I receive updates on research related to culture, international affairs, and spiritual trends several times a year. I am usually “source-critical” in my own thinking because I want to connect sources & agendas before I read the research. This was my favorite–a comment about research that wasn’t promoted to sell a product or pursue a published course. I was listening to a man who had worked previously in an organization that conducted regular research on spiritual trends and outcomes. But what he said was enormously important.

His claim was this: you can track a number of different efforts, programs, emphases, or patterns of instruction, and each produces a singular benefit. ONE pattern, however, produces healthy results in ALL areas of a person’s spiritual life. One habit, one practice raises the temperature on a person’s ethics, their willingness to talk about their faith, their financial health, and their personal maturing in faith. What habit? Consistent personal Bible reading affects every aspect of growing the soul.

If you read the Gospels, you get to know Jesus well. If you read the letters, you are exposed to a steady diet of coaching on relationships, theology, moral choices, repentance, and the need for every person to experience the grace of Jesus. As you do that, your awareness of spiritual need grows. Your love for other people grows. Your depth of courage and conviction grows. Your understanding of the fellowship of faith (church) grows. If you just invest regular time to expose your heart to the Scripture, the Holy Spirit speaks through that, works through that, and exerts leadership through that to transform the human heart.

That’s what happened in my own life so many years ago. I received a new Bible when I was an 8th grader, so every night I started reading the Gospel of Matthew. And that led to a genuine movement of repentance as I entered high school, created a hunger for the Lord that led into my college days, and shaped my relationships, future, career, and view of the world. It transformed my life.

So are you involved in a consistent pattern of opening God’s Word?