Dear Hope

Dear Wendy,

Imagine seeing a letter in your mailbox from someone who is absolutely crazy about you and who delights in simply being with you. You’d tear open the envelope and start reading it before you even look at your other mail, right?

That’s the Bible.

It’s the greatest love letter ever written to you. But it won’t make a difference in your life if you don’t read it.

Not only does Scripture itself affirm the importance of reading it, but it will reshape and renew how you see your circumstances, your relationships, your worth, and your purpose.

Here’s a plan to get started.

With hope, Dr. Tonya

1. Pray before you read. Ask God to speak to you through his Word so that you can understand and apply it to your life.

2. Let love frame your reading:  God is crazy about you. He wants the best for you in every part of your life. He knows everything about you, and he wants you to know him through his Word. Everything in the Bible points to a person to be known—Jesus. It doesn’t matter how much you learn about God if you’re not connecting with him.

3. Plan for a time each day to read the Bible. Choose an “easy-to-read” time—preferably, one that can become a habit. Since I have a quiet cup of coffee every morning, I do my daily reading at that time.

4. Start with the Gospel of John and then read Mark, Luke, and Matthew. No matter where I am in my Bible journey, I read from one of the gospels each day. And you don’t “have” to read a certain number of chapters. Some mornings, I read just a few verses and think deeply about them. Sometimes I’ll read through an entire book in one sitting.

5.  Put your reading in context. Before you begin a book of the Bible, learn its shape and core themes from the brief Book Overview videos at Bible Project.

6. Refer to a good commentary for your questions. I recommend the study tools at Blue Letter Bible.

7. Interact with what you’ve read.

Here are three great questions to ask yourself about the passage you’re reading:

• What does it reveal about Jesus?

• What can I learn about God’s kingdom purposes from it?

• How does it relate to my loving God and my loving others as God loves me?

I keep a daily journal in which I write what I hear from God and my prayer back to him. If you’d like to use it, you can download the journal pages as a PDF. You might also check out my Top Ten verses from Scripture about Scripture.

As you travel your own journey of Scripture engagement, may you increasingly know the true God who works for you, in you, and through you and who gives you an identity in Jesus that has purpose and hope.