Robert Lowery

On May 7, at the request of one of the visitors to this site, I reflected on my Bible reading habits. Recently another visitor, Andy, asked me on May 8 to say a bit more about the code or marking system I use when reading Scripture. My system is both fixed and flexible. How’s that for preciseness?! My encouragement is for you to develop your own, but I am willing to share with you what I do.

Let me share first of all some fixed features I incorporate.

• I always use different colors of ink or a variety of colored pencils.
• I have a color-code system where I underline major doctrines in certain colors and I try to keep this pretty consistent.
• I use all kinds of faces (happy, sad, surprised, inquisitive, questioning, etc.).
• I do not use a study Bible but prefer to use one with very few editorial comments/insertions (e.g., paragraph titles can really throw you off in seeing what the paragraph is really about! For example, my edition of the NIV has as a paragraph summary “Instructions on Worship” as an introduction to I Tim. 2:1ff. If you define “worship” as an assembly of believers, Paul’s instructions are not to be limited to a select time and place! I believe that this insertion has caused countless Christians to misread Paul’s letter.).
• I do not hesitate to write in the margins (all four) as well as between the lines (In medieval times these notes were called glosses (from the Greek word “tongues” as in how various commentators had interpreted a passage) or catenae (from the Latin word “chain” as in chain of interpretive comments)–interpretive notes, so to speak).
• If I read a good quotation on a passage I may write it in the margin of my Bible.
• I create my own cross references in addition to the ones found in the translation I am using (There is a good article waiting to be written on the presuppositions and theology behind the cross-references; you can compare any two Bibles that contain cross-references and see that there is not agreement. What is a cross-reference to one is not to another student. Oh, by the way, cross-references are those references usually found in the center of a page or at the bottom directing the students to other verses that address the same topic you are reading about).
• I often have a concordance beside me so I can look up words or phrases.
• I often create my own cross references to serve as reminder (For example, in teaching Matthew this semester I pointed out to the students that Jesus is saying that all of the events in Matthew 24:1-35 must take place before the generation to whom he is speaking comes to an end. I have written in my Bible next to the phrase “this generation” all of the other places where the concept of generation is found in Matthew–compare 24:34 with 11:16; 12:39, 41,44,45; 16:4; 17:17 23:36. To conclude that the phrase in 24:34 is speaking to our generation is simply incorrect; the original readers would have understood Jesus to be teaching that the destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem were to take place in their lifetime, events that did indeed take place around 70 A.D.! My, that throws a lot of sermons off balance, doesn’t it, especially those who use the signs in Matt. 24:1ff. to interpret our day!).
• I draw brackets around two or more verses that should have been one because they form a complete sentence (One of these days, I hope to ask Stephen Langton, one of those long-gone saints, why he divided the Bible the way he and his cohorts did!).
• Until you get the dates down, I think it is helpful to write at the top of the beginning of each book of the Bible the tentative date of writing.

With regard to flexibility:

• I vary what I am looking for on a monthly basis. One month I may focus on a cluster of doctrines (faith, hope and love) while another month, I may focus on a theme like righteousness or leadership. One summer I read through the New Testament and underlined or perhaps blocked out with a marker all of the passages that had to do with Christ’s final coming. What an experience!
• After I finish my daily reading I go back and read what I did not underline because often that indicates that I did not want to focus on what the author was communicating (I often do this, I have discovered, when the passage is a threat to my comfort zone!).
• I sometimes read a book, especially a gospel and give the units chapter titles as if I were an editor assigning titles to a novel or short story. Of course, in doing this you will discover bad chapter and verse divisions.
• Often on the last page of a book of the Bible, I will write down questions I want to pursue or verses I want to study in greater detail.
• Let me repeat something: I work hard at getting locked into reading only or primarily one translation, be it the NIV (the KJV of our day!) or the ESV or the NASB.

May you be blessed in your reading and hearing (Rev. 1:3).

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Related posts:

1. A Follow-Up on my Bible Reading Habits