Where Does It Say That You Should Read the Bible Everyday?
I was talking with a friend recently about how I'd been spending a lot of time reading books about the Bible, merely less time reading the Bible itself. The spaces between my personal reflections on Scripture were growing wider. I withal felt similar I was growing and learning, but deep down I knew I was missing something.
Our conversation turned to my parents, who take been incredible, faithful examples of what information technology means to follow Jesus all my life—only they rarely read the Bible. For my parents, years of task-oriented, bank check-the-box dedication to Bible written report left them with a biting sense of taste in their mouths. Reading the Bible and memorizing its verses had been impressed upon them so strongly that they could no longer read the Bible without also recalling the negative reinforcement and guilt that often accompanies regimented Bible-reading groups. Both of my parents take preferred to learn and grow by reading someone else'southward reflections on Scripture rather than diving into information technology themselves.
They were spiritually scarred by their perspective of Bible study.
I grew up thinking, "But that's withal no excuse." Nonetheless, equally I establish myself encountering similar methodologies for Bible study, I couldn't assist only wonder, "Is this going to vesture me out as well?" My parents were one time only equally enthusiastic almost Bible written report as I was.
The church has more Bible study plans, methods, groups, and techniques than we know what to do with. But here'southward the thing: these methods help you create bailiwick to do something y'all should want to do. If you don't see the purpose behind the methods, you lot'll fire out. On their own, Bible reading plans and verse memorization techniques are overwhelming—they take fourth dimension and effort, and can get out you feeling guilty for missing a solar day, a week, or a meeting.
What's the point of Bible study plans?
Starting a Bible reading plan is like starting a new diet.
Changing your diet takes bailiwick. Fifty-fifty if it's something you really want for yourself, information technology'due south easy to slip up and forget almost information technology. If yous let bad habits keep footholds in your life, you lot'll fail before you start, and you'll never create the healthy new habits you want.
The Bible is one of our greatest sources of spiritual food. But sometimes nosotros still make full upwards on junk food. Blogs, social media, news, TV shows, books, and games. These things aren't bad in themselves, but when they're the merely sources of perspective, information, and insight you consume, something is missing.
When you accept a sodium deficiency, your body craves salty foods. You might not even observe that you're peckish salty foods in item, but your body is reacting to that deficiency past creating a desire for something that restores information technology.
Many non-Christians have no desire to read the Bible. They desire cypher to do with it. Just that doesn't hateful that as God'southward cosmos they don't, on some level, require his truth, his wisdom, his love, or his perspective. I see non-Christians all the fourth dimension who have no idea how closely their innermost desires parallel God's desires for them.
A Christian, though, is much more likely to find the source of this spiritual deficiency—we've already been exposed to the source of God's wisdom, truth, and perspective. God's Word is meant to permeate every attribute of our lives. Our knowledge of him is supposed to transform us into "the aroma of Christ" (2 Corinthians 2:xv), but something smells fishy.
The more the spaces abound betwixt my daily readings, the more I notice myself saying things like, "That reminds me of a poesy in [book of the Bible]," or, "That sounds kind of like the passage where . . ." Before I know it, I'thou not just paraphrasing Scripture anymore—I'm making vague references to it, or letting other sources take a greater impact on my understanding of God'due south character.
In those moments, losing sight of the value of daily Bible study is more like cutting caffeine from my diet. I've never been a coffee drinker, but I have energy drinks all the time because they help me stay alarm and focused when I need to be. Caffeine is something I've made a part of my regular diet for a purpose—and when I stop having it, I feel it. I don't have the energy I used to throughout the day. I tin can't focus equally long. Or, worse, I get headaches.
Without your daily dose of Scripture, it'due south tough to be at your best all day.
Just reading your Bible isn't but something you need to do to stay spiritually healthy. It's non a pill you have to swallow or a chalky vitamin you have to chew. Reading the Bible is something you should do because you want to.
What if I don't desire to read the Bible?
Imagine that your parents wrote a book for yous—it'southward the history of your family, their spousal relationship, your childhood, how you lot've become the person you are today, and their hopes and dreams for your time to come. Woven throughout the volume is a clear, underlying theme: they beloved y'all very much. Perchance, just maybe, y'all pick upwards on some other theme too: you haven't always known what was best for you, and they usually know what they're talking about.
How practice you call up they would experience if you told them, "Look, at to the lowest degree I read a chapter today"?
How much you read and how frequently you lot read is non the point.
Function of my task at Faithlife lets me write reflections on Scripture or dig into biblical topics. To practice that well, I demand to dig into the Bible daily. Merely whenever I read the Bible for work, I'm reading with an calendar—I'yard hunting for a poesy or prowling through a passage. For Scripture to penetrate my centre and permeate my life, I take to read information technology but to read it, too.
Reading the Bible exposes you to the history of the creator'south human relationship to creation—that includes you. If y'all desire to know who God is, he had 40 people write a whole book nigh him over the course of nigh 1,500 years. Now all you accept to practise is choice a Bible upwardly off the shelf, read the Bible online, or download the Bible on your phone.
However you read the Bible, you're going to get the well-nigh out of information technology if you do it because you want to.
Don't do information technology because someone is making you.
Don't exercise it to testify off how much y'all read.
Don't memorize verses to get a cookie, a prize, or acknowledgement.
Those can all exist useful motivators to help yous become on the correct rails and create healthy spiritual habits yous want to have. But don't let those exist the reasons y'all read the Bible.
Read the Bible because it excites you.
Read the Bible because you want to know God.
Read the Bible because it's living and agile (Hebrews 4:12).
Read the Bible because it tin can speak powerful truth into your life right now.
Read the Bible so that your life reveals more than of Christ (ii Corinthians 3:3).
Those are reasons to open your Bible every day.
So why bother with Bible reading plans?
I pb a small grouping of high school freshmen boys. Every two weeks this year we've read a chapter of Marking and talked about it together.
Every time we meet, at to the lowest degree half of them say, "I didn't have time to read it."
1 affiliate. Two weeks.
Without field of study, yous'll never read the Bible regularly—no matter how badly you want to.
Daily Bible reading plans, Bible study techniques, and external incentives are all tools designed to assistance y'all develop field of study and make Bible report part of your regular routine.
My wife started a nutrition considering she wanted to. At outset, she knew that she wouldn't always be able to resist the unhealthy foods she used to have whenever she felt like. A group of her coworkers started dieting too, and together, they held each other accountable. Sometimes my wife would decline cookies because she knew she would accept to tell her coworkers she'd cheated on the diet. Merely she didn't offset the nutrition considering of her coworkers. She started because she wanted to consume healthier. Subsequently eating healthier for a few months, the reasons why she started were enough to keep her going. She didn't demand reminders or accountability.
In the same style, those external factors that aid u.s. read the Bible regularly are not the reason why nosotros read. But they are, hopefully, tools nosotros tin can use until we've created healthier habits and made Bible study part of our daily lives. These tools, coupled with meaningful, personal reasons to read the Bible volition help yous have a far richer spiritual life.
My church recently went through a serial chosen, "Room for Cream." The premise was that if nosotros want to have room for God in our lives, nosotros couldn't "fill our loving cup" until there's no room for the good stuff. If yous don't have time to read your Bible, what do you demand to remove to make fourth dimension?
The conclusion was profoundly unproblematic:
If yous want room for cream in your life, put the cream in get-go.
If you're trying to brand Bible study a addiction, showtime your twenty-four hours with it. Don't wait until y'all've filled your day with everything else. Don't wait until you're also tired.
You could even read the Bible right now.
Source: https://blog.faithlife.com/why-you-should-read-the-bible-every-day/
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