I delight in your decrees; I will not neglect your word. Psalm 119:16
Podcast
Daily Reading Notes
Daily reading notes are a helpful tool for you to regularly hear God’s voice in his Word as together we move through a book of the Bible or series.
Search the Scriptures
This resource provides helpful notes and questions to work through books of the bible, either at your own pace or through the three year plan provided. It can also be a great resource for reading the bible with others (as a family with teenagers or older children, with a Christian friend, spouse, or with someone new to the bible).
Scripture Journals
A great way to be in God’s word can be with a pencil in hand to add notes, highlights, and questions.
At church we’ll be digging into Luke, Romans, and Jeremiah this year. You might like to purchase the Scripture journals for these books. We use the NIV at church. The CSB and ESV have a few more options for the Scripture Journals and are also great translations.
What I’m looking for…
- I want a bit of help
- I want to get better at reading passages by myself
- I want some general help understanding how the Bible works and how to read it
I want a bit of help
Resources with questions to help guide you toward understanding the passage, while also giving you space to do the work yourself. When chosen well, these can be a great blessing and help, particularly for books of the Bible we’re less familiar with.
Book Examples:
- EV’s Daily Reading Notes – current series or look through the past archive! (click on the series to see a link to the DRNs)
- Search the Scriptures
- Matthias Media – The Daily Reading Bible
- Explore By The Book
*A note on using any resource that guides you through a passage:
Even for resources that just have questions for you to answer yourself, the questions will draw you towards a particular understanding of the Bible passage. So if we’re going to use these resources, it’s important to make sure we’re growing in discernment so we grow to spot whether a question is pushing us towards an interpretation of the Bible that might not be 100% true. Even the recommended resources above might have some unhelpful questions at times!
I want to get better at reading passages by myself
Tools to get better at reading and understanding the Bible yourself, rather than using someone else’s thoughts on a passage.
TOOL 1: 6 Questions
Work through a book of the Bible passage by passage asking these questions:
- What’s the context? (anything I know about this book, or what came before the passage I’m reading today)
- What are some things that stand out or seem important?
- What is God showing me about himself?
- What does this reveal about humanity/me?
- How does this point to Jesus?
- How should this passage impact me?
TOOL 2: Scripture Journals
A great way to be in God’s word can be with a pencil in hand to add notes, highlights, and questions.
At church we’ll be digging into Luke, Romans, and Jeremiah this year. You might like to purchase the Scripture journals for these books. We use the NIV at church. The CSB and ESV have a few more options for the Scripture Journals and are also great translations.Go here for an example of how you can use Scripture Journals.
TOOL 3: The COMA Method [would you choose either this or Tool 1?]
Similar to Tool 1 – some general questions you can use to look at any passage you read, thinking through Context, Observation, Meaning, Application.
If you go to this Matthias Media page you can get a free download of COMA questions to use for each genre of Bible book!
TOOL 4: A Bible Reading Plan
Use this alongside one of the tools above, to help you choose which books of the Bible to work through. Apps can be a great way to track this – whether you’re reading on the app or a paper Bible.
*Tip: a realistic plan is better than aiming too high and stopping after 2 weeks.
I want some general help understanding how the Bible works and how to read it
Read This First by Gary Millar
Very helpful if you’re just getting started in Bible reading.
If you open the Bible and feel lost, this book will teach you step by step the basic building blocks of being able to open any passage and begin to understand what it’s saying.
God’s Big Picture by Vaughan Roberts
An incredibly helpful framework that helps you understand how the whole Bible fits together.
Study Bibles or Commentaries
Sometimes it helps to have a guide when reading something unfamiliar. Study Bibles can be a great resource.
A little word on Study Bibles. They are often helpful, but unlike God’s Word they can get things wrong. There can be a temptation to lazily let the notes replace our own prayerful consideration of what God means. Personally, in a Growth Group setting, I would rather no one bring a study Bible so that we aren’t tempted to skip to ‘the answer’ (which may or may not be right!).
But a good Study Bible can be really useful. For about the price of three Pad Thai’s, you can have a short commentary on the entire Bible, with maps, timelines, and introductions to each book of the Bible. It can point you in the direction of what a difficult word or passage might mean. These notes should not be considered the ‘final word’ or an infallible interpretation, but they can be a great starting point to further thought.
Not all study Bibles are equally helpful. We recommend either:
- The ESV Study bible (usually better notes)
- or the NIV Biblical Theology study bibles (notes are still usually good and it is NIV which we use in church & Growth Group)
Either would be a great resource to have on your bookshelf.