As a Christian, reading the Bible a few times a week is something I do. It's not the kind of book that you read cover to cover. To read it thoughtfully, it's better to have a system to guide you through the many different books of various genres. I prefer digital bibles to print, and there are phone apps, but the most popular one, simply called "Bible" (by Youversion) is overproduced for my taste, and I can't stand Bible Gateway's ads. I've tried various Bible reading plans over the years, but found them about as flexible as a granite tablet. So, in January this year, I decided to take matters into my own hands. What followed was a delightful descent into spreadsheet madness and creative CSV manipulation.
First, I had some non-negotiables. I wanted to read through the Bible over four years (many plans cover the bible in one year, which is a bit too heavy for me). Each year should feature one of the four Gospel books - timed so that the chapter recounting Jesus' resurrection was read on Easter Sunday. I wanted a mix of Old and New Testament every year, preferably with some thematic connections to each other. Oh, and I wanted the Psalms sprinkled throughout, specifically on Sundays, because nothing says "day of rest" like ancient Hebrew poetry.
I decided to see how well ChatGPT would create a plan according to my specifications, because I'm always checking on the limits and capabilities of Gen AI. However, it was not helpful. Could be because I refuse to pay for premium so I'm roughing it with the dumb version. Attention to detail was poor, despite the quality of my prompts. It missed out on books while duplicating others, and kept grouping Ruth and Esther despite them being very different books from different sections of the bible. The one thing they have in common is a female main character *side-eyes sexist training data*. Rather than struggle with AI, I decided if I wanted a job done well, I should do it myself. (Which is pretty much my philosophy with GenAI - only outsource tasks where mediocrity is fine). Thankfully, I had more fun doing it manually anyway.
So here's where it gets nerdy. I meticulously cataloged every book's word count, chapter count, and verse count and put it into a Google Sheet. Did you know that 2 Corinthians has 4,477 words (or thereabouts, depending on translation) spread across 257 verses? Neither did I, until this project. I assigned books by year, and made a Pivot table to crunch the numbers and ensure each year had a balanced reading load. The end result looks like this:
| Year | Old Testament | New Testament |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Psalms 1-42 | Matthew, Acts |
| 2 | Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, Job, Psalms 43-82, Isaiah | Mark, Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, 1 Thessalonians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon |
| 3 | 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel, 1 Kings, 2 Kings, Psalms 83-118, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi | Luke, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians |
| 4 | 1 Chronicles, 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Psalms 119-150, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel | John, Hebrews, James, 1 Peter, 2 Peter, 1 John, 2 John, 3 John, Jude, Revelation |
I discovered Bible Reading Plan Generator. Great customization features here, allowing you to choose start and end dates for a plan, select books, and export them to a CSV file. Unfortunately, it insists on going through books in a traditional order, which wasn't going to work for my carefully crafted year-by-year book selection. So, I got creative.
I generated five separate reading plans:
Then came the CSV surgery. In Excel, I merged the Sunday plan into each year, re-sorted by date, and did a bit of manual re-arranging so that the gospel readings were at the right time of year to culminate in gospel narratives for Holy week and Easter. I had created the Bible reading plan equivalent of Frankenstein's monster.
It's important to note this plan just tells you what chapter to read each day - it doesn't display the text itself. I originally imagined a solution that would include the actual reading as well, so it's a one-stop-shop. I did consider coding my own app for this, but this is still outside my skill set. So I settled for something more out-of-the box and imported the files into the task management app, Todoist. This gave me a way of tracking my reading, and features like streaks, notifications, and syncing across devices. The way tasks are presented in a timeline also provides the flexibility to fall behind or race ahead without it becoming a problem - which suits me better than a daily feed style of content delivery.
There were some technical things to overcome. To fit within Todoist’s limit of 300 tasks per folder, I imported each year separately, which worked since I scheduled about five readings a week. Also, the way I had formatted the date column DD/MM/YYYY meant that 5th of January was imported as May 1st, etc. For the first time in Excel history, the format: "Wednesday, 1 January 2025" was actually the best choice. So after a bit of trial and error, 4 years worth of daily readings were successfully imported.
I've included the CSVs here, in Todoist's import structre:
Is this overkill? Absolutely. Could I have just used a pre-made reading plan? I suppose. But where's the fun in that? Plus, now I have a reading plan that's perfectly tailored to my preferences, with a balanced diet of law, gospels, history, poetry, prophecy, and early church drama spread across four manageable years.
Developing this into a shareable app is something I'd like to explore in the future. Now I have a CSV, there are probably some pretty easy options to expand it. In my travels I discovered Gracious Tech - whose philosophy is a combination of open-source punk and Christian non-profit, a niche blend that I am 100% here for. They have some nice open source bible apps, including Track Bible - which I am using on my phone, and complements the little system I've got going on. Exploring existing apps and building my own could be a good learning activity for me in the future. But sometimes you have to know when to stop organizing how you're going to read the bible and actually start reading it.
The results so far have been good. I haven't fallen behind yet, though it is only February of year one. However, the fact that I designed the plan myself gives me a feeling of ownership and I'm having more fun than I would using someone else's plan. This is one example of how technology can enhance rather than replace meaningful traditions. For me, it is authentic to blend technology and problem solving into my spiritual practice.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some reading to do. Today's task list tells me I'm due for my Sunday Psalm.