"I love it when a plan comes together!"

At the start of 2014, I made a resolution to begin a Bible in One Year reading plan and stick with it. I'd tried this a number of times previously yet after a healthy start my commitment always began to wane. Slowly, but surely I found myself a number of days behind until in the end I lost the will to continue, feeling I couldn't catch up.

This year however was different, this year I didn't give up, and even though occasionally I found myself behind schedule, I made sure I took extra time to get back on track.

What was different this year? What kept me going?

I think it was simply the choice of plan. I went with The Bible in One Year from Holy Trinity Brompton (an Anglican church in London led by Nicky Gumbel). Holy Trinity Brompton are the same church group that heads up Alpha, a very successful course held by churches across the world as a way to introduce people to the Christian faith.

There was actually more to read with this plan that others I'd tried in the past. Nicky has a very substantial commentary / devotional section connected to each of the Bible verses. Quite often it would take more time to read these that it would the verses! But rather than being a distraction from Scripture I found it to be a wholly helpful way of understanding what you were about to read each day.

Truth be told I do have friends who struggle with plans like these and I understand why. It's not that they dislike reading the Bible, far from it, but rather I suspect the problem is the speed to which you are expected to work through each chapter and verse. There's no settling in, no going off on a tangent down a Scriptural rabbit hole - if you find yourself doing this then the whole exercise could become quite laden and 'heavy'. My advice is just to work on through.

As someone who would say they have never read through the Bible, in many respects I actually probably had over the years, just in bits here and there to help with my preaching, teaching or personal discovery. However, this way of doing things never quite brought the connection from one chapter to the other, particularly when it came to the Old Testament.

I liked the way the plan presented itself in terms of sections to read, which worked in this way: Old Testament - Psalm or Proverb - New Testament. So rather than a cover-to-cover where you start at Genesis, followed by Exodus, Leviticus, etc, and then finally finishing at Revelation, doing things this way keeps things fresh and different. This is particularly useful when you are finding a book quite hard to understand or 'get into'. Let me be straight with you here and tell you that I found Isaiah a struggle (I know, a number of you will have just gasped in shock!). It has a very prophetic nature which, although I fully appreciate, found very hard to absorb and to an extent also the book of Ezekiel (another gasp is allowed here too). On the other hand, I found the book of Daniel easier to journey through and appreciated the similar, but different perspectives of the books Kings and Chronicles.

Overall, and I hesitate to write this as it may sound over spiritual, but I do feel that I fed my soul over this last year. I now have within me the Words of God, which the Holy Spirit will help me call to mind when needed. There is also an enormous sense of accomplishment and strong feeling that, if possible, every Christian should attempt the same task. There may be other ways and means in which they also accomplish this, but the journey is worth it. I believe it gives a person a firm platform from which to begin other shorter more 'theme focused' plans in future.

What is important to remember in this whole exercise is that firstly, this is the inspired Word of God and fully deserves our attention and dedication to study and learn. Secondly, across the centuries and continents people have given their lives to bring us our modern translations. There are still many places around the world where even possessing a Bible can bring severe punishment and even death. Sacrifices have been made to get this awesome collection of books and letters into our hands, and I am extremely grateful that I live in a society where access to the Bible is free and unencumbered.

It's never too late to begin what could be an incredibly fulfilling journey. Why not start today?