Last week was a busy one for me. As a result, I was reading my book in public a lot more frequently than normal. This is what usually happened when people saw me reading:
Friend or Acquaintance: Whatcha reading?
Me: The Bible. I'm in the process of reading it straight through in 90 days.
F or A: *Stunned silence* WHY?!??!
The most interesting thing is that I got this same reaction out of almost everyone who asked me. And it was a rather diverse group of people, but they mostly fell into one of two groups and their stunned silence was for totally different reasons.
1) People from my church (or other religious people that I know) - They wonder why you would want to speed through the Bible. What good could come out of this exercise? No meditating over each passage? How can you think about each passage and what it means coming from the Word of the Lord? Why speed past all the goodness in the Bible?
2) People who are atheists, agnostics, or estranged from their church - They think I am nuts! Why would you subject yourself to such a boring and tedious task? What in the world is so great about that thing anyway? What could possibly be the point in spending so much time with the same book? What fun could that possibly be?
To both groups of people I have a few discussion points that I bring up.
- It's not the first time I've taken on a book that some might find "boring and tedious" for fun, I read The Grapes of Wrath in 9th grade for "fun" and I enjoyed it in the end (not my favorite Steinbeck ever, though). Even though this 90 day challenge is similar to that, I was called to do this. And it has been a spiritual journey for me that I would not be able to experience any other way.
- I want to understand the Word in a deeper sense. I want to understand it as a WHOLE. In church we talk about this passage and that passage, but we don't look at how they truly fit together or even the context of certain passages! God put this glorious book together in a certain way for a reason, and I want to experience it in that way.
- Whether you believe that the Bible is the direct Word of God or it is just a book that some people thing is important, there is such HISTORY here. I find the way that the books of the Bible fit together fascinating and the fact that much of it matches up with historian's idea of the times makes it that much more important.
- This is a pre-cursor for a more lengthy, less structured study of the Bible. I am taking notes, underlining and preparing to start over again and get further and deeper into the Word.
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Hi! I came to your blog from one of the latest Bible in 90 Day posts over on Mom's Toolbox. I just wanted to let you know that I prayed for you. :)
ReplyDeleteWhen people ask you "WHY?!??!" you are reading the Bible, I get the same response. People from my church have asked me why I would read through the Bible so quickly, because they think there is no point to that. "You can't possibly learn anything!"
I find that I am learning the BIG themes of the Bible - God constantly calling His people back to Him. Christ loving every single person so much that He came to earth. That God is involved in people's life, not just a distance bystander. And I think those realizations made this whole journey worthwhile.
How are you planning to study after the 90 days are over? I haven't decided for sure, though I think I'm going to study the life of Christ - prophecies about Him in the Old Testament, His time on earth, etc.