A Bigger Life: Episodes

Christian Meditation for A Bigger Life with Pastor Dave Cover

Christian Meditation can help refocus your mind and recalibrate your body to get the stress, anxiety and anger out of your heart and out of your body. Spend about 23 minutes to "be still" with God as each episode uses a different biblical image to e...

Recent Episodes

A Meditation to Trust God’s Will for Your Job or Work Opportunities from James 4:13-15

17:17 | 12-19-2023

This is Christian Meditation for A Bigger Life. I’m Dave Cover. I want to help you with Christian meditation where you can stop, break through all the distractions, and bodily experience God’s presence through biblically guided imagination. If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.James 4:13-15 NIVNow listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.”Jeremiah 10:23 NIVLORD, I know that people’s lives are not their own; it is not for them to direct their steps.Daniel 5:23 NIVBut you did not honor the God who holds in his hand your life and all your ways.Proverbs 27:1 NIVDo not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring.Who can you share this podcast with? If you found this episode helpful, consider sharing it on social media or texting it to a friend you think might benefit from it.Follow Dave Cover on Twitter @davecoverFollow A Bigger Life on Twitter @ABiggerLifePodOur audio engineer is Matthew Matlack.This podcast is a ministry of The Crossing, a church in Columbia, Missouri, a college town where the flagship campus of the University of Missouri is located.

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A Meditation to Visualize and Feel God’s Grace and Power in Your Body from 2 Corinthians 12:7-10

17:12 | 12-14-2023

This is Christian Meditation for A Bigger Life. I’m Dave Cover. I want to help you with Christian meditation where you can stop, break through all the distractions, and bodily experience God’s presence through biblically guided imagination. If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.2 Corinthians 12:7-10 NIVTherefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.Who can you share this podcast with? If you found this episode helpful, consider sharing it on social media or texting it to a friend you think might benefit from it.Follow Dave Cover on Twitter @davecoverFollow A Bigger Life on Twitter @ABiggerLifePodOur audio engineer is Matthew Matlack.This podcast is a ministry of The Crossing, a church in Columbia, Missouri, a college town where the flagship campus of the University of Missouri is located.

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A Meditation to Visualize and Feel the Spirit of God as Your Breath of Life in Genesis 2:7

13:52 | 12-12-2023

This is Christian Meditation for A Bigger Life. I’m Dave Cover. I want to help you with Christian meditation where you can stop, break through all the distractions, and bodily experience God’s presence through biblically guided imagination. If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.Christian Meditation is often speaking to ourselves what we believe is true.Psalm 42:5 NIV“Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.”The imagery of this verse is an important meditation to remind us what is true.Genesis 2:7 NIV“Then the LORD God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.”Who can you share this podcast with? If you found this episode helpful, consider sharing it on social media or texting it to a friend you think might benefit from it.Follow Dave Cover on Twitter @davecoverFollow A Bigger Life on Twitter @ABiggerLifePodOur audio engineer is Matthew Matlack.This podcast is a ministry of The Crossing, a church in Columbia, Missouri, a college town where the flagship campus of the University of Missouri is located.

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A Meditation to Visualize and Feel Your Oneness with Jesus from John 14:16-20

16:37 | 12-07-2023

This is Christian Meditation for A Bigger Life. I’m Dave Cover. I want to help you with Christian meditation where you can stop, break through all the distractions, and bodily experience God’s presence through biblically guided imagination. If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.John 14:16-20 (NIV) “And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever—the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. Before long, the world will not see me anymore, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.”1 Corinthians 6:14-15 (NIV) “By his power God raised the Lord from the dead, and he will raise us also. 15 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ himself?”1 Corinthians 6:17 (NIV) “But whoever is united with the Lord is one with him in spirit.”1 Corinthians 6:19 (NIV) “Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God?”Who can you share this podcast with? If you found this episode helpful, consider sharing it on social media or texting it to a friend you think might benefit from it.Follow Dave Cover on Twitter @davecoverFollow A Bigger Life on Twitter @ABiggerLifePodOur audio engineer is Matthew Matlack.This podcast is a ministry of The Crossing, a church in Columbia, Missouri, a college town where the flagship campus of the University of Missouri is located.

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A Progressive Muscle Relaxation Meditation on Psalm 16:8-9

15:57 | 12-05-2023

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A Meditation on God’s Power Strengthening Your Inner Being from Eph. 3:16

12:16 | 11-30-2023

In Christian meditation, we are re-aligning ourselves vertically. We're remapping our horizontal realities with a vertical view/perspective. Enabling us to embody that vertical perspective replaces anxiety and tension with a calm confidence.If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.Listen to the apostle Paul’s prayer in…Ephesians 3:16 (ESV)“…That according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being.”Imagine “the riches of God‘s glory.“ Imagine the “power” of God‘s glory being in you by his Spirit in you. Imagine that power strengthening you by his Spirit in your inner being. Your inner being is the real you. There’s a real you inside you that wants to live in God’s glory, love, goodness, righteousness, joy.“Power” in the New Testament is almost always associated with overcoming evil. Imagine God‘s power overcoming evil in you — all the ways that evil has been deceiving you and lying to you. Your inner being is being strengthened.Imagine God’s Spirit in your inner being right now — with his infinite glory and power and love and Shalom. God‘s Spirit is infinite and abundant. The more God’s Spirit strengthens your inner being with “the riches” of his presence, the more God’s riches are still available to bring life and renewal to your whole being. Who can you share this podcast with? If you found this episode helpful, consider sharing it on social media or texting it to a friend you think might benefit from it.Follow Dave Cover on Twitter @davecoverFollow A Bigger Life on Twitter @ABiggerLifePodOur audio engineer is Matthew Matlack.This podcast is a ministry of The Crossing, a church in Columbia, Missouri, a college town where the flagship campus of the University of Missouri is located.

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A Meditation to Re-narrate How You See Your Body from 1 Corinthians 6:14-17

14:37 | 11-28-2023

In Christian meditation, we are re-aligning ourselves vertically. We're remapping our horizontal realities with a vertical view/perspective. Enabling us to embody that vertical perspective replaces anxiety and tension with a calm confidence.If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.How you see your body — how you see yourself — is in one sense the main stage in which the battle for your soul takes place. The one who wants to destroy your soul is always working to try to get you to re-narrate how you see your body/self. And the Bible is always God speaking to you the truth about who you are that, if you really understood and grasped it, it would bring a sense of power and elevated glory to every moment of your life. Your conscious awareness in everything you do.1 Corinthians 6:14-15, 17 NIV“By his power God raised the Lord from the dead, and he will raise us also. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ himself? …Whoever is united with the Lord is one with him in spirit.”This is marriage language in the Bible — not the broken and painful Genesis 3 marriages we experience and contribute to — but the Genesis 1 and 2 ideal that God meant to foreshadow our union with Christ as our creator and source of glory and joy and creativity and love. “The two shall become one flesh.”So imagine this…Your body is ONE with the one who the apostle John writes in John 1 is the source of every created thing in the universe — “the one through whom all things were made and without him nothing was made that has been made.” The one the apostle Paul says in Colossians — “in him all things hold together.”Who can you share this podcast with? If you found this episode helpful, consider sharing it on social media or texting it to a friend you think might benefit from it.Follow Dave Cover on Twitter @davecoverFollow A Bigger Life on Twitter @ABiggerLifePodOur audio engineer is Matthew Matlack.This podcast is a ministry of The Crossing, a church in Columbia, Missouri, a college town where the flagship campus of the University of Missouri is located.

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A Meditation on Seeing Your Body Utterly Dependent On God in Acts 17:28

14:37 | 11-23-2023

In Christian meditation, we are re-aligning ourselves vertically. We're remapping our horizontal realities with a vertical view/perspective. Enabling us to embody that vertical perspective replaces anxiety and tension with a calm confidence.If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.Our brain is amazing. One of the amazing things about it that neurologists are only learning these past few years is how it is constantly changing its hardwiring to adapt to our behavior. What we see, what we say, the thoughts we allow ourselves to envision, repeated behaviors we do — is all creating new hardwiring in our brain. It’s interesting that the new testament even says this in Romans 12:2 when Paul talks about how the renewing of our mind is what transforms our lives. And when we understand the imagery we see in the Bible like in the Psalms, it seems clear that one way we renew our minds is to imagine biblical realities as realities in our life. Christian meditation is a way for us to use our biblically guided imagination to see biblical realities with the eyes of our heart as Paul says in Ephesians 1:17.Acts 17:28“In him we live and move and have our being.” Imagine this right now in this moment — In him you live and move and have your being!Right now your life completely depends upon God giving you life. Every moment. Every cell in your body. You are utterly dependent upon God for your very being. He is not just giving you breath, he IS your breath of life.Who can you share this podcast with? If you found this episode helpful, consider sharing it on social media or texting it to a friend you think might benefit from it.Follow Dave Cover on Twitter @davecoverFollow A Bigger Life on Twitter @ABiggerLifePodOur audio engineer is Matthew Matlack.This podcast is a ministry of The Crossing, a church in Columbia, Missouri, a college town where the flagship campus of the University of Missouri is located.

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A Meditation on How Disconnection with God Shows Up in Our Body and What To Do About It from Psalm 38

15:06 | 11-21-2023

In Christian meditation, we are re-aligning ourselves vertically. We're remapping our horizontal realities with a vertical view/perspective. Enabling us to embody that vertical perspective replaces anxiety and tension with a calm confidence.If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.Psalm 38:3-8, 10, 17-18, 22 NIV3 Because of your wrath (Rom 1:18ff - sin is its own punishment) there is no health in my body; there is no soundness in my bones because of my sin.4 My guilt has overwhelmed me like a burden too heavy to bear.5 My wounds fester and are loathsome because of my sinful folly.6 I am bowed down and brought very low; all day long I go about mourning.7 My back is filled with searing pain; there is no health in my body.8 I am feeble and utterly crushed; I groan in anguish of heart. 10 My heart pounds, my strength fails me; even the light has gone from my eyes.17 …And my pain is ever with me.18 I confess my iniquity; I am troubled by my sin.22 Come quickly to help me, my Lord and my Savior.You are your body.One way to think of “sin” is trying to live against who God is and live against the grain of his universe. When we live against the grain of God’s universe, we may get good at suppressing our conscience but “our body keeps the score.”Anxiety. Feeling burdened, weighed down. Sometimes chronic pain. Elevated heart rate. Confession… v. 18,20 — “Jesus, you are my Lord and my Savior.”1 Corinthians 6:11 NIV…You were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.Who can you share this podcast with? If you found this episode helpful, consider sharing it on social media or texting it to a friend you think might benefit from it.Follow Dave Cover on Twitter @davecoverFollow A Bigger Life on Twitter @ABiggerLifePodOur audio engineer is Matthew Matlack.This podcast is a ministry of The Crossing, a church in Columbia, Missouri, a college town where the flagship campus of the University of Missouri is located.

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A Meditation to Embody Being God’s Artistic Creation for Good Works He’s Created for You in Ephesians 2:10

20:47 | 11-16-2023

In Christian meditation, we are re-aligning ourselves vertically. We're remapping our horizontal realities with a vertical view/perspective. Enabling us to embody that vertical perspective replaces anxiety and tension with a calm confidence.If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.Our brain is amazing. One of the amazing things about it that neurologists are only learning these past few years is how it is constantly changing its hardwiring to adapt to our behavior. What we see, what we say, the thoughts we allow ourselves to envision, repeated behaviors we do — is all creating new hardwiring in our brain. It’s interesting that the new testament even says this in Romans 12:2 when Paul talks about how the renewing of our mind is what transforms our lives. And when we understand the imagery we see in the Bible like in the Psalms, it seems clear that one way we renew our minds is to imagine biblical realities as realities in our life. Christian meditation is a way for us to use our biblically guided imagination to see biblical realities with the eyes of our heart as Paul says in Ephesians 1:17.Ephesians 2:10 ESVFor we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.Who can you share this podcast with? If you found this episode helpful, consider sharing it on social media or texting it to a friend you think might benefit from it.Follow Dave Cover on Twitter @davecoverFollow A Bigger Life on Twitter @ABiggerLifePodOur audio engineer is Matthew Matlack.This podcast is a ministry of The Crossing, a church in Columbia, Missouri, a college town where the flagship campus of the University of Missouri is located.

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