Read or listen to an entire book of the Bible each day for 40 days.
We’ve all heard of a 40-Day Fast but a 40-Day Feast? Well, first of all, this is not a celebration of gluttony but a commitment to “feast” on God’s Word by reading or listening to an entire book of the Bible each day for 40 days.
Tips:
(1) Don’t let this overwhelm you. It’s really not that hard. Take a look at this chart. Did you know that there are 40 books of the Bible that can be read in one hour or less?
(2) Don’t be legalistic with this. The purpose of the 40-Day Feast is for you to enjoy God’s Word. In other words, if you read a book and it really strikes your heart, read it again the next day. There’s nothing wrong with reading the same book several times if God is speaking to you through it. However, don’t just read 3 John over and over because of its shortness. Once I read the Gospel of Mark more than once. I also read Colossians several times during one 40-Day Feast simply because it captured my heart.
(3) Don’t just read—You can listen to Scripture too. Some people are visual and some are auditory learners and many fall in the middle. At an undistracted time, listen to a book of the Bible.
(4) Enjoy God’s truth and ask God to speak to you through His Word.
Did you know?
There are five great ways to study Scripture:
(1) Read an entire book of the Bible at one sitting. When I first heard this, I read Job at one sitting and I was amazed at the things I saw in it that I had never seen before. This is by far the best way to get an overview of any book of the Bible.
(2) Memorize the book. The best way to know Scripture is to hide it in your heart. Obviously, if you memorize a book of the Bible, you will know all of its in’s and out’s, how the author uses certain words and their connection throughout the book. But as you memorize, don’t hurry. Take your time, mediate and seek the understanding of what you are learning. The first time I memorized a book of the Bible, I chose the book of James. It’s 108 verses long and took me three months to learn it but it also changed how I looked at that book. By memorizing it, I understood it in a new light. Plus, it’s wonderful to lie in bed at night and read God’s Word in your own mind.
(3) Study Scripture. In other words, dig in. Take a look at how words or themes are used in a different books and in other places both by the same writer and others. Get to know a Bible timeline and gain an understanding of the background of each book that you study. See how all the pieces fit together in the Big Picture of God’s Word.
(4) Read Scripture consistently. Picture it this way. Let’s say there is a huge tree that I am going to cut down. I spend 15 minutes a day chopping on it. The question isn’t whether the tree will fall but whenit will fall. As long as I keep at it, the tree will eventually come down. There is a great power in consistency.
(5) Seek out what others have said about Scripture. This includes both preachers and commentaries. There are people whom God has gifted with a great ability to mine out great truth in Scripture with an anointed way to teaching these truths. Listen to what they say but measure everything back against the whole truth of God’s Word. Notice that we listed this last because, in our opinion, this is the least of the five ways of studying Scripture. Most of your learning, in our opinion, should happen at the feet of Christ and not at the feet of Man.
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