Do You Read Your Bible?

blueskies

blueskies

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Do You Ever Read Your Bible?

For members in this forum, we would expect the answer will overwhelmingly be: “Yes!”; but I was curious about friends, neighbors and coworkers.

So I did some brief research.

News sources tell us that approximately 9 out of ten (87 percent) of U.S. homes have at least one Bible, according to the American Bible Society, and in fact, the average household has three Bibles! So far so good.

Roughly 50 percent of American adults confirmed they were reading Scripture at least three times a year, between the years of 2011 to 2021; which sounds encouraging.

But then, suddenly in 2022, that number declined to 39 percent according to American Bible Society surveys.

We all know the Bible is far and away the all time best selling book in the world. However, it has also been said, “The Bible is the best-selling, but least read, and least understood book."

Like most things in life there is probably not a single reason for this drop, however, with all that seems to be going on in our world you might think more people would be turning to scripture for solace and illumination.

So why the sudden drop in reading scripture?
 
blueskies said:
Do You Ever Read Your Bible?

For members in this forum, we would expect the answer will overwhelmingly be: “Yes!”; but I was curious about friends, neighbors and coworkers.

So I did some brief research.

News sources tell us that approximately 9 out of ten (87 percent) of U.S. homes have at least one Bible, according to the American Bible Society, and in fact, the average household has three Bibles! So far so good.

Roughly 50 percent of American adults confirmed they were reading Scripture at least three times a year, between the years of 2011 to 2021; which sounds encouraging.

But then, suddenly in 2022, that number declined to 39 percent according to American Bible Society surveys.

We all know the Bible is far and away the all time best selling book in the world. However, it has also been said, “The Bible is the best-selling, but least read, and least understood book."

Like most things in life there is probably not a single reason for this drop, however, with all that seems to be going on in our world you might think more people would be turning to scripture for solace and illumination.

So why the sudden drop in reading scripture?
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The radical drop might be due to the prevalence of atheism in the public education curriculums and among public educators, especially those in higher education.
 
TransformedinChrist said:
Every day but this past week it's been so so difficult. I absolutely despise it. I meditate on His scriptures but reading His Word is so essential.
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I’ve been like that too in the past. I can only take small mouthfuls some days. Maybe just a choice paragraph may be all we need when we are struggling, until our mental lethargy gets outed and our natural vitality is restored. I Try watching videos on my favourite bible characters when I’m depleted.
And Hope, as we know, when we wait, will restore us again


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TransformedinChrist said:
Every day but this past week it's been so so difficult.
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I understand, thank you for sharing this. I also have had times, periods, when my outer life takes all my physical attention and my emotional and mental energy. At these times, I sometimes find that I am thinking more about reading Scripture than I can actually do. Still, my Bible waits patiently and like an old friend; it is there, at my side when I am ready to pick it back up again, thank the Lord.

Via dolarossa said:
Maybe just a choice paragraph may be all we need when we are struggling, until our mental lethargy gets outed and our natural vitality is restored. I Try watching videos on my favourite bible characters when I’m depleted.
Click to expand...
This is great advice.
There have been a few times when I’ve experienced a particularly strong and deep relationship with a verse or passage in the Bible when I find myself an empty vessel.
Great post via.
 
When I first read the bible, it was like Musicmaster said "Like a novel". As I was reading it one day a friend asked me to close my bible and when I did he asked,"What scripture did you just read?" I didn't know. He said go back to the beginning and read it like a marathon not a sprint. Take time to ponder what you are reading and find what it is actually saying, then you will understand why this book is so important. I am grateful that God put this friend in my life.
 
blueskies said:
So why the sudden drop in reading scripture?
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Dunno, you'd think Cvd-19 would have shaken us, but ...

The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit." John 3:8
However God Spirit moves, I pray He moves in regenerating more people, even worldwide that they may hunger, pant and thirst for that unpolluted living water of His Word.

1 Corinthians 2:10,12,14 ESV
these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God.
Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. [14] The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.
 
TransformedinChrist said:
Every day but this past week it's been so so difficult. I absolutely despise it. I meditate on His scriptures but reading His Word is so essential.
Click to expand...

When I lay in hospital, the following verses sustained me:

7 “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. 9 Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? 11 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! (Matthew 7:7-11)

5 And he said to them, “Which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves, 6 for a friend of mine has arrived on a journey, and I have nothing to set before him’; 7 and he will answer from within, ‘Do not bother me; the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed. I cannot get up and give you anything’? 8 I tell you, though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, yet because of his impudence[a] he will rise and give him whatever he needs. 9 And I tell you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. 11 What father among you, if his son asks for[b] a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent; 12 or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” (Luke 11:5-13 ESV)

I prayed every day for forgiveness and healing and received both. As I heal, it becomes increasingly more difficult to remember my trials but remember them I do. As painful as the memory is, I pray God never allow me to forget what I once experienced. God is love. Pray on that, dear sister in Christ.

Jason
 
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