Why Bother Dude?

In 2007, for the first time in my life, I finally managed to read through the entire Bible, sort of. I followed our church's daily bible reading program which had me read a single chapter every single day from Genesis through to Revelations. And despite such a program really only being a broad overview of the Bible, it was a huge step for me and I found it extremely helpful - sometimes if only in that it kept me reading my Bible consistently.

But now that 2007 is gone and past, the question was, what now? I knew I wanted to keep going with some sort of daily Bible reading routine, but the question was, what kind?

Last year my only resources were pretty much my handy Bible and notebook. And while this pared down operation made it easy for me to get my readings done wherever and whenever, it also meant that during readings, if any comments/questions arose - and they almost always did - I wouldn't really have any resources (i.e. the internet) to look them up. And later on when I did get near the internet I would rarely dig into those questions/comments because I had mentally already finished my "spiritual time" for the day. This time around, I wanted to not just note those thoughts but actually address them.

The problem was that I was (and still am) a neophyte Bible reader who often had problems just making those 10-15 minutes each day to read his Bible last year. What hope did I have then of trying to even attempt the same one-chapter-a-day thing and throw in any sort of detailed study?

I ended up speaking with Pete about this issue at church, about how I didn't think I could get all these things done while trying to get through the Bible in a year. He said something so simple to me that I had completely neglected: who said you have to finish the Bible in a year? He was right! Why even say you have to finish reading one chapter per day? All these things are rather arbitrary given that God never divvied up the Bible into chapters and verses and even the order of the books wasn't divinely dictated. The most important thing was that I was reading the Bible, learning from it, building that relationship with God, all on a daily basis.

Of course I knew that the problem with just having an abstract goal of reading the Bible everyday was going to cause motivational problems as well. The great thing about a regimented program like the chapter-a-day thing was that it gave you a concrete goal everyday. When you were behind, you knew it because the blank pages of the notebook stared you in the face and told you that it was time to catch up. Without that I would have lost my way quite a few times last year. So how was I going to keep myself accountable?

Well, to make what's become a really long story merely long, that's how I came up with this blog idea. I'm going to start from Genesis 1 and take however long it takes to get through the entire Bible, one chapter at a time and blog my progress. Because I need my computer to post entries, whenever I encounter questions, I'll be able to study them and promise to give them their due time. If this means that it takes me a week to get through a single chapter, so be it, and conversely, if I have nothing to say, maybe I'll blow through a few chapters in a single day!

As for how I'm going to keep the inevitable apathy from creeping into this unstructured program , ah well, that's where YOU come in. You can be my accountability partner. Check the blog every now and then, if I haven't posted something in a few days, bug me about it and don't stop until I get something else up! And if you're here and reading this it's likely that you're further along in your Biblical knowledge than I am so I'd be very encouraged if you have anything to add or to correct regarding anything I put up (but don't worry, I promise not to make you guys do all the work!)

Thanks guys. Pray that this whole experiment works out. God bless!