My Bible Reading Posture - Reading Formative Text

Reading slowly was my own nature: sentence by sentence, word by word, and syllable by syllable. Sometimes I repeated a sentence by chewing it into phrases, as well as extracting keywords from a phrase and looking them up in a dictionary for objective definitions; therefore, hopefully to grab the author’s original intention and meaning of those chosen words that were being put together in a sentence. Later on in life, I learn that speed reading is essential in order to capture as much information as possible within a short period of time. Should I quickly read all materials regardless of their natures?

After reading “In Bed with Word” by Daniel Coleman, instead of skim reading all materials, I need to discern informative and formative articles: only to skim read informative text such as office letters, but to slow down a bit when reading formative text such as the Holy Bible – chewing on the words until they get down to my heart/guts, similar to what Eugene Peterson wrote in “Eat This Book”.

Formative text is for absorption, rather than extraction; therefore, my Bible reading posture should allow expectancy with an open mind that is willing to be challenged, and a softened heart that is ready to be transformed: longing for connection with God, the author, and the world to nurture my humility while swinging gently along with the rhythm of a pendulum oscillating between Biblical hermeneutics and Holy Spirit’s guidance, never particularly looking for affirmations to support my preoccupied perception. Certainly, it is not about to acquire knowledge to boost up personal superiority.