Effective Bible Reading

Meghan Matthews
Nov 6, 2020
2 min read

Updated: Nov 20, 2020

"But, how are we supposed to get to know God?"

This is a question that I hear people ask all the time, and I think that they usually ask it because they’re hoping for an easy answer. Now, to be honest, sometimes God does show up in spectacular, supernatural ways that are undeniable; sometimes people have one or two big stories or moments that they can point to, to say look at what God can do.

But what do we do in between those moments to know God?

The answer is simple, even if it isn't easy.

Obviously, I think that spiritual practices help us to get to know God better, but every spiritual practice is (or should be) based on scripture. It is in the word of God that God most clearly reveals himself, his character, and how he wants the world to be.

So we have to do the work of getting to know God, in the same way that we would get to know anyone else: your best friend doesn’t become your best friend because they happened to sit down next to you on the bus one day. They become your best friend after you have spent time together, learned about one another, laughed and cried together.

If you want to grow in your relationship with God, you have to read the bible. It’s kind of just a fact—even if you’d rather it wasn’t.

Weirdly, people often don’t learn how to read the bible, and that is the biggest mistake that we can make when it comes to scripture. The bible was written over the course of many centuries and it was all put together many centuries ago. It wasn’t written in English, or in North America, and yet there are so many wonderful lessons and amazing stories in the bible that are still relevant today (I know Christians love reading the New Testament—for obvious reasons. . .like, Jesus—but if you want a great read with high entertainment value check out the Old Testament, parts of it are really violent and sexy and other parts are genuinely funny).

Over the next several weeks I’m going to go through some ideas and tips that have really helped me learn to read the bible effectively. I’ll share some resources, and hopefully, you’ll learn to love reading the bible (or at least be able to do it in a way that feels valuable to your faith life).

If you want to learn about how to engage with the bible in a way that makes it make sense, check back soon.

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