Through My Own Eyes: A Blog About Biblical Topics

I wanted to make a blog just to go over how I fell in love with reading the Holy Bible and what I learned, and how you can love reading it as well. In case you didn’t read my “Who I Am” page, I am on the autism spectrum, and I have a set of intense, passionate interests that I focus on. Reading has been a major interest of mine for 90% of my life, and it’s changed a little over the years.

Before and a little after I professed faith as a Christian, I was reading comic books and graphic novels (I was a mega DC Comics fan), and I had a decent-sized collection that I kept up. I was mostly an avid Superman fan and read quite a few books about him. I liked what he stood for, standing for the oppressed and defending people from villains like Lex Luthor (his archnemesis) and General Zod, who, like Superman, is from the planet Krypton and (apart from Superman) wants to rule over humans. Furthermore, I enjoyed reading about Superman over several years, but as I became born again, things started to change regarding what I read.

During the first two years of me being a Christian (I’ve been a Christian for almost 5 and a half years), God was telling me that the comics and graphic novels I was collecting weren’t good for me, and I could practically feel dread as I read some of these books (a lot of comics aren’t kid friendly as the stereotype may be; they’re actually really dark, even grim-dark), and eventually I got rid of them. I started reading regular books again and began building a mini library, but during the time of transition, I was reading Scripture, and I was doing it consistently. I used to read the Bible from time to time growing up as I grew up in a Christian household, but I was never really into reading it prior to being born again, and when I did become born again, it changed entirely for the better. I’m going to write some points on what I learned about reading the Bible, and how you can be encouraged to read it to grow in your walk with God. Let’s get started!

Point 1: Making a routine to read Scripture

I didn’t start reading Scripture consistently when I first started, but as time went on, I began to like what I was reading; I liked the accounts of people like David, Job, Jonah, Paul, etc. Reading these stories of different people in the Scriptures had me hooked because when you become a born-again believer, not too long after your conversion, you will start to have a hunger for God’s Word, and that’s what it was like for me.

I would read a couple of chapters a night, which then led to my reading a little longer. As of this year, overall (from when I got saved to now), I have read through the Bible a couple of times, and I will continue to read through the passages.

In no way whatsoever am I making any brags or boasting; I really enjoy reading, and when God saved me, He gave me a desire to read His Word as time went on. I’m not saying I’ve read many chapters per night or even every single night, but as time went on, it would be a few chapters that I would read on a consistent basis. I don’t want to say this in a legalistic sense because that’s not my intention, but I am just saying that as time goes on, and your love for the Lord gets deeper, you’ll find yourself wanting to read His Word, but sometimes things come up. You get busy with life and don’t have a lot of time to spend (it’s perfectly understandable); and although I believe that there is always room for God for those who love Him, life does get busy, so you don’t have to spend a super amount of time reading, but try with something small like a few chapters, maybe 3-4 chapters. It takes me 20-30 minutes to read a few chapters (mostly in the Old Testament), and there’s no time limit for reading. It is YOUR relationship with the Lord, and it’s how much time you want to spend with Him.

I will say that every person who is a born-again Christian should be making it a good practice to spend time in the Word; it is God’s Word being spoken to you, which leads to my next point:

Point 2: Hearing the Word of God being spoken

Growing up in a Christian family definitely did some good work in my life, for when I started reading the Bible, I was told by both parents to read the Scriptures “out loud”, that way I can hear God speak to me through His Word, and increase faith (Romans 10:17).

Hearing God speak to me through His Word gave me the boost I needed to accrue faith, and eventually to the point of taking God at His Word, to trust in Him. When reading Scripture, make sure you read it out loud to hear God speak to you, because it is His main way of speaking; sometimes He speaks through creation, other people, or even audibly as I’ve heard some people tell me, but it is mainly through His Word (the Bible) that He speaks.

Don’t worry so much about what we would call “extra biblical encounters” when it comes to God speaking; the point I’m trying to make is that we need to take Him at His Word (literally) and trust that He knows what He’s doing.

Sometimes having someone (through an audio recording) read Scripture can help as well, just depending on how you are able to perceive it better. Some Christians prefer to listen to an audio recording because they don’t like to read (this can be a big help because you’ll still be hearing the Word of God speak), and some other Christians like to read the Scriptures themselves. Whichever way works best for you works fine; the key point is hearing the Word of God.

Hearing the Word of God ties in with reading it, and they are both equally important to growing as a believer, which leads to my third point:

Point 3: The Importance of Reading and Hearing the Word of God

The main thing I’ve learned about reading and hearing the Word of God is that it is important for knowing who Jesus is and being on guard against being swayed by false doctrine. There are numerous false doctrines that believers need to be on guard against, such as “there are many paths to heaven”, and the counter for that is John 14:6 (KJV), for it says, “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life; no man cometh to the Father but by me“. People believe that false doctrine because they don’t want to admit the fact that they would have to deny themselves and live by faith, and they believe that they can be good enough to enter God’s kingdom, but Scripture clearly states that the natural state of fallen mankind is depravity and to do evil things, and we need Jesus to cleanse us from our sins, and He is more than willing to do that, if you’ll let Him; He is patient, but it is mentioned in Scripture that we need to seek God while we can, so it’s up to us on where we go from there.

Another important factor of reading and hearing the Word of God is that it’ll help you to be confident in the Lord. When you read the Bible and hear the words written in the passages, it helps train your mind to hear and know God’s voice, and it will prepare you with living in a busy world with many distractions. Focusing on reading the Bible out loud or with an audio recording, preferably in an enclosed space to drown out background noise, will help train you to distinguish the noisy world (numerous ideologies and false doctrines) and help you focus on that still small voice of the Lord, and reading and pondering on Scripture will help you recognize Him speaking to you.

It is important to read and hear the Word of God to know how to recognize His voice, and knowing what His clear commands are, and I find that choosing to spend a little bit of time each day with the Lord has truly made an impact on how I see God and the world; it helps to give me what’s called a biblical worldview, seeing the world through the lens of what Scripture says about things like morality and the reason mankind is here on Earth.

Point 1: Start with the Gospels

By starting this point off with the Gospels, I’m giving my opinion based on what I have learned, and maybe it’ll be different for you (that’s great if it is!), but something that helped me when I was first getting into Bible reading was to read the Gospels; I would read the book of John first, and then I would backtrack to Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Reading the Gospels first will help you understand who Jesus is and what His mission was, and when you read about the life He lived, you’ll begin to fall in love with reading the Scriptures.

To know about Jesus is to read through the New Testament and see how He cared for people, people of different backgrounds and scenarios they were in, and you can read about the miracles that He did to display God’s grace and mercies to ordinary folk, but the ultimate display of His grace and mercies was dying for the sins of mankind. Reading this as a believer is exciting news since you are able to be reminded of the love He has for you, and not to forget that His love extends to unbelievers as well; we have to remember that salvation is available for whosoever comes to the Lord wanting to be saved, and He desires ALL to come to Him (Ezekiel 33:11(the NLT translation sums it up in the modern sense)).

Reading the Gospels can be a good way to start reading Scripture, and you’re not going to understand everything at first, even in due time. There is so much material to cover in the Bible that some scholars spend their entire lives studying it. It can seem overwhelming at first, which is why I wanted to start with the Gospels, because they’re straight to the point and you get to learn about the Lord, but you don’t read it begrudgingly; you do it with a cheerful heart, which leads to my next point:

Point 2: Reading the Scriptures with a joyful heart

When I was first started reading the Bible, I was getting used to the fact that I needed to take some time to relax and enjoy getting to read about Jesus through the passages. As time went on (as I grew to be in love with Jesus), I grew to love reading it just in general.

I think it’s safe to say that when a believer is in his or her early stages in their walk, they are full of excitement about the Lord and wanting to know more about Him and living as a witness as well. We want to spread the Gospel and learn about Him through the Scriptures, and we have that joy in our heart, which comes from Him.

Eventually, life will come about and weigh down on you, and you may have moments of not wanting to read the Bible, and there’s no fault when things come up; time flies fast nowadays, we get busy and caught up with the essentials, and we just feel burned out. I’m not going to say that I know your situation, and I’m not passing any blame if you choose to not be consistent with reading through it (I’ve been there!).

Something that I think can help (just my opinion) is praying to the Lord to have the desire to read His Word again. I say it’s important to read Scripture because, personally for me, whenever I don’t read Scripture is when I don’t feel joy in my daily life; if I go a few days without reading it, it’s that I may be fed well physically, but spiritually I am starving myself, and I feel dull and dreary. Reading the Bible can bring joy in your life and can remain, but the key is keeping the passion you have for the Lord and not letting it die off, which leads to my last point:

Point 3: Keeping the passion for the Lord on a daily basis

The most important thing as a believer in their walk with Jesus is to maintain their zeal/passion for God. Being passionate to read Scripture is a choice that each believer will make day to day, and the fruits are rewarding.

Maintaining a passion filled desire to read Scripture can be challenging, which is why I believe hearing the Word of God being spoken will help in one way (like my point earlier in this article), and another way can be praying more. Prayer is a very big essential to communing with God, and as you read the Bible to hear Him speak to you, you speak to Him audibly to build that relationship (you can pray in your head for scenarios like at work or in the store, but praying audibly is the most effective way of communicating with the Lord.

It’s a good idea to remember what made you so passionate about the Lord when you first became a Christian; all the excitement of being set free from your sins and experiencing His Holy Spirit and seeing that He truly is good, the desire to evangelize, do good to others with no expectation in return, and maybe even passing out Gospel tracts (which is just as effective). Remembering your first love will help you regain focus on what really matters, which is a relationship with Jesus. When you regain your passion and excitement for the Lord, you’ll most likely want to read more consistently if you’ve been neglecting whatever amount of time you would read, and I can assure you that spending a few extra minutes to read Scripture will benefit you down the road, where you memorize what it says and grow in confidence in the Lord; it just takes a little bit of time, and it is much encouraged to spend time with Him.

This particular point could be a blog of its own, because many believers and people in general are just depleted in energy and enthusiasm with life and the hardships in these times we’re living in, so while this blog is about reading the Bible, I encourage you to seek a trusted Pastor or biblical counselor if you are needing some help with getting on track with God or wanting to know about Him; this blog is just things I have learned from my own experience and I am not saying that these tips will help everyone, so if you have deep sincere questions about the faith I encourage you to seek a Pastor or biblical counselor and do whatever you need to do to get some help in those areas.

What can I learn from reading the Bible?

To sum up this blog post, you can learn how to be confident in the Lord and grow in knowledge of doctrine and the way Jesus cares for others and have the assurance that He will never leave or forsake you as a believer of His.

I’m not saying that everything in this blog will help fully, but there may be some parts of it that might help; the key is that I wanted to share what I enjoy about reading the Bible, and how I’ve come to enjoy reading it overall.

I’m not making this blog to say that it will cover all bases, as I happen to have a love for reading, and some of you reading this may not enjoy reading as much. Reading the Bible as a believer is still highly encouraged and expected as you will need to grow in knowledge and know what God wants from His children, but if you don’t like reading in general, an audio recording of the Bible or even watching videos related to the book you are reading can help, but reading the Bible and hearing the Bible being read “out loud” will help you distinguish God’s voice from the noise of the secular world.

I hope this blog was encouraging to you and that it kind of sparks reading the Bible if you haven’t before or if you haven’t read it in a while. I know it’s something that has helped me in the past and helps me continually, and I believe it can help you; it’s just something that every believer should be doing is reading through the pages when you can. You don’t need to get legalistic with reading very many chapters; God wants your heart where you want to read His Word, not begrudgingly, but with a cheerful outlook.