Scripture engagement is a way of hearing and reading the Bible with an awareness that it is in the Bible that we primarily meet God. It is a marinating on, mulling over, reflecting on, dwelling on, pondering of the Scriptures, “until Christ is formed in you” (Galatians 4:19).
The Forum Of Bible Agencies International (FOBAI) Annual Meeting 2014 was held in Sri Lanka, with the theme “Next Generation Scripture Engagement – The South Asian Experience”. We began every morning with a time of Scripture engagement in our table groups, meditating on Psalm 1 in different ways. On the first day, the focus was on using Lectio Divina.
There are four traditional stages of Lectio Divina:
1. Reading (Lectio): To be done slowly and with focussed attention. Lectio Divina is best practiced with passages that you have at least some familiarity with.
2. Meditation (Meditatio): The goal is to pick out a word, idea, or phrase that strikes you in a personal way, and to repeat that idea in your mind, lingering over it and giving it your attention.
3. Prayer (Oratio): Take all the thoughts, feelings, actions, fears, convictions, and questions you have meditated on and offer them to the Lord in prayer.
4. Contemplation (Contemplatio): The ‘task’ in this stage is simply to be silent in the presence of God.
Download the handout which contains a description of Lectio Divina and directions for using this method of Scripture engagement with Psalm 1.
FOBAI 2014 – Lectio Divina (62 KB)