Where to Begin

Perhaps you have come this far and are saying, "I'd like to explore this remarkable book for myself, but I need some help to get started. Where do I begin?"

It's not an easy question, because the answer would not necessarily be the same for everyone. But the solution is not to just jump in and try to read through from cover to cover as fast as you can.

Here are some practical suggestions

Develop some kind of plan or goal, along with some schedule of personal commitment. Start with something as simple as "I will plan to read at least fifteen minutes a day from the Bible." Decide specifically what time you will put aside-first thing in the morning, at your lunch break, at home at night. Find the time when you will be alert and least likely to become distracted or interrupted.
Put one of the Gospels high on your list. This will give you an acquaintance with the life of Christ. OK, you say, but which one? Select the emphasis that most appeals to you:
When you are pressed for time, the book of Proverbs can be dipped into for practical wisdom and advice almost at random.
Almost everyone who has studied the Bible for many years would advise you to make sure you give the book of Psalms a high priority on your reading schedule. The Psalms have been proven over 3000 years to be a key place to camp out a lot. They speak to our inner aspirations, hurts, doubts, joys and thoughts as nothing else. They speak to every age and culture. Take one example. Alcuin, the Christian advisor to the Emperor Charlemagne in the 9th century offered guidance for his leader's private devotions and advised him: In the Psalms, if you look carefully, you will find an intimacy of prayer, such as you could never have discovered without their help; you will find words for an intimate confession of your sins, and for a perfect supplication of the divine mercy. In the Psalms, too, you will find thanksgiving for all that befalls you. In the Psalms you confess your weakness and misery, and thereby call down God's mercy upon you. You will find every virtue in the Psalms, if God in his mercy will deign to reveal to you their secrets. Some rather bold advice, wouldn't you say, for a subordinate to give to the most powerful man in the world in his day? But the Psalms have a way of altering our perspective on who and what is important in life!

Some general guidelines

Don't be in a hurry. It is not important how much ground you cover in terms of chapters and pages. Far better to take your time and give full attention to what you can realistically absorb at one sitting
It is important to reflect. Stop as thoughts and questions occur to you.
Keep a notebook to record your observations and also your questions.
Don't look on your Bible reading as a school course but as an adventure! Here you will continually discover thoughts, insights, and admonitions that help you discern what is the meaning of your life.
Don't worry about what you don't understand. You will have more than you can handle in coping with what is perfectly clear.
When you run into troublesome, difficult to grasp places, make a note of your question or confusion in your notebook and suspend judgment until you learn more.
Persevere through the dry spells. They will come and will pass. As you read, there will be moments of great exaltation and the joy of discovery. At other times the words will seem remote. Overall, the Bible gets better all the time if you ride out those inevitable times when you find it slow going.
It is important to seek out the original context and intent of the Book you are reading. We have all heard of people who have sought guidance in the Bible by closing their eyes, flipping the pages, putting their finger down and trying to discern guidance from the passage they fall upon. It doesn't usually work that way. The Bible was first given to people in another time and another place. It is vitally important to seek to discover what it meant to them in their time to be able to draw application and implications for what it means to us in our time.
Come with the right attitude and ask God to give you understanding. Most of all, open your heart to receive what is there. There is a little secret and assumption embedded in the Bible that unless you come open and ready to receive you really won't get it. Read I Corinthians 2:10-14 and see what it says regarding "spiritual discernment."
Be aware of how important it is to eventually get an overall grasp of the continuity and progression within the Scripture itself. Scripture becomes its own best interpreter and for this you need the larger picture of the collection as a whole. That won't come all at once. In fact it will take years. That is part of the adventure!

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