Christian Living Bible Reading Plans

 Here is the Bible Reading Plan for Christian Living.  They have 31 verses.

There are two versions.  One version is based on verses from 1 & 2 Thessalonians.  The other is verses from the Bible, using 1 & 2 Thessalonians as a foundational Guide

Download the 1 & 2 Thessalonians Bible Reading Plan PDF here.

Download the Biblical Look Bible Reading Plan PDF here.

Here is a Scripture Verse Writing Sheet I created.

Download the Scripture Verse Writing Sheet PDF here.

View the 1 & 2 Thessalonians Bible Reading Plan.

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Bible Reading Plan for 1 & 2 Thessalonians

 Here is the Bible Reading Plan for the month of March I created.  It is 31 verses from the books of 1 & 2 Thessalonians.

Download the Bible Reading Plan PDF here.

Here is another Scripture Verse Writing Sheet I created.

Download the Scripture Verse Writing Sheet PDF here.

View the reading plans for Christian Living.

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Visit this YouTube Playlist I created to help you with your study of 1 & 2 Thessalonians.

Galatians 2:20 (Phone Lock Screens)

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Galatians 2:20 (1080x1080)

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The Holy Spirit is the Book of Acts

The Holy Spirit is a major character in the book of Acts.  He is seen in every aspect of the book.  He moves in and out of the lives of the people of the book.  I would venture to say that He is the narrator of the book.

As I wrote the affirmations for the book of Acts, the Holy Spirit is a part of 24 of them.  I can even say that I could have probably written a lot more of them.

The Holy Spirit made everything possible.  Luke, the author of Acts makes this abundantly clear.  He tells of so many instances when the Holy Spirit made things possible.

The introduction of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost is magnificent.  Luke gives us a vivid sensory experience as he describes how the Holy Spirit came upon the first believers.  To experience feel how the people who heard them speaking in tongues felt gave me goosebumps.  Peter’s speech solidifies the Holy Spirit’s work.

What impressed me most about the first experience of the Holy Spirit was that it created a unity between the first believers that I do not think we will ever see again.  They were willing to be together all the time and share all that they had with each other.  For the Holy Spirit to usher in a moment like this; it was an amazing way to show us how powerful the gift Jesus left for us before His ascension was remarkably astounding indeed.

The Holy Spirit moved in power.  He has amazing power and did amazing things with this power.  He sent people places.  He directed people how to preach and minister. He performed signs and wonders.  And amazingly, we have this same power in us because of the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit guided the early church.  He systematically told the people where to preach and teach.  The Lord said, “…you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth…,” and the Holy Spirit made this possible.  He put the right people in the right places at the right time to deliver the right Word for the right moment.  He does this in and for us today.  He does His job well.

I was taught that the focus of receiving the Holy Spirit was speaking in tongues, but as I began to learn more about the Holy Spirit, I see that emphasis of the Holy Spirit is giving us power to live a holy life, as we work for the Lord to build the Kingdom of God.

According to the Britannica website, a narrator is “one who tells a story. …the narrator determines the story’s point of view. If the narrator is a full participant in the story’s action, the narrative is said to be in the first person. A story told by a narrator who is not a character in the story is a third-person narrative.”  The Holy Spirit is indeed a full participant in the book, therefore making this story a first-person point of view narration.  The Holy Spirit determined the point of view of the story… It is His point of view as the important influence and strength of the church, the early believers, and the building of the Kingdom of God.

I am so glad that the Holy Spirit directed Luke to put Him front and center as the narrator and major being, personality, and character of the book of Acts.

Reading the Book of Acts

Reading the book of Acts was interesting and eye opening.  While I have read verses and passages from the book of Acts before, I had never read it all the way through.  Doing this, help me get a full glimpse of the church and how it started.  It let me see the turmoil of the church and the turmoil of the first believers of Christ.

I must say, I have a better perspective of what it was like to be a believer.  It was hard.  At times, I feel like it is hard to be a believer in this day and age because of how people feel about church and believers, but in all honesty, it is not as bad for me as it was for the early Christians.  Compared to them, I have it easy.

Reading the book of Acts help me see that conflict in the church is not anything new.  I am not sure how I feel about that.  To know that we have probably gotten worse with handling church conflict in this modern era.  As one pastor alluded to… the early Christians could not just leave a church and go to another church down the street.  They had to stay where they were.

Seeing how the first believers worked together to build churches and help get the Word of God out was exciting.  It was enjoyable to see so many people wanting to be a help to Paul and his mission.  I did hate to see the fall out between Paul and Barnabas.  That one hurt my heart.  I felt like they were a great team.  But, I understand that at times, you have to move on.

Paul and Barnabas parting ways helped me to see that you can move on when it is time to move on.  This is one of the things I have struggled with in my own Christian walk.  I have been at churches and with people who made the strong case that if you left a church or no longer wanted to fellowship with people from the church, you were sinning.  I know for a fact, I have stayed at a church too long for this reason, to my spiritual detriment, as well as stayed friends with people for too long, to my mental and psychological damage.  I understand now, when it is time to move, you need to move.

I am somewhat ashamed to say that I never knew this happened between Paul and Barnabas.  I knew of their relationship and how excellent Barnabas was as an encourager, but I never heard a sermon on how they ended up parting ways.

Probably, the most interesting thing to see was that the apostle Paul was the first multi campus pastor.  His ministry crossed continents and oceans.  It has been said that he traveled around 10,000 miles to more than 40 cities, sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  That is pretty marvelous.

We see the letters he wrote that are included in the Bible.  It would be interesting to see what other letters he wrote to his flocks.

It was wonderful to understand the history of the church and to see how it parallels to today’s church.  Understanding how the first believers learned, grew, worked, and helped build the kingdom inspired me to be better.

Reading Through the Book of Acts (My Writer’s Perspective)

As a writer, I look at the things written in the Bible through my writer’s eye to help me understand how things were written.  As an English professor, I teach my students that they must look at all aspects of a reading to understand it.  I feel that the Bible is no different.

I enjoyed reading the book of Acts.  It was a great story.

Luke was a good storyteller.  I do feel like some details were omitted from the book.  I understand time constraints and things like that.  The book of Acts could easily be a book series that details Paul’s travels.

There were so many good elements to the stories.  There were great characters who you could get invested in.  The protagonist, Paul, the apostle was introduced in an exhilarating way.  He story was well-developed and he changed in the story.  His story arc was good.  Peter, the Apostle’s story was interwoven in an exceptional way that help us see him in contrast to Paul.  There were so many supporting characters that were written in a way that you grew to love them in the short time that you got to know them.

I am making a special note about the Holy Spirit as a character in the story.  I could even venture to say that He is the narrator of the story.  He is the most important character in the story because He helped everyone in the story operate in a way that moved the building and establishing of the first church along.  He directed the people, the movement, the actions, the moments in a way that no other character could have done.  I would venture to say, if there was no Holy Spirit in Acts, then there would be no Book of Acts.  Huber L. Drumwright, Jr. writes in THE HOLY SPIRIT IN THE BOOK OF ACTS, “a recognition of the unusual importance of the Holy Spirit in Acts is completely justified… “The full title of the book of Acts is The Acts of the Apostles. That title could equally well read The Acts of the Holy Spirit.” ”  This statement rings true to me.

The settings of the stories were interesting and exciting.  There was not much world building in the story, but because the places in the story were real places, the places gave a frame of reference.  There were lots of repeats of the places in the story.

The conflict in the stories were varied and exciting.  There was light violence, internal struggles, fall outs between friends, battles with nature, spiritual warfare, and tussles with political figures.  There was much conflict to move the stories.

There was so much suspense and drama. There were a couple of times where we could ask, “Are they going to make it?”  We could ask, “What is going to happen next?”  Of course, with all the conflict in the stories, there was plenty of drama to go around.

The dialogue in the book was enjoyable.  I do feel like more dialogue could have been added, but that is just me.  Each character had a unique voice.  They were different, sounded different, and had a view point of their own.

There was death in the book.  Sadness came with the first death in the book.  It was an amazing scene that caused us to feel for the character who died.

There was a natural story arc that flowed from beginning to end.  The plot was well defined.  There was a useful story structure.

There was a clear narrative voice that directed the story from scene to scene.

There was one central theme through out the entire book – the Holy Spirit operating to move the progress of the church forward.

The ending left me wanting more.  We get a sense of the end of Paul’s life, but his death is not mentioned.  I would have liked to have seen that.

I read it along side a dramatized version of the Bible on YouTube, which made the reading more exciting.

My favorite characters were Barnabas and Tabitha.  I feel like I match those two characters best in my walk with Christ.  My favorite conflict was when Paul called out Peter for being hypocritical when the Jews came to visit in Antioch.  Paul called Peter by his government name.  This was a great story.

The Bible has so many genres of writing in it.  It is an amazing book.  Looking at it as a writer always makes me appreciate the Word of God more.