- Thank you for coming tonight. It means a lot that you'd come and listen to a talk on a Thursday evening about how to read a book. I'm guessing I don't need to get your attention 'cause you're interested, you're here. So the title of this address is the title of one of my forthcoming books, How to Read a Book, Advice for Christian Readers.

That book should release in March 2024 with Canon Press and in this talk, my goal is to just sketch the basic outline of that book and it's gonna be painful to pass over a lot of interesting anecdotes and illustrations and fuller explanations along the way but I trust you'll get the gist of the book.

Now when you see that title, you probably have the same question that so many people have had when I told them I wrote a book called How to Read a Book and the question is, didn't Mortimer Adler write a book by that title? So there's the book. Yes, it's called How to Read a Book, the Classic Guide to Intelligent Reading.

So then the next question is, how does your book differ from that book? Well first off, book titles are not copyrighted so I'm safe there. Adler's book is an influential book and rightly so. Curious, how many of you have read that book? Like the whole thing? Wow, okay, a lot of people own the book but they actually read it, that's good.

So we have a literate crowd here. I'm indebted to Mortimer Adler. I don't intend for my book to replace his but my book differs with his in at least seven ways. So one is it's written by a Christian. Mortimer Adler did not write as a Christian. He wrote as a pagan philosopher when he wrote this book.

And second, my book is specifically for Christians. That's why the subtitle of my book is Advice for Christian Readers. Third, my book is broader in scope than Adler's book. So my book is about not just reading only to increase understanding, which is Adler's focus. I'm also talking about reading for pleasure which Adler almost makes fun of.

Four, my book is more accessible than Adler's book. You can see in his title, the subtitle, The Classic Guide to Intelligent Reading. You get a little bit of a whiff there of his, you call it a higher culture approach. He has a disdain a little bit for those who don't share his taste for a higher culture.

And number five, I'm a little bit, a lot a bit more concise than Adler. His book is 426 pages long and 120 of that is how to read specific styles of literature like how to read mathematics or how to read philosophy or science or social science. And I don't get into that kind of detail.

And seven, my book's more personal. So he sounds like an old school professor who when he writes avoids using the personal pronoun, I or me, no personal stories, very old school professor with patches on his elbow type, which is interesting, but I don't think it's as interesting as you could be.

And then seven, I think my book's more relevant. His book first released in 1940, 1940. And then he updated it with Charles Van Doren in 1972. So even the update is over 50 years old, 50 years. So that was 35 years before the first iPhone released in 2007. And readers today have new challenges and questions and I attempt to address those in my book.

So there's, that question's out of the way. You guys were probably wondering that. Well, there you go. And in this talk going forward, I'm gonna share a lot of lists. Don't feel like you have to write them all down. It's all in the book. I'm giving you the gist of it so you can just kind of absorb it.

Book's coming out in March, 2024. So here we go. When people ask me what I do for a living, sometimes my answer is I teach people how to read. And that means I'm teaching adults how to read carefully. So I'm teaching pastors how to read theology well. As a pastor, I teach people how to read the Bible well.

And reading is something that everyone can get better at. And my aim in this talk is to help you get better at reading, to take your reading to the next level. So here's the plan. We'll explore how to read a book by answering four main questions. First is why should you read?

And I'm gonna start here 'cause it's pointless to talk about reading and aspects of reading if you're not convinced it's worth doing. Second, how should you read? And this is where we often get stuck when it comes to reading. We learn the basics of reading, but don't learn how to take it to the next level.

Third, what should you read? Of the amount of reading material available, you can read only a very, very tiny sliver of it. And then finally, when should you read? And I'll try to help you strategize how to prioritize quality reading, and then when we're done, we'll pause and do some Q&A as long as they'll let us, and then we'll break for the evening.

So let's begin with that first question. Why should you read? You should read for at least three reasons. The first is read to live. What does that mean? I'm thinking what Jesus writes in John 6. He says, "The words that I have spoken to you "are spirit and are life." Life.

So the most fundamental reason you should read is that you need God's words to truly live. This is why Christians value reading so highly. Second, read to grow. So read not merely to survive, but read to grow, to learn, and develop, and mature. So the main reason to read is not so that you can remember facts.

You'll probably forget most of what you read, and that shouldn't be discouraging. I had a professor who would tell his students, "I've forgotten more than you'll ever know," and he was probably right. The cash value of reading is not whether you can remember information. The benefit of reading is that you grow.

It's like the food that you eat and drink. Do you remember every single piece of food and liquid that you have consumed? Of course not. But that doesn't mean that it's all been lacking in value because you can't remember it. It's helped keep you alive. And reading is like that.

God can use reading to help you grow, and it can help you grow in at least six areas. One is intellectually. You can mature intellectually. You can increase in how you understand what's true. And second, reading can help you mature in how you see reality. So a good book can function like time machines that they take you to far off places and different cultures and different times, even fantastical ones.

And the more time you spend in good books, the larger your view of God's world will be, and thus the more accurate your view of reality will be. Third, reading can help you mature spiritually. So you can increasingly bear the fruit of the spirit by reading sound teaching and stories, and you can be better prepared to suffer when trouble comes.

Fourth, reading can help you mature emotionally. You can learn more about human moods and mindsets by reading good stories and proverbs and poems and studies. And fifth, reading can help you mature in how you communicate. So you can learn to communicate more clearly and concisely and colorfully by reading master communicators.

And then six, reading can help you mature in particular aspects of your vocation. So you can learn more facts or techniques or testimonies that can help you improve how you do what God has called you to do, whether that's serving in a household or a church or a society or a nation.

So that's the second reason, read to grow. Third reason is read to enjoy. So you shouldn't read a book so that you can check it off your list as I've read that book, and then broadcast it to other people, I've read that book. God invented reading for you so you can enjoy it in a way that honors him.

And you enjoy God by enjoying his gifts, or you can think of it this way, reading is a gift from God. So rather than spurn the gift, I actually honor God by enjoying the gift he gave me. And what we like to call this at Bethlehem Calvin Seminary is serious joy.

Read with serious joy. So that's why you should read, those three reasons, to live, to grow, and to enjoy. But do you know how to read skillfully? Question two, how should you read? We'll spend the most time on this second question. How should you read? So I'm gonna propose seven guidelines for how to read skillfully.

And the first one is the most important, and that's to read carefully. What does that mean? To read carefully is to interpret a text by analyzing what the author of that text intended to communicate by his words. So let's break down careful reading into five parts. It's goal, reason, means, method, and need.

So the goal of reading, of careful reading, is to understand what the author meant. Understanding a text presupposes that the text means what the author meant, and our goal is to discover what a text's author meant to communicate through his written words. The reason for careful reading is the golden rule.

You must love your neighbor as yourself. So follow that golden rule. Interpret others as you would like them to interpret you. Do you want people to twist your words and say that you meant to communicate something you really didn't mean to communicate? You would hate that. So don't do that to other people.

A text's meaning is something you discover. It's not something you create. The means of careful reading is to look at the fish. How many of you know what I mean by that? Okay, yeah, you've been around Bethlehem for a while. Okay, so it's an essay from 1879 called The Student, the Fish, and Agassiz.

So a student of natural history recounts how his professor taught him to look carefully, and the professor began with this unusual assignment. He pulled a fish out of a jar that contained specimen in yellow alcohol, and he asked the student to look at that fish with his naked eye.

About 10 minutes later, the student thought, "I've looked enough." But the professor told him to keep looking for hours. The professor kept checking in with the student. "Do you see it yet?" He kept exhorting, "Look, look, look at the fish." And he kept this up, not just for hours, but for three long days.

And the student looked at that fish from every possible angle. He felt the inside of the fish and the outside of the fish. He drew the fish with pencil on paper, and that helped him see even more details. And he didn't realize that there was so much to see, so much he had overlooked the first time when he'd spent 10 minutes superficially looking at the fish.

So that's how to read carefully. Look, look, look. Then the method of careful reading is to discover what and how the author is communicating. That is, trace how the author argues. Mortimer Adler calls this coming to terms with the author. Does what you understand a text to mean, does that match what the author intended to communicate?

So Gene Vaith summarizes the basic forms of literature in three categories, nonfiction, fiction, and poetry. He says that nonfiction is the art of truth-telling. Fiction is the art of storytelling. Poetry is the art of singing. And you can make an argument with all three styles of literature. And when a book does make an argument, it's crucial to trace how the author is arguing.

And to trace the argument, you need to understand at least two fundamental concepts, how logic works, and how propositions relate to each other. And that's all I'm gonna say about that, but just those two little bits, we could have another three-hour lecture on just that. There's a lot there.

And then finally here, the need. The need for careful reading is that it is a prerequisite to observe, understand, evaluate, feel, apply, and express. Careful reading is crucial for educating students. John Piper describes education as instilling six habits of mind and heart. So here's my paraphrase. I notice in this figure how the six habits build on one another.

The first is observe, and that's foundational. Observe accurately and thoroughly. So are you seeing what's actually there in the text? And then you build on that by understanding. You understand what you observe clearly. Are you perceiving what the author intended to communicate? And then you evaluate what you've understood fairly.

Is it true and valuable? And then you feel that evaluation in an intense way, intensely and proportionately. So are your emotions in accord with the truth and worth of what you have observed and understood and evaluated? Paul says to abhor what is evil, cling to what is good. So you should be loving what God loves and hating what God hates.

And then five, apply your discoveries to all of life wisely and helpfully. This answers the question, so what? Why does this matter? And then finally, express your discoveries compellingly. Can you communicate what you have observed and understood and evaluated and felt and applied in a way that others can know and enjoy that accuracy and clarity and truth and value and helpfulness?

So that first guideline about how to read is read carefully. The second guideline can revolutionize how you read. It's kind of like the difference between riding a one-speed bicycle and riding a multi-speed bicycle, or even riding a motorcycle. And that's this, read at different levels. My mentor, D.A. Carson, trained me to read at different levels, and I've adapted a system that works well for me.

I'll share it with you. I read at three different levels, and those levels correspond to the famous advice from the philosopher Francis Bacon. Here's what he said. "Some books are to be tasted, "others to be swallowed, "some few to be chewed and digested. "That is, some books are to be read only in parts, "others to be read, but not curiously, "and some few to be read wholly "and with diligence and attention." Those three levels line up with what I call survey, macro-read, and micro-read.

Tasted, read only in part, that's survey. Swallowed, read but not curiously, that's macro-read. And then chewed and digested, read wholly, with diligence and attention, that's micro-read. So, let me define quickly these terms. Survey means you quickly and efficiently size up a book without reading every word. I'll say more about that in a moment.

Macro-read is you read every word, but you move quickly to get the big picture. And then micro-read, you rigorously observe, understand, and evaluate what you read, and there are various levels to that. Most people, when they read a book, they think that micro-read is the only speed to go.

It's the only kind of reading. And that's why some people don't read very much, and if they don't like the book, they get stuck, and then they stop reading. And further, let me give you some analogies for these three. You could think surveying is like a helicopter, macro-reading is like a bus ride, and micro-reading is like a bike walk or an excavation.

Or, the cooking metaphor, surveying is like a microwave, macro-reading is like an oven, and micro-read is like a Crock-Pot or a smoker. Is that okay, Jenny? I didn't check that with you, okay. We're good. Okay, so it may be more helpful to refer to these three levels as layers, and the reason is that the three levels are not distinct kinds of reading, but they're cumulative layers.

So, surveying is the foundational layer, macro-reading includes and builds on surveying, and then micro-reading builds on surveying and macro-reading. So, surveying is the broadest, most general layer of reading, and then micro-reading is the narrowest, most specific layer. So, I'm gonna say a few things about each of these. I'll start with surveying.

Surveying is quickly and efficiently sizing up a book without reading every word. So, it's learning as much as you can from a book in a short amount of time. And some people think this doesn't count as reading, it's not worth doing, they don't think it's valuable. So, let me make the case.

I think this is a valuable skill for at least five reasons. One is it helps you quickly evaluate a book. So, you can ask questions like, who's the author? What's the book's genre? What's it about? What's its thesis? Does the author seem competent? Does the book seem important? Is it interesting?

So, when I require my students to survey books for my courses, I specify how long they should spend with a particular resource. Like, I might say spend at least 30 minutes with this 300-page book. Why am I doing that? I'm trying to train them to read at different levels and I'm introducing them to outstanding tools.

I don't expect them to master that book in 30 minutes, but I wanna introduce them to a tool so they're more likely to use it in the future. Second reason it's valuable, it helps you determine whether you should purchase a book so that you have access to it later.

And you probably already do this on Amazon when you check the search inside feature. Third, surveying is a valuable skill because it helps you pre-read a challenging book so that you're prepared to macro-read or micro-read it. Kinda know what the argument is. You can x-ray the book. Where are we going?

What's the thesis? And then four, it's helpful to determine whether you should stop reading a book. Some of you need this gift I'm about to give you. Your conscience is condemning you for not completing books. You don't have to finish a book. If it's a bad book, put it away.

Read a better book. You're welcome. And number five, surveying is a valuable skill because it helps you determine whether you should macro-read or micro-read a book. That's surveying. Now, say a few things about these other two. Macro-reading, again, this is, if surveying is quickly and efficiently sizing up a book without reading every word, macro-reading includes and builds on that by reading every word, but you move quickly to get the big picture.

And you can do this by listening to an audio book at a normal speed. I listen to a lot of books that way. You can move along. Third, micro-reading is when you rigorously, rigorously observe, understand, and evaluate what you read. So surveying is fast. Macro-reading takes much longer. Micro-reading takes the longest.

Micro-reading is the most active reading 'cause you're rigorously tracing the argument and marking up the text. So that's a third, that's a second guideline is to read at different levels. Third guideline, how you should read, is to read systematically, read systematically. This refers not to how you read any one book in isolation, but to how you read books in relation to each other.

And there are four aspects to reading systematically. You analyze. You analyze a book when you carefully read it, either surveying, macro-reading, or micro-reading. Then diversify. You diversify by reading other books, so books on the same topic, books on different topics, books upholding the same perspective and different ones, books in the same genre and different ones.

And then you compare. You compare by noting how various books are similar and dissimilar, and then you synthesize. You synthesize by perceiving how various books interrelate and integrate. So categorizing arguments and approaches is what I'm talking about here. You show how they relate to each other. Reading systematically is reading comprehensively.

It requires penetrating insight that's both deep and broad. It's the most demanding type of reading, because doing it well requires the ability to think deeply and understand concepts and perceptively make connections and draw conclusions. It's hard, and it's wonderful. Here's an illustration of one way I did this recently.

In 2020 and 2021, I became increasingly concerned that our culture was so rapidly making sin look normal and righteousness seem strange. And I attempted to make sense of it by reading systematically, which resulted in my writing an article about it, 10 resources that have helped me make sense of our current culture and how Christians are responding to it.

Read a lot more than those 10, but I picked 10 of the most helpful. So that's guideline three. Guideline four is read repeatedly. And I'm speaking about great works. Read great works more than once. And don't you already know this to be the case? Would any of you ever say, I don't need to read Romans again.

I've already read it once. That's preposterous. We know that great literature requires multiple readings, and you can read it regularly for the rest of your life and never plumb the depths of it. So if you read classic literature in junior high and high school, as some of you are doing right now, I know some of you in here who are doing that, does that mean it would be a waste of time to read some of those same books again in college literature courses?

Would you say, oh, I don't need to read that again. I already read that in high school. I read that in junior high. No, the books should get better with each reading if they're great books. And since you should be a more mature person each time you read a book, each reading should be more profitable and pleasurable, at least for the greatest literature.

Guideline five, read without distractions. The most prominent distractions today are gadgets like smartphones and tablets and computers and televisions. People are addicted to screens. Some of you are checking your screens right now. So don't be distractible like Doug the dog, the golden retriever in the Pixar movie Up, who gets so easily distracted that at any moment he may snap his head and exclaim, squirrel.

In order to read well, you've gotta be able to focus. And focusing means you gotta put aside distractions. So here are four suggestions to do that. One, turn off notifications on your devices, your computer, tablet, phone, et cetera. Just turn 'em off, keep 'em off. Two, don't incessantly check your email or text messages or social media or whatever else distracts you.

Three, schedule blocks of time to read and treat those blocks of time as do not disturb appointments. And four, say no to spending most of your free time watching videos or shows or scrolling social media for eye candy in the form of entertaining pictures and memes and short videos.

In short, train yourself to develop habits that cultivate a taste that prefers reading good books. Guideline six, read with eyes to see and ears to hear. Jesus rebuked the Pharisees for failing to read with eyes to see and ears to hear. What does it mean to read with eyes to see and ears to hear?

It means to truly understand. Read to truly understand. That means you should read with a heart posture to faithfully obey God and not rebel against him. Sometimes we assume that a guy doesn't understand the truth because he's not thinking hard enough or because he's not smart enough. But the reason may actually be that he's watching shows with sexually charged nudity in them.

That's why it's so important to read with a heart posture that is submitting to God and that is not rebelling against him. Guideline seven, read with serious joy. That phrase may sound like an oxymoron, but it's not. To read with serious joy is to read with thoroughgoing, wholehearted, energetic joy.

I'm following C.S. Lewis here. He says that a serious reader is not a solemn reader in the sense of an unsmiling, long-faced, but thoroughgoing. Instead of that, he calls it, this is a quote from him, it's thoroughgoing, wholehearted, and energetic. It's genuine, it's resolute, it's earnest. That's how we should read.

And I should qualify that reading for pleasure doesn't always mean reading without challenge. We like to do things with challenge, like hiking up a tall mountain. That's hard, and it's rewarding and enjoyable. And reading can be like that. Read a great book to stretch you. So that's how to read, seven guidelines.

But you won't be putting your skills to good use if you're reading the wrong book. So that leads to question three, what should you read? So here are seven quick recommendations what to read. Obviously the first one is, read the book by the author of life. God wrote a book.

God wrote a book. Reading the Bible matters more than everything else you read combined. Prioritize reading God's words over man's words every single day. Make it automatic. Recommendation two, read what helps you be vigilant about your character and doctrine. So here are three specific examples of how God has used writings to help me be vigilant about how I live.

One, meditating on specific passages of scripture helps me focus on the type of character that God esteems. Two, outside the Bible, the stories that have most formed my character by far are the Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis. And I'm not embarrassed to say that. I still listen to those.

I've lost count. It's 50, 100, 150, I don't know. It's a lot. I started when I was a kid, and I haven't stopped. Here's an example. When everyone around you is believing lies, what you need is the smell of burnt marsh wiggle. And if you don't know what I'm talking about, you need to read The Silver Chair.

Third example, the years 2020 and 2021 were unusually difficult for many leaders, including pastors and professors in America. And some leaders wilted under emotional pressure from highly reactive people in the midst of tensions about politics, ethnic partiality, the infectious COVID-19 disease, and government lockdowns, and mask mandates, and vaccinations, and intolerant demands growing from expressive individualism.

Sorry if I'm bringing back bad memories for you all. During this turmoil, I read a book called The Failure of Nerve by Edwin Friedman. Not a Christian. I was astounded with his common grace insights about leadership that applied directly to parents and pastors and professors. I learned that good leaders are stable and sober-minded.

Good leaders don't anxiously react to highly reactive people by hurting the whole group to adapt to the least mature members of the group. Good leaders don't let criticism ruin them. Good leaders recognize that criticism comes with the territory of good leadership. That was helpful, that was really helpful. Reading books can help you in that way.

Here's a third recommendation, what to read. Read what helps you excel at what God has called you to do. So if you're a Christian, God has called you to be a faithful church member. If you're a male, God has called you to be a faithful man, son, brother, husband, father, grandfather.

If you're female, God's called you to be a faithful woman, daughter, sister, wife, mother, grandmother. God has called individuals to do various jobs, paid and unpaid. God has called us to all kinds of worthy vocations. So read what helps you excel at what God has called you to do.

Suggestion, or recommendation four, is read what helps you better understand reality. Better understanding reality helps you better understand and worship God. So here are three overlapping categories of books that can help you better understand reality. Great books, stories about history, and fiction. So I'll say something briefly about each of these.

First, great books. The category great books typically refers to classics, like Plato's Republic. So classic books have earned their privileged position by proving to generations that they're top quality. Does everything in the classics align with what the Bible teaches? Not even close, if you read the Greek myths. So every non-inspired book we read requires discernment.

In such cases, as Augustine argues, Christians may glean from the classics similar to how the Egyptians, excuse me, how the Israelites plundered the Egyptians to decorate the tabernacle. Great books can help you mature, to develop stable, sober-mindedness. Great books can help stress test what you believe by subjecting you to contrary ideas and by helping you form deep-rooted convictions about reality.

That's why my daughters are reading books in the Integrated Humanities or Omnibus courses from Logos Online School. It's why the Bethlehem College features Omnia, an extended academic core. Bethlehem College refers to our strategy as great books in light of the greatest book for the sake of the Great Commission.

So that's great books. And then stories about history. This is my favorite way to learn history. It's so much more interesting to learn about key names and dates and events in the context of a gripping story that makes it feel like you know the main characters. And then fiction.

I quit reading fiction in college and graduate school so that I could focus on exegesis and theology. And that was a mistake. I'm looking at the Comptons right there. We were part of the same church for a bit and our pastor, Mike Bulmore, whom we dearly love, he was in my home and we were sharing a meal or something and he said, "Hey, so Andy, what fiction are you reading?" I was a PhD student at the time and I kind of, I don't have time for fiction.

I thought that was a good answer, that he would be pleased with me. And he said, "Oh, Andy." And he gave me a gentle rebuke and I took it to heart. You need fiction. Why? Reading good fiction is valuable for at least three reasons. One, it helps you better understand God and God's creation, particularly human nature.

Second, good fiction engages your mind and imagination and emotions in a way that nonfiction doesn't. And third, good fiction is a gift from God for us to enjoy and we should treasure God by enjoying his gifts. So read what helps you better understand reality. That's the fourth recommendation. Number five, read what you wholesomely enjoy.

The type of reading I'm describing here is pure leisure. It's reading for pleasure, reading for joy. It's what Alan Jacobs calls reading at whim, W-H-I-M. In C.S. Lewis's The Screwtape Letters, the senior demon Screwtape rebukes his apprentice Wormwood. He says, "You first of all allowed the patient "to read a book he really enjoyed because he enjoyed it "and not in order to make clever remarks about it "to his new friends." He's showing how that's a satanic device.

Satan and his demons don't want you to read what you wholesomely enjoy. Recommendation six, read what models outstanding writing. If you want to write well, then read outstanding writers. And recommendation seven, read what people you respect and trust recommend. There's just too many reading options for one person to filter.

It's much wiser to work as a team and learn from the reading recommendations of people you respect and trust. So those are why, how, and what you should read. There's one last practical question to ask, and that's when should you read? The short answer to that is read whenever you can.

And I put an asterisk there. Read whenever you responsibly can. So here are seven tips for making reading part of your routine. Number one, start small. It's better to read something good, something good, than to read nothing at all. Even if that means you're starting with just five minutes a day.

So you may not be able to run a marathon today, but could you walk around a track one time? Just walk? So start small, gradually go further as your endurance increases. Tip two, plan what to read. Develop a feasible reading plan. Don't worry about getting it perfect. You can tweak it along the way.

But having a plan is better than having no plan. So here are four suggestions to help you plan what to read. First, follow a Bible reading plan. And don't worry about getting behind. What matters most is that you're constantly feeding on God's word. And second, plan to diversify your reading.

So various time periods, old and new, diverse styles of literature. Read multiple books at a time. Have a handful of options, like a weighty theological book, like Calvin's Institutes. An accessible devotional, like J.I. Packer's Knowing God. Some fiction my daughter would like, maybe Victor Hugo's Les Mis. A biography, like Ian Murray on Martin Lloyd-Jones.

A current event book, current events book, like say Thomas Sowell on race and economics. One of those books may strike you as particularly appealing at different times of the day. So it's good to have different options. And then plan to study a particular topic. You may decide to study a portion of scripture in depth.

Or you may want to study an influential and destructive ideology, like critical theory, or the prosperity gospel. So that's tip number two, plan what to read. Tip three, listen to audio books. Some of you are tissing right now. You're a purist. You're a purist, and you say, "An audio book doesn't count as reading." And my reply to that is, that's nonsense.

It's merely a different kind of reading, in which someone else is reading aloud. Audio books are awesome. I love 'em. And I would like you to love them too. So here are 11 benefits of audio books. I'll go fast. I'm serious, I'm gonna prove it. Number one, audio books are convenient when it would be difficult to read a print book.

And I'm cutting out paragraphs under each one of these statements. Audio books are convenient to store, convenient to transport, can be easier, can be easier to understand and remember. They're an incredible deal. Okay, let me say something about that. An audio book enables you to listen to a professional read aloud to you at any time you want, at any speed and volume, that you can adjust along the way.

How cool is that? Six, audio books can be delightful. My favorite reader is Jim Dale. He brilliantly narrates the Harry, not narrates, he performs the Harry Potter books. My second favorite reader is Andy Serkis, who masterfully performs Tolkien's The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. He's the actor who plays Gollum in the movies, which is one thing the movies got just right.

Seven, the audio books give your eyes a break. Eight, audio books can be a better option than reading with your eyes, especially for books you wanna macro read. Like, I like audio books for listening to biographies and histories and novels. Nine, audio books can helpfully supplement certain books with your eyes.

I love to listen to the Bible. 10, audio books can enhance visual reading, so you can engage multiple senses by reading with your ears and your eyes at the same time. And audio books are ideal for road trips. That's just 11 that come to mind. Okay, tip four, plan when and where to read.

Have you thought strategically about where you read? You can read while you're sitting or standing, stationary or moving, so figure out ideal combinations of place and time for your optimal reading. And here are six times you could plan when to read. Shortly after you wake up, I think that's an ideal time to feed on God's words.

You create a routine so that your reading time and spot is consistent and automatic. Read during scheduled blocks of time. Put it in your calendar, and when someone asks if you're free at that time, you can say no. You don't have to tell them why. Third, read during predictable, redeemable times.

This could be while you're walking or traveling or showering. It's possible. Read during unscheduled free times, like when you're waiting in line or stuck in traffic or waiting for a meeting to start. Read before you go to sleep. Fantastic way to end the day and prepare for deep sleep.

And then read on retreats and vacations. Just schedule half a day or an entire day or more to rest and relax by reading. Tip five, read consistently. Would you rather eat one amazing meal one time a week or eat three times a day smaller bits for every day? And the answer is, yeah, I'd rather eat regularly, right?

Treat reading like you treat eating. Prioritize a daily reading routine over reading big chunks sporadically. But it doesn't have to be either/or. You could devote larger chunks to reading, like on a Sunday afternoon. You could sit down and read a whole book of the Bible at one time. The key is that you read consistently.

So make a plan, stick with it. Tip six, read with others. So you can team up with a friend or a group of friends to discuss what you read, and that will help you read carefully. And more systematically, and you can benefit from the insights of other people. And tip seven, read responsibly.

So C.S. Lewis distinguishes two types of reading. He calls it escape and escapism. He says escape is fine, escapism is not. The point is that there's more to life than reading. And too much of a good thing is not good. If you drink too much water, you can die of water intoxication.

So do good things proportionately. You have many responsibilities as a Christian, and you would be disobeying God if you choose to read so much that you fail to meet those other obligations. So, those are my very concise answers to the four big questions. Why should you read? How should you read?

What should you read? And when should you read? And now it's your turn to ask some questions and some Q&A. So just go ahead and raise your hand, I'll call on you. And I'll repeat your question, and we'll go until someone asks us to stop. So who would like to ask the first question about reading?

Yes, sir, Brian D. White. - What fiction are you reading right now? - What fiction am I reading right now? Well, I can show you on my phone, actually. So, I don't read, yeah, I don't think I read any fiction with my eyes. That might sound bad to some of you.

The reason is I use my eyes for reading on the screen pretty much all day. And if I can enjoy reading in another mode with just my ears while I'm driving or walking or working out or something, I prefer that. So there is a book by, it's Sherlock Holmes, Arthur Conan Doyle, and it's read by Stephen Fry, who's got an amazing British voice.

And if you subscribe to Audible, you can stream it from Audible. It's, it's good. I've listened to the, or read the Sherlock Holmes many times, but this is my favorite time so far. Right there. - How do you read false teaching, or if you should read false teaching? - How do I read false teaching if I should read false teaching?

I'm a, I'm a pastor and professor, which means I read a lot of bad things for the sake of other people to help them, because one of my jobs is to root out error and destroy bad arguments and understand Satan's schemes. My other title, my unofficial title is I'm professor of defense against the dark arts.

So I take that seriously. So I read bad teaching daily, and I do it with more seriousness than with joy. And my mindset is I want to love what's true and root out what's false for the sake of the church. So I read it carefully. My goal is to understand it accurately and to represent it fairly, such that if I represent someone's position, they would say, yeah, that's my view.

You said it better than I could myself. Never want to misrepresent a view, but represent it fairly in the best possible way, and then show where it fails. So did you have more in mind there? Okay. Right back here and then here. Is that Jared? Okay. - So in the books over again, periodicals and other kinds of reading.

- Yeah, he's asking about books versus articles, blog posts, news articles, that sort of thing. And I say in the book manuscript, my advice for books applies to all those other kinds of reading. It's just, those are smaller units. So the way you can survey an article, you can do that with, excuse me, the way you survey a book, you can do with an article as well.

Same skillset, just less time. So is there more you're wondering there? - What percentage are you-- - Oh, what percentage? I don't-- - Are you curious about that? - It's probably 50/50, 'cause I keep track of over 100 theological journals, which come out multiple times a year. So I'm constantly downloading those.

I keep track of a couple hundred blogs by RSS feeds, and then I have Twitter feeds. I'm processing a lot of those. I saw a hand over here. Yeah. - When this book releases in March, will there be an audio book available? - Yes, I plan to read it myself.

He asked, will my book have an audio book? And I've asked Canon Press, I would like to read it, because I prefer to listen to an audio book by the author, read by the author. Even if he doesn't have a professional voice, I think he will pronounce things correctly and emphasize things correctly.

It's just more interesting. So if they let me. They said I have to do a trial submission, and if I pass their test, then it will be me. Okay. Good luck. And here we say good providence. (audience laughing) Yeah. All right, so right here. Mr. Siegel. - So, Karen Swalwell Pryor, written a lot about writing and reading, had a piece in that Baptist theology book where she raised, it was a thoughtful article in which she talked about the challenges that we face in ministry in what appears to be a post-Christian culture emerging around this, is made all the more complicated by an emerging post-literate culture.

And that person's obvious challenges to us, to his faith, to his ministry, to the gospel depends on books and on readings. My question would be, do you share this view of an emerging post-literate culture, and what are we to do about that? - Good question. He's asking, do I think that we live in a post-literate culture, and do I have any concerns about that?

The answer is, if you defend post-literate meaning people aren't as good at reading as they used to be, yes. It doesn't mean that people in our culture can't read, per se. It's just their idea of reading is scrolling Instagram and looking at the captions under the pictures. That's reading.

And that makes it really hard to communicate the most important truths seriously, which makes preaching harder, because it's hard for people to listen to a sustained argument for 40 minutes. It makes teaching harder, 'cause people's attention spans are warped, and they can't, maybe some of you can attest to this.

I just think back 25 years, when I was working on papers, and then working on dissertations, I would regularly spend four, five, 10-hour stretches in my study with no internet access, lost in my books, lost in my own world, no email to check, no phone ringing, didn't have a phone, just immersed in the literature.

And that was fun, and I was focused, and that was normal. And now, you think I'd be more mature about it, right? I'd be even better at it. Now, I read not just a chapter of a book, I read a section of a book, and without thinking, I switch over to my email application and hit refresh.

I hate that, I hate that. If that's happening to me, it's gotta be happening to other people, right? And you're all guilty, aren't you? (audience laughing) Yeah, over here, and then over here, yep. - Do you have any advice for readers with disabilities, advice I could give? - Yes, I do.

He asks about readers with dyslexia. Do you wanna come up and say something about that? No, she has read books and books about that, 'cause she's an educator, my wife, and just knows more than I do. But what you can do is recognize that someone with dyslexia is not dumb.

Sometimes they're way smarter than you are, it's just they have a challenge in a way that you don't. And they can take in, for example, someone else reading a book, and understand it better than the average person. Their mental abilities are sharp, and they're all there. And this is where that person's parents, teachers, need to learn different tools and techniques to help them get over certain barriers where they can learn to overcome that impediment and still succeed well.

And it can be done. There are many people in this room who've done that, I know, and who love it. There's a lot more to say. If you have specifics, come talk to me afterwards, or talk to my wife. Right there. - I'm wondering, in a non-fiction domain, where you're trying to capture a lot of ideas, a lot of perspectives, and terms, and propositions, and that kind of thing, and you went and archived those, and managed that, and then be able to synthesize that, and keep track of it, and so forth, do you just use paper resources, or do you have digital, or do you have lots of digital note-taking applications that you use any of that technology?

- The question is, how do you rigorously follow, trace an argument when you're reading? Do you take notes in some way? And personally, what I do is I take notes in the item I'm reading. So if I own it in print, I always have a pen or pencil, and I'm marking it up.

So you can actually pick up books I've read. Kara did this the other day. She read Desiring God by John Piper, and it had my markings in it from the '90s, and she would come, "Dad, you wrote this in the margin. "Do you still believe that?" Like, "Uh, no, I probably wouldn't say it like that." (audience laughing) So I argue with the books.

It's kind of fun to go back and look. If I'm in Logos software, or with a PDF, I'm marking it up right there. If I don't own the book, if it's a library book, I use a program called Zotero, and it has a note option in there, and I'm taking notes there.

When I take the most detailed notes is when I'm going to review that book. So if I'm reviewing a book, or I'm gonna be using it real carefully in something I'm writing, I'm taking very detailed notes. Sometimes I will write the outline of the book in a separate document so I can compare.

My favorite, I love this, by the way, when a book has not just a bare-bones table of contents, but has a detailed table of contents, an analytical outline that has all the headings and subheadings. I love that. That helps you X-ray a book to get its big idea. Is that helping a little bit?

Okay, other questions? Right here. - So how can I encourage my family members to love and enjoy reading, but they are interested in like a book about YouTube, or they've just been distracted by that? How do you encourage them to love reading? - Good question. Basically, how do I encourage family members to love reading when they're distracted by YouTube and other things?

I have an appendix in my book. I forget the title. I think it's 22 Ways to Encourage Your Children to Love Reading, something like that. So I won't read the whole thing to you here, but it starts when they're young. My wife has been a master at this. So since our kids have been young, she would come home every week with about 100 books from the library.

It's harder to do with the libraries now 'cause they have all these LGBT books for the kids. It's really bad. But having a home that focuses on books, books everywhere, use them all the time, don't have big screens all over the place, or little screens all over the place.

Just make it a book paradise. Give books for gifts, for them to own and build their library. Talk about books all the time. Be a reader yourself. Read aloud, read aloud in the morning. My wife reads the Bible aloud at breakfast. She reads some kind of classic story after lunch.

I often read in the evenings after dinner. The girls often listen to audio books together before bed. It's just, it's just in our cycle. It's in our routine, reading, listening to books. And then they do it for fun when they have free time. So it's kind of, it's like when you wanna cultivate a taste for good food, you can't just change something overnight if you've developed a love for really poor food.

You have to do it gradually. But you can change your tastes. It can be done so that you actually enjoy good food. I think that's what reading is like. Good question, right here. - How do you distinguish between great books and fiction? - How do you distinguish between great books and fiction?

- What's your distinction? - Well, some great books include fiction. But I was thinking that the category great books includes fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. And then a subset of that is fiction that's not great books. So an example of fiction that is not in the great books category might be like a modern novel about a Navy SEAL that I find interesting.

That's not great books. But I could enjoy it. But reading "The Odyssey," that's great books. And "The Odyssey" is different than "The Odyssey." Okay, right there. - When there's a movie out, do you recommend reading the book first and then watching the movie, or watching the movie first? - She says when there's a movie out that is based on a book, do you recommend watching the movie first or reading the book first?

You know what I'm gonna say. Read the book and don't watch the movie. (audience laughing) Next question, yeah. Yes, right there. - How can you micro-read fiction that isn't like great books? - How can you micro-read fiction? I don't think fiction typically is something you micro-read, unless you're analyzing it for a dissertation.

In general, fiction is just, it's supposed to be for joy. And to micro-read it is, I think, to over-analyze it, unless you're a professional reader and you're gonna teach on it and write a paper on it. Yeah. Yes, right there. - How do you survey or macro-read theological books?

- Yeah, how do you survey or macro-read theological books? So I have to answer, that's two questions. Survey a theological book by, well, am I still sharing my screen? I am. It would take too long. I was gonna navigate by Dropbox to a PDF and show you, but that would take too long.

Basically, I get a lot of, I'm the administrator for Thamelias, and I administrate the book reviews, and I get hundreds of books a year from publishers, the books that are about to come out, so we can consider reviewing them. So as I process these books, I have to process large batches of them and then sort them in my Zotero library quickly.

So I learn how to look at an author, look at the topic, the title, subtitle, look at the table of contents, figure out what is this book about. You can do that in less than a minute. That's not that hard. Then what I'd wanna do next is figure out, is this something that interests me?

Is this an author I trust? Is this a topic I need to know more about? Is this a book that seems like it's gonna be important for my field or for something I'm writing, something I'm teaching, something like that? And then I have a, if so, I put it in another folder for reading in my reading queue.

And so my attitude towards a book is, there are millions of books to read. I'll give you 30 seconds, go. You gotta earn everything beyond that. Like, that sounds so pretentious, but it's just, life's too short to waste on bad books. So my serving is kind of filtering out ones that don't merit the time.

And if I get the sense this is good writing, it's a good topic, it's an author I trust, or it looks like this will be an important book to interact with, then it'll bump up into, let's spend more time serving it. I'll give it a half hour, I'll give it an hour.

And if I, as I'm doing that, and it draws me in, then you know it's a good book. Or I was gonna give it 30 minutes, and oh, two hours just went by. I'm reading every word. I choose to macro-read it. So it's gotta earn that. And the macro-read is this, you're moving along, you're reading every word, you're no longer surveying.

That's a short answer, but hope that helps a little bit. Any other questions? Brian Deck, and then right here. - Do you use all three levels of reading with Bible consumption? - Do I use all three levels of reading with Bible consumption? Yeah. But I would survey differently. So surveying in the sense of trying to figure out what is the theme of a book.

You know this. Did I teach you for New Testament background and message? Yeah. So I require students to write a one-sentence summary of the theological message of every book of the New Testament. That's 27 sentences. So that requires surveying, and then macro and micro-reading to do that well. But the surveying is like, what's the big idea?

What's the structure of this book of the Bible? So if you're reading the book of Matthew, you gotta know there are five discourses and five statements or parallels in between each of those, and they all fit together, and there's a front and a back, and there's a climax. Like, you gotta get that structure, and you can survey to get that, and then you can jump in.

But normally, I'm macro-reading and micro-reading Scripture. Every morning, wake up, first thing, audible's up, I hit play. I pick up Bible reading where I left off. Every morning. This morning, I listened to Nahum. This is the next thing. Listen to the next thing. It's the slowest speed of all things I listen to.

It's at 1.2. For Proverbs, I slow it down to one. But other than that, I go 1.2. But for everything else, it's usually 2.5. It's, we're moving. I saw a hand over here, yep. - How do you discipline yourself to maintain a macro-reading, and then not drop it down to micro?

I find when I read, I get way too into it. After 20 minutes, 20, 30 minutes, and I'm in micro. - He's saying, how do you consistently discipline yourself to macro-read without going into micro-reading? Sometimes it's a mix. So the analogy is like you're on the freeway, and you're cruising at 60, and then, oh, down to 40, down to 30.

We're rolling at five, come on. Okay, we're back up again. It's kinda like that when you're reading. It's not just maintaining the same speed, but you might slow down a little bit when you hit a patch where it's like, oh, this is really important. This is really interesting. And then you get going faster.

So it's not just one or the other. Okay, anything else? Any other questions? Right here. - When you read carefully, do you apply it the same way across the three different levels? - When you read carefully, do you apply it in the same way across the three different levels?

Yes, but you can't do it as well when you're surveying. 'Cause your analysis is going to be less accurate. So just recognize that as you do it. Okay, Mr. Siegel, how are you doing on time? One more, who would like the last question? I shouldn't have said that. Made it all dry up.

Okay, you already asked one. All right, go ahead. - About how many books should we aspire to read? - Don't think that way, yeah. So I wouldn't count your books. My mentor, Don Carson, would say I read about 500 a year, but he's not counting. And if I told you the number I read, you would be impressed.

But I'd say don't be impressed because a lot of that's surveying. So this isn't a competition. Just read in a way that honors the Lord as a good steward given what he's called you to do. And that's reading carefully five books a year. If those are five really good books, that's great.

So don't walk out of here thinking, "Oh, I gotta go read 50 books." Just think, read to enjoy, read to live, read to grow long-term. All right, be encouraged. (audience applauding) (upbeat music)