A Simple Bible Study Guide
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Today I’m excited to give you a simple Bible study guide for any chapter of the Bible. When reading through the Bible in larger segments as we are doing in the Bible Reading Challenge for this year, it can feel like too much to study the Bible in depth or be involved in a structured study at the same time. Four chapters a day is taking an average of twenty minutes a day of reading and to add twenty or thirty minutes or more a day to participate in a structured study requires close time management.
I’ve found that I can manage participating in a structured study for 4-8 weeks while doing the Bible Reading Challenge, but then I need to take a break for a few weeks or more. For the last several summers, I’ve found that the summer is a time when I really need a structured Bible study. The accountability and Christian interaction that structured Bible studies provide is priceless.
This summer, however, with our family events and my ministry commitments, I believe that through prayer, I have peace about focusing on the Bible Reading Challenge without leading or participating in a structured Bible study. Therefore, I’m going to add a little more thought into what I’m doing daily for the Bible Reading Challenge.
All of the above strategy for Bible reading and spiritual growth is just my summary of what has worked for me. Everyone is different! Your schedule, your current life demands, God’s whisper to your heart…all of those play a role in determining what method and what study will work for you. Having said all that, today I wanted to provide the questions I typically ask myself as I study a Bible chapter. Each day I’m going to read through the four chapters of the Bible Reading challenge and then choose one chapter of the four to answer the following journal questions:
- Which verse in this chapter stood out as I read through the passage?
- How can I summarize this chapter in three or four sentences?
- What does this chapter or the verse I chose in question 1 mean to me?
- How can I apply this chapter or the verse from question 1 today?
Often for question number 4, I don’t answer the question at the end of the reading, but I think, pray and meditate on it for awhile or off and on throughout the day and then write in my journal or type in my app when I have a few moments.
I grew up thinking through the Bible study steps of observation, interpretation, and application. I’m sure those original steps belong to a well-known teacher; I just learned them from my pastor while I was a teenager. Feel free to customize the questions to your own preferences or make your own list of questions from scratch, but my hope is that the thoughts in this short guide will assist you in daily reading and studying God’s Word either in a group study or on your own.
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PS: One of our readers loved this and created a free printable bookmark of the question. You can find it HERE.
Do you have a particular outlining or studying method for your Bible study? I’d love to read about it in the comments below.
