If you want to get a good overview of the whole Bible, you can follow a “Read the Bible in one Year” programme. There are also special Bibles you can buy which are divided up into daily readings which will take you through the whole text in one year. (Enquire at your local Christian bookshop for advice on these.) Otherwise, if you read about 3 chapters a day and five chapters on a Sunday, you can get through the whole Bible in one year. There is even a book which claims to be the Bible written as a novel!

There are many Bible reading notes and devotional books available, which guide you through a short passage of the Bible each day and provide thought-provoking comments. Ask at your local Christian bookshop for details of what is available, as there are many different Bible reading notes, suitable for various ages and stages of Christian experience. This is probably the easiest way of starting Bible study.

Commentaries are available to guide you through the in-depth study of any particular book of the Bible. Some are quite deep and academic, whilst others are lighter and more easy to digest. Again, your Christian bookshop should be able to help and advise you as to what material is available. This form of study is more demanding, and needs more time and determination, but is very rewarding.

You could take a theme from the Bible, such as sacrifice, or faith, and follow it right through the Bible; the same approach can be taken with a Bible character or a doctrine. For this kind of study, you need a Concordance (see Bible helps P13), or a Cross-reference Bible with concordance which will help you find and follow through a particular theme.

There is great benefit in reading a short passage and then taking just one word or phrase and chewing over it in your mind, pondering the meaning and implications of the word or phrase.

“The Inductive Bible Study Method” is rewarding, but also fairly time-consuming. It is a system which helps you to discover things for yourself about the passages you are studying, and can become quite absorbing and fascinating. It involves using colour-coded Bible marking and drawing up lists and summaries of what has been read, as well as compiling your own “lessons for Life” from the text. The best way to do inductive study is to buy an Inductive Study Bible, since space is left in the actual Bible text to write your notes etc. At the the time of writing only the New American Standard Bible and the New International Version are available in inductive format.