The right “tude”

We are apt to be busy about everything but that which concerns our spiritual progress, and at the end of a profitless day we snatch up a Bible or [a devotional booklet] and read a few verses, and it does us good for precisely three-quarters of a second. We have to take time to be diligent. Meditation is not being like a pebble in a brook, allowing the waters of thought to flow over us; that is reverie. Meditation is the most intense spiritual act; it brings every part of the body and mind into harness. To be spiritual by effort is a sure sign of false relationship to God; to be obedient by effort in the initial stages is a sure sign that we are determined to obey God at all costs. Take time. Remember we have all the time there is. The majority of us waste time and want to encroach on eternity. “Oh well, I will think about these things when I have time.” The only time you will have is the day after you are dead, and that will be eternity. An hour, or half an hour, of daily attention to and meditation on our own spiritual life is the secret of progress.

---Oswald Chambers, “The Complete Works of Oswald Chambers,” Discovery House Publishers, 2000, pp. 711-12

[TBC: The difference between the kind of meditation to which Chambers is referring (Christian) and what we know as Eastern meditation is this: “Christian meditation involves seeking deeper insights into God’s Word (Psalm:1:2But his delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night.
See All...), pondering God himself (Psalm:63:6When I remember thee upon my bed, and meditate on thee in the night watches.
See All...), reflecting upon God’s works (Psalm:77:12I will meditate also of all thy work, and talk of thy doings.
See All...), and considering what our responsibility is and what our response should be (1 Timothy:4:15Meditate upon these things; give thyself wholly to them; that thy profiting may appear to all.
See All...). Eastern meditation involves ceasing to think, and emptying the mind. It is a prelude to possession . . .  the mind goes blank and one enters an altered state of consciousness.” (Excerpted from “Occult Invasion” by Dave Hunt)]