Bear with me here, this one's going to be short, mostly because I left my window open and I'm disgusted by the fact there's more pollen on my laptop than on my car.
But, what's the big deal with study Bibles? The only thing I see in them that might make them better than my leather-bound non-study Bible is the random historical tidbits and translational flukes they point out.
Wait, my leather-bound non-study Bible has them too--granted, not as many of them, but they're there.
And, you know, I bet I can get around my humble NIV faster than any super Christian can with his eighty pound BPV (that's Back-Problem Version in case you're unfamiliar with the translation).
I'll go out on a limb and say it doesn't have anything to do with my 6-point-font handwriting either.
I will concede however that I do write in my Bible. It's my freakin' textbook, as written by Dr. I AM and compiled by people with varying degrees of spirituality, like Moses, David, Isaiah, etc. By the way, I am a college student, so notetaking is my thing dawg.
And notetake, I do.
Does it surprise you to hear I've got this color-coded system that uses a variety of simple symbols to explain to me what I'm learning?
Yeah, green brackets around a verse indicate that verse at one point or another spoke to me, and meant something truly profound or encouraging.
Green corner brackets help keep a set of verses together in my mind, as in a specific concept that does not make sense broken into the numeric verses.
Green underlining means I better reread that verse and see if I'm applying the underlined part to my life as well as possible.
A green box means I better shut up and listen.
A green exclamation mark usually means a light bulb just turned on, and the concept I understood was so huge, it made me shout something out loud. Green exclamation marks usually make my cheeks hurt from smiling too.
The next most common color is blue. It follows the same hierarchy green does, with brackets, underlining, boxes, and exclamation marks.
Blue anything means someone taught something from this in a way I wouldn't think of, and so I should probably look at the passage with a more open mind than I normally would, or that I should ask myself if I can apply this concept to other overall Biblical themes to learn something new and insightful.
Purple arrows in the center margin always point to a verse that straight up screams Jesus. This is only a recent undertaking, but even so, I am always astonished how much of the New Testament I see in the Old.
Purple notes tend to bring stuff down to my level.
Red arrows mostly point out a verse I find useful for various reasons, like whenever someone asks what to do about a sick relative or friend. There is however a section I notated in 2 Peter that I cannot figure out why I have all these red arrows in the right margin.
On the rare occasion there are actual words written next to something, dude, that's when a passage clicked in a way that sheds light on how I should read everything else in the Bible.
Some verses are multi-colored and notated.
Then of course, the words of Christ are in red. Great idea, whoever thought of that.
I don't know where I'd be without my Bible. Lost, most likely.
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