Read the Bible in One Year: Christian Discipleship Journal's Bible Reading Plan

Want to read the Bible in a year? Have you tried before and failed as things got busy or you just slowly forgot? I was walking across campus the other day and bumped into my former room mate reading from his Bible. He showed me a printed sheet of paper with readings to do each day and a box to put a check mark next to each one. If you follow the schedule, you can finish the Bible in a year, without having to do unreasonable amounts of reading each day.

The other benefit is that there are only 25 readings for each month, so busy days that require you to skip reading or other days on which you happen to forget won't mess you up or make you fall behind. You get 5 or 6 freebies each month. The other cool thing is that each day there are four short readings: one from a Gospel, one from a New Testament Epistle, one from Old Testament Wisdom/Poetry, and one from Old Testament History.


It's a great way to stay organized and stick to your goals. Print it out here.

If you prefer, you can also print out these really nifty bookmarks to keep your place and to mark off your readings: (January - June) and (July - December).

This cool idea comes to us courtesy of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, MN.

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Quotes on Biblical study:

Let us not therefore despise the hearing of the divine Scriptures. For this is of Satan's devising; not suffering us to see the treasure, lest we should gain the riches. -St John Chrysostom, Gospel According To St. Matthew, Homily 2

Has some good thought come to you? Have you felt some good impulse or inclination in your heart? Stop! Check it with the Gospel. -Blessed Vladyka Ignatij (Brianchaninov)

In Holy Scripture we see humble words, simple words, but within they possess such great depths of the knowledge of God that the passing wisdom of this world cannot even stand beside it. St. Paul wrote about this wisdom of God: 'Among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away. But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God' (1 Cor. 2:6-7). -St. Nicodemos of the Holy Mountain, A Handbook of Spiritual Counsel

The reading of Scriptures is a great means of security against sinning. Ignorance of Scripture is a great cliff, a deep abyss. It gives birth to heresies and introduces a corrupt way of life. Even one parable can help the soul to have contrition for a sin, to find a little rest from the concerns of the world. Reading Scripture each day will accomplish some great and noble good in us. -St. John Chrysostom

Just as soul and body combine to produce a human being, so practice of the virtues and contemplation together constitute a unique spiritual wisdom, and the Old and New Testament together form a single mystery. -St. Maximos the Confessor

It is, indeed, impossible for the mind not to be troubled by thoughts, but accepting them or rejecting them is possible for everyone who makes an effort...therefore we practice the frequent reading of Scripture, so that we may be open to a spiritual point of view. For this reason we frequently chant the psalms, so that we may continually grow in compunction. For this reason we are diligent in vigils, fasting, and praying, so that the mind which has been stretched to its limits may not taste earthly things but contemplate heavenly ones. When these things cease because negligence has crept in again, then, it is inevitable that the mind, by the accumulated filth of the vices, will soon turn in a carnal direction and fall. -St. John Cassian

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