It’s a sunny Sunday morning as you file out of church and head for the coffee. As soon as the first sweet dose of caffeine is imbibed, you look around to see who you might be able to encourage—fully resolved to talk about more than football with someone.

After seeing Dave on his own and engaging in a few minutes of polite small talk with him, you roll out your new post-church question: “Hey, Dave, what’s God been teaching you in your personal Bible reading recently?”

There’s an awkward silence from Dave, who has a slightly embarrassed focus on his shoes. He eventually replies, “To be honest, I’ve never really been very good at reading the Bible on my own. I’d love some tips on how to make it a positive part of my Christian life instead of something I constantly feel guilty about.”

What will you say? What practical advice can you offer to help your brother (or sister) sort out this—I think we’d all agree—pretty core component of a healthy Christian life.

Of course, few of us have it fully sorted, and so we don’t feel qualified to tell others what they should be doing. I certainly don’t feel like I can speak from anything other than the wisdom that comes from regular failure. But failure is a good teacher, even if I’m not a good student, so here are five tips I might give to Dave.

1. Understand you’re not alone in the struggle

Let’s keep it real. Dave will be encouraged to hear he’s not the only one who finds it a challenge. So tell him you’re happy to give him some ideas, but that doesn’t mean you’ve got it completely under control all the time.

2. God loves a cheerful Bible reader

Tip #2 is, of course, a misquote. What the Bible says God loves is actually a “cheerful giver” (2 Cor 9:7). But sadly I think we often come to the two activities—financial giving and Bible reading—with similar attitudes. Our sinful hearts often engage in them out of a sense of duty and legalism instead of seeing the activities themselves as a blessing to be cheerfully enjoyed. Ideally, God’s word is something we “delight” in (Ps 1:1-2), and reading it is not a task that feels onerous.

(To be honest, I think using a Bible-in-a-year type of reading plan doesn’t naturally help with this goal of delighting in God’s word. If you’re anything like me—and I suspect most people are—it won’t be long until you’re reading for the sake of ticking off the day’s readings and keeping on track with your plan. But that’s not to say such plans can’t be useful, and we’ll come back to that shortly.)

More positively, how can we foster that sense of delight as we read God’s word? 

The psalmist says he does this by meditating on it (Ps 1:2). By which I suspect he means reflecting on what he has just learned about God and his amazing provision. In other words, we shouldn’t read the Bible just for the sake of increasing our knowledge, which tends to puff us up (1 Cor 8:1); we should read it to grow in our appreciation for our Creator and Saviour. Stopping to smell the divine roses—and be thankful—at the end of our Bible reading is a really helpful practice.

3. Variety is the spice of life

God wires us all differently, but most of us will do better with a Bible reading practice that changes reasonably frequently. (That’s another reason why I’m not the greatest fan of Bible-in-a-year reading plans that just get you speed reading for long stretches of time.) I reckon mixing things up regularly keeps Bible reading fresher and more interesting.

Fortunately, there are lots of useful ways to engage with the Scriptures, so variety is not that hard to achieve. Why not ask some of your friends from church to share with you any creative methods they use that you could also try and/or recommend to others? But here is my handful of suggestions:

• The Swedish Method is better known as a way to read the Bible with another person or a small group, but using this method on your own is also super helpful, and brings a useful structure and process to your reading. 
• Listening to larger slabs of Scripture being read (while on a walk or doing the ironing) helps you observe things you don’t always notice when reading smaller sections. I really enjoy David Suchet’s brilliantly read audio of the NIV.
• The readings in Matthias Media’s Daily Reading Bibles are designed to take around 15-20 minutes and contain: the full text of the Bible passage for that reading; some questions to get you thinking; some ‘points to ponder’ and some ideas to get you started in prayer.
• For slightly deeper personal study (perhaps not daily), there is no reason why you can’t use small group study guides on your own (e.g. Interactive Bible Studies or Pathway Bible Guides). In addition to thought-provoking questions, they give you a little bit of input too.
• You can use all of the above ideas in conjunction with a Bible reading plan that ensures that over time you are engaging with every part of God’s word (without necessarily feeling bound to follow the plan's strict schedule).
• There’s also nothing wrong with taking a day or two each week to pause your normal regime and take the time to read the passage you’ll be studying in your growth group or that will be preached on by your pastor on Sunday. 

4. Consciously limit your social media and TV time

Social media and TV/streaming platforms work hard to keep you engaged for longer than you intend, so monitor your time and put a daily or weekly limit on them. This is not just good for your mental health, but will also make finding time for Bible reading much easier. Aim to make Bible reading the ‘fixture’ and entertainment media the ‘if I have time’ activity, not the other way around.

5. Ask for help

Primarily, ask for God’s help. Pray that God would help you not just to be disciplined in Bible reading, but to delight in it. 

But you might also ask a friend or multiple friends at church if they want to (independently) follow the same regime as you. Knowing that you might regularly talk to your friend about some of the things you’re concurrently reading might help you all stick at it. 

Or use a simple habit tracking app to motivate you to maintain a long streak of reading the Bible each day. The app I have been using recently is called Habo and it is available for Android and iOS.

In the end, regular personal Bible reading isn’t rocket science, but nor is it entirely instinctive, so keep rolling out that Dave question to those in your church or growth group: “What’s God been teaching you in your personal Bible reading recently?” You’ll either get an encouraging answer or you’ll find a few people who could really do with some help.