Reading the Bible Together

My church launched an initiative on Dec. 1. Many of us have covenanted to read the Bible 15 minutes a day until Easter. We signed documents, which I must admit, makes me take it seriously. We took partners in our efforts, in hopes that we'd all be more accountable.

It was the thought of my signature that came back to me on Dec. 1, when I realized that I hadn't read my 15 minutes, and neither had my covenant partner, my spouse. We sat down to read together. It seemed only natural to read the same passage, so we returned to Luke, which he had been reading during the time when our pastor challenged us to read one Gospel from start to finish, straight through.

We have continued reading our 15 minutes of Bible reading out loud. One of us reads and the other listens. Some nights we trade off--one reads for half the time, the other for the other half.

Some nights I feel we've become our grandparents, although I'm not sure that they read the Bible to each other out loud, the way that we're doing. It feels very earlier-century to me.

And yet, I find myself looking forward to it. One of the things that I miss most about my younger school days is that it was the last time when I was surrounded by people who were all reading the same thing. There was always a discussion partner near by.

It's interesting to see what parts of our reading jump out at him. They're often parts that I'd have just zipped right over. It's interesting to read out loud, which keeps me from my obnoxious habit of reading quickly, but not deeply. It's interesting to be part of a project together.