How to Read the Bible – A Three Step Plan (written for Catholics - valid for all)

taylormarshall.com ^ | September 30, 2013 | Dr. Taylor Marshall

[NYer]

How do you read the Bible? Today is the feast day of Saint Jerome, who once quipped, “Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.”

“Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.” – Saint Jerome

It’s a running joke that if you want to find a Bible verse, you ought to ask a Protestant and not a Catholic. Protestants read the Bible. Catholics not so much.

This raises the question:

Why Don’t More Catholics Read the Bible?

I think the answer lies in the fact that we Catholics go to Mass. The Holy Mass has at least two Bible readings every time. If you pray the Breviary or Liturgy of Hours, multiply that several times.

Joe Catholic says to himself, “Why should I study the Bible? I go to Mass. I hear it there. Check and check.”

There is something beautiful in this. For Catholics, Bible reading is liturgical. Hence, Bible reading remains chiefly a community experience.

Three Step Plan to Kick It Up a Notch

It’s good to listen to the readings from the Bible at Holy Mass. However, we also need a personal (even private) encounter with God in the pages of Sacred Scripture. All of the saints breathed Sacred Scripture. Scripture served as the grammar for their souls. They couldn’t communicate without it.

Here are some basic spiritual needs that you have every single day of your life:

1. Praise – Voicing your delight in God and His provision for your life. Gratitude destroys discouragement.
2. Wisdom – You need practical advice to navigate the complexities of life.
3. Challenge – You need to be lifted higher. You need to grow in your faith. You need to be inspired. You must be an intentional Christian.

So when you wake up tomorrow, do the following:

1. Read a Psalm. Start with Psalm 1. Make it your anthem of praise for that day.
2. Read at least one Proverb. Proverbs are the wisdom morsels of your day. There are 31 chapters. Why not read one chapter every day during the month. Oct 1 is Provers 1. October 31 is Proverbs 31. You get the idea.
3. Read a chapter of the one of the Gospels. This is your challenge. Your Savior challenges you in the four Gospels. He calls you to be not merely a nominal Catholic but a disciple. You cannot seriously read the Gospels and stay lukewarm. Christ speaks in a way that cannot be ignored.

“But I’m so busy. I don’t have the time!”

What? You’re too busy. Sorry, you just got served a yellow card:

That’s a yellow card. You’ve been warned…

Doing these three readings will take you only 3-5 minutes. That’s the time of a commercial break. It will change your life for good. I promise. It takes 21 days to make a habit, so give it 21 days and see if you aren’t hooked. Put the Bible on your night stand and read it in the mornings. Start fresh.

“Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.” – Saint Jerome, Doctor of the Church

[aMorePerfectUnion]

“John the Baptist DID NOT become Catholic...

“sure he did.

.............

FACTS please. Assertions and opinions are fine when identified as such.
So far, you shared an opinion.

If you cannot back it up with evidence, it is simply bluster on a very blustery thread.

So far on this thread, I’ve asked you for evidence about 3 of your specious claims. No evidence yet...

[metmom]

Section 1.4 Imprisonment and execution. wikipedia Michael Sevectus

From your wiki link, which fails to state that Calvin burned Sevectus, not *Servectus*.

When Calvin requested that Servetus be executed by decapitation as a traitor rather than by fire as a heretic, Farel, in a letter of 8 September, chided him for undue lenience.[34] The Geneva Council refused his request. On 27 October 1553 Servetus was burned at the stake just outside Geneva with what was believed to be the last copy of his book chained to his leg. Historians record his last words as: "Jesus, Son of the Eternal God, have mercy on me."[35]

From this link Unitarian Universalist site.

I got the following message..."The requested document does not exist on this server. "

Dan Corner

An independent source? A blog? Dan who? Still fails to show that Calvin did the deed.

Hat trick fail.

[metmom]

Your other questions do not warrant an answer.

I didn't expect any less as the answers would be too incriminating to Catholicism. I can see that the best course of action by a Catholic would be to deem them unworthy of an answer.

[verga]

I won’t waste my breath.

[NKP_Vet]

You can make it to heaven if you have not been exposed to the teachings of Jesus Christ but have lived your life according to the beatitudes. This is the teaching of the Catholic Church. On the otherhand if you have been exposed to Jesus Christ and you flatly refuse to abide by his teachings, you are going South when you leave this earth. When He gives explicit requirements to entering his Kingdom, and you ignore him, and indeed make fun of him, I don’t want to be that person on Judgement Day.

“Then Jesus said to them: Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you” John 6:53

The earliest Church Fathers believed in the Real Presence and taught that if you do not partake in the Eucharist, you can not enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

All Christians believed this for the first 1,500 years after Christ perished on the cross. Martin Luther believed this. But the bastardized version of the Church, invented by followers of his, do not believe in the Real Presence and most protestants make fun of Catholics, the FIRST CHRISTIANS, who have been following the orders of Christ for the last 2,000 years.

I would hate like hell to be a Catholic-bashing “christian”, who has been exposed to the truth, but refuses to admit the truth, when his days on this earth are done.

I would suggest you use same some of that venom for radical muslims that are trying to whip Christians off the face of the earth.

Why the protestant guilt complex? I think we all know the answer.

[smvoice]

You know the day is coming, verga, when all you may have is breath. To wail and gnash, day and night.

[Elsie]

Your other questions do not warrant an answer.

Your BetterThanYouness does...

[Elsie]

I won’t waste my breath.

Or any brains cells either it seems.

[NKP_Vet]

I was specifically speaking of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Describing the Life, Death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ.
In otherwords the New Testament.

[Elsie]

You can make it to heaven if you have not been exposed to the teachings of Jesus Christ but have lived your life according to the beatitudes. This is the teaching of the Catholic Church.

I guess the Marines are RIGHT!!!

[Elsie]

You can make it to heaven if you have not been exposed to the teachings of Jesus Christ but have lived your life according to the beatitudes. This is the teaching of the Catholic Church.

I guess Jesus sure was dumb for getting Himself killed!

[Elsie]

Why the protestant guilt complex? I think we all know the answer.

Why the Catholic superiority complex? I think we all know the answer.

[verga]

Can you ever stop with the inane obnoxious comments?
They are not the least bit amusing.

[NKP_Vet]

“So I guess we should thank the Catholic Church for God”.

Without the Holy Bible, how would you have known about God?
PROTESTants refuse to believe in Tradition. So since you refuse to believe in Tradition, you are exactly right. Without the Catholic Church telling you about the Life and Teachings of Jesus Christ, you would have no way of knowing he ever existed.

A fact is a fact no matter how many times you deny it.

[NKP_Vet]

Tell that to one of the foremost PROTESTANT and now CATHOLIC THEOLOGIANS of our time.

http://www.amazon.com/Rome-Sweet-Home-Journey-Catholicism/dp/0898704782

[Elsie]

In otherwords the New Testament.

I suspected as much.

I went back even further; to the first DOUBT being cast on what GOD did or did not say.

---

In today's world the quote is like: "Does GOD's word REALLY mean that???"

[Elsie]

PROTESTants refuse to believe in Tradition.

THIS PROTESTant 'believes' it; he just don't think it is NECESSARY!

[Elsie]

Why?

My gripe is not with a Koolaid drinker; but a Koolaid MAKER.

[GeronL]

“Tradition” is not part of my religion.

Being saved has nothing to do with all those rituals and cloisters. It’s faith and worship of Jesus/God that saves your soul.

If we last another 200 years I swear there will be a Saint Pie Day where everyone bakes a pie for their favorite saint.

:p

[Elsie]

They are not the least bit amusing.