After forty days without food, Jesus still could still say, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4). Jesus also said, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me shall not hunger.” (John 6:35).

I take it that Christ would have us to think about the Bible as food, and to think about exposure to the Bible as eating. We cannot truly live without the Bible because true life comes to us through the Christ revealed across its pages.

A Plan for Reading the Bible

God has not told us when or how often we should read the Scriptures. He just told us we need them in order to live. Since we plan for pretty much everything necessary to life, it makes sense that we would plan to be in the Scriptures.

So, in view of the new year, I put some time into refreshing a tool I designed for reading the Bible through in one year. It’s called, Bible Eater: A Plan for Feeding on Christ in The Whole Bible in One Year.

Here’s a quick overview followed by an explanation of its features:

• Read 2-3 Old Testament chapters per day and take 4 days off per month, or use those days to catch up.
• Read 1-2 one-sitting designated Old Testament books in each 3-month period, indicated in blue.
• Read 1 New Testament chapter per day, 5 days per week.

Features:

1. Flexible Format: This plan has a balance of daily reading at a pace of about 2-3 and sometimes 4 chapters a day, and 4 days off per month. In addition, 1-2 Old Testament books are designated for a one-sitting read during each 3-month period, including Deuteronomy, 1 and 2 Chronicles, Job, Ecclesiastes, and Isaiah. These books were chosen because they are the right length to keep the reading plan simple, but also because these books can be helpfully read in a single sitting for the big picture.
2. Reading Both Testaments Together: Some annual reading plans assign the first ten months to the Old Testament and the last two to the New Testament. Others get you in both testaments but have you in four different places every day. Since we read the Old Testament from the perspective of our New Testament position, it is good to read both together, but this plan keeps it simple with one track in each testament at a time. While the Old Testament is designed to be read in three-month blocks, the New Testament books can be read in any order.
3. Redemptive Historical Highlights: Every chapter in the Bible is important since every word in the book is from God. But some chapters are more crucial for helping us understand the overall narrative of the Bible’s salvation story. Red highlights indicate these kinds of chapters. Some contain promises of a prophet, a priest, a king, a new exodus, a new creation, etc. to come. Others show the need for this One in the unfolding drama of God’s grace to a rebellion-wrecked, suicidal humanity. New Testament highlights show the fulfillment of these great expectations in Jesus Christ.

Why Plan to Read the Bible?

The eating imagery certainly helps us understand the nature of the Bible’s importance to our lives. But that picture also helps us think through how we might act on the Bible’s importance.

Like eating, it makes sense to plan for when and how often we will read the Bible. In my own experience, both of these can suffer without a plan, and more so for the Bible because of the artificial filling effect of sin. And like eating, it makes sense to plan for what and how much we will read. We can survive on an unplanned nibble of food here and there, but that wouldn’t be good for us and it wouldn’t make sense if we had a magical grill with an eternal supply of steak.

Plenty of people stay alive without a plan for eating, but they aren’t usually healthier for it.

If you haven’t decided yet on a plan for reading the Bible because you’ve decided that having a plan isn’t important, I’d encourage you to read John Piper’s excellent and persuasive article, “A New Year’s Plea: Plan!” And if you aren’t hip on this specific plan but would like to consider others, read Justin Taylor’s excellent overview of various Bible reading plans.

God is a God who plans and He always plans for things that are good. For that reason, we can reflect the glory of God by exercising dominion over our time with a plan to enjoy the greatest privilege we have as humans: eating the bread of life and living.

A beautiful new song by Keith and Krystn Getty:

Here’s an explanation of how it was written.

Today, the last F-22 Raptor rolled off the production line at the Lockheed Martin production facility near Atlanta. Funding is being shifted to the less expensive F-35 program, a similar fifth generation fighter jet.

Until several years ago my only exposure to a fighter jet was the movie, Top Gun. An F-16 showed up an an air show I attended and when it flew over my head, two thoughts went through my head: 1) I’m glad I’m on the right side of that machine, and 2) I want to fly that machine.

It was graceful and powerful, wonderful and fearsome.

Then it occurred to me that the only reason we need jets like this is because of the trouble that sin causes. We may have invented them had sin not entered the picture, but not for the purpose of defense. This machine was designed to save lives. But while a fighter jet can both take our life and save our life, it cannot keep us alive forever. It can keep us from dying now, but we will die nonetheless. It’s just not that powerful.

Thankfully, in Christ we have something more powerful at work in us. That’s why in Ephesians 1:19-20, Paul prays that we would know “the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead.”

If I could buy an F-22 Raptor, I would do it. If I could fly one, I would fly it.

But, thankfully, I don’t need a raptor to know the kind of power I ultimately need, for I know the power that defeated death in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

HT: Drew Hodge

LifeSiteNews.com:

“Alexander Tsiaras, Chief of Scientific Visualization in the department of Medicine at Yale University, employs new kinds of visualization technologies to view the human body. . .Using micro-magnetic resonance imaging, Tsiaras tracked the development of the baby from conception to birth.”

If it is true that we are “fearfully and wonderfully made,” as Psalm 139 tells us, then, in one sense, what we see in this video should be no surprise. At the same time, if this is true, then we should be very much surprised, and plan to be surprised for all eternity.

HT: JT

I’m listening to a song about the worst thing and the best thing in the world.

When Kristi and I arrived in Albuquerque a little over a year ago we were welcomed by the Byrd family. Ian and Alyssa’s community group gifted us with some transition money as a welcome to the city and the church.

In time, we’ve come to learn about some of the tragedies that have shaped the lives of our new friends. Most good people have known very dark days. Some have lost spouses. Others have lost children. Some have lost children very young. That’s the case for Ian and Alyssa, whose daughter, Sydney, was stillborn at 31 weeks. This family has grieved seriously, they have looked to God longingly, and they have shared something of their story through their blog. Thinking on the death and loss of a little one, I’m reminded of Paul’s words in Romans 8:18, “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.”

Ian and Alyssa wrote a song for their girl. It’s titled, simply, Sydney’s Song. Sydney’s Song was released just a few days ago on November 30, her fourth birthday. The lyrics movingly mingle heartache and grief with the hope and glory that we know in Christ – a savior who suffered with us, and who died for us, and who rose from death in order that he might, as the song says, “make the sad untrue.”

The song is $2 and can be purchased here.

Sydney’s Song

He gives and takes away
You were never meant to stay…
in our arms

Goodbyes they come too soon
Our dreams, they died with you…
that day

And while we trust, our hearts ache for you
And while we live, we live still without you

Hallelujah, this broken heart is His to mend
Hallelujah, He breathes new life in me again
Hallelujah, He is Peace, the Risen Lamb
Hallelujah, the sting of death is in His hands

He gives and takes away
He was never meant to stay…
in this world

Goodbyes they came too soon
Our hope, it died with You..
And Rose Again!

Her empty arms
His father’s heart is torn in two
Jesus you came, to make the sad untrue