I mixed up my readings today for a little variety.  Most of the time when I have read through the Bible in a year I did not go through it sequentially.  I would write a list of the book names on a sheet of paper and then plan on reading 4 chapters a day.  I would jump around from Old and New Testament back and forth often pairing books that I don't like as much with ones that I do.  Such as pairing Leviticus with Hebrews or one of the gospels.  If you read about 4 chapters a day of the Bible you should get through it in a year even with missing some days.

 My present challenge is to read through the New Testament in February.  So, today I did Luke 7-9 and then read 1 John, 2 John and 3 John.  I've always Loved the personal way that John writes and the way he emphasizes walking in Love and living out your example.  One of the passages that stood out to me today is in Luke 7:40-50. 

Jesus goes to the home of Simon who was a Pharisee because he has been invited to a dinner.  In those days, dinner would be eaten in a reclining position with Jesus' feet behind him.  A woman enters the room soon after Jesus and in tears wets his feet and anoints him with fragrances and wipes his feet with her hair while kissing his feet.  Simon responds to this by being indignant because he says that she is a sinner (probably a prostitute).  How Simon knows this is up for some speculation.  Maybe he's been a customer?

Jesus replies that while Simon offered no water for his feet she has wet his feet with her tears.  While Simon offered no kiss, she has been kissing his feet.  While he offered no anointing, she anointed his feet with costly perfume.  Then he says in verse 47 "he who is forgiven little loves little."  I think this is exactly what the gospel is really all about.  After all, the most important commandment of the gospels is to love God and then to go love others.  And one of the reasons that we love God is because we realize the sacrifice that he made for us and that he loved us first.  We realize that we have been forgiven a debt that there was no way in heaven and earth we could repay.  John says this also in John 4:9-10

"By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him.  In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins."