The Bible is the best book that anyone can read. It contains the Word of God and it is filled with so many practical instructions for living. More so, it's spiritual food that every believer needs to consume to be able to grow and what's amazing is that, even if we feast on the Word, the meals never stop coming and there's always something new.
Here are five Bible reading tips to help you get the most out of the experience:
1. Pray before you read
Talk to God for a bit. Share with Him the things that are bothering you or questions that you need to be answered. Speak to the Lord about the things that you want to know from Him, and He's not limited to spiritual things. I've asked the Lord about stuff from what His plans for my life are to, "Lord, what do you look like?" and He answered both. I ask Him big things and small things, serious things and casual things. He always answers. Really, He's just waiting for us to ask.
The Bible is God's way of speaking to us, so when we pray before we read, we are basically engaging in a conversation with Him, and in it, He delights.
2. Expect to hear from God
We've done the praying, now what? Before we begin to read the Bible, we must set our hearts in an attitude of expectation to receive from Him. As we read, let's anticipate the moment when He will speak; and this happens when a verse suddenly pops up. A Word will speak to you, and that's when you know that the Lord is speaking.
When I get to this point that I have a Word from Him. I stop reading and begin praying. The prayer in item number one is a prayer of inquiry. It's asking for information and it ranges from less than a minute to fifteen minutes in my experience. The prayer that follows the Word is the type that enforces the revelation to become a reality. This is where thanksgiving, praise, and worship come in; the long prayer, to be more precise.
3. Keep a journal
Writing down the verses that God speaks to us is a good way of reminding us of the Lord's instructions, promises, and did-you-knows. I always find this very helpful when there's something that I have to go back to. "As I see it, Bible journaling is a mentorship moment where God teaches and we, like good students, take note," I wrote in a different article about journaling, which you may want to check out.
4. Highlight the verses that speak to you
It's easier to look for specific verses when they're categorized by color. Don't highlight the entire Bible though, just the ones that speak to you. In doing so, we don't have to scan the entire Bible looking for a certain Word that we want to remember, we flip through some and see the color, and we know.
Different colors mean different things. The way I do it is this: orange is for knowledge, sky blue is for encouragement, green is for instructions or commands, yellow is for all the verses about God, gold is for the promises and I have a bunch of other colors for different categories. I started out with five colors but as time went by, I had to have more colors. If you're a beginner at this, start with only a few and gradually work your way into the color scheme as you see fit. Make it your own.
5. Quality comes before quantity
It's possible to read 100 chapters a day and get nothing. It's also possible to read only five chapters and get so much out of it. When reading the Bible, the quality of what we get out of the Words are more important for our souls compared to what we get when we speed read. Slowly but surely, they say. Read the Bible like you're strolling along the beach, take it one step at a time and take in the scenery. This is also very good for the memory.
The first few times I read the Bible, I did so with the goal of "I just have to read it" in mind. I got a little bit out of it but not as meaty and as juicy as compared to when I started valuing quality over quantity. Plus, I remember more since I can focus and really meditate on the revelations unlike when I just wanted to get it over with.
So, there you go. Get started and take in everything the Bible has to teach you.
