January 4 – Read Something Every Day

        Deuteronomy 17:18, 19 - " When [the king] takes his throne, he is to write for himself, on a scroll, a copy of this law, taken from that of the priests, who are Levites. The copy is to be with the king, and he is to read it all the days of his life so that he may learn to revere Yahweh his God, and to carefully follow all the words of this law and these decrees....."

        The above verses were written for future kings of Israel, and during the time when Moses was still the leader of the nation.  It was a command so that the future king would not get arrogant, think himself more highly than his people, and thus pervert justice in the kingdom. We Christians can certainly take heed from these words. A daily dose of God's word, with a willing heart to submit to God's will for the day, will teach us to follow God's ways and to love Him.

        I realize that sometimes one does not feel like reading every day, or that time restraints may prevent us from taking time in God's word, especially time to really meditate on the words and pray about them. One thing I try to do in the midst of these constraints, is to at least read a Psalm every day. One should definitely read and meditate upon texts from the New Testament, as that contains a fuller revealing of God and his ways. As has been stated by someone, "the Old Testament is the New Testament concealed, and the New Testament is the Old Testament revealed".

        There are 150 psalms in the English Bible (a couple are actually combined in the Hebrew texts). There are an average of 30 days in each month, the number of which divides evenly into 150. Therefore, no matter what day of the month it is, I know which Psalm to read. If it is March 23, I know to easily turn to Psalm 23, Psalm 53, 83, 113, or 143. If it is January 31, I know that I can read some of Psalm 119, which has 176 verses, and which is also 80 times larger than Psalm 117. Proverbs can also fit into this pattern, since it has 31 chapters. Certainly Matthew, Luke, John, and Acts fit into this pattern also, as these NT books are divided into slightly less than 30 chapters.

        So forgive yourself for those days that you miss reading God's word. Then dive back in the next day, and let God speak to you from his word.