 20 minutes, you know, and I haven't finished what I was thinking I would get through. Anyway, So this time sometimes gets away from me, thinking about one particular aspect. So I guess that's self-control, controlling what you're doing. And as you pointed out at the beginning, prayer and relying on the Lord to strengthen you and help you during your time. One of the things that I have found when I'm reading scripture is that God points out sin. And none of us point out sin. The reality is we know what sin is all about. So, the way to keep that from happening is not to sin. And so, that would be one of the ways. Very good. See it bigger? immediate hindrance of getting to meditation, but setting up for your next meditations and your application of your current or previous one, just getting to the point where you're basically skimming over, repeating what you've already read, and you're not getting deep enough, you're not invading it with prayer, it's just kind of introductory prayer, reading what you want to read, think of it for 20 seconds, and you go on, And that just gets shallower and shallower and shallower to where you're not, you don't get, you're not laying all the God's blessings for your current meditation and you're not setting yourself up for your next one. So everything just becomes a skimming off the top and flooding by and to where it's not just hindering you from getting to one meditation, but you're basically just robbing yourself of Very good. Okay, Nathan? One thing is, the distractions is a setting or a place of meditation, and that can be in a room, you might see something you need to bring up, or something that we need to do, and I just feel like if you go to a place where you can really focus on God's scripture, that will help, but you just, I think it needs Yes, I think that again goes back to prayer and being in a private place with few distractions. So thank you all. I appreciate the input. I'm glad that you have thought about that. Certainly think that it will serve us well as we consider meditation. Remember that just because a task is difficult doesn't mean that it doesn't contain joy. So contemplating upon the reflection of Jesus in any scripture that we're reading always should bring joy to our hearts. Another thing about difficult tasks is it has the added benefit of the thorns in the flesh because that keeps us humble. Not spending quality time in meditation can be a form of self-indulgence. That could provoke God to give us up, to be buffeted about by Satan, to teach us humility. and loneliness. That's certainly something that the men that he used in this meditation for the Puritans understood that well. I think it would do us well to consider that. Perseverance in the habit of meditation, the believer's character is tested by what stops him from doing what is right. So I'm sure y'all have all seen it. My lovely bride, because she knows, I know that I can't write very well for everybody to see it. She came over here with me yesterday to put that up for that to be a backdrop for us to think about it. If you faint in the day of adversity, your strength is small. So I think I've been convicted by that a number of times throughout my life and do think that it helps to meditate upon that in itself because it does teach us to persevere in our task even when the going gets tough. And it will get tough. I think we all understand and know that one. And particularly in the beginning, if this is something that is new for you or your family, that I'm pretty certain will be the hardest part. So if you can remember that, that is certainly one of the ways that the Lord grows us and strengthens us as we seek to work out our sanctification before him. So now as we go into the conclusion, basically I just said what my next point was and that is meditation is essential for progressive sanctification. Catch back up to myself again. Paul describes this process of ever-growing change in Ephesians 4, 23 and 24. It says, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. So this passage reminds us that a believer grows into the likeness of God by replacing our sinful attitudes with a renewed perspective in the spirit of our mind. This battle against sin starts in the mind. The thoughts are what one dwells upon. This is why meditation is so important. It is God's ordained plan for biblical thinking, renewing the mind, overcoming sin, and thus growing in greater Christ-likeness. This next one is, in my mind, one of the bigger ones because we're going back to entertainment. It says meditation replaces the love of entertainment with love of Christ. So he says, perhaps the best advice I could offer someone who desires to become a stable, godly person of meditation is to this. Turn off the television, that goes with all the devices also, and fight the temptation to be an entertainment-dominated person. One of the last thoughts here is to learn to enjoy meditation. Just like anything else, the Lord truly, as we meditate upon him, as we seek him, he does give us the joy that meditation gives because we're meditating upon him. He is our strength. One of the last things that he says here that I thought was good. The believer that knows meditation is a scriptural command and duty should not ignore its delightful status as his privilege of a child of God. And he says the reality is that the greatest gifts of God to his people will do no good if they are not unwrapped and enjoyed. And so I would urge each of you to unwrap this good gift of meditation that the Lord has given us. I know that we will each one receive great benefit from it. Any other questions or comments? If not, let us pray. Father God, we do thank you for giving us this time, this book, the efforts that went into writing it, the efforts of your people to seek to read and understand and put into practice the good habit of the art of meditation. Father, we pray that you would give us the grace beyond ourselves to be able to implement this into our daily lives as we do seek to grow in the light of Jesus. We thank you for this. We pray that you would go with us as we come before you for public worship, that you would give your grace to us as we seek to worship you with all of our hearts and minds. It is in Jesus' name I pray. Amen.