A Five-Dollar Word To Enhance Your Bible Study

One of the most beneficial things that I took away from college and seminary, in terms of my personal Bible study, is by far the mechanical layout. That’s really just a five-dollar word for “diagram.” It’s a method of diagraming a text so that the main points are excavated and brought to the surface. I think because I’m a visual learner this method helps me a ton. I recently diagrammed a few verses from Psalm 103.  This is a great passage to dissect with a mechanical layout because it’s simple enough for anyone to do, and it’s full of the rich promises of God.  Here was my attempt.

To be completely honest, I usually don’t type it out using fancy arrows and extravagant methods of highlighting, bolding and underlining. I usually just chicken-scratch it into my journal.  But I thought I’d go the extra mile with this example to make it as clear as possible, and so you would think I’m super-spiritual. Just kidding!! But just look how this illustrates all the benefits that the Lord tells us not to forget: 1. He forgives, 2.He heals, 3. He redeems, 4. He crowns, 5. He satisfies.

Such incredibly humbling thoughts!

If you don’t already do some sort of Bible diagraming, I highly recommend it. It will help the text come alive to you in such a fresh way!