Most Christians read anywhere from a couple of Bible verses to a couple of chapters of the Bible in one sitting. This method allows us to look at the details of the Bible passage, understand what the passage means, and apply it to our lives.
There is another way to read the Bible to help you understand God’s Word in a more complete way.
You can read one book of the Bible in one sitting.
Advantages to Reading One Bible Book in One Sitting
There are many advantages to reading one Bible book in one sitting.
You can keep track of characters and the plot.
If you are reading a narrative book like Ruth, Esther, or Mark, you will be able to keep track of who people are. When a person is mentioned in one chapter and then not again for a couple chapters later, you will still have the person fresh in your mind. You can notice character development as well and how God changed the person’s life or how he resisted God’s call for his life.
You can notice themes more easily.
This applies to any literary genre represented in the Bible. If you read the book of John or 1 John in one sitting, you will notice how often he uses the word love or light. In the book of Proverbs, you will notice wisdom and folly and how the terms are used throughout the book. In 1 Corinthians, you will notice the theme of unity.
You will read more of the Bible than you would otherwise.
Most Bible reading plans call for smaller portions and there certainly is a time and a place for that. But if you are hungry for more of God’s Word, than this is one way to get it!
You will read the books of the Bible how they were originally intended to be read.
This is especially true of the epistles like 1 and 2 Peter or Galatians. Can you imagine getting a long-awaited letter in the mail from the Apostle Paul and then only reading a little bit at a time over the course of many weeks? The first readers of the letter would have devoured it all at once! I can more easily put myself in the shoes of the first readers when I read an epistle all at once, too.
Creative Ways to Read One Bible Book in One Sitting
While you could simply pick up one book of the Bible on your own and just start reading, there are creative ways to utilize this method of Bible reading.
Michelle Morin from Living Our Days is doing this with a friend through the book of James. James has five chapters. They will get together 5 times. Each time they will read through the entire book out loud then will discuss one of the chapters.
Pastor John MacArthur reads through one New Testament book in one sitting every day for 30 days. If you are interested in trying this plan out, Sarah Beals at Joyfilled Days has created a chart to keep track of this Immersion Bible reading plan. She thoughtfully organized the chart from shortest book to longest book.
Doesn’t this take a long time?
You may be thinking…one book in one sitting? Doesn’t that take forever?
It doesn’t take as long as you think.
Here is chart that tells you how many minutes it takes to read each Bible book.
You could also use an audio version of the Bible in your car or in your kitchen for the same benefits.
Have you ever read through one book in one sitting? What did you learn from the experience? Comment below!
Keep track of your Bible reading with the no-stress, no-pressure Bible reading record chart. Free printable! Get yours here.
Excellent tips! I have read through many books of the Bible in one sitting and I’m always pleasantly surprised by how much I get out of it that I don’t when reading it in snippets. I’m sharing this post!
Awesome! That’s great! and thanks for sharing.
I like to combine the two methods. I’ll read the whole book at once (or in 2 days) for the big picture, then go back and spend time in each paragraph to get the details. The overview helps me keep the details in context.
That’s a great idea!
Hello there! I hope this comment finds you well!
Thank you so much for putting this article together. It was really helpful! I stumbled across your website from google searching “How to become biblically literate” (lol). As you can tell, I am searching that because it is a desire of mine to learn more in efforts to understand more. One reoccurring way to accomplish bible literacy that I keep seeing come up on various sites, is just by simply reading the Bible & understanding context.
Now, with your encouragement in reading the Bible in one sitting.. My honest question that I need help with, is in what way is that helpful?! I love the idea that it helps you read the Bible faster (I’ve read all of NT, not all of OT) so I’m all for it, however I hesitate with the thought of how I’ll be able to remember a large portion of the book in one sitting like that. Wouldn’t it be difficult to understand/comprehend what you’ve read when you can (speaking for myself lol) barely even retain or memorize whole books at once in that way?! I hope my question makes sense.
I truly want to grow in my learning & understanding of the Bible so that I may deepen my relationship with God, grow stronger in my ability to contend for the faith, & be confident in why I believe what I believe. Please help!
Welcome Christina! I am so glad you found me here! I am so excited for you as you work to understand the Bible more. Thank you for your question! I think that reading a book of the Bible in one sitting is especially helpful in books that are narrative or story so that you can see continuity in the story or characters in the book. Just like if you watched a compelling movie for days on end just watching 10 minutes at a time each day you would forget things like “who was that character again?” or “what is the purpose of this person’s adventure?”. So that you can see the overarching story line and themes and character development it would be best to watch the whole movie all in one sitting and in the same way you get the whole story all at once when you read one Bible book all in one sitting. This would work for the Gospels or Ruth or Nehemiah or Esther. It would take a long time to read Genesis or 1 Kings in one sitting, but maybe one thing to do would be to read large chunks in one sitting like all of the chapters of Genesis that talk about Joseph (Genesis 37-50) or all the parts that talk about King Hezekiah (2 Kings 18-20) in one sitting. So in some ways I think it would be easier to retain Joseph’s life and what happens to him when you do read it all in one sitting since it’ll play like a movie in your head rather than bits and pieces of a story you heard over many days, if that makes sense.
So the purpose of reading in one sitting is not to memorize all the facts or the details, but to get the overarching story.
That being said, don’t feel bad if you can’t do books all in one sitting. It’s just a suggestion that helped me out. Like you said, the most important things is reading it and understanding the context. If you have questions along the way, don’t hesitate to ask! I’ll do what I can to help. You can message me on any social media or email me at rachelschmoyerwrites@gmail.com