When I used to be a pastoral student at Liberty University in 1989, I made a commitment to Jesus to read the Bible ten chapters a day until I had read it 100 times. I started this commitment on August 16, 1989, and I fulfilled this commitment on February 27, 2024. It took me 34 and a half years to read the Bible 100 times. It must have taken me 33 and a 3rd, meaning I must have finished it about 500 days sooner. So, I missed my goal, but as Dr Jerry Falwell used to say at Liberty University, “Shoot for the celebs, land on the moon, and no one will notice the difference!”
This one discipline has single-handedly modified the trajectory of my life and pastoral ministry. It has carried me through the past 27 years of raising a family and church planting as a pastor of a Southern Baptist Church in Colorado Springs called Vanguard Church. I discuss this discipline and commitment within the book, The Good Pastor, published by Leadership Books.
I hope my story of commitment to this discipline will encourage a latest generation of Jesus followers to make the Word of God the central piece of their lives. I pray this discipline will turn out to be the hub that dictates to them every thing else about their lives.
Now in case you knew me personally or as a pastor, you would possibly say, “Kelly, in case you truly spent that much time reading and applying the Word of God to your life over the past 35 years, it could appear to me you can be so much godlier than you truly are.”
I agree!
One of my favourite authors is Henri Nouwen, whom I can relate with. Once someone remarked to him, “Henri, it surprises me that you just should not godlier than you’re given how much time you may have spent with the Lord and His Word in your lifetime.” To which Henri responded, “I do know, are you able to imagine how bad of a person I can be had I not spent any time with Jesus and His Word.”
My sentiment exactly!
I take a look at my life and think to myself, I ought to be godlier! But I am unable to imagine where I can be today without this discipline of reading and applying God’s Word every day.
As I reflect on the past 35 years, I desired to capture the highest ten lessons I actually have learned from reading the Bible 100 times and here they’re:
- The God of the Old Testament is similar God of the New Testament.
- God is perfectly Holy throughout the Bible.
- God is ideal love throughout the Bible and commands us in Leviticus to like each other.
- The entire Bible is about one person, and His name is Jesus. He is the ONLY technique to everlasting life.
- God hates our sin. The shame you are feeling before repentance is all the time from God.
- God all the time and immediately forgives sin after we repent. Shame you are feeling after repentance isn’t from God.
- God seeks every private means possible to convict us of sin for repentance before He brings public destruction in our lives.
- God’s judgement on this life is all the time to guide us to repentance and restoration.
- God’s kindness to us isn’t random; it’s all the time for the sake of either showing His goodness to us or to show us back from our sin.
- All Scripture is profitable for us. Don’t unhook your plow from the Old Testament. Nothing in all the Bible is a mistake or inconsistent to who God is or unapplicable to our lives today.
My life and pastoral ministry have been ceaselessly modified by my time within the Word and the appliance of it in my life every day. However, my discipline yesterday in God’s Word doesn’t guarantee success tomorrow. The Bible is alive and energetic such as you and me. This is why it can be crucial to read the Bible every day. The author of Hebrews says it like this:
“For the word of God is alive and energetic. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the guts. Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account (Hebrews 4:12).
Every time we read the Bible it’s alive and energetic. It digs into motives, actions, feelings, and thoughts and allows us just like the Psalmist to say:
“Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there may be any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way in which everlasting (Psalm 139:23).
James, the brother of Jesus, said the Word of God is a mirror into our souls. When we read it, we see our true selves if we’re willing to listen to the prompting of the Spirit within us because it mirrors to us our lives through its energetic counsel. However, as James says, reading it just isn’t enough.
“Do not merely hearken to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but doesn’t do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after taking a look at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the right law that provides freedom, and continues in it—not forgetting what they’ve heard, but doing it—they might be blessed in what they do” (James 1:22-25).
Read God’s Word! Apply it every single day and also you might be blessed by God. It is a promise from God! It has saved me from self-destruction, and it might probably prevent too!
