Jesus taught that the Bible is as essential for the soul as food is to the body, declaring in Matthew 4:4, “Man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” For this reason, we are called to meditate on God’s word day and night (Psalm 1).
One helpful way to ensure we are being properly nourished by the word of God is by following a Bible reading plan. We as a church highly recommend the Robert Murray M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan. This reading plan takes us through the Old Testament once, and the Psalms and New Testament twice, over the course of a year. Each day includes two readings for family worship and two for private devotion.
The benefits of this plan include the following:
- No time is wasted deciding what to read. The plan provides a simple and clear structure.
- A focus on Christ and the gospel. By taking us through the New Testament twice a year, it keeps the essence and foundation of our faith before us.
- An immersion in the Psalms. The plan also goes through the Psalms twice a year, the prayer book and hymn book of the church. Praying the Psalms stretches our emotional and spiritual bandwidth, taking us to higher heights of gratitude, praise and adoration and bringing us down to deeper depths of lament, confession and repentance than we could reach on our own.
- You get to see how the Bible fits together. By reading four chapters of the Bible simultaneously, you learn to spot the inner connectedness and unity of Scripture. This approach also provides a balanced diet of the Word, allowing you to engage regularly with different books, genres, and themes without long gaps in between.
- You get to be part of a Bible reading community. There is a weight loss program that advertises frequently on a local radio station; the closing line of the advertisement is always the same: “If you could do it yourself, you would have done it already”. As with weight loss, so with reading the Bible. Everything is harder on your own and therefore one of the chief benefits of using the M’Cheyne Bible Reading plan is doing it together with your family and the church.
You can access the daily readings through the ESV Bible app here, or download a printable copy of the reading plan here.
“Remember the necessity of your own soul. What plant can be unwatered and not wither? ‘What will it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul?’ Ah, take heed of that!”
Robert Murray M’Cheyne