The American Bible Society issues an annual State of the Bible each year. The title of the 2022 survey statistics caught my eye. The study reported that roughly 26 million Americans had mostly, or completely stopped reading the Bible regularly during COVID-19. This made me sad. It says to me for one reason or another, Americans who used to read the Bible have decided they would no longer do so. The reason may be because we are busier than ever. It may be because reading the Bible takes much time, and we don’t have time for that. It may be because something happened to us during the pandemic, and the Bible is no longer relevant. It may be because in this stage of life, we have accepted it is okay to be lazy. Whatever are the reasons, 26 million have said, in one way or another, it no longer makes sense to read the Bible.
As interesting as that may be, I find another metric to be even more interesting. The American Bible Society also produces something called Scripture Engagement. ABS defines it as “consistent interaction with the Bible that shapes a person’s choices and transforms their relationships with God, self, and others”. This metric is interesting to me because this is the one I am watching closely. Whether or not Americans are reading the Bible is important, but it is far more important to me whether or not we are looking to the Bible before we make decisions. It says to me the Bible is relevant, or not relevant to us. Unfortunately, I have nothing good to report on the current Scripture Engagement in America. Only 49 million of Americans were Scripturally engaged in 2022, down from 64 million in 2021 and 71 million in 2020.
Why is it important to read the Bible? Why have you personally continued to read the Bible in your life? We know that the Bible is the Word of God. But what does that matter? Why must we read the Bible? More importantly, are you Scripturally engaged? This Sunday, we are talking about why reading the Bible made it on the short list of spiritual disciplines. Let’s come and think together why it is so very important for us to read our Bibles daily. What if there were no Bible, or there were the Bible but we won’t read it? Let’s encourage each other, while it is Today, to increase in our Scriptural engagement, and let our Bible reading transform our relationships with God, and others.
Your Friend
Alvin