My Bible reading velocity has increased since I started keeping track of my reading on February 9, 2006. I initially kept track on this blog, but switched to a private Google Docs spreadsheet after July 2, 2019. I did a search on this and it looks like the only time I wrote another post like this was in 2019. I have read through the King James Version (KJV), New King James Version (NKJV), English Standard Version (ESV), New American Standard Bible (NASB), and New International Version (NIV) Bibles. Lorena and I are currently reading aloud through the Reina-Valera, 1909 (RV) Spanish Version of the New Testament over the Internet with Grandma Conchita in Mexico. I am currently, in a read through the New Living Translation (NLT) version of the New Testament and hope to do a full read through that version when I finish.
When I first started, it was a pretty big effort just to get through a chapter per day. It took me 1,363 days to read through the Bible in my first pass. The last time, I read all the way through the Bible starting in late December of 2022, it took me 120 days. I really feel like I have missed something if I miss a day of reading. I am pretty sure I could count the days I missed on one hand since when I started reading 17 years ago. I am pretty sure I would benefit greatly by slowing down and reading more carefully, but I want to do that as an additional reading as opposed to replacing what I am doing now.
So far, I have been through the whole Bible ten times. I am on my 38th pass through the New Testament if you include the times I read through the whole Bible. This whole effort, if you want to call it that, has been an incredible gift to me.
This morning, I finished my latest read through the New Testament. This last pass, one time through the whole Bible and two times more through the New Testament was with the ESV. The next pass will be through the New American Standard Bible (NASB) version. I am still getting a lot out of it and enjoying it more and more. The plan is to follow the normal pattern and read through the whole Bible followed by two additional reads through the New Testament. I am going to try to do the entire Bible again in less than a single year, but using a more structured approach. For now, the plan is to read four chapters every day in the Old Testament and then slow down to three chapters per day when I get to the New Testament.
Lorena, Kelly, and I went to a church convention yesterday. She got asked to translate from English to Spanish for one of the meetings. It was a two hour long meeting, so she asked me if I would be willing to translate for the last speaker. I had actually not done it for awhile, but said yes and had a ball. I forgot how fun it is to translate. The funny deal is that I seem to focus on what is being said better when I translate, too. I hope I get to do it again soon.
I started this last read through the Bible, reading a couple of chapters per day, but pretty quickly went to three chapters and then, most weeks, I ended up reading a two to three extra chapters on Wednesdays (for Bible study) and on Sundays. It dawned on me that I was getting through the Bible fairly quickly. Based on where I am now, I can get through the entire Bible in a year if I average a little under three and a half chapters per day until November 15 of this year–I started on November 16, 2017. I am going to take a stab at it. I have been enjoying my reading more and more all the time.
Christian flew in from Tempe on Monday night, then took Amtrak down from Seattle to Centralia with Kelly after she got off work on Tuesday. It will be a whirlwind trip because they have a friend flying into Seattle on Friday to hang out with them. Our time together has been very relaxed time with them and, as usually, has centered on cooking, food, conversation, reading, and music, not necessarily in that order. Exercise has been on hold for a couple of days which affects all of them, but (shame) me because they all work out at least five days a week while I give lip service to working out five days a week. Is there such a thing as a Fourth of July resolution?
Yesterday, Lorena and Kelly picked 15 pounds of blueberries while I worked on some stuff for my new job and Christian worked on his dissertation research and comprehensives preparation. We spent a lot of time doing similar things growing up so it was very nice and relaxed. As for the blueberries, my understanding is that there will be pie sometime before they get back on the train to head back to Seattle later tonight.
Lorena and I attended the funeral of a young (43) woman we had met as a healthy, engaged wife and mother only six months ago. We met her and her little family at our Wednesday night Bible study and knew here as an engaged, thoughtful person who enjoyed life and loved God. She was diagnosed with cancer only a couple of months ago. She was buried this afternoon. The service was uplifting and hopeful. The day was beautiful and sunny. Our mood is melancholic.
A couple of years after we started our homeschool, I decided I needed to read my Bible more systematically. I had never read the Bible straight through. I decided the only way I would be able to do it was if I kept close track of what I was reading. On February 9, 2006, over eleven years ago, I started at Genesis with the idea that I would read one chapter every day (or a stanza when I got to Psalm 119) by reading through the New Testament two times, then reading through the whole Bible from cover to cover. The goal was to complete this sequence three times, then decide what to do next. I kept the record on the 
The new header I put up (you can still see it 
It is hard to overstate the importance of the little home church with whom we met every Sunday morning for worship and every Wednesday evening for Bible study. The Wednesday meeting was a little smaller with a group 9-10 regulars; the others from Sunday go to a different Bible study. Wednesdays, we meet at our little apartment every other week while another couple, Gary and Debbie, had it at their house the rest of the time. Which ever place we met, everyone would stick around after the study, sometimes and hour and even more, just to talk and be together.
of Angel Food cake, so Debbie made one for us and Jill made her mother-in-law’s famous caramel topping. We all shared this same beautiful table for an evening after meeting when Grandma Conchita and remember that night fondly.