Weekend Resource: Bible reading plans written with grace in mind
Resource:
The following 3 Bible reading plans, from the Navigators, are great tools to help the reader stay on track progressing through the Bible. The highlight of these plans, from my experience, is that the reader is NOT required to read every single day of the month. Writing a Bible reading plan with grace in mind makes these plans all the more effective. For those that never skip a day, the pauses allow for time to meditate and return to selected passages of your choice.
1. Book-at-a-Time Bible Reading Plan
“The book-at-a-time Bible reading plan provides two readings for each day. The first reading alternates between Old and New Testament books, giving you three or four chapters a day. The Gospels are spread throughout the year. The second reading takes you through a chapter or so of the wisdom literature and Isaiah. Combined, these readings will take you through the entire Bible in one year. To prevent frustration of falling behind and so provide some reflection time, each month consists of only 20 readings. You’ll have several days each month to meditate more deeply on something that was significant to you in the past week, to catch up on missed readings, or to revisit favorite passages.”
2. 5x5x5 Bible Reading Plan
“Through the New Testament in 5 days a week, 5 minutes a day.
- 5 MINUTES A DAY. If you’re not currently reading the Bible, start with 5 minutes a day. This reading plan will take you through all 260 chapters of the New Testament, one chapter per day. The gospels are read throughout the year to keep the story of Jesus fresh.
- 5 DAYS A WEEK. Determine a time and location to spend 5 minutes a day for 5 days a week. It is best to have a consistent time and a quiet place where you can regularly meet with the Lord.
- 5 WAYS TO DIG DEEPER. We must pause in our reading to dig into the Bible. Below are 5 different ways to dig deeper each day. We recommend trying a single idea for a week to find that work best for you. Remember to keep a pen and paper ready to capture God’s insights.
1. Underline or highlight key words or phrases in the Bible passage. Use a pen or highlighter to mark new discoveries from the text. Periodically review your markings to see what God is teaching you.
2. Put it into your own words. Read the passage or verse slowly, then rewrite each phrase or sentence using your own words.
3. Ask and answer some questions. Questions unlock new discoveries and meanings. Ask questions about the passage using these words: who, what, why, when, where, or how. Jot down some thoughts on how you would answer these questions.
4. Capture the big idea. God’s Word communicates big ideas. Periodically ask, “What’s the big idea in this sentence, paragraph or chapter?”
5. Personalize the meaning. When God speaks to us through the Scriptures, we must respond. A helpful habit is personalizing the BIble through application. Ask: “How can my life be different today as I respond to what I’m reading?”
3. Discipleship Journal Bible Reading Plan
This reading plan takes you though 4 passages a day, 2 from the New Testament and 2 from the Old Testament. Just as the first reading plan, you are only given readings for 25 days, allowing for catch-up, meditation, etc on the last few days of each month.
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Weekend Resource: 18 tricks to memorize more scripture
Resource: 18 Tricks to Memorize More Scripture, by Demian Farnworth. Farnworth gives not only the reasoning behind the importance of Bible memory, but also goes further and gives 18 highly practical tricks for making Bible memory easier and more effective. Recently, I have spent time writing about the importance of the Word in our fight against sin as we seek to taste and see that the Lord is good. Farnworth gives us 18 ways to go further in this area. He also mentions the fact that busyness is often the culprit of memory trouble in all of life, which is interesting to ponder.
Excerpt: “But one of the most compelling reasons for memorizing Scripture I found in John Piper’s sermon If My Words Abide in You: memorizing Scripture shapes the way I view the world by conforming to God’s viewpoint.”
Here is another interesting idea to aid Bible memory.
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Taste and See: Part 4 – The Word
John 17:17
“Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.”
If out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks (Luke 6:45)…and we are feeding our heart poison, what comes from our mouth? We might be temped to say, “I don’t talk about inappropriate and vulgar things, I don’t cuss much,” but does that prove that we are feeding our hearts on the good things of the Lord? Psalm 34:1 says, “I will bless the Lord at all times; his praise shall continually be in my mouth.” Praising the Lord is a far cry from just refraining from speaking evil.
May I be honest personally? Psalm 34:1 is not me. I have moments of praise, but my praise is not continual. I take that to mean a couple things:
1) I am not feasting my heart in meditation on His character revealed in Scripture, and
2) I am tasting of something other than Him instead.
What is the difference between my life and David’s? David was able to praise the Lord continually only because he had tasted of the Lord and seen that He was good, and committed to obeying all that the Lord had commanded. In Psalm 119:9-16, David showed that his heart’s intake was the Word of God, and his lips poured forth accordingly. If you want to praise the Lord as David did, you must spend the time with the Lord in His Word that David did. Robert D. Foster put it this way: “To know God, it is necessary to spend consistent time with Him…The intimacy of communion with Christ must be recaptured in the morning quiet time. Call it what you want — the quiet time, personal devotions, the morning watch, or individual worship — these holy minutes at the start of each day explain the inner secret of Christianity. It’s the golden thread that ties every great man of God together — from Moses to David Livingstone, the prophet Amos to Billy Graham — rich and poor, businessmen and military personnel. Every man who ever became somebody for God has this at the core of his priorities: time alone with God!”
Scripture makes the prescription for our heart’s sickness clear, and I am walking the path towards Psalm 34:1 with you. As we consider the tastes of the world, find them wanting in comparison to our beautiful Lord, we reject them in order to turn to the Lord in His Word. It takes faith in God and a belief that He will reward those who seek Him (Hebrews 11:6), but letting our minds dwell on the reality of God and His character by meditating on His Word will not fail to produce a harvest (Galatians 6:7-10). Psalm 1 is yet another picture of the one who does not have any dealings with sin, and bears the fruit of delightful meditation on the Word (also see Jeremiah 17:6-10; Isaiah 5:24; Hosea 4:1-6, 8:7, 10:12; Matthew 3:8-12; Galatians 5:22-25).
The Word plays the central role as we seek to overcome sin. It shows us what is right and wrong, as well as allows us to gain an intimate knowledge of of our Father. You will only know the Father to the extent that you have been in His Word. If we have a 10-minutes-a-week plus church relationship with God, we will know Him about as well as we know the people we wave at on the streets and cannot remember their first name. But we want more than that. We want to taste and see in such a way that sin is exposed as a lie and its promises pale in comparison to the delights of knowing God.
Father, You are a holy God, completely set apart from sin. By Your Word, sanctify me so that I am able to step out of sin and see You more clearly. When I gaze through a shroud of sin, I find myself unable to see Your goodness with clarity. My heart longs to taste and see, please sanctify Your child.
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Weekend Resource: 7 Minutes with God
Resource: 7 Minutes with God: How to plan a daily quiet time, by Robert D. Foster (Navigators).
Great Resource for Discipling a New Believer
Take a moment and think of someone you know who has only been told why to have a quiet time, not how. This pamphlet is concise and effective in explaining the why’s and how’s of a quiet time. That makes it a great resource of discipling a new believer. Years ago, God used it to completely change how I approached my quiet times and to instill in me the importance of daily time with the Lord.
The Golden Thread that Ties Every Great Man of God Together…
As a section of the pamphlet explains,
“They sought an answer and came up with a scheme they called the morning watch — a plan to spend the first minutes of a new day alone with God, praying and reading the Bible. The morning watch sealed the crack. It enshrined a truth so often obscured by the pressure of ceaseless activity that it needs daily rediscovery: To know God, it is necessary to spend consistent time with Him…
“The intimacy of communion with Christ must be recaptured in the morning quiet time. Call it what you want — the quiet time, personal devotions, the morning watch, or individual worship — these holy minutes at the start of each day explain the inner secret of Christianity. It’s the golden thread that ties every great man of God together — from Moses to David Livingstone, the prophet Amos to Billy Graham — rich and poor, businessmen and military personnel. Every man who ever became somebody for God has this at the core of his priorities: time alone with God.”
Here is a PDF version of 7 Minutes with God.
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Deeper
Father, in Your faithfulness, teach me Your statues. Expand my narrow horizons so that I can filled with the all the fullness of God. Please give me a faith that is deeper, stronger, and battle tested. I ask that you bless me with a mind that constantly has an unanswered question, causing me to seek a deeper understanding when I would have otherwise settled for less.
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It takes faith to memorize
Psalm 119:11 comes to mind when someone mentions memorizing scripture. Psalm 119:11 gives a clear answer to the question, “Why memorize?”
Somehow, though, knowing “why” has not been enough to keep my going when I try to memorize. You could say it is a lack of desire to defeat sin. But I think the problem is deeper. I don’t think it is a lack of a desire to defeat sin, because I try pretty hard to do that whenever I see sin in my life. I think that even if I had a stronger desire to defeat sin, I’d still find myself ignoring the value, no matter how great, of memorizing. Why?
Because there is a fundamental lack of faith. Hebrews 11:6 says, “And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.”
I do try to defeat sin. That happens to be the problem, I am drawing on my own resources and assuming that at some point I will overwhelmed the power of sin. That’s nonsense, because it took the death of a member of the Trinity to overcome sin. It is arrogance to think that I can repeat that victory by my own strength. No, it is more than arrogance. I think it is practical blasphemy to say I am as powerful as God, or to put Him as weak as me. The blasphemy doesn’t come from my mouth, but do my self-sufficient actions not shout it?
It takes faith to spend time memorizing something, taking God at His word that it will do a supernatural work in my heart that is unexplainable yet real. To memorize scripture, it takes more than a head knowledge of the value and benefits of memorization. It takes faith in the heart, that says, “God I don’t understand how Your Word changes hearts, but I know that it alone brings the change because it is Your living Word.” Faith is acting on what you believe, taking God’s truth and applying it to life.
God, it is not by my own strength that I commit to memorizing scripture by faith. It is Your Spirit’s drawing me that has brought me to this place. Continue to draw me as I take each step and trust Your Word to do the work I see only You can do in my wandering heart.
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Bible Study
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Teach Me – Part 2
I find it interesting that with everyone one of David’s requests for God to teach him is an accompanying praise, petition, or promise.
The overarching request for God to teach us His Word is sourced from our adoration of God, mingled with our physical and spiritual needs, and partnered with a vow to obey. We want God to teach us more about His praiseworthy character, because the more we know the more we see that only He can fill our every need, and when we see who He is and how He is everything we need, faithfully following is the enlightened heart’s response.
Practical application:
1. Make requests of God based on a knowledge of who He is and what He wills, not simply according to first-impulse self-oriented desires. How can God deny a request that is consistent with His character from a saint aligned with His will?
2. When you make your requests known to God, watch for Him to reveal more of His character to you in His answer. How often do we forfeit a deeper knowledge of God because we neglect to notice His character displayed in His actions?
3. Ask God to teach you and commit to following the truth He opens your eyes to, instead of following on the condition that it suits your fancy. Why would God honor a request from a heart with a noncommittal attitude?
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Teach Me
Psalm 119:12, 26, 29, 33, 64, 66, 68, 108, 123, 135, 171
12 Blessed are you, O Lord;
teach me your statutes!
26 When I told of my ways, you answered me;
teach me your statutes!
29 Put false ways far from me
and graciously teach me your law!
33 Teach me, O Lord, the way of your statutes;
and I will keep it to the end.
64 The earth, O Lord, is full of your steadfast love;
teach me your statutes!
66 Teach me good judgment and knowledge,
for I believe in your commandments.
68 You are good and do good;
teach me your statutes.
108 Accept my freewill offerings of praise, O Lord,
and teach me your rules.
124 Deal with your servant according to your steadfast love,
and teach me your statutes.
135 Make your face shine upon your servant,
and teach me your statutes.
171 My lips will pour forth praise,
for you teach me your statutes.
“Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law.” (Psalm 119:18). I don’t want to rely upon second hand learning. I love to hear your word preached, but I want even more to go before You in Your Word and see with my own eyes. What bride would be content to only hear of her lover described by her friends? I am in a covenant relationship with God and will not be satisfied with anything less than going to His Word to know Him personally. Teach me, O Lord.
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Strategy
“All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.” – 2 Timothy 3:16-17
“What’s your strategy to learn the whole Bible?” That question caught me off guard, and I put my fork down to think a moment.
“I don’t think I have one.” Honesty was the best policy, and I couldn’t even think of a fabricated answer.
“Get one.” The man wasn’t shy about telling me that I needed a plan, and he wasn’t slow to offer me one either.
Words from that lunch with Jim Downing, the oldest living Navigator, still ring in my head now months down the road. I had been, like most of us, caught in the idea (whether by default or defeat), that the Bible, in its entirety, is unknowable. What. Mr. Downing was challenging me to do, however, was not to know the Bible exhaustively, but rather know it extensively. It is God’s Word, it is valuable, so it deserves my attention. My goal is to be familiar with the Bible as a whole, to know the flow if it, the stories, the people, and especially the revealed character of the three members of the Trinity.
What should be in your plan if you intend to become familiar with the Bible?
Read the whole book. We won’t be familiar with what we have not read.
Memorize scripture. Mr. Downing recommended learning the key verse for every book of the Bible. He said when you get done with that, learn the key verse for every chapter.
Study each book. This can take years, but diligent study of each book makes it come alive.
Sound daunting? Does to me too…steady learning is crucial. First steps can be things like reading the Bible every year, and memorizing a verse every week or so by putting it on a notecard and carrying it around in your pocket. Bible study groups aid with the study part.
How many of us want to die having never become familiar with all of God’s word? That goal is not unattainable, we just set our bar low. Am I the only one who was content to go without a plan to know the whole book?
Right now, I am already looking forward to the Christmas holidays and school is out. My first semester in college has been great, but a break would be great. I have recently committed to giving this Christmas break to the Lord. I will take advantage of the lack of college study burdens and give time to God’s Word. This is beyond just having extra-long quite times…this will be time set aside daily to study God’s word. I want to take one of Paul’s letters (not sure which yet) and read it multiple times, observe the text in depth, listen to some pastors I know who have podcasts of their preaching on the book, etc. I put this goal on my calendar so that I won’t get so busy with other things that I forget to apply myself.
The Bible is all God-breathed. It is all profitable. I want to know as much as I can. Will you join me and take this step over the Christmas holidays?
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