Reading the Bible is more than just reading a random verse—or skipping around the Bible and reading one little chunk you happen to put your finger on. Such skipping and skimming will not give you a firm foundation of what the words of Jesus really are or what they mean.

Certainly one or two verses at a time is important for study and application, for inspiration and correction or for sharing with other people (why else would this page be sharing one or two verses every day if it weren’t important?) However, what this week’s method is getting at is finding a larger picture and context for the individual verses that you know and hear.

To get the most out of and to understand well what the Bible means, you want to make a lifelong habit of reading larger chunks of the Bible at a time. This will help you understand the full picture of what is meant therein. By regularly reading the Bible, you will gain a much broader understanding of what is being said about the range of topics, like faith, prayer, suffering, purpose and mission, others who are not like you, the church, judgment, and family life. So much more!

By making a habit of reading larger chunks, you will also be much better at preventing yourself from ripping single verses out of context or skipping verses you don’t want to follow. For example, often cults are started by someone taking one verse out of context and building a whole dogma out of it, for the cult leader to use it to hold unbiblical sway over followers and to build a little kingdom for themselves. Sometimes a whole new translation of the Bible has been based on one misapplied verse that followers are vulnerable to because they don’t understand the whole context of scripture. Sad but true!

Another very important aspect to note is that sometimes people find parts or verses of the Bible they don’t like and don’t want to follow because it speaks to something that they’d rather ignore about their own lives, for example, like those verses that speak about humility, sexual promiscuity, lying, stealing, gossip, or laziness. By regularly reading through the Bible to get the context of what is spoken about, you will not be able to easily hide from the fact that the Bible speaks about those things. Don’t we want to know what the Bible has to say in its entirety? Don’t we want to fully know and understand what God is speaking to us today through His word?

A great suggestion is to read a chapter every day, working through the various books start-to-finish or even the reading through the whole Bible or the whole New Testament. You can buy a “Bible in One Year” book which has the suggested readings laid out for you after the fashion of a devotional. There are many around but here is one that I have used: https://www.amazon.com/One-Year-Bible…/dp/1581347081/

Also, you might try an online one, which there are many as well, but here is the website for one that I have used by downloading the app to my phone so you can listen while in your car: https://bibleinoneyear.org/en/

The main point is to get started (or get back to) reading the Bible, maybe even just setting a little time limit, like at least 5 minutes per day and following a schedule, like, starting by reading through one of the gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Or how about the book of Acts, which talks about the early church. Wherever you start, just keep it up!

Revelations 1:3 says this about the book of Revelations, but you might take it to mean all of the Bible, as this hand illustration seems to do: “Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear it and take to heart what is written in it, because the time is near.”

Blessings to those who apply themselves to read and learn the word of God!