The Briefing: How to Read a Christian Book

If there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s forgetting. Your name. What I did on the weekend. The experiences of last year. Gone, every one.

I used to read Christian books and forget them. In one sense, that’s no big deal: we all forget, and it doesn’t mean we haven’t learned anything. But I also wasn’t absorbing what I read: crystallizing the key points, tasting the sweet, going away informed and transformed. That takes a different kind of reading.

Over the years I developed a method of reading that helped me remember what I read. I thought this was idiosyncratic, something that would work only for me, until I read Tony Reinke’s Lit!. To my surprise, a number of “my” techniques jumped off the page. If they’re good enough for Reinke, they’re good enough for me, and they might work for you too.

So here they are: 11 ways to read a Christian book, absorb it, and remember what you read. (If you’re an e-book reader, adapt them for the screen; you can highlight and make notes there too.) Keep reading