The Secret Place

Last Saturday morning, as our prayer meeting at church was ending, I heard the leader announce that I would be leading the prayer meeting the next morning. Panic! He had forgot that I had left the service early the week before and so he had not notified me that he wanted me to lead this Sunday mornings prayer. Okay, that was the first reason to panic, but the real reason was because, I had not been spending very much time in prayer and in the Word lately, and so what did I have to offer anyone? I had been allowing so many distractions into my days that they were crowding out my daily quiet time. I also wasn't feeling very good, I was feeling week, and had a slight headache, and it just got worse as the day progressed. I really felt like I was under an attack spiritually and physically. The last thing I felt like doing was reading and studying to prepare for the next days devotional. As I feebly called out a prayer to God for what to give, Psalms 91 came to me. "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty." I felt like this was for me, but also for me to give them. In the middle of all my distractions, I needed to be dwelling in the secret place of the Most High. But how? So many of the distractions in our lives are unavoidable obligations. The Holy Spirit also brought these verses to my mind:

Psalms 34:1 "I will bless the Lord at all times: His praise shall continually be in my mouth."

Joshua 1:8 "This book of the law shall not depart from thy mouth, but thou shalt meditate therein day and night."

Ephesians 5:18-19 "And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess: but be filled with the Spirit; Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord;

In the middle of our busy lives we need to make time with God a priority. We also need to remember that in the middle of our obligations, we can still stay in His presence, by keeping praise to Him, and His Words on our lips. We think of meditating as quietly thinking on something. But actually, in the Old Testament the word meditate actually refers to a low murmur. it seems likely then, that during the biblical process of meditation, memorized scriptures were actually spoken aloud to help the heart and mind engage with Gods truth.* So, no matter what we're doing with our hands, we can encourage ourselves in the Lord and stay in the secret place, by singing songs of praise to our Lord, blessing Him with our mouth, and meditating aloud on His words.

*taken from The Power of Crying Out, by Bill Gothard