2026 - A year in Psalms and Proverbs
Time spent each day dedicated to connecting with God devotionally, no matter the format, pleases the Lord because God desires relationship with us. This pleasing the Lord is not a response to get on the good side of God or to win favour. This pleasing the Lord is more family like - 1 John 4:8 tells us that God is love. The love of God is sometimes described as that of a father and child or of a married couple. These relationships are intimate. Intimacy takes time to build. So it requires us to spend time – daily if possible – with those we love.
Isaiah 55 records God’s Word like rain that waters the earth, producing life. May reading the Bible bring life to each of us, like rain for our souls! And like daily bread where John 6 says “Truly, truly, I tell you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but it is My Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” “Sir,” they said, “give us this bread at all times.” Jesus answered, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to Me will never hunger, and whoever believes in Me will never thirst.’
Even more prescriptively, according to Psalm 119: 9-11, studying the Bible helps us to live a life that pleases God, worthy of our identity in Christ. Matthew 4:4 reminds us that God’s Word is spiritually life giving, only God’s Word can truly satisfy spiritual hunger. Colossians 3:16 encourages us to be ready to share God’s Word. James 1:22-25 commands us to be doers of the Word. Joshua 1:8 calls us to mediate up the Word, and devotionally receive the scriptures. And Hebrews 4:12 reminds us that the Bible is transformative, revealing hidden motives and intentions that we have in our hearts as the light shines, calling us to live holy lives that ultimately bring us closer to God.
While in Bible College, we were assigned readings. Known as the Goldsworthy Trilogy, reading Gospel and Wisdom focused my heart for a semester on what is termed Wisdom Literature - Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Job. Goldsworthy uses the lens of Jesus as the key to understanding what wisdom is, unpacking examples in Proverbs, Job and Ecclesiastes as ‘the perception of order’, ‘the hiddenness of order’ and ‘the confusion of order’. This book is readily available to purchase, but for me 25 years ago, it was my first deep dive into a specific genre of the scriptures, and that experience helped to shape my appreciation of slower meditation upon the Word.
Our 2026 Bible Reading Plan is focused on Psalms and Proverbs, with passages listed to read each week, meaning that you can schedule in across the week your reading and reflection. The idea of this Bible Reading Plan is to spend significant in a more focused way, so that we might deepen our appreciation of the Psalms and Proverbs.