Happy Monday! As we reflect on the ways we've grown in our faith over the years, this one practice has changed my faith especially in the last year and a half - Learning to read the scriptures with the heart. This practice has helped me by inviting the Spirit of God to be my guide while reading. To read with both mind and heart isn't something I've practiced in it's fullness. I am still growing in this practice of learning to listen, reflect, pray and be obedient from what I am reading in scripture. “For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” Hebrews 4:12. I learned this practice from a women's small discipleship group with four other ladies from my church. We were reading through the New Testament for a year together and began with this approach of reading with the heart. For example, we would begin with an assigned reading for the week. On the first reading, I’d read it through to get the context and the message of the passage. Then I’d read it through a second time using a New Testament Bible we were given I'd marked it up by highlight any passage that began to speak to me or that I felt was important. Then I’d do a third reading of only the highlighted sections and see if there might had been a phrase or even a word that is rose to the surface in my mind and heart. Usually it will be a very brief phrase or sentence. I’d then memorize that, live with it for the day/week and allow it to form my heart. We would then come the following week with what we had been reading and learning from with our heart to share with group. I continue to learn this practice of reading with the heart. It has opened up a way of listening to hear from God (not what I want to get out of it) as I read changing me along the way. I’m reading with the heart; reading to be transformed by it. To submit to it. To be taught by it. I saw this quote recently on reading with the heart, "we read the Bible with our minds to see the glory of God, and with our hearts to savor the glory of God." Comment below on what simple practice has changed your faith. "that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints." Eph. 1:17-18

Posted by Jenny Young at 2024-01-15 14:06:03 UTC