21 Things I Learned by Reading Individual Bible Books in One Sitting

My goal is to read the whole Bible in 2 months. More than that, my more complete goal is to read each of the 66 books in one sitting whenever possible. Some of the books took 2 days or so to read. I figured if I could spend hours at a time reading a novel, I could certainly do the same with the Bible.

I am almost done with month one and I will start Esther today.

Read on for what I’ve learned or have what I’ve been reminded of so far. . .

1. The Bible is a story.
2. It is more than literature and more than history. It is about God. It has the ability to change my thoughts.
3. The story is more alive – like a movie in my head – when I read it in chunks.
4. The story is in my head during the week.
5. God is involved and wants to be involved in the lives of men and women.
6. There are lots of names – more than just in the genealogies.
7. As I take the time to read the names, it makes me curious about the people attached to the names.
8. God cares about individuals. Why else would so many individual names be in the Bible?
9. I am spending time with God.
10. God is spending time with me.
11. People are more alike than different.
12. Good parents have bad (adult) kids. Bad parents have good (adult) kids.
13. The God of the Old Testament cannot be defined or confined to a single definition.
14. It is easy to be disobedient. It takes diligence to obey.
15. I found myself rooting for the “good” kings, hoping they wouldn’t do something sinful and thus tarnish their example.
16. It is worth my time to read the Bible.
17. I am seeing the big picture of the Old Testament. I am looking forward to seeing how this will influence my reading of the New Testament.
18. I am not getting lost in the details. I am not stopping to underline, take notes, write questions, or research the passage I am reading.
19. I am seeing the themes of the books more easily.
20. It has been cool to catch the flow of the drama because I am not starting and stopping so many times.
21. This concentrated reading schedule has wakened a deeper desire to know more about the Bible. I am looking  forward to when I can underline, take notes, write questions and do research.

Your Turn . . .

• Have you read the Bible this way?
• What did you learn?

Try This . . .

• Bible Summary has an index of tweets of the Bible, one tweet per chapter, one chapter per day. Go here for the tweets.
• The PodBible is the Bible read by real people, many with an accent (at least according to this American).