2021 Bible reading ideas
If you’ve been wondering what to do in your Bible this year, I highly recommend a Bible read through. Below I’m going to list some ideas to get the most out of it.
Bible read through – LEVEL ONE
This year I’m going back to doing the 5 Day Bible Reading Plan. I like this one because it’s a comfortable amount to read and is in semi-chronological order. It has you reading some in the Old Testament and some in the New Testament each day so you don’t get completely bogged down at any one point. It’s free and easy to print out and put in your Bible.
Now, if you’ve already read through the Bible and don’t want to just read again, or if you tried to read through the Bible in a year and found yourself reading, checking off a list, and not remembering anything you just read, here’s how you can level up in your reading.
Bible read through – LEVEL TWO
If you’ve read through your Bible in a year before, and this is a repeat year of reading through it, add this level into your reading.
After you’ve read through a page in your Bible, pause at the end of the page and summarize that page in a word or two at the top by writing down the major events or ideas.
This is a great idea to do when you start a Bible read through because at the end of the year, you’ll have notes at the top of every page in your Bible. This is especially helpful if you find that your mind wanders quite a bit during reading. When I first started doing this, I had to re-read many, many pages because I couldn’t remember what I just read!
Bible read through – LEVEL THREE
Level three is after you’ve read through and summarized the pages at the top. This is the level I’m working on this year.
After you’ve read through a page in the Bible, pause and ask yourself “What does this teach me about God?” Write the answer at the bottom of the page. If you’re in a difficult section and the answer doesn’t come easy, you can just write out a devotional thought.
This year, I’m only doing this for the Old Testament readings, not the Psalms/Proverbs or New Testament. Then next year as I read through the Bible again, I can do it for the New Testament or Psalms and Proverbs and keep going!
Not reading through the Bible this year?
If you don’t want to do a Bible read-through this year, there are some other great options that you can do to keep you in the Word. Though I highly recommend a read-through, I do know it’s a big commitment. So if you’re in a season of life where you can’t commit to that, here are some other wonderful options.
Psalms “I WILL”
Read through each chapter of the Psalms and in a separate notebook write out all the Psalm verses that say “I will” or “I shall.”
Study a book closer
I just finished creating a Biblical meditation journal series for every single book of the Bible! The complete
I Will Meditate Series is now available on Amazon for you to journal through any book of the Bible chapter by chapter. They are guided journals to make it easier to think deeply through every verse and chapter. The books can be done in any order and are easy to use. (I created these journals because I needed a guide to help me interact with the Bible in a way that I could keep things in context and pull out truth about God and life application from each chapter of the Bible. I love them!)
Psalm 119 Meditation
Meditate through Psalm 119. The chapter is divided up into 22 stanzas. So you could meditate through it comfortably in a year by going through 2 stanzas a month.
A simple meditation is to read through the stanza and write out in a notebook these three things: What did I notice? What do I wonder about? What am I reminded of?
Study the book of Acts
The book of Acts has 28 chapters, so if you read, summarized, and doodled two chapters a month, and three chapters for 4 months you’d work your way through the entire book of Acts. I read through the book of Acts and took notes in my Bible journal.
Meditate on shorter books
Galatians, Ephesians, and 1 Timothy are all 6 chapters long. If you worked through two of these books, doing a chapter a month, you’d finish two by the end of the year. Simple meditation techniques that work great for these books are to read through a chapter then answer a different question below each week after re-reading the chapter each time.
- Week 1: What truth about God is shown here?
- Week 2: What do these verses teach me about myself/mankind?
- Week 3: What request can I make to God?
- Week 4: How should these verses change how I live my life?
You guys are great and always have wonderful ideas, so if you have other ideas of things to do to keep yourself in the Bible, please share below with everyone!
