Should We Be Reading the Bible Every Day?
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The Christian life entails hard work. In fact, living the Christian life is the hardest effort a person will ever make. But it’s the richest, most worthy labor of love a person can embrace. Ever. And we don’t do it alone, because we have God’s Holy Spirit to guide us (John 14:26). The world cannot offer anything even remotely close to what we have.
Why is the life of a Christian so rewarding? Because we know the Creator of the heavens and earth. We know and thank God, our Creator, who in Christ Jesus always leads us in triumphal procession, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of Him everywhere (2 Corinthians 2:14).
How do we do that unless we know the Lord? And how do we know Him but through His Word? We Christians all came to faith in the Lord because God drew us to Him by using someone to share the Gospel with us (John 6:44; Romans 10:14-15). It could have been in person or even by reading!
We belong to Christ, and we are His bride (2 Corinthians 11:2). How do we get to know the One who saved us from the wrath of God except by spending time in His Word — the Bible? But is it biblical to say we have to read the Bible every day to achieve this?
Does getting to know God and His commandments take more than:
An hour a week while we sit with the church listening to the pastor’s sermon? Do our Bibles “get lost” from Sunday afternoon until the following Sunday morning?
Occasionally, when we have a question about something we heard is in the Bible?
Sundays and during Bible studies, only when we have to prepare answers for a workbook?
It does.
Getting to know the Author of life (Acts 3:15), abiding in Him (John 8:31), obeying Him (Deuteronomy 12:28; John 3:36), loving Him (1 John 4:7), and becoming like Him (1 John 3:2) means knowing his Word, the Bible, to the best of our God-given ability. Don’t we know God will not hinder us from understanding His Word by the power of His Spirit?
Daily fervent, expectant, and whole-hearted (and minded) intake of the Bible is our submissive, humble, and worshipful effort to know God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit and walk by His Spirit.
In short, is it biblical to mandate daily reading of God’s Word?
It sure is.
Please don’t take this as harsh admonition. Take it as a call to an ongoing discipline that will cause you to fall more and more in love with the Lord, become more like Jesus, be an active member of His church, and share the Gospel with words and works. God spoke His Word to us through His prophets and Apostles (Hosea 12:10; 2 Peter 1:21), and He uses it to reveal Himself, its profitability to teach, reproof, correct, and train in righteousness (2 Timothy 3:16-17), and help us mature into the people He created us to be.
All this cannot be done in a willy-nilly fashion. That’s why it’s a discipline. Work those spiritual muscles as you run life’s race with endurance (Hebrews 12:1).
What Keeps Us from Time in the Word?
Satan. Our insidious enemy would have us anywhere but in the Bible. Daily Bible intake reveals the truth (John 8:32) and cements it inside us. When the devil or his minions attack, we have a ready defense because we know we can get close to God (James 4:8), and we have the Sword of the Spirit, which is His Word (Ephesians 6:17). Daily reading of the Bible helps us memorize Scriptural truths and apply them in our everyday lives.
Laziness. If we have time to breathe physical life-giving air, we must make time to take in God’s spiritual- and eternal-life-giving Bible. We can get up early to catch a game or a flight. Why can’t we wake early each day to read the Bible and gain wisdom for our days?
Apathy. If God didn’t care about us, He would not have given us the Bible. When the sovereign King of all creation gives us wisdom for life and godliness, we have no excuse not to read the Scriptures (Romans 1:18-32; 2 Peter 1:3).
Distractions. These days it’s so easy to be caught by anything and everything but the Bible. Social media, television, sports (participatory or spectatorial), the predilection with politics, even family functions, all take precedence for many people over time in the Bible.
Boredom. You may hear people say, “I already know that. Why should I read it again?” God gives us wisdom every time we read the Bible. Plus, the Bible is more exciting than anything Hollywood can produce.
Pride. Everyone needs the Bible. Proverbs 16:8 tells us pride goes before destruction. If a person says he doesn’t need to read the Bible for life, he is deceived.
Christian living books, commentaries, and devotionals. We can’t get the most from the Bible by reading about it. We have to read it. Books about the Bible are useful tools once we gain what we can from direct Bible reading.
Lack of belief in its relevance and inerrancy. The world tries to foist its ideals and doubts of absolutes on Christians. Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life.” Truth matters, and the Bible has never been wrong. It will never be proven wrong.
Unreachable expectations. We cannot expect to “master” the Word of God in a quick manner or in a long one, for that matter. Biblical scholars still wrestle with certain passages. And as with every student of the living and active Word (Hebrews 4:12), God reveals greater insight to us each time we read the Bible. So keep discouragement at bay and delight in what the Lord teaches you in His Word.
How Often Should We Read Our Bible?
British preacher John Blanchard, says, “Surely we only have to be realistic and honest with ourselves to know how regularly we need to turn to the Bible. How often do we face problems, temptation, and pressure? Every day! Then how often do we need instruction, guidance, and greater encouragement? Every day! To catch all these felt needs up into an even greater issue, how often do we need to see God’s face, hear His voice, feel His touch, know His power? The answer to all these questions is the same: every day!”
Reverend D. L. Moody said, “A man can no more take in a supply of grace for the future than he can eat enough for the next six months, or take sufficient air into his lungs at one time to sustain life for a week. We must draw upon God’s boundless store of grace from day to day as we need it.”
Reasons to Read the Bible Daily
To grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord (2 Peter 3:18)
We’re never to read the Bible to gain knowledge for knowledge’s sake. We read the Bible to know the Lord and grow in Him (and all that growth entails) and then help others grow in Him, too.
To learn how to pray (Matthew 6:5-13)
Our Lord and Master, Jesus Christ, taught us to pray. (This is better called the Disciples’ Prayer. The Lord’s Prayer is found in John 17.) In addition, the Bible — from Genesis through Revelation — is filled with prayers, particularly the Psalms.
To learn how to handle the Word rightly (2 Timothy 2:15)
The Bible, when you think about it, is a miracle. God saw to it that we have what He intends us to have. Throughout the millennia from Creation to now, He made sure we have the record He had His chosen men write (2 Peter 1:21). It is our privilege and responsibility to handle it rightly.
To substantiate what you hear
Consider the Bereans from Peter’s account in Acts 17:11. The passage reads, “Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so.” Did you catch that? The Bereans examined the Scriptures daily. Oughtn’t we, too, to see if what we are taught is so?
To counter false teachers
It seems a new teaching/teacher arises daily who counters the truth of God’s Word. False teachers twist the words of Scripture to meet their own ends – to their destruction (2 Timothy 4:3; 2 Peter 3:16). Daily immersion keeps us full of the truth, able to discern the lies, and refute them with compassion and love. Jude tells us to contend for the faith (v. 3).
The Apostle John wrote, “Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name” (John 20:30-31). In John 21:25, he said, “Now there are also many other things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.”
What a glowing encouragement to us to keep reading the Bible – God’s revelation of Himself to us – daily.
Thanks be to God no Christian can get too much of the Bible. Daily intake of His Word is like a multi-vitamin for our souls.
Photo credit: Unsplash/Nathan Dumlao
