Journaling has an innately spiritual connotation to it. I think introspection is considered a spiritual exercise. If you do a search for spiritual journaling you will get responses covering all faiths and philosophies, so because I am Christian I will refer to my practice of journaling for spiritual benefit as “Bible Journaling” because that is my sacred text and what I base my spirituality on.
From my own experience Christians do not read their Bible like they should (and even admit this) due to the exercise being dull and seemingly a chore. I have to admit that growing up I felt I had a good grasp of the Bible and the idea of just sitting down and reading it for “pleasure” actually seemed like torture. I already knew all the “good parts” (the Bible stories) so I felt I knew the Bible. When I took the Bible Knowledge entrance exam at Bible college, I realized I didn’t know nearly as much as I thought I did, and was very embarrassed about that. However, Bible college was not the place to learn the joy of reading the Bible, because very quickly it became a textbook. I was so busy gathering head knowledge to pass exams and write papers, I didn’t learn or have the time to let it become heart knowledge.
In college they stressed personal devotions, probably because they knew that the Bible often becomes little more than a textbook while pursuing these theological studies. It wasn’t until I received a Woman’s Devotional Bible and started applying five simple questions a mentor gave me to my daily readings that I began to actually glean things and enjoy the daily exercise. When I started interacting with what I was reading, it became meaningful and memorable to me.
Most of us do not have the knowledge within ourselves to discover joy in Bible reading. I guess this was why Christ emphasized discipleship — those who have been taught need to turn around and teach those coming after them. Face it, the spiritual things of God do not come naturally to us. That is why He gave us the Bible. Sadly, in the churches I’m familiar with the basics such as Bible reading, study and prayer are not being taught. Sure, there are Sunday School classes, Bible studies and sermons each week that tell people what they should believe about the Bible, but very little teaching is being done to help people learn what the Bible says for themselves. The honest truth is that it is EASIER to simply present a lesson that teaches people what to believe. It takes dedication of time, and investment of yourself, to sit down and help a person learn to study the Bible for themselves and get something out of it — kind of like raising a child. Hmmm….
Another huge obstacle for people is time constraints. Many people feel they don’t have the time to devote to Bible reading or study. One of the main reasons for that is everyone pushing at them the “read thru the Bible in a year” plans. Those are fine for people who have the time and inclination to pursue them. However, most people are intimidated by the fact of reading through four chapters every day. When a child begins to crawl, we don’t immediately pick them up an insist they start training for a marathon, do we? NO! You have to start out simply and slowly and work up to something like that. The child must crawl, then walk with faultering steps two or three at a time, then they work on running, etc. But we take inexperienced Christians and expect them to jump into a marathon with two feet, then look down on them when they fall by the wayside around February.
Let’s start out simply. Take an index card and write out the three questions I will list below. Use that card as a bookmark in the Bible you will do your daily reading in. Get a notebook and a good pen to keep with your Bible. Each day, at a time that works best for you, find a quiet place to sit and read through the daily readings I provide below. Record in your notebook the answers to the questions given. They are the same questions for everyday. Different passages will reveal different answers. If you can’t find an answer to a question from a passage, don’t despair. You won’t always. There is no way to come up with three questions that will always apply. But most times they will. Be sure to stop by and let me know how it is going for you!
Journaling Questions:
1) What facts do you find about God?
This question applies to Jesus and the Holy Spirit as well. They are all God, just different aspects of God. This question applies to any names of God, characteristics, behavior, attributes, relational, etc.
2) What facts do you find about man?
What does the Bible teach about man? How is he portrayed? Do you have examples and evidences of this from your own life?
3) What verse stands out to you and why?
Write out this verse on an index card and carry it with you to meditate on through the day. Come back at the end of the day and write any experiences/insights you gain from thinking and praying about this verse.
The questions should serve to trigger your memory about the explanations I give beneath them. You might have to include the explanations as you start this practice, but later can have just a card with the questions as you establish the habit.
Be careful to only list facts and insights that can be directly supported from the passage you are dealing with. A common practice is to take a fact from the passage and springboard into application, because this is frequently done for us by our pastors on Sunday morning. However, hours of study and prayer went into the message the pastor is giving you. It is extremely dangerous to simply read through a passage and formulate an entire sermon around it in five minutes. Starting out you may need to have someone look over your insights and help you pick out what is fact (or observation) and what is springboarding into application without full counsel of scripture.
I recommend that you only read a few verses each day — like one paragraph. Most modern translations will break up passages in paragraph form, and old King James Bibles will have a little paragraph symbol by the verse number to indicate the start of a new paragraph. The symbol looks like a capital “P” with an extra line in it.
Some might think — so few verses? It is better to read five verses a day and get something out of it than to read four chapters and walk away not remembering what you read. Far better than not reading anything at all. Start small. You can always add more later.
I also recommend that you start out with only five daily readings. You might ask, shouldn’t I be reading every day? Well, I suggest that you have two days free in case you miss a day or otherwise get behind on your reading through the week. Also, having two days open allows you the time to REVIEW what you read and wrote the week before. Face it, we don’t have total recall. In order to get more out of our Bible reading we need to take time periodically to review what we read and what God revealed to us. Reading it again at the end of the week when things are still fresh is the best time because it helps “seal it away.” Then in a few weeks you should review again. Each time you review it will be reinforced and it will begin to transfer from short-term memory into long-term.
Weekly Review:
Take the time to read over the previous week’s entries and answer these questions –
1) How faithful was I in doing each day’s reading? How can I improve?
2) What particularly stood out to me in my readings and insights this week?
3) How has scripture helped me in my day-to-day living this week?
4) What one thing stands out that I should share with someone else? Who are they and how will I share it?
5) Focus on the one verse that stood out to you each day. Read them together. Do you gain new insights? Does something jump out and grab you? What is it? What do you think God is trying to impress on you?
PRAYER
One major item that is overlooked or undervalued is prayer. Before you sit down to read your Bible you should pray. What difference does this make? It’s the difference between turning on an appliance that is plugged into the electricity and one that isn’t. Praying helps “plug” you into your power source. It also helps you get in the right mindset to approach scripture and be open to the leading and instruction of the Spirit. My personal practice is to do a simple prayer that gets me in the mood, do my reading, and then do my serious praying. I do this because I have just stocked up on God’s Word and now the Spirit has some ammunition to use in my own mind and heart as I approach God.
Pattern of Prayer
I came across a simple acrostic in college that helped my prayer life. It was A-C-T-S. After awhile I added an “L” to it, because that is one of the most neglected aspects of prayer. I will explain the acrostic:
A = adoration: praising God for who He is. Notice I said praising God for who He is, not what He does. Praising God for what He does is selfish and the focus is on what you get from Him. It is important for us to focus on who God is, and that helps challenge us to live better lives, because with God as the standard we realizing how far we fall short. Focus on the names of God, His characteristics.
C= confession: admitting your shortcomings and putting them behind you. There is something liberating about confessing your sins and shortcomings. You allow God to give you that ‘squeaky-clean’ feeling again. He is ready to forgive if we will simply ask. But, we have to be sincere. Repentence means a change of heart. When we confess our sins we need to completely intend to not do it again, to change what needs to be changed to keep from doing it again. Sometimes we need to ask others to help us with this.
T= thanksgiving: thanking God for what He has done and will do. How often do we thank God for those good things He does for us, for those answers to prayer that we get? I also recommend picking out five specific things each day, preferably that happened that day, to thank Him for. They don’t have to be profound. In fact, start out with the little things you take for granted every day — food, clothing, shelter, etc.
S= supplication: making requests of God. If you have properly gone through the first three steps, your perspective should be in line with God’s mind when you come before Him for requests. I have had many people ask me why they don’t get answers to their prayers, or don’t get the answer they wanted. Simply, it wasn’t God’s will. We only have the promise of getting what we ask for when we ask according to God’s will (1 John 5:14,15) Whatever we ask for, we need to offset with “thy will be done” just like Jesus’ example in the garden (Luke 22:41-43)
L= listening: being still and letting God speak to you. We are supposed to have a relationship with God. Have you ever had a relationship with someone you never took the time to listen to? We are quick to go to prayer and do all the talking, but how often do we stop, sit quietly, meditate on God and listen for His still, small voice? Sit quietly, thinking on God — who He is — and the thoughts that come unbidden to your mind, jot those down. In my experience He has almost always spoke to me in snippets of verses or complete passages of scripture, which is why being in His Word daily is important. If you don’t have much familiarity with His Word, there won’t be much for the Spirit to draw upon to give you a message for your day.
I do recommend keeping these notations in a journal and also reviewing them on a regular basis. Leave a few lines so you can go back and jot down the answers to the requests you made. Go back and see how God’s messages impacted your life over time. Do the devotional questions in the morning, and try the prayer journaling in the evening — bookending your day with God.
I would love to hear your experiences with these methods!
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