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Alpha Course Week 6: How and Why I should Read the Bible

The Bible is the most popular, powerful, and precious book in the world. But what is the Bible? Is it really God's Word? Can we hear God speak through the Bible?

How did you find this Alpha session on why and how I should read the Bible?

I appreciate that not everyone has the same view on this book but the Bible has been such a source of faith and hope for me in the last 30 odd years I’ve been a Christian. I never get tired of it, it never runs out of inspiration and I always see God in the words.

If you want to know more about the Bible and want to understand it better, here are some resources that will help you on your way:

The Bible Project

The Bible Project is an amazing resource - especially if you are a visual learner like me. The Bible Project is an animation studio that has produced a whole series of videos to help you learn.

  1. Here’s a link to the website: https://bibleproject.com/explore/
  2. Here’s a link to the YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channe...
The Bible Project - How to Read the Bible
The Bible App Mobile Version

The Bible itself! (Obviously)

If you are like me and use your phone for everything - then I would recommend the following:

  1. The Bible App from YouVersion. It’s free and pretty good. Check out their website: https://www.youversion.com/the-bible-app/
  2. The Bible in One Year app is great if you want to get into reading it through, it takes about 20 minutes a day and you can even have David Suchet read it to you! https://www.bibleinoneyear.org
  3. Biblegateway.com is a great online resource if you want to avoid phone apps. It’s easy to search for keywords and topics too...https://www.biblegateway.com
An Old Bible that is worn

What Bible Translation Should I Choose?

When it comes to the Bible, the thing that you will notice straight away are all the translations. I remember the first time that I purchased a Bible. I was a new Christian, and it was pre-Internet! So I wandered into a Christian book shop and saw there were all kinds of different translations to choose from.

I was a bit overwhelmed.

If I am honest, I bought the one called the King James Version simply because it had all the “thees” and “thous” in it. And, whilst poetic and lovely, I found it incredibly hard to read and understand.

So my advice is to start with one of the following translations:

  1. NIV (New International Version) - this is quite a popular choice. It’s modern English that is pretty straight forward to understand.
  2. The Message by Eugene Peterson - this is more of an interpretation than a direct translation, but I love it and I use it for general reading and meaning (I wouldn’t do specific word studies with this version of the Bible).
  3. The Passion Translation (TPT) is one of my favourites at the moment. I am using it for our Church’s study of Mark’s Gospel (feel free to follow along). The only downside is that it is just the New Testament at the moment.

Of course, the beauty of the Internet and apps is that you can easily access multiple translations. When I study - I usually read the same thing in multiple translations to get a better feel and understanding of Scripture.