The Bible is the Word of God, and as believers we need to read the Word of God every day. How do we know God? It is by reading His Word. How do we read His Word? It is not by reading the Bible as a newspaper to obtain more information but by dealing with our heart to be soft and open to the Lord, so that He may speak something to us as we read the Word.
When we read the Bible we need to learn to just open to the Lord that He may speak to us and infuse us with what is in His heart – He’s the writer of The Book, and He wants to impart His thoughts into our being!
There are many ways to read the Bible: you can do a fast reading (read the New Testament in 1 or 2 months), you can do a regular daily reading (1 chapter in the NT and 2 chapters in the OT), you can study the Word (a more topical approach to the Word), you can seek enlightenment and nourishment by digging deeper into the footnotes and the cross-references, etc.
One of these ways helps us a lot – reading the Bible daily, consecutively, and consistently. It is good to read the Word daily to be washed, renewed, and reconstituted.
LetTheWord.com – reading the Bible with the brothers!
Recently we have been introduced to a website – lettheword.com – where you can log in with your Facebook credentials and you can form a group with which you can pursue together. I can testify that it has been such a sweet experience to be grouped with three other brothers and pursue the Lord together in reading the Bible and reminding one another about this! As brothers, we tend to procrastinate the reading of the Bible up until close to midnight (a practice which we need to give up!), but we still remind one another to do it!
These past few months I really enjoyed texting, emailing, or writing on Facebook/Twitter to remind my companions to read their portion of the Word and update it on the www.lettheword.com website! I may be at home and the brothers may be in their homes/dorms – but we can pursue the Lord by reading of the Word consistently and regularly!
It’s not about how much you can read and how good you are in this – it is about building up a habit of reading a portion of the Bible every day and also being aware of the other members of your group in this regard!
I realized that we need to have such a healthy practice in the church life and, since technology is always advancing, why won’t we use the modern means of communication and connecting to help us pursue the Lord and building up healthy habits!?! At LetTheWord.com it’s simple: even one chapter per day is OK, you just need to do your Bible reading regularly and consistently, log it in online, and be in touch with the other members of your group about this!
I can text the brothers, I can chat on facebook with them, I tweet them, or I message them via iOS5 – in so many ways, wherever the brothers are, wherever I am, I and them are encouraged to pursue the Lord together and enjoy reading the Word daily! [testimony of a brother in UK using the lettheword.com website to read the Bible with a group of young brothers in his locality]
Reading the Bible with a smile on my face!
The Bible is life. This is a cast iron, indisputable fact and every time I read it I gain more of His life. Before I knew about God’s economy, I read the Bible selfishly, looking for the verses that gave me something. Now I read it corporately, experiencing how it builds up the church. I read the Bible with a smile on my face. When on the London tube, you’ll probably catch me nodding my head as God’s economy is further revealed to me. Being part of Let the Word has made my Bible reading more consistent and enjoyable. Being encouraged every day by my fellow brothers to read and enjoy His word is such a joy.
Our group is made of two young people, an older brother and myself (a student). How many young people read the Bible regularly? Hardly any but half of our group are young people and they read it every day consistently. This is such a testimony for the Lord’s work and His move in Europe.
That the simple act of reading and then posting our reading online can significantly boost our reading of the word is so awesome. We are a corporate church and this act of reading the Word independently and also corporately is so wonderful. [testimony of a young brother in London, UK, part of the same group on lettheword.com as the one before, sharing about his experience in pursuing daily the reading of the Word with the brothers]
