For 18 months, I did not read the Bible. I listened to it on a Bible audio app. I wanted to experience the Word like someone sitting in a home meeting 2,000 years ago when a letter from Paul was read to the small group gathered. Not everyone present in those meetings was literate. No one had Bibles. I wanted to hear the Word without input from commentaries, word studies, and people’s opinions on how to interpret what I was hearing. It was a challenge to hear through the deafness created by my own history and biases.  I wanted to receive a raw and pure transmission of truth. 

At first, I struggled not holding and reading the familiar leather-bound Bible I had grown so familiar with over the years. After a few days, something changed. I awoke each morning and discovered a hunger to hear Scripture with new ears. In some ways, it was like I was hearing the truth for the first time.  

I remember the day the Lord told me the season of just listening to the Word was finished. I left those 18 months knowing something had shifted in my heart, yet, to be honest, I could not tell you what it was. I have returned to reading Scripture, but now I read it aloud. There is something about the sound of God’s Word entering the environment of our home that is creating a fresh visitation of God’s Spirit. 

The Lord is asking many of us to entertain different ways to experience our faith for the new season that is unfolding. This is not just about how we receive the Word. It is about all the things we have assumed. Something new is afoot. A reset is taking place. All our assumptions are up for examination. None of what is taking place will compromise the core of truth, but it will make the parts of our lives that have been enslaved by a religious spirit nervous and uneasy, and that is a good thing.