Bible Reading Plans for 2012

With every new year comes the recommitment to (finally) make it through the Bible in a year (or so). So to streamline the planning aspect of fulfilling your new year’s resolution, I’ve compiled various bible reading plans for you! Of course, picking one of these doesn’t guarantee results, but it’s the first step in the right direction.

If you need motivation to even start thinking about bible reading, here’s a plea from Pastor John Piper, please read!

The KINGDOM Bible Reading Plan (Desiring God)
Compiled by Bethlehem professor Jason DeRouchie, this plan offers five distinctives:

1. Proportionate weight is given to the Old and New Testaments in view of their relative length, the Old receiving three readings per day and the New getting one reading per day.
2. The Old Testament readings follow the arrangement of Jesus’ Bible (Luke 24:44––Law, Prophets, Writings), with one reading coming from each portion per day.
3. In a single year, one reads through Psalms twice and all other biblical books once; the second reading of Psalms (highlighted in gray) supplements the readings through the Law (Genesis–Deuteronomy).
4. Only 25 readings are slated per month in order to provide more flexibility in daily devotions.
5. The plan can be started at any time of the year, and if four readings per day are too much, the plan can simply be stretched to two or more years (reading from one, two, or three columns per day).

The 3650 Challenge (Tim Challies)
This system calls for 10 chapters per day, with each chapter being drawn from a different part of the Bible. This means that over the course of 2012 anyone who uses the plan will go through all the Gospels four times, the Pentateuch twice, Paul’s letters 4-5 times each, the Old Testament wisdom literature six times, all the Psalms at least twice, all the Proverbs as well as Acts a dozen times, and all the way through the Old Testament History and Prophetic books about 1.5 times.

The Chronological Bible Reading Plan (ESV)
Read through the Bible in the order the events occurred chronologically.

The Bible Reading Plan for Shirkers and Slackers
Aside from the name, this is a great way to whet your appetite for bible reading. Pastor Andy Perry explains the advantages to this plan:

1. Removing the pressure to ‘keep up’ with getting through the entire Bible in a year.
2. Providing variety throughout the week by alternating genres.
3. Providing continuity by reading the same genre each day of the week.

The advantage of this plan is that it provides guidance as we read each day but does not put us on an internal guilt trip if we miss a day – we just pick up with the next reading on the day it happens to be.

A Bible Reading Record (Don Whitney)
It’s a list of every chapter in the Bible, and you can check them off as you read them at whatever pace you want.

There are tons more out there, but these are just a few that I thought would be most helpful. Enjoy the New Year celebrations everyone!

bc

Randoms

Top 10 Top 10s
Tim Challies’ list of books, new stories, and tech to end the year on a good note.

God’s Absolute Sovereignty
No doctrine is more despised by the natural mind than the truth that God is absolutely sovereign. Human pride loathes the suggestion that God orders everything, controls everything, rules over everything. T he carnal mind, burning with enmity against God, abhors the biblical teaching that nothing comes to pass except according to His eternal decrees. Most of all, the flesh hates the notion that salvation is entirely God’s work. If God chose who would be saved, and if His choice was settled before the foundation of the world, then believers deserve no credit for their salvation. But that is, after all, precisely what Scripture teaches.

The Ten Happiest Jobs
Forbes magazine gives us a list of the ten jobs that bring the most joy to their workers. Check out #1.

TGC Recommended Books from 2011
So some of The Gospel Coalition staff have compiled a “recommended” list of books published in 2011. These are the books that stuck with us, that will continue to teach us in the coming year and beyond. We’d gladly hand out these books to friends, family, and neighbors. After you read our list, join in the fun and share your own favorite reads among the books published in 2011.

bc

Randoms.

Why is Tim Tebow Hated So Much?
A good article to get us thinking, and hopefully praying: “There are a lot of people out there pulling against Tebow, and I am not talking about football or the big game on Sunday. What I am talking about are the cynics out there who want Tebow not only to fail at football but also to fail at being a Christian. They are literally licking their chops to see him fall morally. It is an ugly, cruel ambition to root for a man’s ruin, but there are people who are doing just that.”

In the Danger Zone: Raising Our Children in the Age of the Screen
We are now the people of the screen. We are surrounded by screens, monitors, and other flickering devices, and each demands our attention. What began with the television has now spread to a host of other technologies. Our minds are increasingly shaped, entertained, informed, stimulated, and perhaps even altered by the Age of the Screen — and so are the minds of our children.

Who is Albert Pujols?
Something I didn’t know about one of the great players in baseball: “Scott Lamb and Tim Ellsworth tell the story of one of the best baseball players of all time—and also a brother in Christ—in Pujols: More Than the Game.”

Bean Time!
I’ve been watching a lot of Mr. Bean (Rowan Atkinson) lately, check him out!

AND…

bc