Last year, at this time, I preached a sermon at Valley Springs Presbyterian Church about being committed to reading your Bible on a regular basis (you can still listen to the sermon online at www.valleysprings.org/sermons, dated Dec. 27, 2009). Every Christmas, we celebrate the great gift of God the Son coming to dwell with us in human flesh. The incarnation is one of the great miracles upon which our hope of salvation firmly rests. But Christ’s humiliation is not God’s only condescending act for humanity. The fact that God has chosen to speak to us through human language and human grammatical constructs, which we can read and understand, also is a great gift from God. The Bible is one of God’s greatest gifts to us. And it is readable and accessible in our language. And the Bible contains “the words of eternal life” (Jn. 6:68). We would be fools to ignore such a great gift. In fact, we cut ourselves off from “all things that pertain to life and godliness” (2 Pet. 1:3) if we do not deepen our knowledge of the Word. We cut ourselves off from the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives, if we do not soak in God’s word (Eph. 5:18 & 6:17 with Col. 3:16).
So the challenge still stands for the new year. Be a person of the Book. This is not necessarily a challenge to read through the Bible in one year or follow one certain plan; it is a challenge to regularly, daily, let the Word of God shape and transform your mind and your heart and your life. Will you step up to the challenge in 2011?
From my personal experience, I have found that it is difficult to be regular in the Word without a plan. The last two years I have used the Bible reading plan found in the ESV Study Bible, with some modifications to fit the high school ministry at Valley Springs. I do not have a modified plan to offer you for 2011, but let me lead you to several options. I do not challenge you to use a plan just to have something to check off, but to have something to help you develop a regular habit of reading God’s Word. With any of these plans, modify them as needed, but let them help you soak in God’s Word.
This ESV Study Bible reading plan that I have used, along with other reading plans, can be found at http://www.esv.org/resources/reading-plans-devotions/. These reading plans come in various formats. You can set the plan of your choice to be your homepage on your web browser, or even subscribe to the RSS feed, if you want to follow it like a blog. Of course, you can do as I do and print the plan and carry the copy in your Bible.
For 2011, I plan to use the M’Cheyne One-Year Reading Plan. Robert Murray M’Cheyne was a Scottish pastor in the early 19th century. Although he died at the early age of 29, he has impacted the church greatly, especially through this Bible reading plan. I was introduced to this plan as a teenager by my pastor and used it then. It leads you to read through the Old Testament once and the Psalms and New Testament twice in one year. You can skip the last column and read through the whole Bible once in the year. I look forward to a new year of continuing to be shaped and transformed by God’s Word.
I encourage you to browse through these plans (or do your own Google search for Bible reading plans) and pick one and stick to it. If you miss one or more days, don't give up. Just keep plugging along. The point is not to just "do a plan," but to put yourself in a place where God's Word can shape and influence you. May God richly bless you in 2011 as you feed on his Word.
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