Dear Family and Friends,

What do you remember most from your grade school years? Remembering those years wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be but I came up with a few for myself.

The first thing that came to mind was playground time followed closely by lunch time.

Although the rest of my grade school experience is mostly a blur, what I do remember was memorizing a whole lot of stuff. I’m now suspecting grade school gave me PTSD. The alphabet. Numbers. Multiplication tables. The Presidents. The Gettysburg Address. The books of the Bible (I spent a few years at HBA).

Grade school was our foundational years. What we learned and memorized set us up for future learning. 

Would you agree that our early years of following Christ were pretty much the same – foundational in nature?

Was every sermon lesson fresh for you? Did you have a lot of ‘aha’ and ‘oh, that was good’ moments as you learned something new each week?

Then we were told to read the Bible and do our devotionals. When I first started reading the Bible, I was dedicated and diligent about reading and doing my devotions.

But I have to admit, my diligence gave way to indolence, my dedication strayed to other priorities in life. 

Have you gone through a similar dry period? Our reasons may differ but that’s not important.

What is important is recognizing that the Bible is the foundation on which to grow our faith. “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” 2 Timothy 3:16-17 

I spent some time reflecting on why my interest in the Bible waned. The Bible didn’t change, I did. Allow me to share what I learned about myself and the way we read the Bible.

I used to be a strong proponent of Bible reading plans, even developing one of the plans we used at C4.

But I recently switched from following a reading plan to going through the Bible as I would a book.

This works better for me. I found it easier to get into the writer’s head. I also found freedom in setting my own pace.

Reading plans were helpful in the beginning but after a few years, I found myself rushing to finish my daily assignment.

And because my understanding was superficial, so was my appreciation for the Good Book. Reading the Bible had become a task, a righteous obligation. I had crossed the line Paul once wrote about, “But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy.” Titus 3:4-5

So one day, I stopped myself and asked: honestly, does it really matter if I read through the whole Bible in a year? This adjustment in attitude helped as my focus and my goal shifted from finishing to understanding the Bible.

Which leads me to my next revelation about Bible Reading Plans. Perhaps a name like Bible Study Plan may be more appropriate, especially for young believers. Let me explain. 

Aileen and I are helping our grandson learn to read. He knows a lot of words and his alphabet. He is at that stage of putting them together and is getting much better at sight reading and sounding out words.

But as he struggles to read each word, it seems that he is just reading words and not fully understanding the story.

Aileen found that stopping at the end of each page so he can put the pictures and the words together helped.

Doesn’t my grandson’s struggles sound like us when we first started reading the Bible? We may have read the words but did we fully grasp God’s lessons for us? 

Do you remember learning the 5 W’s and H in grade school? Who, What, When, Where, Why and How? We were taught that answering these questions would help us better understand the subject.

Be honest and ask yourself, did you (or do you) read the Bible with the 5 W’s and H in mind?

This is what I meant earlier about getting into the head of the writer. For example, have you ever wondered why each Gospel is unlike the others?

It’s because each one was written for a specific purpose. Each author had an overarching story to tell.

Matthew wanted to prove to the Jews that Jesus was the long awaited Messiah. Many believe Mark, the first to write a Gospel, set out to confirm Jesus’ identity and mission to the Christians in Rome. Luke compiled details of Jesus’ life to offer proof of Jesus’ divinity and His humanity. John demonstrates that Jesus was not only the Messiah but the Son of God incarnate, and the only way to God the Father. 

It’s hard to glean all of this from just reading through the Bible. A little bit of context brings the stories and the people to life.

We find that people and the trouble they got themselves into really haven’t changed in thousands of years.

Answering the 5 W’s and H helps us realize the Bible is a living document that helps us live today. If you are looking for tools to help you better understand the Bible, you may want to check out Bible Project, Bible Hub, Blue Letter Bible and Precept Austin.

Earlier I mentioned my grade school memories of memorization. Have you ever felt compelled to memorize Bible verses?

Many of us have memorized verses to help us through times of need. May I suggest we try understanding the verses first?

Consider what a well known cognitive psychologist once wrote, “Memory is the residue of thought.” This means we remember what we think about. The more deeply we dwell on a subject, perhaps even to the point of evoking emotions, the more likely we are to remember it. 

Regardless of whether any of what I’ve said applies to you, what is important is that we each search our hearts and, if need be, rekindle our love for God’s word.

I encourage you to slow down and find joy in God’s word. Take your time as you read your Bible. We are not in a race. God hasn’t set a quota for us to read.

Allow God’s word to soak into your heart. Instead of spending time reading many verses, study just a few verses at a time. 

Allow me to end with a brand new reason why I am so into the Bible. On Tuesday, the following verses from Psalm 139:13-16 came rushing to me.

For on this day our granddaughter was born. I look forward to the day she can read this passage to our Father in Heaven.

“You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed.” Psalm 139:13-16 NLT

God blessed our family this week with the birth of a beautiful granddaughter.

I pray that He blesses you as well.

In love always,