Starting to read the Bible can be intimidating. There are difficult pronunciations, detailed genealogies, and a myriad of different cultures represented in the Bible. It is true that the Bible is a challenging read, but you needn’t do it alone. Pray to the Holy Spirit, asking Him to teach you about God through Scripture, and ask Him to lead you to verses that speak to you and your situation.
The most important part of starting to read the Bible is simply to do it. Pray before you start, asking God to make the Scriptures understandable. If there is a particular book of the Bible that you feel led to start in, make that your starting point. When I became a saved Christian, the first book of the Bible I read was the gospel of John. I was drawn to the way Jesus is so thoroughly explained, both who He is and what He did. In particular, I loved reading about the way Jesus healed people with diseases that were often lifelong and seemingly impossible to be cured. People who couldn’t speak, people who were blind, people who were paralyzed, people with leprosy, people with seizures, people with internal bleeding were all cured by Jesus while He was here with us on Earth.
This is an example of how exciting it is to read the Bible. There are so many awesome truths we can find in our Bibles. We can learn about human nature, we can witness God’s unconditional love, we can see others like ourselves who lean on God to get through the trials of this life.
Looking for good, practical advice? Try Proverbs, a book of the Bible that was written by King Solomon (the son of King David). One of my recent favorites in Proverbs is found in Chapter 19, verse 11: A man’s wisdom gives him patience; it is to his glory to overlook an offense. [NIV Bible] This verse is the perfect example of how different God’s ways are from our ways. In God’s eyes, it is better to display mercy when someone offends us. Showing mercy to someone who otherwise deserved our anger is a sign that the Holy Spirit is gaining strength inside of us as we listen to His inner promptings. The more you read the Bible, the more you will see the truth in it!