Christian Personality Development Lesson 5

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Bible Reading: How Much To Do It For Spiritual Health

Surveys show that very few Christians read the whole Bible regularly. Most of them remain faithful to just a few portions familiar to them. This is tragic.

God has give His word to be given. We should not restrict ourselves to selected portions like children who prefer eating only candies, rather than consuming wholesome and balanced food.

It is necessary for each person to develop a systematic plan to read the Bible — and the WHOLE of it. Probably you would be shocked, and you might even revolt at the suggestions that you should read the WHOLE of the Bible. If so, the next paragraph is going to shock you much more than that.

I would like to suggest very lovingly that you should plant to read the WHOLE of the Bible at least once EVERY YEAR !

Now you might say that I am placing too much of a demand upon you, and that it is better to abandon the whole idea of Personality Development than listening to me. But wait ! You might be making a serious miscalculation and mistake. Reading the whole Bible in one year might not be as difficult as you think !

Let me illustrate this with a little calculation. First of all, let us estimate the time needed to read the WHOLE Bible, just once in your mother-tongue (first language). Please circle the correct answer below:

I believe that it would take at least the following number of hours to read the FULL Bible in my mother tongue:

1000 -500 Hours ?

250 -200 Hours ?

150 -100 Hours ?

Before I give you the correct answer, let us make another calculation: All of you indulge in one or more of the following activities every day:

Reading newspaper

Watching TV

Other Reading

Conversation with friends

Let us say that you devote a only a mere 30 minutes a day for these activities. If so, then  in one year you devote at least 182.5 hours for such activities.

Of course, let us be honest: most of us devote more than a mere 30 minutes every day for such activities. Thus the number of hours devoted to such pursuits would be in several hundreds of hours every year. Further, most of us do not think much of time spent in this way. It is not a strain at all upon us to read the newspapers, see TV, or converse with friends.

Now comes the interesting statistics: It takes less than 90 hours to read the entire Bible in one’s mother tongue !! Just think of it:

Many of us waste more than 182.5 hours every year without

feeling any strain. Yet we complain about reading the Bible,

reading which does not require even half that time !

Thus for most of us it is not a problem of time, but a problem of priority. The statistics works the following way:

15 minutes x 360 days = 90 hours

or,

Reading a mere 3 chapters per day +

5 chapters on Sundays = full Bible in one year

It is obvious that most of us do not read the Bible once per year not because of lack of time, but because we lack interest, priority, and commitment to do so. Thus right from the beginning we must get this fact straightened out:

If you feel that as part of your self-enrichment you will not be able to read a substantial portion of the Bible every year, the problem lies with you and not with God !!!

After all, if you can spare hours together for insignificant things of life, but find it difficult to spare a minimum of 15 minutes a day then the problem is self-created. Everyone allots time for things which he considers important.

Thus please begin today to restructure your life in such a way that you are able to give at least 30 minutes a day for reading the Bible. Some plans are suggested below, and choose whichever is best for you:

a-30 minutes every morning

b-30 minutes every night

c-30 minutes during ……….

OR

a-15 minutes in the morning + 15 minutes at night

b-15 minutes ………………. + 15 minutes …………

Or

Make a sensible plan of your own !!

If time-bound plan is difficult to implement, use the following plan:

3 chapters every day + 5 chapters on Sundays

Further, mix various portions in your reading. This will give variety, and also help you make the daily portion even by mixing length chapter with shorter ones.

Some Suggestions:

a-Weekdays

2 chapters from OT + 1 chapter from NT

or

2 chapters from non-poetical books + 1 chapter from poetical books

b-Sundays:

3 chapters from OT + 2 chapters from NT

If you find it difficult to design the plan yourself, then you can pick up one of the ready-made Bible-reading Plans.

The Bible Society, the Scripture Union, and many other organizations issue Bible-reading plans every year. Bibles issued by the Trinitarian Bible Society, and many similar Bible, study-guides, etc. also contain such plans. These help a person to read the whole Bible in one year — with a uniform reading-load per day.

Each One of Us Has Only One Life to Live. !

Let Us Live it in Such A Way That

We Would Not Have to Repent About it in Eternity !!


Record these answers in a diary for checking them at the end of this course


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