Life is Short. Read the Bible
Parents of Student Ministries–
I appologize for prematurely sending an email a few minutes ago.
I have been so incredibly encouraged as I have heard how many of you have adopted the suggested reading tools into your family’s Bible time together.
This Sunday, Alex Deshield shared a lesson from Prov 2:1-9 building on last week’s lesson. I then reviewed the suggested use of the binder and notetaking pages we provided. You can find the recording of the lesson on our church website.
Last week I present the students with a suggestion along with a tool for their Bible reading: Whenever they read the Bible or listen to a sermon, they should take an extra few minutes to think and then write some simple responses to help pursue being changed by God’s Word. For those who do not have a reading plan that they are already committed to or are looking for something else, we also suggested a reading plan (bookmark side 1 & side 2). It is simply the NT and Psalms column of the MCheyne’s reading plan that will take the reader through the New Testament once and Psalms once in a year.
The way that we use this reading plan in my family is that we all read the same text in the morning. If we can get together as a family in the evening (something we strive for but can’t always accomplish), we read what we covered in the morning and then review the questions that we each answered in the morning.
These questions are:
- What did the text say? Explain what you read, the intended meaning of the original author to the original audience.
- What did it teach me about God? The Bible is foremost a book that reveals God Himself. If we are content to read the Bible and see nothing of God, something is deeply wrong.
- How should this affect me? We must be doers of God’s Word (people who act appropriately in response to what we see) and not hearers only who deceive ourselves (James 1:21-25).
- What should you pray in response? God must accomplish miracles in us as we read. We do not have the power to respond rightly to what we read, so we pray.
These questions and the prayer of LUBOT (see last week and the bookmark) are not magical nor are they the only strategy for Bible reading. But they are a simple and helpful tool that I believe would benefit every student (and honestly every adult) at GBC.
I was encouraged as I saw and heard from many the dramatic benefit this had in the last week for many.
If your student didn’t get a binder, you can pick one up at the church office during the week or on Sunday evening at the Student Ministries room.
Student Ministries exists for and is devoted to supporting parents in your discipleship and evangelism of your students. If you have any questions or want to discuss anything going on in student ministries, please email me.
Your servant for His glory,
-Jacob