7 Complete Readings of the Bible (and Prayer and Fasting)

As I continue on in my goal to read the Bible complete 7 times (I've done 4), I often find myself scrounging around for an approach - any kind of approach - that is effective for learning the Bible in a study way. I am continually reminded that the Bible doesn't give up its understanding easily. And the usual study approaches all fall into a sort of micro-focus that loses the whole. So I remember that the goal to read the Bible 7 times is a result of this experience. Just take it in. This gives you the whole (if you are getting it). Systematic theology and Biblical theology (and Historical theology) are the disciplines to see the parts in relation to the whole. But it takes the complete readings, unfiltered by your inner Editor, Vanity, and your inner Censor, Worldly Pride (and your inner Contradictor, Self-Will) to get your arms around the whole and have the whole in you.

Having said the above I think a practical approach beyond the complete readings and the theological study (both of which gives a picture of the whole) is this:

(1) For a closer doctrinal study from the Bible itself focus a close study solely on the Book of Romans. It is the Constitution of Christianity; the Christian Manifesto; the Cathedral of the Christian Faith.

(2) For memorization focus on Spiritual Warfare related verses and passages relating to your standing in the Kingdom, your faith, what your faith rests on, what protects you, what you have as a believer, what gives you direction; verses and passages as armor and weapons against assautls from the forces of darkness, against illusion, against temptation, against fear, against your own ignorance; for in the flesh, in the world, and also in the spiritual realms, now and when you die. For the Way, and the battle until the goal is attained.

(3) For the 'higher visual language' aspect of the Bible just meditate on and draw completely into mind (and even list) each complete story, each scene of importance, each symbol, each parable, etc. Even each person, place, thing, event and idea in terms of their deeper and higher meaning they carry in the their place in the Book of books as a whole.

This ongoing goal of reading the Bible 7 times complete is the type of goal that forms a pure arc in time above all other efforts, which can be, of necessity, scattered and less focused (though potentially effective nevertheless). Prayer and fasting being the other two primary efforts that must be consistent in time and, rather than forming an arc over time, they must form one's boundary as a microcosmos. They have real meaning for what they are in plain, biblical language, and must be performed as that, but they are also the Two Conscious Shocks. When you know what the Two Conscious Shocks are from Work knowledge and Work effort and experience (self-remembering and non-identifying for duration, depth, and frequency to accumulate energy and to contain that energy at the critical, difficult interval) then you know what prayer and fasting are at a higher level. It adds to the plain level and doesn't do away with the plain level. Prayer and fasting require a daily and weekly discipline.