What Does the Bible Say?

Beginning on Ash Wednesday of last year our congregation began the journey of reading the Bible in a year. We will be continuing our journey this year. Based on feedback we received from the congregation we have three separate reading plans for this year.

The chronological plan is what we did this past year and follows The Bible Recap PodCast.
The continuous plan has readers begin their journeys in Genesis and read straight through to Revelation. For many members of Grace this is how they read the Bible each year.
The new plan for this year includes the Apocrypha. This plan follows Fr. Mike Schmitz’s The Bible in a Year Podcast/YouTube series.

Below you will find a number of resources to help you on this journey…take what you need and leave what you don’t. We suggest that you use the NRSV translation of the Bible because it is what our denomination uses…but we understand that we all have our personal preferences.

As we read through the Bible, Angie encourages all of us to pay attention to the way(s) in which God interacts with humanity. One of the biggest hangups that folks have when reading the Bible is that they want it to simultaneously be a history book and an ethical guide that contains all of the answers to all of their questions. We want to caution all of us away from that approach and instead guide us to read the Bible as a story that begins with God creating and never ends. As we read the Bible we need to be open to coming across some stories that will seem impossible, while other stories might make us uncomfortable because of their violent nature. Our gut reaction might be to stop reading the Bible the first time we come to one of these stories, but I would encourage all of us to sit with our discomfort. If we can’t talk about the hard parts of the Bible in church, where can we talk about them?

Resources

Enter the Bible is a resource from Luther Seminary. It contains videos, podcasts, breakdowns of each book of the Bible, and so much more! You can sign up for a free account here.

If you want to compare translations of the scripture or need a Bible in a language other than English, Bible Gateway is a wonderful resource. If you want to do a deep dive into a certain passage Bible Hub offers Hebrew and Greek inter-linears and a lexicon. Both Bible Gateway and Bible Hub are available as websites and free apps.