Radical December

I mentioned in my Radical mid-December post that I wanted to blog about the Bible. Well here we are.

One of the challenges in the Radical Experiment is to read the whole Bible in one year. For some people, this is radical. They've never read the Bible all the way through. They don't read the Bible every day. Maybe they just read it on Sundays at church, or maybe not at all. To pick up the Bible on a daily basis and commit to read the whole thing in one year is extreme. It's radical.

For some, it's not radical. But still a little bit of a challenge. They read their Bible every day, but they've never read it all the way through. They do different Bible studies. They camp out in particular books. But Levitcus? Obadiah? Forget about it. (Obadiah, if you can find it, is actually not all that intimidating, because it's only 21 verses long.)

For others, like me, it's not radical, and not a challenge. I began reading the Bible in a year several years ago, and enjoyed doing it so much that I committed then to attempt to do it every year for the rest of my life. Some years (like 2009), I just don't quite finish. Other years (2005, 2010), I finish in plenty of time. This year, I finished on December 15 and just haven't known what to do with myself for the last two weeks!

So as the year is ending, and you are maybe thinking about new year's resolutions, I'd like to encourage you to try reading the Bible all the way through in the year 2011. You'll be amazed at the beauty of God's story and His Word to you that are tucked away in places you never imagined. (Zechariah, anyone? Titus?) You'll be blessed by meeting with the Lord on a regular, daily, basis...and that alone could make 2011 the best year yet! I'd also like to offer a little advice to help you stick to it...

1. Schedule a time and a place. For me, it's 6am on the couch with a pot of coffee ready. I set two alarm clocks to make sure I'm up (at 5:30--so I have time to wake up beforehand). When I'm not in language class, that hour moves to a little later in the morning, but it's still first thing, and it's still on my couch. That's what works for me.

2. Have a plan. Here's where I want to make my Radical December offering to you. In 2010, I used a plan that worked better than any other I'd ever tried. This plan gives make-up days! There are 25 days of scheduled reading per month, so if you miss a few days, it's okay. Sometimes, life happens. Your doorbell rings unexpectedly at 6am, and that scheduled time doesn't happen that day. The problem with 365 day reading plans is that as soon as you're behind one day, it begins to snowball and you feel overwhelmed. This plan, however, gives time every month to make up the days you missed. And if you don't miss any days, then you have a few days at the end of every month to camp out in a passage that really spoke to you.

It also has little boxes for you to check off what you've read. It makes you feel like you've accomplished something. So, if you get bogged down in Hezekiah (kidding), skip ahead and read a bunch in Ephesians, check it all off, then go back to Hezekiah (still kidding).

You can download this plan, called the Discipleship Journal Bible Reading Plan from this website. (It's the third one down the list, but hey! Try whatever one works for you!) Or check out THIS website that has quite possibly every plan known to man, and therefore...one that can work for you!

3. Get some accountability. We all know that we make resolutions and then break them within a few weeks. A great way to stick to them is to have someone hold you accountable. That means, tell someone you're going to read the Bible through in a year, tell them which plan you're going to use, and what you're scheduled time is, and then...have them ask you every once in awhile if you're sticking to it.

In fact, if you're planning on reading the Bible all the way through in 2011, why not post a comment and let me know? I'll ask you how it's coming each time we talk on Skype. I'll get the ball rolling by saying: I am planning on reading the Bible through in 2011. This year, I'll be reading it chronologically, using a 6-day-a-week plan.

Happy Reading!