Sustainable Spiritual Habits
There’s a lot of talk about reading the Bible at the beginning of every calendar year. But that talk dies down pretty quickly, usually after a week or two. That’s because reading the Bible is like starting a new exercise regimen: easier started than sustained.
You can expect to see nearly-new exercise equipment in the thrift shops beginning sometime in the early spring. The act of hauling that machine to Goodwill works as a kind of cleansing ritual: I am finally admitting to myself that I will not use this machine to get in shape. Now I must move on from that misguided ambition and make better use of the space in my home (and find another place to hang my clothes).
Bible-reading plans usually have a longer shelf life, but the principle is that same. People usually begin with high ambitions, but the vagaries of life overtake them, and after a few months of struggle and discouragement, they usually enter the phase of giving up on their earlier ambitions and setting aside their hopes.
Repeat that cycle a few years in a row, and you can get cynical. You begin to resist the urge to even try to establish a new habit.
How can we find a sustainable pace for Bible-reading? After all, we know that we can’t really grow if we don’t make room in our lives for those basic spiritual practices.
Probably the most important thing is to manage our own expectations. As a recent Gospel Coalition article put it, “Don’t Expect a Spectacular Christian Life.” Each of us must understand that our spiritual vitality is shaped not so much by the spectacular as it is by the mundane. It is our habits, not our crises that determine the quality and depth of our spiritual life.
So, yes, it’s good to aspire to cultivate the habit of regularly engaging and reflecting on God’s Word.
But notice my language. I didn’t say, “daily,” and I didn’t say “read” or “study.”
Each of us must carve out for ourselves what it means for us make Bible engagement a regular feature in our lives. Daily is best, but maybe 2-3 times a week is a start. (As we have said before, start from where you are, not from where you’re supposed to be.)
I have found great profit in copying the Scripture into a notebook, then marking it up to understand what is says and what it means, then journaling on what it means in my life. God has used His Word (recently, Paul’s letter to the church in Rome) to expose and illuminate my heart.
This method of copying, marking, and journaling has been so fruitful for me that I find that I am forming a sustainable habit; I no longer have to force myself to sit down to do this. I enjoy it and miss it when I am not able to carve out the time for it in on a busy day.
But what if you’re not a reader? And what if your handwriting is so bad that even you can’t read it?
Some Christ-followers are rediscovering what our spiritual forebears have known about the Scripture for thousands of years: it can be very profitable to listen to Scripture being read.
In the thousands of years of the history of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures, it has been only recently (the past 500 years) that ordinary Christians have had access to printed copies of the Scriptures. Before the invention of the printing press, only the wealthy could afford books. And in many communities, the only copy of the Bible was kept at the church.
How did God’s people have access to God’s Word for all those centuries before the printing press? They heard it being read aloud! They heard the pastor read Scripture and preach from it week after week.
Now the digital revolution has brought us full circle, where apps can read Scripture aloud for joggers, home-makers, retirees, dog-walkers, and commuters. And thanks to the ubiquity of digital technology, we are not limited to hearing God’s Word once every week.
But the important questions about our Bible engagement are not about technique. The two most important questions about our Bible engagement are about something deeper:
1. Is Bible engagement becoming habitual for me? Habits have a kind of inertia. Just as the inertia of bad habits can be toxic, the inertia of good habits can be life-enriching. As Justin Earley has pointed out in his book The Common Rule, we rely on the inertia of habits to organize our daily lives. There are a dozen healthy, normal habits that have become so deeply embedded into our behavior patterns that we literally don’t have to think about them while we’re doing them: brushing our teeth, driving home from work, buttoning our shirt.
As Bible engagement becomes more and more deeply ingrained in our behavioral patterns, as it takes on the character of an unconscious habit, we begin to put ourselves in the place where God’s Spirit can use His Word in our lives. And we will begin to see God’s Word shape our priorities and instincts.
2. Am I reflecting on what I hear/read/study? Bible engagement for its own sake can be counter-productive. It can create a kind of arrogant self-sufficiency, a self-righteous posture, a deadly sense of final accomplishment. (We must never forget that some of Jesus’s most implacable enemies were the experts in biblical literacy; the men who knew the Scriptures most intimately opposed Jesus most vehemently.)
It’s never just a matter of reading and knowing the Bible. Rather, it’s when I reflect on what God’s Word is saying to me in the moment, that’s when I find that it illuminates my inner life. It’s when I marinate in the text that I begin to see assumptions, habit patterns, places where my imagination is vain or lustful or self-absorbed. That’s when God’s Spirit can use His Word to do that painstaking work of rehabilitating my heart and reshaping my thinking.
When I reflect on Scripture, I create the space for God’s Word to do God’s work in my life.
Do you want to read through the Bible in a year? It will take about 10-15 minutes every day. But if you’ve never established the pattern of reading the Bible every day, don’t start there. Just start with reading (or hearing) Scripture a few times each week. Let your expectations grow with the formation of your new habit.
If you’ve never read the Bible regularly, don’t tie yourself to an ambitious reading schedule, at least not right away; instead, commit yourself to establishing a habit of setting aside the time to commune with God in His Word.
This isn’t a race. It’s okay to go slow. The process (hearing from God) is more important than the product (keeping to a schedule).
And always give yourself the time and mental space to think deeply and carefully about what you’re seeing in God’s Word.
Ask God to speak to you by His Word.
That is one request God is waiting for us to ask.
Persevere,
Paul Pyle
Discipleship Pastor