Read the Bible in a Year

Fast Facts

• There are 1189 chapters in the Bible. Therefore, you can read it in a year if you read 3¼ chapters every day.

  If you read just three chapters each day, you can finish the Bible in 400 days. If you read four chapters each day, you can finish the Bible in 300 days.

• There are 260 chapters in the New Testament, so you can read it in less than nine months if you read just one chapter every day.

• There are 929 chapters in the Old Testament, so you can read it in less than ten months if you read three chapters every day.

• There are about 31,000 verses and 774,000 words in the Bible.

  Some Bible-reading plans have you read about 80 verses per day, instead of splitting up the reading into chapters. This requires more detailed record-keeping than I'm willing to do.

• To read the Bible in one year should require only 15-20 minutes per day.

  There are at least two different audio versions of the Bible that consist of 72 hours of speech. This implies that you could read the Bible in 72 hours (or three days) if you read it straight through. However, much of the Bible is difficult to read, because of boring lists of names, mysterious prophecies, or challenges to one's lifestyle. Nevertheless, it is theoretically possible to read 16 chapters per hour; or said another way, it is possible to read one chapter in about 3½ minutes. This jives well with my own typical speed of about 5 minutes per chapter. At this speed, it would require only 20 minutes to read a daily dose of four chapters, and only 15 minutes to read three chapters.

• 93% of Americans own at least one Bible, and 80% claim to be Christians. 18% of born-again Christians say they read the Bible every day, while another 55% read it less often than daily but at least weekly; 23% do not read it at all.

  While these figures might look either good or bad to you, Americans in general are quite ignorant of the Bible, whether they claim to read it or not. Reading the Bible through in a year will not make you an expert, but it will clue you in to all the basic facts you need to know.