New Eyes

I have recently finished reading the entire Bible, cover to cover, for the first time - and in under a year! It was challenging, sometimes boring or confusing, and often encouraging. The spark that started the flame was a Bible history class that I took when I began taking classes at Liberty. This class explained every single book of the Bible. I learned the history and context of each book, as well as all of the main themes. Guys, this class changed my life.

In the past when I read the Bible, I looked for encouragement. I looked for those frilly verses that made me feel good. Then I underlined them or circled them like I was giving them my mark of approval. I read through Scripture looking for only what  I thought would make me feel good, and often got bored or lost motivation. But this time was different. God blessed me with new eyes to read. When I read, I recognized those things I studied in my class. At first, I'll admit, I kept reading because I was trying to remember what happened before I read about what happened. It was almost like a little game for me. As I continued to read, God changed my heart.

For me, the New Testament has never been difficult to read. You read about Jesus, you read about the early Christians, you read a little encouragement, then you read about the end of the world (which, admittedly, is VERY confusing). It was the Old Testament that lost me. I was lucky if I made it to Joseph (who is in GENESIS, might  I add). This time I had different motivations for both. When I started, I was reading the New Testament, specifically the Gospels, looking for ideas or things to talk about in YoungLife. YoungLife only teaches out of the Gospels. I was forced to read the stories I'd read a million times with a new light, because I was looking for something that could encourage or teach a new Christian. I was learning how to read with my new eyes.

The Old Testament began, like I said earlier, as a little competition with myself. In order to keep myself feeling "full", I read 3 chapters of the Old Testament and 3 chapters of the New Testament every day (or almost every day). I started incorporating my new way of reading to the Old Testament, and soon I was seeing things in Scripture I'd never seen before. I began seeing the people as people, rather than superheroes. I saw Moses' flaws. I understood that Saul was a bad guy. I knew that the prophets were seen my the culture around them as eccentric weirdoes.

By the time I got to Psalms, my entire way of reading the Bible was completely different. I began thinking about those verses that I'd underlined or circled. I began wondering why I'd marked them. And then I realized that it didn't really matter if I'd marked them because I had no way to reference them. Basically I was just reassuring myself that I knew the pretty verses everyone else knew. (HINT: That's probably not the best way to read Scripture.) So I got this little notebook. Every time a Scripture or passage stood out to me, I wrote it down. And I wrote down the main topic of the Scripture. Then I made this database on Access and started plugging in the different verses with their keywords. Now if I have a bad day, I can reference my database. If someone asks me what the Bible says about lying, I can look it up. (Admittedly, no one has really ever asked me what the Bible says about anything, which is another topic completely.) Since I started my database more than halfway through my reading, I've got a lot that I can still add, but I already have over 350 verses.

The point of all of this is to challenge my Christian friends to read God's word with new eyes. Pray that God opens your heart to all parts of His Scripture, not just the pretty parts. Think about writing verses down that you underline, because it could be months or even years before you get back to that Scripture again. Think about God's Word as a love story. The entire book is a love story about God and His people. Think BIG PICTURE, and the tiny, confusing or boring parts won't seem so difficult to digest anymore. It's not important that you remember the difference between Elisha and Elijah, or that you can pronounce Nebuchadneezar (who I always picture as a giant cucumber). The important thing is that you understand God's love for His people, despite their sin, despite their rebellion. Maybe your life will be changed too.