Story of My Life

I finally did it. I put tabs in my study Bible.  I bought these books-of-the-Bible tabs on clearance several years ago at a Christian book store that was going out of business. I wasn't sure if I wanted to put them in my journaling Bible or my daily reading Bible or some other Bible. (I have a lot of Bibles, okay?) Then I acquired this She Reads Truth Bible and I knew this was the one. I use this Bible for studying, and it's where I keep all of my study notes now. I knew it would the perfect place for these tabs, but I was still undecided. I really liked the Bible as is. Would I ruin it by putting these tabs on? Would I hate them? I decided to just go for it and put them on. I LOVE THEM. Tabs for each book of the Bible make it so much easier to quickly flip around and find different references as I'm studying. I do know the books of the Bible, but having tabs for quick reference makes studying so much better. And the bright colors of these particular tabs go perfectly with

  If you do an internet search for "Bible Study Methods" you will find that there are SO many to choose from! There's the Inductive Method, the Topical Method, the Devotional Method, Verse Mapping, the SOAP Method, the ACTS Method, and so on and so on. I've tried a few of these, and I've never found one that really *works* for me. I want to study the Bible in a way that I can learn what it really says and what it means in context. I don't want to rely on someone else's ideas or my own ideas to try to figure out what it means. So I've put together a method of my own, inspired by a couple of  respected Bible teachers 1 and by the reading and study sessions that my husband and I have together each day. I call this way of studying "The Connections Method". It doesn't rely on commentaries or devotionals, and it doesn't require drawing conclusions or trying to make every Bible passage fit directly into our modern day lives. Instead, it sim

This Study With Me series is meant to show you that any regular person can study the Bible for themselves. With that being said, I know that I own a lot more study resources than most regular people. There are a couple of reasons for this: one is that my husband was a Bible college student and we still have his Bible college books. The other reason is simply that I love books and I pick up second-hand copies of good books wherever and whenever I can. More on that later.  Let's talk about resources. When looking for resources to help in studying, there are a few things to keep in mind that will best help us learn about the context of  the Bible. 1. Just the Facts.  If we are studying the Bible to find out for ourselves what it says, we are not looking for someone else's ideas, opinions, interpretations, or doctrines. These are things that might be interesting to consider later on, after we have already studied a passage, but first we are looking for information to help us unders

  Thank you for joining me in the second post of my Study With Me series! The first two questions that people usually ask when they are planning to begin reading and studying the Bible are, "Where should I start?" and, "What Bible should I use?" So we're going to address both of those questions today. Where should I start? It can be a little overwhelming when you flip through your Bible trying to choose a place to start reading. But when you think about the purpose of studying the Bible, it clears things up a bit. I believe our purpose should be to read and study the whole Bible so that we can hear God speaking to us more clearly. If we just read it here and there in little parts and pieces, we are severely limiting our ability to see the themes and connections that run throughout the entire Bible. Where should we start? The answer is simple: at the beginning! Yes, the very beginning.  Genesis is where to start, especially if you have never read the entire Bible

I've known all my life that I should read the Bible. My parents gave me my first Bible when I was five years old; a cute, red, King James Version that I still have to this day.  If you went to Sunday School as a child like I did, then you've probably heard the running joke that the best answer to every Sunday School question is "read the Bible and pray." There's even a song that I remember from my childhood that still goes through my head sometimes that was written and performed by my great-aunt Patsy Prescott, the yodeling Christian cowgirl: "Read your Bible and pray, read it every day. Read your Bible and pray, 'twill drive the devil away." I agree completely that Bible reading is important, but even more so is studying  the Bible. Over the years I have learned how to study the Bible for myself, and I want to share what I've learned and what I'm learning, because I have come to realize that it is so important for all Christians to learn to

The other night I was thinking about the way things were before the internet and social media. I've seen a lot of people lately talking about leaving Facebook for other platforms, and I was thinking about what the world would be like if none of those things existed anymore.  One thing I know for sure is that if there were no social media anymore, people would have a lot more time to do a lot more things! Don't get me wrong, I'm on Facebook and Instagram, and I probably won't be giving them up completely anytime soon. But I find that I'm able to get a lot more things done when I put down the phone and close the laptop and actually do something worthwhile. The thing I like most about social media is being able to keep in touch with far away family and friends. (And these days when we all mostly stay home, even not so far away family and friends.) But what did we do before social media existed? We called people on the phone and we wrote letters and sent them in the mai