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

Imagine the One Who Inhabits Eternity Setting His Steadfast Love on You Forever

25:30 | 07-28-2022

Christian Meditation is a quiet time for you to re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind with your body. And re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind and body with God‘s presence with you and in you. Remember the quote from the apostle Paul in Acts 17:28 – In him you live and move and have your being.If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.To begin, lie flat on your back or sit comfortably in a chair. Uncross your legs and arms. And close your eyes if you can. And just take a deep breath and begin to put your mind’s focus on relaxing your body. This is a time for you to meditate. To be quiet — free from all the noise and digital distractions in your life. This is a time for you to be alone. This is a quiet time to re-integrate your body with the rest of your soul, and re-calibrate your body and soul with God’s presence. This is an ancient discipline. A time to be intentional with your mind’s focus so that you can find a moment of rest. Of quiet. Of calm. Renewal. And the more you practice this kind of intentional relaxation in your body, the more your brain will be wired to be able to do it. And you will be able to do it quicker and easier. (You can do shorter versions of this kind of relaxation if you notice tension or anxiety coming on, or you’re trying to fall asleep at night.)Christian meditation uses biblically guided imagination to experience your utter dependence upon God’s life-giving Spirit even at the cellular level. Remember the apostle Paul’s quote in 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!Listen to Paul’s phrase 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 God’s Spirit in your inner being right now — 100% focused on YOU right now with his infinite and intimate love and care. Psalm 107:1“Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever!”Endures forever. Remember Isaiah 57:15 says that Yahweh — the I AM — is the One who inhabits eternity. And when the One who inhabits eternity inhabits you and sets his steadfast love on YOU — that means his love is steadfast on YOU for eternity!God‘s steadfast love endures forever — it is infinite and abundant. The more you receive the more abundant it is available. So imagine this — imagine God‘s infinite and abundant steadfast love entering into your body right now through his Spirit in your inner being. The more you receive the more that’s available. “Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever!”Meditate on what this promise from God’s Spirit is telling you. “I can rest in the goodness of the I AM — who is 100% with me/focused on me right now.”“I can rest in his steadfast love for me in this moment.”“God’s steadfast love for ME will endure forever.”In every moment you can always say to yourself…God is present. He is in this moment. And I can trust him.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 Diego Huaman.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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Imagining the One Who Inhabits Eternity Inhabiting You Part 2

26:26 | 07-26-2022

Christian Meditation is a quiet time for you to re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind with your body. And re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind and body with God‘s presence with you and in you. Remember the quote from the apostle Paul in Acts 17:28 – In him you live and move and have your being.If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.The Only One who inhabits eternityIsaiah 57:15 (ESV)“For thus says the One who is high and lifted up,who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy:‘I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite.’”Try to imagine eternity! Eternity past. Eternity future. The I AM is the only One who inhabits eternity.Isaiah 44:6 (NIV)“This is what the LORD says…I am the first and I am the last; apart from me there is no God.”The first and the last — there is nothing outside of him!Forever there is no one else but the I AM. He is the source of all existence. The giver of all life. Forever. There is nowhere else for you to go for life. there is nothing apart from him that gives you your existence. Your life. Your ultimate joy. There is nothing outside of him. He is the first and the last.In John’s revelation when he saw Jesus…Revelation 1:17-18 (NIV)When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. Then he placed his right hand on me and said: “Do not be afraid. I am the First and the Last. I am the Living One; I was dead, and now look, I am alive for ever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and Hades.”Jesus is repeating the exact same words about himself that Yahweh says in Isaiah 44:6. He is the one who inhabits eternity. And there is nothing that exists outside of him!John said when he saw Jesus as he truly is he fell at his feet as though dead. The sight of the one who inhabits eternity was overwhelming to him. But Jesus‘s first words were Do not be afraid.“Do not be afraid. I am the First and the Last. I am the Living One; I was dead, and now look, I am alive for ever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and Hades.”Tim Keller writes:“Christianity may be the most body-positive religion in the world…God made matter and physical bodies, and saw that it was all good…In Jesus Christ, God himself took on a human body which he still has…and someday he is going to give us resurrected bodies.”So when Jesus says he died and is now alive forever and ever and holds the keys of death — he’s talking to you — he’s talking about your body. He’s talking about more than your body. But not less. Your body matters to God. So much so that Jesus died bodily and rose from the dead bodily so that he could do the same for your body forever. He has already destroyed all the ways that death affects your body even now.Think of Jesus‘ words as they apply to you in your life right now…Do not be afraid — do not be anxious — do not be insecure — do not worry — the one who died and rose from the dead has destroyed death for you and is bringing you into the eternal story of his resurrection. He is the Living One — the eternal one. And he holds all the keys. He holds all the keys to everything the real you — including your body — longs for forever. Whatever circumstance that is bringing you anxiety or fear or insecurity or hopelessness — Jesus holds the keys.

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Imagining the One Who Inhabits Eternity Inhabiting You Part 1

32:45 | 07-21-2022

Christian Meditation is a quiet time for you to re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind with your body. And re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind and body with God‘s presence with you and in you. Remember the quote from the apostle Paul in Acts 17:28 – In him you live and move and have your being.If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.Almost every desire you have and decision you make is activated by your imagination. This is why advertisers give you imagination more than information in their ads — because they know that it’s your imagination that drives your desires and your decisions. This is what it means to be human. We are created in the image of God. And in Genesis one, over and over, we see how God first imagined a reality and then made it so. We are beings of amazing imagination where we can create realities by first imagining.But we also experience unseen realities through our imagination as well. A parent away on a trip can imagine times with their young child, and imagine their faces when joyful or sleeping, and feel and experience the joy and love of that even while away. In the same way we can feel and experience the realities of an unseen God using the biblical images God gives us. When we don’t do that, then we are doing the opposite with our imagination. Using our imagination to see certain things as reality that are not reality. Like that God is not with you and that you are alone in every uncertain or anxious situation. We are using our imagination to see a current or a future narrative as real that’s not real, and it drives our anxieties and fears and our self-protective decisions.So today let’s meditate on…Isaiah 57:15 (ESV)“For thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: ‘I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite.’”“High and lifted up“ is a poetic synonym/parallelism to the word “holy.“ Holy means ultimate. The I AM is the most ultimate glory and power and beauty and goodness and love that there is. Holy is often in parallel in the Bible with words like radiant, splendor, glory.The way we live inside the reality of God‘s holiness is by having a contrite and humble spirit. We connect most with the one who inhabits eternity and whose name is Holy when we have a spirit that is humble and a heart that is contrite. Imagine being in the presence of the One who inhabits eternity — the One who has no beginning and no end — the One who is God forever in the past and the One who is God forever in the future. And he says you connect with him in this moment when your spirit is humble and your heart is contrite. So imagine your utter dependence and need of his life giving presence and power and renewal in you — the One who inhabits eternity reviving your body and spirit by his eternal and holy presence inhabiting you.. Your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you. Deuteronomy 33:27 (NIV)The eternal God is your refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms.Psalms 90:2 (NIV)

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Imagining Your Constant Dependence on God’s Spirit for Your Life

27:14 | 07-19-2022

Christian Meditation is a quiet time for you to re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind with your body. And re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind and body with God‘s presence with you and in you. Remember the quote from the apostle Paul in Acts 17:28 – In him you live and move and have your being.If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.Remember the reality of what’s called neural plasticity – your brain is always rewiring itself constantly based upon how you use it — what you see, what you say, what you do, what you think and feel — neurons that fire together wire together — so if certain neurons have fired together a lot then they have wired together a lot and made what’s like a worn path in the snow where your brain gets really good at something that you repeat a lot — like playing the piano or playing guitar or typing on a keyboard — like we discussed in the last episode — sometimes your brain gets really good at feeling pain in a part of your body even though there’s no longer damage or harm there, or sometimes your brain gets really good at responding with anxiety or insecurity or fear or anger in certain situations or feeling threatened in certain situations because you have trained your brain through repeatedly responding that way in those situations. So certain kinds of meditation or mindfulness are a way of remapping your brain to your whole body to help it re-integrate and re-calibrate to your mind and soul. So when you focus on specific areas of your body you are remapping your brain to your body. And when you focus on relaxing and feeling (becoming aware of) your entire body like we do in this kind of meditation, every brain and pain specialist and psychologist I’ve read says it is calming and even resetting to your central nervous system. But in Christian meditation we go even further than that and also focus on experiencing, through our imagination, the reality of God‘s presence in your body as the Bible emphasizes in so many places. Remember — neurons that fire together wire together — and so your brain will get really good at remembering to feel your body and associating that also with remembering God‘s presence in your body and presence with you always. So that in times where you might usually feel threatened or typically get anxious or angry or stressed – doing a quick meditation to feel your body will also associate in your brain a remembrance of God‘s presence in you and his love and control in every situation. So in typical situations where you would normally worry or become anxious or insecure or angry or frustrated or even hopeless, instead you are reminded that God is present, he is in this, and you can trust him.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 Diego Huaman.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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Imagining the Creator Holding You Together So You Don’t Have to

30:12 | 07-14-2022

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Imagining God Intentionally Creating Your Body for an Amazing Eternal Plan

34:34 | 07-12-2022

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Imagining God’s Spirit Flowing Through Your Body Like Rivers of Living Water Part 2

19:35 | 07-07-2022

Imagine God’s Spirit flowing in and throughout your body like rivers of living water. That’s the very image Jesus gives in John 7:38. Christians Meditation is a quiet time for you to re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind with your body. And re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind and body with God‘s presence with you and in you. Remember the quote from the apostle Paul in Acts 17:28 – In him you live and move and have your being.If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.John 7:38-39 (NIV)“‘Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.’ By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.”Jesus said something similar when he was speaking to the woman by the well…John 4:14 (NIV)“…The water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”Psalms 16:11 (ESV)“In your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.”Imagine the fullness of joy being in the presence of God‘s glory and God‘s beauty and God‘s perfect love for you. Seeing the one who created this entire universe with your own eyes. Resurrected eyes in a resurrected body. Imagine this reality and feel it now into your body. The Bible’s bigger story is that Joy is the ultimate experience when Heaven returns to earth when Jesus comes back — we will have resurrected bodies of glory and power and true spirituality and immortality and we will live in the amazing presence of God forever.Jesus said all of his teaching has Joy as its ultimate goal…John 15:11 (ESV)“These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.”That’s why in John 17, the night Jesus was arrested, when he is praying for his disciples and he is summing up the purpose of his entire life on earth he says…John 17:13 (NIV)“…So that they may have the full measure of my joy within them.”In the final words of the epistle of Jude in the New Testament, Jude says that the ultimate ministry of Jesus in your life is…Jude 1:24 (ESV)“…To present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy.”Joy is the ultimate reward in the kingdom of heaven. The joy that comes from being fully in the presence of God.Infinite pleasures in the hand of the infinite God. So using your imagination, take his hand now as your greatest possession. Take his hand now as your security. Your calm confidence. Your peace. Your Joy. Feel this into your body.Even now, consciously knowing that you are in God’s presence will begin to replace your worry and fear and anxiety and self-protective reflexes with his joy and the security of his presence. Use your biblically guided imagination to know and experience that he is at your right hand and you are at his right hand in Christ. Knowing right now in this moment that the forever God is your God forever and you are in his presence right now in this moment. He is the fullness of joy right now. In his hand is your greatest pleasure forever.So take hold of his hand right now in your imagination.

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Imagining God’s Spirit Flowing Through Your Body Like Rivers of Living Water

26:28 | 07-05-2022

Imagine God’s Spirit flowing throughout your body like rivers of living water. That’s the very image Jesus gives in John 7:38. Christians Meditation is a quiet time for you to re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind with your body. And re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind and body with God‘s presence with you and in you. Remember the quote from the apostle Paul in Acts 17:28 – In him you live and move and have your being.If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.John 7:38-39 (NIV)Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.So imagine the Spirit of God flowing like rivers of living water within your entire body with his Life and Light and Power and Glory. Focus your mind on feeling your whole body from within. Imagine and feel God’s life and light and power and glory and love and presence flowing up and down your spine from your brain to your sacrum, and flowing through your veins throughout your entire body. Imagine your whole body being one with God’s life-giving, light-giving, power. Imagine God focused on you right now with his infinite and intimate love and wisdom. Say quietly to yourself, “The Spirit of God is in me right now. I am calm and confident in his presence and care.” Imagine and feel this reality all throughout your body for a moment. Remember, neurons that fire together wire together! Make it a habit of feeling your body and also feeling God’s presence in your body at the same time.John 7:38-39 (NIV)Whoever believes in me, …rivers of living water will flow from within them.” By this he meant the Spirit…Jesus said something similar when he was speaking to the woman by the well…John 4:14 (NIV)“…The water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”So imagine this into your body right now — the Spirit of God being a spring of water in you that is welling up as eternal life.This is an image Jesus wants you to imagine as an unseen reality within you. So imagine this. The Spirit of God flowing within you like rivers of living water. The Spirit of God welling up within you like a spring of water of life. Feel this flowing all through your body. Replacing stress and tension with the transcendent presence of God‘s peace. Replacing anxiety with the calm confidence of God‘s presence. Replacing fear and insecurity with the renewing strength of God‘s eternal life. Replacing anger with the softening assurance of God‘s love. Imagine this.

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God is Present in Every Anxious Moment from Psalm 118:6-7

25:18 | 06-30-2022

An intense awareness of God‘s presence is always the antidote to anxiety and insecurity. Christians Meditation is a quiet time for you to re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind with your body. And re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind and body with God‘s presence with you and in you. This is a time for you to be alone. And to be alone with God. Remember the quote from the apostle Paul in Acts 17:28 – In him you live and move and have your being.If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that in your podcast app for this podcast.Your body is part of your connection with God. Your connection/oneness with God is both physical and spiritual. In him you live and move and have your being.So let’s bring spiritual reality into our meditation by looking at…Psalms 118:6-7 (NIV)The LORD is with me; I will not be afraid.What can mere mortals do to me?The LORD is with me; he is my helper. This is another example of a Meditation where the Psalmist is mostly talking to himself. This is the kind of meditation God‘s people have been doing for thousands of years. And it’s what we’re doing here. You’re talking to yourself and using your imagination to feel into yourself — in your mind and body — you are imagining the unseen realities of what God’s Spirit (through his word) is telling you is real.So say this meditation quietly to yourself –The LORD is with me; I will not be afraid.An intense awareness of God‘s presence is always the antidote to anxiety and insecurity. The logic of this meditation is that if Yahweh (The Hebrew name for God meaning HE IS) is with me, I do not have to be afraid. Nothing and nobody can do anything to me that doesn’t have to go through him first. And if God allows it then God is in it. And if God is in it he is with me and he is my helper in it.So remember that phrase we looked at in our last episode whenever you feel anxiety coming on in a situation say to yourself “God is present, he is in this with me, and I can trust him.”Psalms 121:2 (NIV)My help comes from the LORD,the Maker of heaven and earth.Psalms 125:2 (NIV)As the mountains surround Jerusalem,so the LORD surrounds his peopleboth now and forevermore.So always remember God’s promises of never, and forever. Deuteronomy 31:8 (NIV)The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.”Hebrews 13:5-6 (NIV)…God has said,“Never will I leave you;never will I forsake you.”So we say with confidence,“The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid.What can mere mortals do to me?”Never will I leave you. Never will I forsake you (Heb 13:5). The forever God is your God forever (Rev. 21:3ff). Timestamps:00:44 - 13:16 Body Meditation13:21 - 24:24 Bible Meditation Psalm 118:6-7Who 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 Diego Huaman.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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Living Inside God’s Protection in Psalm 27:1

26:32 | 06-28-2022

Christians Meditation is entering a solitary place. If not physically, then at least let it be so mentally. This is a quiet time for you to re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind with your body. And re-integrate and re-calibrate your mind and body with God‘s presence with you and in you. This is a time for you to be alone. And to be alone with God. Remember the quote from the apostle Paul in Acts 17:28 – In him you live and move and have your being.If your podcast app is set to skip the silent sections, disable that for this podcast.Psalms 27:1 (NIV)The LORD is my light and my salvation —whom shall I fear?The LORD is the stronghold of my life—of whom shall I be afraid? The logic of the imagery is that if this is the unseen reality your life is in — that Yahweh is YOUR light and YOUR salvation and the stronghold of YOUR life — then what is there to actually be afraid of? Of whom shall you be afraid exactly? Well, there are 1000 things actually. But none of them are stronger than the I AM, who is always surrounding you as your light/life, your salvation, your stronghold/fortress. Which means that none of them are really in control of things. When difficult things are happening to you, the difficult things are not in control of the situation. The One who is your Light is in control. The One who is your Salvation is in control. The One who is the Stronghold of your life is in control. The Almighty LORD of Heaven and Earth is ultimately in power over any other threat to you. There is that phrase — Fear God and you won’t have to fear anything or anyone else. The unseen reality always surrounding your life is that HE IS is your light — your salvation/healing/rescuer — your stronghold/fortress. There is nothing and no one else over you to fear.Whenever you feel threatened in any way – anxious in any way – feel tension in your body in any way – whenever you sense an overreaction in you to some social or work or family situation — you can say…“Lord, YOU ARE present, and you are in this, and I can trust you.“YOU ARE my light/life. YOU ARE my restoration. YOU ARE the stronghold of my life. You can rest in a calm confidence. You can replace anxiety with imagining the reality of God‘s presence and that God is in this situation and in this moment with you. You can replace all your multi-layered insecurities and the way they manifest themselves in your life and in your relationships and in your mind and body with the security that the God who created this universe is also 100% with you and focused on you as your light and your rescuer and your fortress. He is the stronghold of your life.“Lord, you are present, and you are in this, and I can trust you.“YOU ARE my light/life. YOU ARE my restoration. YOU ARE the stronghold of my life. You can just let go of so much anxiety and fear and insecurity and anger and fight or flight central nervous system living. Rest in God’s lordship. Power. Presence. Love. Release your clenched muscles. Let go of the tension. Let your muscles soften.Timestamps:00:39 - 14:27 Body Meditation14:28 - 24:57 Bible Meditation: Psalm 27:1Who 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 Diego Huaman.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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