My iPod (Part 1)

I am thinking of my history of relationship in Christ, remembering my attempts at a disciplined bible study life and seeing how they compare with my study disciplines in High School. Yes, about the same. Short bursts of motivation mixed with explanations why I did not have enough time to complete the assignment when due. Or worse, who cares about the assignment... we're grading on a curve right? And I know I am better than some of my classmates.....
After a little maturity set in, I did accomplish a few years of "One Year Bible" successes. I remember going from year to year reading The Living Bible, then the NIV, then (because I wanted to say I had done it) the King James Version! I encouraged our High School students one year to read the "One Year New Testament." I liked that... no Old Testament! Ten minutes per night and I was ready for bed.
I also remember a period of pretty strong discipline when I got up at 5:30 AM and used a half hour in the easy chair, studying God's word, meditating on it, then.... snoozing until I had to get to work! I don't know how some people can complete hours of sedentary study and remain alert. And this brings me to a discovery I have made about myself (and I suspect many of you men will relate to this) and a way that has made it possible for me to ingest ten times the scriptural input of my best and most disciplined year. I know you read the title of the blog entry, so let me explain how it happened for me.
My mother is 86 years old and losing her eyesight. As I was wondering what to buy for her for Christmas 2006, I heard an interview on The Bible Answerman with Max McLean, who is the voice behind "The Listeners Bible." I thought, Yes! The perfect gift for my mom. Get her the set of CD's and she can hear the word of God since it is so difficult for her to read it now. Then I realized how dumb I have been. I have known for years about "bible on tape or CD" etc... but you can't always be in your car and lugging around a pack of Cd's would be cumbersome, and staying in one place in the house to listen sounded boring. But, wait! What if I could buy them and install them in my ipod? I take my ipod with me wherever I go. I have 6431 songs on my ipod! I love music and have some way in every room of the house to hook up the ipod. I have each vehicle set up for the ipod, and I have headphones and a case for it when I walk, work, exercise, ride... it can go nearly anywhere as you know. So I bought The Listeners Bible. One for my mom, and one for me. I ripped them into iTunes and loaded them into my ipod and began listening.
To begin with, we were studying Ephesians in the Tuesday morning Men's Bible Study (you are invited by the way...) I created a "Dan's Bible Study" playlist with just Ephesians in it and went to work an hour early (yes, I went back to an early morning discipline) to get non-brain related work done, and listened to the entire book of Ephesians THREE TIMES every day for the weeks that we were in Ephesians! I was amazed at how the nuances of scripture would come out after weeks of hearing it over and over. And I haven't fallen asleep once!
After Ephesians we studied Romans. Did you know that you can listen to the entire book of Romans in only one hour? I love Romans. I love it so much that in my lifetime I must have read the entire book 40 times. Guess how many times I was able to hear Romans since moving to the ipod? More than 100 times!!! Since Romans we have gone on to Revelation. The scary book. The one that is intimidating and controversial. I can listen to Revelation in 1.1 hours and have listened to it every day in its entirety since the day we began the study. I have been encouraged (thank you Rob McConnell!) in the past to read one chapter of Proverbs every day. There are 31 chapters, so it is an excellent discipline to pick up. Now I listen to three a day after Revelation. If today is the 25th, I listen to chapter 25, 26, and 27. There is so much beauty in God's word that only becomes available to your mind when you expose your mind to it.
Without preaching, let me encourage you to recognize something. For many (most?) of us men, our ears have much more time than our hands. Driving, physical labor, resting. Those three activities allow your ears to accept tremendous amounts of input from God's word. Consider it.
PS. There is an awesome New Testament available now called The Word Of Promise. It is done in radio theater and uses true professional actors (Jim Caviezel is Jesus) in a first class production. I acquired five sets last Christmas for friends, myself, and family. I now alternate every other day between it and The Listeners Bible. So, Listen Up!!!