Thanksgiving week has been celebrated as National Bible Week for 72 years. Sponsored by the National Bible Association, National Bible Week has as its goal
to encourage everyone to read the Bible and raise awareness of the Bible’s importance and relevance to our nation as a whole, as well as in the lives of individuals.
This year’s theme is the secret is in the Book.
If you haven’t already developed the habit of reading the Bible every day, I encourage you to establish a Bible reading plan. You will find a variety of plans at Bible Gateway. You can choose to read the entire Bible in a year, the New Testament in a year, or a short-term plan for Advent or Lent. You have a choice of a number of translations.
I try to follow a different plan every year, both in the readings and the translation I choose. One of my favorite plans is reading the Chronological Bible in a year. Reading David’s Psalms in conjunction with what was happening in his life, for example, is very inspiring.
For someone who is new to regular Bible reading, I suggest beginning with the New Testament in a year. That will give you shorter daily readings and more time to meditate on what you read each day. The New American Standard Bible and the New International Version are good translations that are easy to read.
Another option is to read the daily readings in the Book of Common Prayer, which include a Psalm and readings from both the Old and New Testaments. You will cover a lot of the Bible in these short daily readings, but the language, while beautiful and majestic, is more difficult for modern readers to understand than more modern translations.
Whatever plan you follow, you will be greatly blessed by reading God’s Word daily.