Dear Friends,
We know that Daily Bible Reading is an essential piece of growing in our understanding, trust, and love for God. Each year, we put together a pathway to read through the Bible together as a church family. You can find information on a new study group for this plan starting in January here: Bible In a Year. Please see below for our Bible Reading Schedule for 2025!
A few tips as you get started:
1st, Tie your Bible Reading to something you enjoy.
Make Bible reading likable! Do you enjoy a good cup of coffee or tea? Get that cup and use that coffee or tea break as a time to sit down with the Bible. Do you like nice pens and notebooks, or maybe journaling is a joy to you? Buy yourself a nice notebook, pen, or journal and dedicate them to your Bible reading time. Is there a particular place, like a park bench, where you like to read? Go there! These are all ideas of ways to reward yourself for reading the Bible! Make Bible reading something you love!
“O how I love Your law! It is my meditation all the day” (Psalm 119:97)
2nd, Set a specific time and place to read the Bible.
When we say vague things like “I want to read my Bible every day” without making explicit plans on when we will do that and where we will do that, we’re just giving voice to a vague hope. Our ability to read the Bible then comes down to our day going nearly perfectly so that some extra time shows up unaccounted for and we can then get into the Word. Guess what? Rarely does that happen. Plan now the when and the where so that Bible reading isn’t a nebulous desire but instead something very specific you have built into your schedule.
“Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so.” (Acts 17:11).
3rd, Never miss two days in a row!
Decide now that if you miss you won’t beat yourself up for it. We don’t want Bible reading to become a pain or a source of guilt in our life. But if something happens and we have to skip a day, we forgot to read, or we got busy and can’t read, we want to make extra certain we are back on track the very next day. We want to pile up successes, not failures. We want to see a steady stream of check marks on the Bible reading plan. We want to say to ourselves “I’ve decided to do this, I am doing it, and I will keep doing it. I won’t let an occasional mis-step derail me.”
“For Ezra had set his heart to study the law of the Lord and to practice it, and to teach His statutes and ordinances in Israel” (Ezra 7:10).
And Finally, Always apply to your life what you read.
Meditation in the Bible means carefully and thoughtfully turning over the Bible’s truths in your mind. That is an essential part of daily Bible reading because our goal is not to simply information but transformation. We want to come to know God, not just read about long ago people in a far away land. Thus, when we’re done with the reading, we always need to ask the big questions of that day’s chapters: what does this teach me about God? What have I learned here about what God likes and dislikes? How does this reading cause me to trust in God more? What here helped me persevere on my way to heaven? These are questions that get Bible reading off the page and into our lives. Bible reading has to become Bible living and that happens when we meditate on God’s word.
“Make me understand the way of Your precepts, So I will meditate on Your wonders” (Psalm 119:27)
Reading the Bible for an entire year is not an easy task. It’s important not to make the quantity of reading done your gauge for success but instead measure what you did get read and how it drew you closer to God. That’s our goal, and these tips and strategies can help you get there all year long. May your heart rejoice in God’s word!
“The precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes” (Psalm 19:8).
