Reading the Bible is one of the most important practices of the Christian life. We need to set time a side each day to dedicate to studying the Word of God. I particularly have a routine where I start with prayer and during my prayer time I incorporate reading my Bible with my daily devotionals. But in addition to that, I do something called inductive bible study. Where I study different books of the bible chapter by chapter verse by verse.
Here are 10 tips that will enhance your Bible reading experience and guide you to conduct an In-Depth Bible Study:
- If you are relatively new to the Word of God; the first thing I would recommend you do is to set a plan to read the bible in one year. In my personal humble opinion every Christ follower should try to read the entire bible from Genesis to Revelation at least one time in their lives to become acquainted and familiar with the Word. A couple of years ago in our congregation we set ourselves to do just that. Most of the women purchased the Bible “A Woman After God’s Own Heart” by Elizabeth George; an excellent resource to start you read the Bible in a year plan, because it provides a daily devotional and gives a guide of the scriptures that you need to be read each particular day.
- In depth bible study – First thing you need to do is choose a book of the bible that you would like to study in depth. Once you have chosen a book, you will begin with chapter 1 verse 1 and study that particular book chapter by chapter, verse by verse.
- Use diffrent versions of the Bible to analyze a verse. The You Version Bible is a great resource to do this because it gives you the opportunity to view various versions at the same time.
- Invest in a Study Bible. Having a study Bible will give you the opportunity to go deeper in your study, helping you learn about the culture and the history amongst other things.
- Bible Apps I use and Recommend – You Version Bible and Strong Concordance. Like I mentioned in a previous video I absolutely love the You Version Bible App for my short reading. I am not sponsored by them but they are by far the best Bible app for daily devotionals. In addition to my “short daily readings” I also use the Strong’s Concordance App for step #7 and The Free Dictionary by Farlex for step #6.
- Use a regular english dictionary to understand the meaning of certain words in each verse. To do this I use the app The Free Dictionary By Farlex. Me personally, I look for the meaning of practically every single word on my daily verse.
- Also on the same note you can use a Greek/Hebrew dictionary like Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance or The Vine dictionary to deepen you knowledge of the origen of a word in the Hebrew or the Greek. The Old Testament is written in Hebrew and The New Testament in Greek.
- Write down the key elements that stood out to you during the study. Make some annotations of things that impacted and edified you in your daily reading.
- Review the context. It is very important to read the story behind that bible portion you are reading. Perform a little research of the culture, and history of that particular time to understand why it was written and for who it was written.
- Read a well supported and reviewed bible commentary that is biblically sound. Bible commentaries can bring a deeper perspective of the subject at hand.