BibleScribbler

Coffee, a Bible, and a Napkin to Scribble On

Goal of Life vs. Goal of Our Vacation Quote

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If we would only give, just once, the same amount of reflection to what we want to get out of life that we give to the question of what to do with a two weeks’ vacation, we would be startled at our false standards and the aimless procession of our busy days.

– Dorothy Canfield Fisher, as quoted in Michael Hyatt’s Creating Your Personal Life Plan which you can learn more about here.

I’m working through this to see how it would apply to the guys at the mission.

Reading the Bible in a Year

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With the new year comes a new chance to get on a Bible reading plan. As a family and at the mission we are doing the Chronological reading plan according to the folks at ESVBible.org. If you have never read the Bible all of the way through, or if you’ve never had the adventure of reading it through in the order that it happened, I suggest you check this out.

ESV Chronological Reading plan at ESVBible.org

ESV Chronological Reading plan as a printable and checkoffable worksheet.

I want to plug reading the Bible at the website: If you buy an ESV study bible they give you a free unlock for all of the study Bible notes online. You can also use the notes section to write your own notes and then every few months dump them to Evernote for archiving. It’s really cool to be reading the Bible and come across a digital note you made 2 years ago (and not be distracted by 1,253 other people’s notes at the same time.)

The other thing is don’t let this reading plan be an opportunity for pride or shame. If you miss a day, press on, don’t give up. If you work 5 days ahead, shut up and praise the Lord. I’m currently in the 5th year of a “through the Bible” reading plan that was only supposed to take one year!

Nothing grows you spiritually like reading the Bible deeply and responding daily.

Growing from Jail

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Yesterday I got to talk to a guy that had spent the summer in jail. At one point in his time there, he got in a fight and spent 12 days in the "jail within the jail." – no windows, a shower every 3 days, and they passed his food to him through a slot in the door. He said it was really miserable but he wouldn’t deny that he deserved it.

In his summer in jail, he read through the Bible three times, in three different translations. He said the NLT was easy to read, but he wanted to aquaint himself with the older language of the KJV, so he read it once through too.

He said he is now closer to God than ever before. He read through the 5 books of Moses, got out of jail and went back to his dad and said, "Why didn’t you ever read this and tell me that God was always with me?! Why didn’t you tell me that God went along with me through every one of my trials in life?!"

Pretty awesome. He is now in his late 30s and is eager to learn more about, and draw closer to Jesus.