This short article is written for those of you who know you should read the Bible regularly, but don’t. I’m assuming, by the way, that you’re not a reader – that is, someone who enjoys reading and does it a lot. Since you already think you should be reading the Bible, if you were a reader, chances are you’d be doing it already.
For the rest of you, if you’re going to make this Bible reading thing work, you need a plan. Or, more accurately, you need a time. You need fifteen minutes, preferably at the same time every day. Five days a week, minimum. Six is better if you can manage it. Schedule this! Seriously. If reading the Bible is not important enough to put on your schedule, you’re probably not going to do it. You’ll continue not reading the Bible while knowing you should. Yes, it does take discipline, I’m not going to lie to you. But I guarantee you will never get any benefit from things that you intended to do, but didn’t do.
Throw away any “Read the Bible in a Year” plans you have, by the way. Most of these jump around so much that it’s hard to get the overall picture of what God is saying in the Scriptures.
Each day, before you begin to read, take a moment to pray. Ask God to show you what he wants you to see in his word, and to block out every distraction; it’s amazing how many distractions your enemy will find to throw at you when you sit down with the Bible. Ask him also to help you pay attention to what the Scripture actually says and not just what you expect it to say (believe me, this really is a significant issue). Remember that the Bible wasn’t given to answer all our questions, it was given to show us who God is, and who we are in relation to him. You don’t have just a casual interest; this is our Father, telling us about himself. Read it as a son or a daughter.
Here’s the actual plan you should follow: Start at the beginning of the New Testament; Matthew 1:1. Keep going until you get to the end of Revelation. Then go back to Genesis 1:1 and read through the Old Testament. Don’t worry about how much you read each day; focus instead on getting in a good fifteen minutes. Read slowly enough to get a grasp on what the text says, but not so slowly that you get bored. Some days you’ll end up reading more than others, and that’s fine. You might not get finished in a year. In fact, you probably won’t. But so what? Let it take as long as it takes.
Why did I say start at the New Testament? Because the New Testament is about Jesus. Yes, he fulfilled the promises God made in the Old Testament, but on your first time through you won’t know enough to see the connections. If you start with the Old Testament I can almost guarantee that you’ll give up before you finish reading Exodus.
When you finally do finish both New and Old Testaments, start through them again. I promise you’ll see things you missed the first time. No one has ever reached the point where they have no more to learn from God’s word. Make Bible reading a habit, and you will continue to reap benefits from it for the rest of your life.