Chances are you’ve read or seen a dozen different Bible reading plans floating around. Some have you reading a chapter in four different books each day. Some promise to take you chronologically through the Bible. Others have you reading the Psalms 17 times, the NT 3 times, and the OT 2.5 times in a year. It’s all very ambitious.
And I’m too dumb to follow it. Maybe you are like me. Maybe all that scheduling is too complicated and intimidating. Maybe you’re afraid you won’t make it all the way through by the end of the year.
Allow me to introduce you to the Bible reading plan I’ve been using for years (Since middle school? Wow). I’ve read through the Bible several times by now. How many? I don’t know. In how much time? I don’t know that either. No, you may not have that sense of accomplishment as you turn the final page to Revelation 22 on December 31. It might take you even two years to read through the Bible.
But I promise there’s no complicated schedule with color-coded selections. And your devotional reading time won’t feel like a Bible drill, flipping pages left and right.
Here’s what I do: Start reading in Genesis 1. Read. Then the next day, pick up where you left off. Maybe you miss the next day. That’s okay. You don’t have a whole schedule to re-arrange or a host of passages to catch up on. Just pick up where you left off. Each day, read some more, always picking up where you left off.
It’s crazy, I know. We read every other book in the world this way, but the Bible? It can’t be that simple!
I might be out of my mind here, but it’s been working. The key is, just keep reading. Don’t let yourself quit. Don’t let yourself skip. Just. Keep. Reading. Through Leviticus (a beautiful book with an undeserved reputation). Through 1 Chronicles. Through Romans. Through Revelation.
Maybe it’s just me, but many of those Bible reading plans feel like a diet plan I’ll never be able to keep up. Slow and steady. And when you get to the end, start over.
That’s my two cents on Bible reading plans. Then again, I’m a dummy.
Yup, it’s the best way. I’ve been doing that for decades, too. But we also read the Bible as a family after each meal (also straight through the Bible, over and over, but at a different spot), so that means that when you’re stuck in difficult passages for a few weeks in your own reading (Jeremiah to Ezekiel, for example), you’ll also be reading something else with the family. That is often a real blessing and helps me make connections between different parts of the Bible.
Here are some other tips that I have found helpful over the decades: http://anniekateshomeschoolreviews.com/2014/10/six-tips-for-bible-reading/