As you may have gathered from last week’s post, I frequently set myself reading goals that I don’t manage to achieve.

On January 1^st 2016, I began a ‘Read The Bible in a Year’ program. In May 2018 I finished it.

This of course was not the first time I had actually picked The Bible up to read it, nor was it the first time I’d started to read it cover to cover. Leviticus is a common stalling ground. I think the furthest I’d managed previously was Ruth.

Frankly, unless your job requires you to read The Bible, I don’t know how anyone manages to get through it in one year. Presumably they have a lot of train travel time.

Having now officially read the whole book, I feel I can write a review on it. Here it begins:

If you’ve never picked it up before, The Bible is divided into Two Testaments: Old and New.

The Old Testament is basically about the Ancient Jews before Jesus arrives on the scene. The New Testament is when Jesus is about and a little bit after that as well. There were approximately 400 years between the last scroll of the Old Testament being ‘penned’ and when Jesus arrived.

Within the one book of The Bible there are smaller sections also referred to as books. The Old Testament has 39 Books and the New Testament has 27 books. Total = 66 Books in the one.

So what’s in there?

A whole heap of stuff actually. There’s a variety of genres to suit pretty much everyone.

If you’re into action and violence then the Old Testament book of Judges is your place to start. If you’re into the bizarre, try Daniel in the Old Testament or the book of Revelation right at the very end of the Bible. If you’re into love, romance and sex there’s actually a fair few places you could go: Song of Songs, Ruth, Esther or David and Bathsheba in 2 Samuel and a bunch of sections in Genesis are some places to start.

If you’d like to read the original version of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical about Joseph, go to the end of Genesis. If you want to read about the prostitute saving God’s people, look for Rahab towards the start of the book of Joshua. And if you’d like to start with the Ten Commandments, halfway through Exodus is the place to look.

Obviously if you want to read about Jesus specifically, the New Testament is all yours, particularly the first four books: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

But if you’re the logical type and prefer an essay explaining how Christianity operates, then read Romans.

And that is The Bible in a nutshell, which hardly does it justice.

In order for justice to be served, you’ll have to take a look yourself.

Yours in wide-reading,

Alison

Image Credit: Edgeworth Christian Fellowship, Oregon. To them I say “Good Luck”