I have to admit, I struggle habitually reading my scriptures.  Depending on my calling at the time, I can get into a great routine—or not.  I remember praying for some major help in setting up a failsafe plan and I suddenly found myself teaching Gospel Doctrine.  Yikes! You get what you ask for!  But the results of the dedication I took on myself was indescribable and precious to me now.  I gained another testimony of Christ to tack onto my existing one.

I’ve heard a lot of people say the reason why they don’t read the scriptures is because they don’t understand them.  Yea! I belong to that club.  And if you read merely by faith you tend to glaze over the words and not get anything out of the time you wasted (did I say that?) reading them in the first place.  Been there!

I was doing my visiting teaching one day when the sister asked me what I thought a passage in the scriptures meant.  I panicked, ‘cause I didn’t know.  I told her I would ask my husband and get back with her.  Years later, in a RS lesson, the teacher asked a question about a doctrine found in the scriptures.  Then she said, “And don’t you dare go home and ask your husband for the answer.  Find out for yourself”.  I remembered my earlier experience and promised myself things were going to change.  And they have.  Some people don’t appreciate this, but now I have an opinion about everything.

I’m going to tell you the secret to reading your scriptures.  Just remember you heard it here.  You have to have questions.  Do you want to learn something specific?  Do you wonder why?  Whatever happened to so and so?  Why is this important?  What does this mean?  How can I understand this better?  How does this involve me?  Keep going…

When you have an interest in something, it becomes personal and scriptures need to become personal with every single one of us.  If you set out to answer your questions by reading the scriptures, going to a religion class, or even just reading Sunday lessons, you will figure out how to gather the information provided through that beloved Topical Guide and footnotes, and here’s the biggie—the Holy Ghost will teach you the rest.  It’s really true.  I have spent years rereading random passages that didn’t mean a dang thing to me until I did some research, ran into these passages and POW.  I giggle every time I come across them now, because of my memory of discovery.  I love the scriptures because those passages keep piling up and now I’m giggling through all five books.

I still admit to an irregular routine.  I still nod off occasionally when I’m reading straight through.  I still have loads of mysterious passages to uncover.  But I also find my thoughts occasionally wander to a favorite passage or story out of the blue when I need it most.