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An important part of good Bible reading is simply knowing where you are at in the overall storyline of Scripture.

Losing your place in the story will lead to misinterpretation, misapplication, or both. It’s like picking up a novel or a biography and reading randomly: you’ll likely find something interesting, even edifying, but if you don’t know what’s come already and where this is going, you’ll be confused.

So as I read Bible stories with my kids, I’ve been trying to remember to ask them where we are at in the big-picture storyline (e.g., simple questions like, Is this the Old Testament or New Testament? Before the Flood or after? The time of Abraham or the time of Moses? Before the exile or after?)

One helpful guide along these lines is the outline for George Guthrie’s Read the Bible for Life Chronological Reading Plan (PDF). I’ve outlined it below:

Act 1: God’s Plan for All People

  • Creation: The God of All of Life
  • Fall: Rejecting God’s Vision for Life
  • Flood: God Judges and Makes a Covenant to Preserve Life

Act 2: God’s Covenant People

  • The People: God Calls a Covenant People
  • Deliverance: God Rescues His People
  • Covenant and Law: God Embraces and Instructs His People
  • The Land: God’s Place for His People
  • Kings and Prophets: God Shapes a Kingdom People
  • Kings and Prophets II: God Divides the Kingdom People
  • Kings and Prophets III: The Southern Kingdom as God’s People
  • Exile: God Disciplines His People
  • Return: God Delivers His People Again

Act 3: God’s New Covenant People

  • Christ’s Coming: God’s True King Arrives
  • Christ’s Ministry: God’s True King Manifests His Kingdom
  • Christ’s Deliverance of His People: God’s Work through the Death, Resurrection, and Enthronement of His King
  • Christ’s Church: God’s People Advance the Kingdom
  • Christ’s Second Coming and Reign: God’s Future for the Kingdom

For other tools along these lines, see the following posts using Graeme Goldsworthy’s material:

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