I've discovered that I'm absolutely horrible at reading and finishing books. I read a lot, but just not books for some strange reason. I have many half-read books on my desk. I think part of it is because of subconscious bad associations with reading books. For example, normally when I open up a book to read, it's a thick boring textbook for school. The last book I finished reading was Computer Networks by Tanenbaum. This is not exactly light reading, and it is definitely not recreational reading.
On another front, in high school I was always discouraged from reading the types of books that I liked to read. As a geek, I was inclined towards reading science fiction and fantasy books, but this wasn't exactly smiled upon. I was always prodded by teachers to broaden my horizons, and to read books of other genres. Reading frilly poetry books wasn't exactly my cup of tea. I liked reading history books as well, but they weren't smiled upon because it wasn't creative writing. The only other thing I read was newspapers, but those couldn't count for book reports unfortunately. So, I was stuck with reading a bunch of books that I didn't care for.
In either case, I think these are some of the factors that make it very difficult for me to read my Bible every day. As of late, my devotionals haven't been consistent at all. So this last week I was thinking about how to address this problem, and it hit me. I noticed that at least 90% of my reading is done on my computer. I read tons of editorials, articles, and academic papers on my computer. Subconsciously, I probably associate computers with fun, while I associate books with boring school work.
I noticed that for classes with required textbooks, I rarely read the textbooks, and the textbooks became expensive paperweight. However, last term, I had a class where all the readings were from electronic academic papers, and I actually read them all.
So, I thought, if I could get a Bible chapter sent to me each day through an RSS feed or an e-mail, that'd be great. It'd be a electronic version, and I'd be able to read it every day. Every morning, I have a habit of reading all my e-mail, and a bunch of news feeds and articles, so it'd be easy to work devotionals into my daily routine.
I found a site that
e-mails a Bible chapter a day. I decided to start up again slow by reading one chapter a day, and I'll slowly scale up. Getting a chapter a day by e-mail is even better since I use GMail. I'm able to label or star certain chapters that I like a lot. Furthermore, I can use GMail's awesome search ability to find old passages that I want to refer to again. So, finding Bible verses that I had read has never been easier.
The site that I subscribed to was neat because it has a bunch of different Bible versions available. I decided to go with the New King James Version (NKJV) this time, as I had grown up on the New International Version (NIV) of the Bible. I find that the NKJV is a bit more rich in the words they use.
Reading the Bible in a new translated version has been reinvigorating. I had grown accustomed to the NIV translation, and it felt somewhat flat to read because I was so used to it. The best way I can explain this is by an example.
You know how sometimes you find a song that you really like, and you play it over and over again. Eventually, you get so used to the song that it's no longer as good, and it becomes background music, and you don't pay attention to it anymore. Then, a remix of the song is released; the lyrics are the same, but it sounds different. The song is interesting once more, and you pay attention to it again. That is kind of how I feel with reading the Bible in a different translation (as cheesy as that may sound).
In either case, I'm not writing to brag about how holy and good I am. Instead, I'm writing for accountability purposes in the hopes that it will motivate me to do my devotionals. Maybe someone else is having troubles keeping up with their readings as well, and this may be a solution? If anyone else wants to join up with this
Bible chapter a day challenge with me, please write me. I'm a few chapters inside the book of Genesis so far.
