You know a key activity of Iowa Seed Sowers is giving away Bibles.
Its God's word that people need to hear. A preacher recently said that the diet of the church needs to be the word of God, but so much of what is being shared in the church today is man's wisdom and pop-psychology.
I was taught that 3 things are going on when we share the gospel with the lost, and of the 3 things going on, we have 1 job to do. Our job is to deliver the truth from the scriptures, speaking the truth in love. The Holy Spirit's job is to use the word of God to convict the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment (John 16: 7-11). He's very good at His job, by the way!. The the lost person's job then is to respond by belief or by unbelief, one of the two. So, giving away Bibles is a great way to do our job!
Romans 10:17
"So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God."
Sometimes people ask me about how to read the Bible. That's not always an easy answer, because people come from different backgrounds, have different levels of spiritual maturity or experience with the Bible. I highly recommend a chronological approach to Bible reading, because it gives the "big picture" of God's work through history, and makes the Bible make more sense. That's why we offer the "Creation to Christ" Bible study (in the cross-column header above). And I firmly believe that verse-by-verse teaching through the word of God is critical to build healthy Christians and healthy churches. But I also believe we should be diligent to personally read God's word daily, letting the Holy Spirit teach us day-by-day so we can grow in Christ and discern truth from error.
I don't know about you, but I need to plan, or the busy-ness of the day or my own laziness will sap all my time. We plan for what time we have to be at work, when we need to be home for supper, etc. A disciple of Jesus Christ needs to discipline himself to do the needful things, and reading the Bible daily is one of those things.
So I put a copy of the Bible Reading Plan I use up in the cross-column header (above), if you'd like to use it for your daily reading. It will take you through the Old Testament once in a year, and through the New Testament and Psalms twice. In the picture above (left), you can see a copy of this plan that I used from 2012-2016. I couldn't figure out how to mark it up any more and keep reusing it, so I started a new copy in 2017.
To use it, click on the header above and download the file. Print it out using the "1-Sided to 2-Sided" format on a printer or a copying machine, and then you can fold it up and paperclip it to the inside of your Bible, like I do. Its pretty handy, and works very well for me. There are a ton of other Bible Reading plans you can find on the internet. I just thought I'd share this one, and I hope it's an encouragement to you. Maranatha!
