Blogging the Bible in 90 Days

Thoughts on the Bible as a whole

2010-04-05T08:51:00.001-07:00

Now that I have finished the whole Bible, people in my life are asking me what I thought of the experience as a whole.
I feel like I have a greater understanding of a lot of things as they relate to the Bible.
I better understand the connection between Judaism and Christianity.
I have a full context for Bible passages that are read in church, printed on bookmarks, and sewn on pillows.
I have a much deeper feeling about the Bible being the Word of God.
I feel a deeper connection with my ancestors.

Since my speed-reading days have ended, I have not picked up my Bible in 90 Days Bible, but I have certainly taken my new-found knowledge into action!

I will be taking a few weeks off from the intense-study, but I am planning on going back through and focusing on the sections where I made notes. I hope to chronicle some of my thoughts on this blog, so stop back every once in a while! :-)

BIG NEWS!

2010-03-29T15:48:00.000-07:00

I finished the Bible today. AMAZING!

Only 8 days of reading left

2010-03-22T06:15:00.000-07:00

I am caught up.
I am on track.
I am invigorated and renewed.

Today is day 81. The challenge is to read the Bible in 90 days, but there are only 88 days of reading. I keep forgetting about those 2 extra days. That means that I will be finishing the bible on Monday or Tuesday of next week. WHOA.

At this point, I have not read for today yet, but I do not foresee any problems with staying on track for this last week. Although, I will say that I am starting to get a little sick of Paul. Sorry, man. But first you are focused on in Acts and now Romans and I just know that 1 & 2 Corinthians is coming up. Paul, Paul, Paul! I know you were the head of the new "church" and all, but seriously? Weren't there 11 other apostles? What are they up to anyway?

This whole journey is leading up to my favorite holiday on the church calendar - EASTER! I am ready. I am waiting. And the passages in the gospels describing the FIRST Easter really got me all emotional. I am connecting with the Word of God like never before.

Explaining myself... to everyone!

2010-03-11T11:00:00.000-08:00

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.

Caught up, and ahead of the game

2010-03-08T10:53:00.000-08:00

For the first time since I started this challenge, last night I was caught up and had time to keep reading. I was ahead! Amazing! I am also seeing the pages after my bookmark dwindle and that is a great feeling! I am coming to learn so many technical type things about the Bible that I never knew.

- Compared to the Old Testament, the New Testament is SHORT!! Wow, it is only about 1/4 of the whole Bible.
- There is a book of the bible that is only JUST BARELY one page long - Obadiah. But that certainly doesn't make it any less significant than any of the other books of the Bible.
- Jonah was inside the "great fish" for only about a chapter's worth of text. That surprised me!

Less than 30 days to go

2010-03-04T06:04:00.000-08:00

Less than 30 days to go and this is the first week that I have started off behind. Last night I was more than 4 days behind and now I am only 1 and a half days behind. I did not get to do my catch-up reading last weekend because of being busy and productive in other aspects of life (curtains are hung! yay!). But excuses do not get me caught up! I have a car trip coming up on Sunday, so that should give me 4 hours of reading time, but I have to be careful to not get car sick and I have to remember my book light! I also would rather not come down to the wire again to only have Sunday to get caught up. I've been reading on my breaks at work this week and hopefully that will help - BUT I have to STILL DO MY HOUR of reading at home! That has been a hard thing to fit in and this week is no exception.

As for the reading itself, I FINALLY finished Jeremiah last night and breezed through Lamentations. Sadly, Lamentations was over before it began and now I am trudging through Ezekiel. Ugh. These prophets are only interesting when they are predicting things that will happen in the time of Christ. I am trying to keep my eyes pealed to mark these passages, but it isn't easy since I do not have that much experience reading the New Testament. I am interested to look for a visual time line that shows how the books of the bible line up in history. A lot of the stuff in Jeremiah and Ezekiel is about what happened in Kings and Chronicles. I feel like we are beating a dead horse here sometimes. I know the repetition is for a reason, but the minimalist writer in me is editing this huge book in my head as I go along. "It's the Word of God! Stop editing!" I have to remind myself.

I never really realize how SHORT the New Testament is. It's barely a quarter of the length of the whole Bible. I can't wait to get there!

Catching up on Checking in

2010-02-23T12:45:00.000-08:00

I've been on schedule the last 2 mondays... I just didn't get a chance to post here! As much as the biblein90days.org people encourage reading in small chunks each day, I feel like I get the most out of reading sessions if I read for an hour or more completely interrupted. The last 2 weekends involved some heavy-duty "catch-up" sessions and those left me feeling more like I understood and absorbed more than when I catch a little here and a little there throughout the day.

That being said, having to hurry-up-and-catch up the last few weekends is making this whole process stressful. I am pledging to not get behind this week and get back to my reading one-hour-every-day schedule that I was able to maintain in the beginning.

I have de-prioritized this challenge a little in the past weeks which is what pushes me into the weekend flurry mode. Making sure dinner is on the table by 6-6:30 or finishing another 30 Psalms? Dinner wins. Having a mini-date with Mike who I haven't seen all day or trudge through the rest of Isaiah? Mike wins. Not to say that this challenge is not important to me, but I have realized that I have plenty of wiggle room in my schedule to not fall behind but still keep my priorities in line.

That being said, I'm 1/3 of the way through the reading for today already which is a great start for the week!

Weekly Check-up: February Is Confusing

2010-02-09T12:12:00.001-08:00

Well, I was caught up on Sunday - actually, I thought I was ahead a day! But now that the day of the challenge does not match up with the day of the month anymore, I am finding it difficult to remember which "day" I am on! Ooops! I am reading every day, but it seems like I am always behind a little (or a lot) by the weekend. By Monday, though, I am on track! I really enjoy my super-reading-sessions on the weekends the best. Sitting down and just becoming immersed in The Word is much more relaxing than trying to read a little here and a little there. I feel much more in communion with the message. Here's to day 45 this coming Monday - the halfway point of the journey!

Weekly Check-up: 1/3 finished!

2010-02-01T12:23:00.001-08:00

I'm very proud to say that I am not behind. It does seem that I get a day or two behind every week, but Sunday is my catch-up day and nothing else is done until my reading is caught up! Yesterday, I read about 2 1/2 days worth and it really felt good. It was suggested in one of the daily e-mails to try breaking your reading down into smaller sittings, but it did not work for me at all. I feel more connected to the readings if I do one long sitting at a time. I feel like I remember it better, too.

January is over and I have read the bible every day since the beginning of this challenge. I am 1/3 of the way through the bible and the feeling is AMAZING! I am also very excited to see what the last 2/3 has in store.

Context, perception, and real understanding of the bible

2010-01-22T11:21:00.000-08:00

This is the encouragement quote from yesterday's e-mail:

"There has probably never been a time in human history when the Word of God has been more accessible yet more unread." We're living in a time of superficial Christianity on the part of many people, and the postmodern culture has invited persons to be on a spiritual quest of their own devising rather than to follow the path of biblical Christianity. Millions and millions of people have only some vague concept about the Bible. They know it's about God, and some know it's about Christ, but beyond that, they have no real understanding of what the Bible is and how they are to obey it and know it."

- Al Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary

The last part of the quote definitely resonates with me. I didn't really know ANYTHING about the Bible until this challenge. I knew there was the Old Testament and the New Testament. I knew they were made up of books, chapters, and verses. I knew there were some Psalms or something in there, too. I knew the very, very basics.

I always come back to the fact that I was not confirmed and maybe this magical Bible knowledge would have been imparted on me during confirmation classes, but I have a feeling there is more to it. There is not an emphasis on the Bible as a whole as much as there is an emphasis on the parts.

People quote individual verses or a few passages. Our weekly lessons are parts of chapters, but sometimes parts are edited out or edited together! We know the stories of the bible (David & Goliath comes to mind as well as Noah, Adam & Eve, and Joseph and his Technicolor Dreamcoat!), but we have no context for them. And no perception of their importance within the rest of the bible.

Context, perception, and real understanding of the bible are all things that I am gaining from this experience! It is glorious.

Weekly Check-up

2010-01-19T10:10:00.000-08:00

I'm on track. Actually, I'm better than on track. I haven't even started reading for today yet and I'm already half done!

Okay, here's the back story. Last week, I got behind (again). I figured I could easily get caught up while we were at Mike's parents' house for the long weekend. Well, I did get mostly caught up, but not quite. So, Mike volunteered to drive home (even though it was my turn to drive) so I could get completely up-to-date with my reading. What a sweetheart! And who knew that reading the bible would be so easy while listening to soundtracks from the Muppet movies. Haha. I did read at about half-pace due to not wanting to get car sick, but I only had a few pages left by the time we got home.

I settled in to finish up during the evening, and when my time for reading was almost up, I checked my progress... and realized I read AHEAD by 6 pages! Oops! I guess there is something to be said about the book of Judges! So for tonight, I only have 6 pages to read - all in Ruth, I think.... maybe I'll even catch myself reading ahead again!

This challenge has really made me realize a 2 things:
1) It is possible to get caught up reading the bible! Some passages are a chore, but some are so fascinating, they just fly by!
2) If a modern-day editor got a hold of the bible, there would be some serious editing done. :-P The repetitiveness is really starting to annoy my minimalistic side. I am trying to see the reasons behind the repetition!

Thoughts from Day 9 (Leviticus)

2010-01-11T17:56:00.000-08:00

Few days of reading had me questioning as much as I questioned Day 9 - a large portion of Leviticus. God gives Moses A TON of laws for the people to follow. I am not kidding - there are A TON! I knew about some of these laws before - after all 10 of them are the commandments that we all know - but some of them are bizarre, seemingly unimportant, or over-important! Two that were about a page apart caught my attention:

Lev 18:22 "Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable."

Lev 19:19 "Do not wear clothing woven of two kinds of material."

According to these passages, being a gay man is a sin. So is wearing a nice poly-cotton blend.

Let me just say: WHAT?!?!!!?!?!?!

I have so many questions about this and no answers, so I'll just list them:

Why are God's instructions so exacting?

As Christians, do these still count as sins today?

Should I be confessing my love for poly-cotton blends when I list my sins?

Are these laws as important as the 10 commandments? Is there a such thing as an unimportant law in Gods eyes?

I know that Lev 18:22 has been quoted a LOT lately as an argument against gay marriage, but is it still relevant? Or are we quoting something that has been usurped by the power of Christ?

It is frustrating to have more questions than answers, but dwelling on these questions is what has made the experience of reading the bible thoroughly so interesting.

10 days down, 80 to go!

2010-01-11T09:44:00.000-08:00

This week I got behind by ONE day. Let me tell you, it was harder to catch up than I thought. But I pledged time on Sunday to finish or ELSE*. And I did! I even read a little bit ahead because I was so wrapped up in Numbers. I made some notes about the readings from over the weekend and I hope to do a post tonight or tomorrow based on them.

Mostly I am just glad I am finished with Leviticus. That was a difficult book.

*or ELSE I was not to do anything fun until I was finished!

A confession....

2010-01-07T11:24:00.000-08:00

I didn't read last night. My sister came over for dinner and then we went to the movies and got home late, so there was no time to read before bed. Strangely, today Amy over at Mom's Toolbox wrote about the frustration of falling behind. I'm not there yet. I'm not frustrated. I know I will have the time tonight to read double and I don't forsee missing out on my reading time again for weeks. I'm steadfast in my resolve to stay on track and finish this baby in 90 days!

I'm already excited to read about the ~~fifteen~~ ten commandments tonight along the rest of Moses' journey.

So far in the pages I've read there are so many instances where the laws of the commandments are being broken (even if they hadn't been created yet) that I am interested to see the people's reactions to the commandments and how it affects their lives.

The questions that the readings bring up is what keeps me coming back for more. :-)

The first three days... right on track!

2010-01-04T09:45:00.000-08:00

Day 1 and Day 2 I read in the evening. Yesterday, I read in the morning (stayed home sick from church, so lots of time)! I am not sure which I prefer yet, but I am so excited about the project that I just can't WAIT to read by the time I sit down to do it. Those 12 pages fly by.

I've discovered a few things, about my reading style and about the content of what I am reading.
- I can't read if there is any music or noise happening. I used to be able to! All those names get garbled when listening to something else, though, so quite time is necessary.

- Reading through the popular stories of Genesis (Adam & Eve, Noah, Esau & Jacob, Joseph) has helped me to realize how much our culture has ADDED to these stories that just is not in the bible. Also, facts have been changed (or perhaps interpreted differently), but the essence of the stories is what is important.

- A whole lot of procreating going on! WOW. I'm not sure what to make of some of it, though, especially the way women were treated.

- I've been taking notes, but mostly just trying to take it in. I'm underlining things that I would like to go back and ponder or research after the 3 months are over.

- It takes me about 45 minutes to read as long as I don't get interrupted.

I'll try to post here every few days with a "check up" of where I am and any ponderings that I have.

Holding the Bible in 90 Days in my hands!

2009-12-30T08:58:00.001-08:00

Last night I went to our local Cokesbury store. I have to admit - I always feel out of place and awkward in Christian stores. I feel like I am in a foreign land! When the clerk asked me what translation the Bible in 90 Days is based on - I hesitated. Do I say N-I-V? Do I pronounce it "nivh"? No clue! I spelled it out and she didn't bat an eye, so I think maybe that is the right way to say it? But, in my church we do not have a very heavy emphasis on the bible as a book. I think it is forgotten that a bible is a book with many translations and each has a story behind it.

Last night I started my new routine of sitting up in bed and reading the bible. I was so tempted to start with Genesis, but instead I read the preface and the appendixes - so interesting! I am totally geared up and ready to start this challenge!

Amy at MomsToolbox.com is asking us to register for the official Bible in 90 Days daily e-mails (which can be done here). I am so interested in seeing the materials that are provided through MomsToolbox and through the Bible in 90 Days site.

Why I'm Reading the Bible in 90 Days

2009-12-29T10:42:00.000-08:00

Sometimes when things in life come together in just a certain way, it is not simply a coincidence.

I did a 360 spin/slide in slow motion on a sheet of ice while driving to church a few Sundays ago. By a miracle, my car was not damaged (well, about $30 of work had to be done, but nothing major by a long stretch) and I was still in once piece. I praised God as I got out of the car, and looked up to see the tire marks in the ice showing me where I had been. I looked down the hill where I knew I must continue so as to move my car from the blind spot where I was. The road ahead of me was an un-touched sheet of ice that I would have to navigate carefully as I continued on my way.

That experience solidified something for me: It is easy to know where you've been, but where you are headed is not quite as simple. In the present we are powerless to control the chaos around us, and can only do our best in every situation. The future is a blank slate.

I managed to safely continue on my way that day - and I prayed for new found direction in my life. The direction appeared before me as I read through my blog reader and found Amy's guest post at The Finer Things in Life the very next day. The thought of reading the Bible was inspiring to me - and it never had been before. This was my new direction. Even now a few weeks later, I am still renewed by the thought of the challenge.

Tonight I am going to pick up my copy of The Bible in 90 Days and the Participant's Guide. I think that this challenge will add a fresh outlook and a renewed spirit to my new year.