If you are reading the Bible from front to back, then you are doing it in the hardest way possible.
Listen to Audio
Introduction to Reading the Bible
Welcome back to the Ministry Corner. Reading the Bible seems like such a mammoth task, doesn’t it?
Have you ever read it all the way through? Can it even be read all the way through? Perhaps it seems like such a big task. It’s such a big book, and few people ever seem to finish it.
You know, it’s a fact that most people, when they start out reading the Bible, start out with a big bang. They enjoy the stories in the beginning and the story of Moses. They read through, and they usually get stuck around Leviticus. Suddenly, it gets boring, and you can’t go anymore.
You might have some questions like,
“Am I reading it right? Why is it so hard? Is it even possible to finish reading this book?
Well, I want to set your mind at ease today because there is no right or wrong way to read the Bible. Just read it. That’s your starting point.
Just read it and put it in. Then you can start to work on other ways of reading it and understanding it better. So, that’s your starting point: to just read it.
But perhaps you’re at the point now where you have been doing that, and you think,
“I could be getting way more out of the Bible. I should be getting more out of it.”
You look at other people who just seem to get so much out of it. And you don’t feel like you can do that.
Well, today I want to show you five ways to read the Bible that will make it more interesting for you. It will allow you to unlock the power that’s in it, and it will change your life like never before.
Joshua 1:8 says,
This book of the law will not cease [to come] out of your mouth; but you will meditate in it daily and at night, so that you are sure to carry out everything that is being written in it: for then you will cause your journey in life to be prosperous, and then you will succeed wisely.
If you can unlock the power that’s in the Bible through these different ways, you can succeed in everything that you do. You can unlock the power in your life that God wants for you to have in His Word.
Way No. 1 – Read the Key Parts
The first way you can read the Bible is to read the key parts. Don’t just read the Bible blindly. Start with the most important parts.
You see, if you’re not sure where to start, then you can start by reading the important stories of the Bible. The best place to start is always with the Gospels. This is because they are important, and they tell you about Jesus and what He said.
That’s the starting point. It is the foundation of your Christian life, isn’t it? So start with the Gospels. Just read through all of them, even if you don’t understand it, and it will bless you.
Read the most important stories of the Bible. Read the stories of Moses in Genesis. Read the story of Joshua. He has his own book, so he makes it super easy for you.
Read the stories of David and Solomon by reading through 1st and 2nd Samuel, and 1st and 2nd Kings. This will just give you an overview, sort of like a template of the Bible.
These are the key parts, the highlights. That’s a good place to start. As you read through those, you will then have a place to build on, and you can start reading other books of the Bible.
You can start adding to it bit by bit. But that’s your starting point, and the most important place to start.
Perhaps you might have a specific book you want to start with. Don’t start by reading the prophets. Let me tell you right now, any of the prophets, like Isaiah and all of those are heavy.
You can get into those when you’ve been reading more. But unless that is something that excites you, start by reading the stories and something that you can really get into.
You might find something that interests you. Perhaps you might open up randomly and find a spot that really is interesting.
If that happens to you, perhaps the Lord is leading you in that, so you should follow it. Read through that book.
I remember when I was in my teens, and I was finally reading the Bible properly. I had been saved since I was a kid, but I only got a proper Bible of my own and started reading in my early teens.
I remember when I was reading through the book of Ezekiel, and it fascinated me what was going on there! I had no idea what was going on in the story with the angels and the visions, but it fascinated me.
And so I read that book. And you know, it was a blessing to me because I read it. I didn’t know how this connected with the rest of the Bible. I didn’t know how it interlinked or what any of it meant, but I enjoyed that one book in the Bible, and so I read it.
So find a book like that that interests you. Read it through, because at least you’re putting the Word in. Perhaps the Lord will speak to you through it, and you’ll start to see things coming together. You’ll start to get an idea of what’s in the Bible. So that’s way number one of reading the Bible.
Way No. 2 – Find the Puzzle
The second way to read the Bible is to find all the puzzles. You started with the template, but now you’re going to put some pieces together.
The Bible is a puzzle, and here is how you can start to assemble the pieces of that puzzle. You need to have some pieces from all over the different places so that you feel like you’re starting to get something together.
It feels like something is happening, and you’re not just grasping in the dark. That is where daily readings come in.
Daily readings are powerful, and they make it easy for you. They keep the Bible interesting, so you don’t have to think too much.
This is one of the best ways to read the Bible, especially when you’re starting out. Find a good reading plan to follow, but some reading plans are a little bit hard. They’re not really very clear, and they still keep it a little bit boring.
So you need to have a variety. You need to find a good reading plan that gives you a variety from the Bible, so that you can start to bring the pieces together.
This is sort of similar to the first way I showed you, where you’re just reading the important parts. You’re bringing pieces together, and they don’t make sense yet.
They will, however, start to make sense the more you read and put the Word in. And as you work through, you can start to bring all the pieces of the Bible together.
If you want to look for a good reading plan, you can check out the link to our website for GBM Bible. You can find it here:
We have a reading plan on there that gives you 10 chapters a day. That might seem like a lot, but it’s perfect because it gives you a variety and a spread of the Bible. So that is the second way that you can read the Bible. You can start to get it in and start to understand the wide picture of the Bible.
Way No. 3 – Psalms and Proverbs
The third way to read the Bible is by reading the Psalms and the Proverbs. What do you do when you don’t know what to read in the Bible today?
Maybe you open the Bible randomly and you think,
“I’ll find something.”
What if there was a plan you could follow, that you could at least still read something systematically, but not have to try and figure it out? It’s simple and laid out for you.
Well, here is a simple strategy to read the Bible, and that is to read the Psalms and the Proverbs. And I’m going to show you now a very simple trick that you can use that will give you something to read. It can give you just a couple of chapters, or actually quite a few chapters, depending how you use it.
Reading Proverbs
It’s very simple, so here’s how it works. First, you start by seeing what day of the month it is.
For instance, today is the 15th of the month. So I start by going to Proverbs and finding Proverbs 15. So I will just read that chapter today. That is all you have to do. Just read that.
There are 31 chapters in Proverbs. So if you do this, you have one for every day of the month, and you can repeat this every month. By the time you get back to the new month, you will probably have forgotten what you read in Proverbs, so it’s perfect. You can start again. So this is a good place to start.
Reading Psalms
Then if you want more, you can do the same thing in Psalms. You just jump over to the book of Psalms. You find Psalm 15, and you read that for the day.
And now what if you want some more? Well, Psalms offers way more options for you to read than just one chapter like Proverbs.
So here is what you can do now. Because there are over 150 Psalms, you can simply take today’s Psalm, Psalm 15, and add 30 to it. So now you can go and find Psalm 45. You can jump to Psalm 45 and start reading it.
Then when you’re done with that, you just add another 30 onto it. So we’ll jump to Psalm 75, and then you can read Psalm 75. It is another chapter. You can continue doing this until you run out of Psalms.
So we jumped to Psalm 105, then we’ll jump to Psalm 135. Then there’s no more you can do after that, because you’re out of Psalms.
But there you go. You’ve got a very clear, easy plan you can follow through, and you’ve read six chapters for the day.
Perhaps you might get a psalm that really encourages you. It gives you promises, gives you hope for today, or speaks to what you’re going through.
So if you’re not sure what to read for the day, just do that. Just do like a devotional reading. See what the Lord speaks to you through the Psalms, because they really touch you, and they will always give you something for the day.
That then is the third way that you can read the Bible.
Way No. 4 – Meditate On the Promises
The fourth way to read the Bible is to meditate on the promises. Here is how to take the Bible and use it like dynamite.
This is far more than just reading the Bible and putting knowledge in, or reading the stories. This is you taking promises that are in the Word and using them in your life to release the power.
You need to find promises that God has given in the Word. They are hard to find. They’re scattered throughout the Gospels and throughout all of the books of the Bible.
There are promises there. They are little nuggets of truth that God has promised to the righteous, to those who are in Him and to those who trust in Him. And you need to find them.
So perhaps as you’ve been reading through the Word, you might be seeing things that stand out. Write them down.
Put them down and keep them as promises that you can speak out, as things that you can use in the future. Because you see, the Bible is like a jungle. It has so many things hidden throughout it that you have to find.
You might be able to find someone else who has found promises in the Word, but they only look for specific things. Perhaps God wants to say something to you and has promises just for you. So you need to find those promises in the Word, then take them and start to confess them.
Meditating on the Word does not mean just thinking about it. It doesn’t mean it is like Eastern meditation, where you just sit there quietly and go into a trance. The word meditation means to mutter.
It means to speak under your breath constantly. And that is actually what was in the Scripture that I shared at the beginning from Joshua. It said,
This book of the law will not cease to come out of your mouth, but you will meditate on it day and night.
So that’s where this comes into play, and where meditating on the promises becomes powerful. You take Scripture, and you meditate on it.
You keep thinking about it all day. You take just one, two, or three verses every day, and you meditate on them. You say,
“My God will supply all my needs, coming down from His abundance in the realm of glory. My God has provided all my needs.”
You say, “The daughter of Tyre will be there with a gift. The rich among the people will seek my favor.”
You say, “God will bless the righteous with favor. He will surround him as with a shield.”
You take those Scriptures, and you just meditate on them all day. You think about them. You speak them under your breath. You confess them, and you say,
“Thank you, Lord, that You have provided my needs. Thank you, Lord, that You have put a shield of protection around me.”
Doing that puts the Word down into your spirit. It puts it down there permanently. It starts to churn inside, and it unlocks the power of the Word.
You see, there’s power in the Word, but it’s not going to be unlocked until you meditate on it, until you speak it, and you churn it. Then that power comes out.
This is how you unlock the true power of God. This is one of the most important things you can do while reading the Word. You don’t just read over the Scripture and say,
“My God has provided all my needs.”
Okay, that’s great. You read it, and you say it over and over and over again.
You say, “My God has provided my needs.”
You keep speaking it until you believe it, until that power is unlocked in your spirit. Then you begin to unlock the true power that is in the Word, the true power that it has to change your life and to change your thinking.
And, as the Scripture says, you renew your mind, so that you believe the promises God has given you. Then you can start to live an abundant life of blessing that He has for you.
This is one of the most important ways to read the Word. And it goes far more beyond just reading it, but actually unlocking the power that’s in it.
So that’s the fourth way that you can read the Word of God.
Way No. 5 – Study Like a Teacher
The fifth way to read the Bible is to study it like a teacher.
You can unlock the power of the Bible with just a few simple steps, and it might seem complicated to be a teacher. You might think that you have to be highly analytical or observant.
Yes, you will need some of that to study the Word like a teacher. But there are a few simple things you can do that I want to show you now that will help you unlock more power in what you’re reading.
So you might be reading the Word, and say you’re reading Ephesians. Here is a good Scripture to use for this. Ephesians 1:3 says this.
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realm with every spiritual blessing in Christ.
Now, you might read through that and think,
“Okay, I’m blessed in Christ.”
But maybe you won’t fully understand what it actually means. This is the key Scripture of our teaching on the Way of Blessing. So there’s been a lot of teaching on this, and that’s why it is so clear.
But I want to show you quickly how you can unlock this with any Scripture, and it’s really quite simple. You don’t have to be too complicated while you’re reading it. You don’t have to over-analyze it, but you can just break it down into a few simple things.
The Six Serving Men
So, for example, you can use what is called The Six Serving Men. You can say who, when, where, what, why, or how. That might seem complicated at first, but it’s pretty simple.
So, you can break it down and say who is in this verse? Well, first we have God the Father, Jesus Christ, and we also have us.
Referring to all of these, you can say what is being talked about in this Scripture? Well, we have blessing, and we have spiritual blessings.
You can say where? This one is pretty clear. It’s in the heavenly realm in Christ. You could ask when, and it could be clear when this is happening.
If you know the Greek of the Scripture, you will know that it says He blessed us in the past, once and for all. The once and for all event means He won’t have to bless us again. So, if you know more about the Scripture, you can add that.
It could be past, present, or future that it’s talking about. It is something that’s happening now, happened in the past, or will happen.
So you can break that down. You could ask how? He blessed us in Christ, and you could ask why?
Now, this Scripture doesn’t say why. But if you read the next one, it says He chose us in Him before the creation of the world.
So, you can just say why? Because He chose us, which is great. You can break down every Scripture like this, and maybe it seems complicated. But you will be amazed that when you do this, you start to just see connections.
You see how things connect and how things start to make sense suddenly. Maybe you didn’t notice before that the Scripture says He blessed us in the heavenly realm in Christ. He blessed us with every spiritual blessing, and it’s in Christ alone.
It’s not because of anything that you did. It’s not because you earned it. It’s because it’s in Christ. And now you understand this, and you think,
“Now I understand what that Scripture really is saying.”
So this is a really powerful way to break the Scripture down. And this is where something like electronic Bibles also come in handy because you can skip around Scriptures.
You can see different translations. You can go into the Greek in the back using Strongs, and you can really unlock the power that’s in the Bible.
Now, I don’t want to make you become intellectual if you’re not that kind of person. But just start writing down a few simple things. Start writing down key things that stand out, like who is being talked about in this verse, when it happened, and how it’s happening.
You’ll start to see some power. You can go through every book of the Bible and do this.
You can summarize verse by verse, or you can summarize a whole chapter. Go through a whole chapter and see who’s being talked about in it. When is this taking place, and why is this happening? It just helps you kind of understand the bible.
It’ll help you remember it more because you can make notes. They don’t have to be long or complicated. You can make just simple notes describing what’s in the Bible. And when you do this now, you can open up to getting revelation in the Bible.
You can start to understand more what is happening in it, and you can ask God to add to it. Don’t just use your mind and become intellectual because you could be tempted.
If you’re like me, you could be tempted to get into it really far, go extremely intellectual and analytical, and analyze every detail. That can be good, but you know what you should be doing actually when you study the bible? You should be allowing the Lord to give you revelation.
You should be allowing that as you read, you see something stand out to you, or you see it connect to something else in the Bible, and the Lord can do that.
The more that you read, the more the Lord can give you revelation. The more He can help you understand it because that ultimately is what should be happening.
The Bible is not just an intellectual book. It’s not just a theological book that we should be studying and knowing about the doctrine.
We should be studying it so that we can get a revelation of God, understand how He thinks, and understand what He wants us to do. And so that we can go and help others understand what God wants for them, and show them what God has promised them.
Wrapping Things Up
That is the ultimate way you should be reading the bible. That’s the fifth and final reason, and I hope that this was a blessing to you. I hope that this showed you some of how you can go about reading the Bible, and maybe just jog your memory for ideas.
These are not the only ways you can read the bible. You could do plenty of other ways.
Perhaps you find it hard to read. You could listen to an audio Bible. You could listen to someone else speaking it, and make it super easy for you to get the Word in all the time. But don’t discount the power of the Word and actually reading it yourself.
As a believer, this is your handbook, and you need to learn how to read it. You won’t know how to read it automatically just by having it. You won’t know how to unlock its full power until you start to practice these things.
So I hope that was a blessing to you. Comment below and tell me some of the ways that you read the Bible. Ways that you’ve found that really unlock the power of it, and ways that really make it have meaning for you.
I look forward to seeing what some of your comments are. Like and subscribe to my publications if it was a blessing to you.
In the next article, I want to show you some of the ways that reading the bible will impact you. I’m going to show you five results of reading the Bible.
I will show you what impact it actually will have when you start to put it in like this, and when you start to read it in a way that unlocks its power. So I’ll see you in the next one.