Transcription
Hey guys, it's Alyssa from Alysa nan.com. Welcome back to my channel. Today's video is a part two, or a follow-up, to the video that I did on my interleaved journaling Bible. In that video, I just walked through the setup of my Bible and how I'm using it. And so, if that's something you're interested in, I highly recommend watching that one first because there will be some context that will be helpful for this video. I'm not going to go into details of what you're going to see in here. So, if you're interested, then watch that video first.
At the end of the walkthrough, I mentioned that there was one more, well, at least for now, there was one more uh note-taking process that I wanted to add to the pages of my interleaved Bible. And that process was going to require another set of tools, which is what I have here. And um, I'm really excited for this because I was thinking, this is new, but really isn't new. This is just a further, more fuller iteration of what I've been trying to do for years, literally. I'll talk about that here in a minute. But basically, I have a setup where my interleaved Bible is going to work in conjunction with my Bible study journaling process. So that is what we're going to talk about in this video.
So, there's a little bit of history that I need to explain before we get into this. If you've been with me for some time, then you may remember, or you may have even come across this if you're just looking for this kind of content on YouTube, but I have done two other Bible study bullet journal videos in the past. They're on my channel, they're linked down below if you want to check them out. And I'm really, on the one hand, I'm really proud of those videos because, you know, I shared what I knew. And I hope, I always hope, that whatever I share is useful to other people. So, if anybody got ideas or inspiration or whatever from those videos, then I'm really happy for that.
However, I also have to be very transparent and say that I personally did not stick to those setups. The two setups that I came up with, I did not stick to them. There was something missing from those journals that I didn't know what it was at the time, but as time went on, I just was missing something. And I was trying to figure it out, and it's frustrating. Um, but I was kind of going through this journey of learning how I wanted to take notes as I was studying the Bible, even as I was learning how to study the Bible. So, um, that last video was back in 2019, I think. So it's been a good five years since that last iteration of my Bible study bullet journal. And I had a lot to figure out. So, what I have here is the result of five years of just kind of trying to figure it out for myself.
But before I open these up and share what I've come up with, let me explain what my pain points were and the challenges I was facing, so that you understand the problem I was trying to solve and why this was such a big deal for me. Um, just in case this is something you end up resonating with as well. Like, if you've come across these challenges, hopefully this might be something that will work for you too.
Number one, some of the Bible study Bible journaling tools that are out there were not meeting the need that was slowly developing for me. And this is no shade. I'm, I'm not like, um, trying to put down any of the wonderful tools that are out there. You guys, there are so many tools. We have so many tools that we can use for studying the Bible. And I'm not knocking any of them. Please use what works for you. But for me, I was needing something that was going to help me go through the inductive Bible study process with some specifications. And I'll get to that here in a second. So, I wasn't finding a tool that was going to help me do what I wanted to do in the text.
Okay, now I could have just used a notebook for what I wanted and I could move on, just using a regular notebook and just jotting down my notes. I have done it. I, you know, that has been a reality in my life. Um, however, the challenge with just using a regular notebook was the fact that it's too much space. There are no boundaries. There's nothing to tell me this is enough note-taking. And no boundary lines don't do well with my brain. I think that too much freedom in a project like this probably doesn't do well for a lot of our brains.
Um, number one, for the very, very real reason that at some point you have to cut it off. Like, at some point you have to move on to the next chapter or the next passage or whatever. And if you just have unlimited space to write, unlimited amount of notes, then, at least in my brain, my brain expects that I'm going to write all the notes. And expects that if I have two or three or four commentaries, and I have a sermon I can listen to, and I have teaching over here, and I have this, and I have that, that I need to compile all of that in my notes. And the reality is that I don't have time for all of that. I don't have time to consult 50 different resources and write all that down. And so, at some point, I need to cut myself off in the note-taking, in the note-taking space. So I need boundaries.
But I also need something that's flexible. I needed something that was going to help me work through the three stages of the inductive process, which is observation, um, interpretation, and application. And again, while I could just, you know, in a regular notebook, just write down, okay, observation, and then write some notes, and then interpretation, and then write some notes again, I needed those boundary lines. That was key for me. That was super key for me. And that's what I was struggling with.
So, those are my pain points. It's mainly just three. I need boundaries, but I need flexibility. And I also need something that's going to walk me through, or help me walk through, the inductive process.
Now that you know my pain points, let me walk you through how I came up with what I've got. First of all, I get, I found these notebooks from Walmart. This is from Mint Green, that's the brand. And I don't know what it is, but I love this size. It's larger than A5, which is what this is, but it's smaller than 8 and a half by 11. So it's not quite as big as a regular 8 and a half by 11 notebook or folder, but it's not just, you know, it's not too small. Which is, I mean, A5 is not too small, but it's bigger than A5. It's just, it's the perfect amount of space. That's what I'm trying to say. And so this is just a regular lined notebook. And I did use this for some time to take my Bible study notes. And so I have several of these. Every once in a while, I'll just pick one up at Walmart because I'm kind of paranoid that they're going to not sell them at some point and I want to have some on hand. Um, but I decided I really liked this size and I wanted to continue using this size, but with like, some actual stuff on the pages. So that's, that was the first thing that I decided I wanted.
And the second thing I knew I wanted again was something that was going to help me with inductive Bible study. And there are some key steps that I wanted to include every time I was working through a passage, whether it was a, you know, just a portion of a chapter or a full chapter. I just, I wanted some of those very, um, routine pieces. Like, every time I go through this process, I want to go through the same, you know, I want to go through the same steps. You'll see what I mean here in just a minute.
Okay, so what I've come up with, are we centered? Okay. What I've come up with is a four-page spread. And this, man, this takes me through a chapter because I'm going through chapters right now. This takes me through a chapter of scripture so seamlessly. And I love it. Let me walk you through. I said earlier that the inductive process takes you through observation, interpretation, and application. I'm going to do my best to explain how the spread works without going into too much detail because that will take longer than what I want this video to be. But if you want more information on inductive Bible study, I have a blog post you can read on my website. I have a Bible study handbook, quick reference handbook, that you can get from my shop that goes through all of this information. So I have other resources you can look at to help you through if this is your first time seeing this or you're not exactly sure how this works.
Okay, so I'm going to move this over here. So you're studying through a book of the Bible, for instance, or you're studying through a passage of the Bible. And, okay, I've opened up to Lamentations. So let's see, can I do all of this? I can. Here we go. So I'm going to go through Lamentations chapter 1, for instance. And so I'm going to write Lamentations 1. And if there is a title at the beginning of a chapter or at the beginning of a section within a chapter, you can write that in as well if you would like. So that title can mean a couple of different things, whatever you needed to mean. Okay.
Then, as I'm reading through the text, right? Let's just pretend, actually, let's go through a clean text. Let's pick a different book. Here's Acts. Okay. So we're going to do Acts chapter 1. Acts chapter 1. And maybe I'm not going to write a title in quite yet, okay? Because there's a couple of sections and they each have titles. So maybe I don't write a title in yet. As I'm reading through the text, I'm potentially highlighting, using my color code that you saw in the other video. And I'm reading, I'm highlighting, and I'm looking for keywords and phrases. And those keywords and phrases are going to go in here. I'm asking questions. I have a whole list of questions in my, um, Bible study handbook that will help kind of trigger specific questions you can ask about the text. And you can write them in here. Okay.
And then, as I'm reading, I'm also observing different things. Like, okay, Acts chapter 1, or I'm sorry, Acts, the whole book is addressed to a man named Theophilus. I could write that down and say it's addressed to Theophilus. And if I already know, I could say, and the Book of Luke is also addressed to Theophilus. That could be an observation I write down. If I don't know anything about Theophilus, I could say, "Who in the world is Theophilus?" and write it down in the question box. You get the picture, right? So I'm observing things, I'm asking questions. I will often run out of space in my question box and ask questions in here. So you can see what I'm getting at when I say that I needed boundaries, but I also needed space to tailor-make the process to whatever chapter I'm in. So I needed freedom, but also boundaries. And so you can use this, this whole side of the spread, you can use it in any way that makes sense. But the key is, is that you're doing observation work. Okay? You're asking questions, you're noticing things, you are taking note of things that either don't make sense or that maybe you know that it relates to something else. Like Luke and Acts are both addressed to the same person by the author, Luke, you know. So you can write all that stuff down. These are just observations. You're asking questions. You're not coming to any conclusions. I'm not writing any commentary on this space. Potentially, you could, but I'm not. I'm not specifically writing commentary here. I'm just getting the feel for what's happening in the chapter or the passage. Okay.
Then you move over to the interpretation. I think I made my point here. Ah, I'll leave it open. It's just, I'm running out of space. Okay, I think we can do this. There we go. You know, when I look, when I actually look into the camera and see what, what you guys can see, I notice that I have more space than I think.
All right, now that I've done the observation step, I move into interpretation. Okay, interpretation means now I'm going to start using cross-references. I'm going to start looking at commentary. I'm going to start looking up words that I don't know. I'm going to maybe look into the characters that are in the story. I'm going to look at the, oh man, it could be so many things. I'm going to look at figuring out the explanation of the prophecy if I'm in the prophets. I'm going to start looking at, you know, how does this poetry function if I'm in the, um, the wisdom or the poetry books. I'm going to start figuring out what I don't know. This is the interpretation process, right? And as I'm doing that work, I'm probably going to come across the verse or verses that are key or central to that chapter. All right. And that's probably going to come from noticing what was repeated often, or the, um, uh, the theme or the concept that was central to that chapter. If that concept was not there, then the rest of the chapter sort of falls apart. That potentially might be my key verse or verses.
Now, you'll notice that when I show you what I've actually filled in, that you can relabel these to be whatever you want. Okay? This is just, this is the information that's fairly pertinent to the observation proc, not the observation, the inductive process. But you can move things around if you need to. Um, and I'll show you that here in a bit.
Now, evaluation is simply the process of taking a look at what you understand so far from the text and determining whether or not what you've read is eternally applicable, meaning it applies to us in the exact same way as modern believers, or do you have to take what was, um, pertinent or what applied to them then and figure out how it, in principle, applies to us? Some things don't apply straight across the board from back then to now. And so that's what the evaluation process is for.
And then the recognize box is for recognizing God's character in the text. So, what did I observe about God in this particular portion of scripture? Did I notice his holiness, his love, his authority, his omniscience, his grace, his kindness? What was I seeing in the text about God? You write that down here.
Then you take all of that information and you, this is the second part of the application. So I did not explain this. So this is all observation. This is interpretation. So you're just going to write down what you find from your extra-biblical sources or biblical sources if you're doing cross-references. Um, the key verses is for the interpretation, um, step. Evaluation and recognize and personalize are all part of the application step. Okay? Personalize is where you figure out how it applies to you personally. We do not jump to this right away. This is at the end of all of this other work. Okay? You evaluate, you recognize, then you personalize. If you skip all of this, then you potentially might misapply. And so you have a, um, a series of questions to ask yourself about what you learned in the text and how you can apply it to yourself. Okay?
And then I just added an extra notes page, which I always need. So far, I've always needed it. And so this could be just more interpretation notes. You could write down quotes from commentary. You could do all kinds of things. You could write lists, or, you know, draw pictures, outline, whatever, whatever you need to do. That's what the notes page is for. And then when you turn the page again, you get your next two-page spread. And that's it. That's it. And this, you guys, has been game-changing for me.
Let me show you what this looks like. Okay. Oh, you have a table of contents, which works basically like an index. So you can write down, um, what you've studied. I've only done two chapters so far, but you can write down what you've studied and then the pages that those notes are on. Um, I have a little things to remember in any Bible study. And then I have a little title page. And then here's my first spread. So I was in the Book of Mark. I was in chapter 4. Looking back, I'm, it might have been helpful for me to divide the chapter into two parts and do like a first half on one spread and then a second half on a second spread. But I was able to fit in, for the most part, um, I was able to fit in one chapter on one spread. It just depends on how much you want to take notes or how many notes you want to take, you know, what I'm trying to say, you know, the extent of your note-taking. But while you can separate a chapter into multiple entries, um, having the constraints of trying to fit one chapter on one spread might actually be helpful because now you're going to start looking for the most important information, right? Right. So you're not going to write down every single thing. You're going to write down the most pertinent things that are going to be helpful to you.
I'm not going to walk you through all of this, but basically, um, I did, let's see, I did ask questions here, but I also asked questions in my observation space. I just chose two random colors, purple and blue. And the questions are in purple. And any highlights are random highlights are in blue. And so you can see that coming out. And so I do have some questions here. I've got some questions there. And my interpretation notes, some of them came from a study Bible I was using, the NIV Study Bible that I have. And so some of my interpretation notes came directly from that study Bible. I quoted another commentary that I have up here. And then what I ended up doing was I, instead of writing my key verse here, so if you remember, the key verse or verses go up here in this box, instead of writing that there, I realized that my key words were my key verse. And so I just have this whole other color, um, just highlighting the fact that this is my key verse. What I thought was just a key word ended up being my key verse. And then I relabeled this box as cross-references. So you can do stuff like that, right? Um, and that's how that turned out.
My evaluation process, uh, did not, it wasn't specifically, here's the principle that matters in modern, in a modern context based on an ancient context. I just wrote down general application that I was noticing. General notes about sort of what to conclude about the text I was reading. So I don't even follow, what I'm trying to say is that even though I've set this up to evaluate whether or not something is directly applicable or whether or not we just have to to apply the principle, that's how I've set this up. Sometimes that, that little step isn't even applicable to, to the process itself. Does that make sense? So I wasn't formally evaluating, but I was evaluating some of what was happening. That may not make any sense at all, but that's what I was doing. So I say that to say that you can make it what you need it to be. Okay. And then I went in here and did my personalize step. And then I had some extra notes. And that was it. And that was Mark chapter 5, or chapter 4, rather.
I did Mark chapter 5 here. And let me tell you something. Let me tell you something. Having these constraints takes a load off my mind. I only have to fill these pages. I don't have to go on and on and on and on in the way, you know, the way I felt in this particular thing. I didn't have to go on and on and on on the way I felt like I needed to in a blank notebook. I feel like I have to take all the notes. But here, I don't have to take all the notes. I can just take the notes that make sense right now. And if I ever want to go back and do Mark chapter 5 again, I can. Um, I'll get to that here in just a second. But I just have to fill this space. And I have enough space to work through all of the steps of the inductive Bible study method, which is what I was really, really needing.
So that is the process for my notebook. Okay. You may be thinking, that's great, Alyssa, but how does that even work with my interleaved Bible? Let me show you. Okay. So this notebook is where I process. I know I've been using that word a lot, but where I process my Bible study inductive notes. Okay. This is what was missing in my Bible study bullet journal. I didn't have a way to do this originally. And so now that I can process, say I'm going to get sick of that word, I'm so sorry, but now that I can write all the things, and I call these messy notes, I know they don't look all that messy. These look way messier. This is kind of messy, you know. Anyway, I call them messy notes because they're not meant to be perfect. They're not meant to be conclusions. Here's where I do the work, right? This is a workbook. I'm doing the work. I'm asking questions. I'm tripping over it. I'm, you know, coming across stuff that I didn't see before. I'm like, oh, I'm, you know, I'm making discoveries. I'm exploring. I'm having all the fun right now. That I've had the space to do all of this, I can come in with my bullet journal and my organization. Uh, I need better words for this, but I can come in with a process of, oh, that word is really now starting to, I can hear it now. I'm saying process too much. I can now, I can now come in with the method. I need a different word. I can now come in with my note-taking organization. Okay.
So here's how this works. Okay. So this is just an A5 journal that I got on Amazon. I really like it because it's dotted. It lays flat, which is lovely. Okay. It is numbered. And so I really, really enjoy all of those features. It has a little band to keep it closed. It has a pen loop. I can stick a pen in here easily. This is a little bit of a bigger barrel, but I can stick my pen in there easy peasy. And it's got two ribbon bookmarks. I love it all. And, um, as you can see, I've decorated this because that's what I do. I have so many stickers and things that I just need to use. I need to stop hoarding my stash. Um, and I printed out lyrics just to make it look pretty. And it does come with, I don't know if you can see this, but I did glue the contents pages. It has a table of context or or not context, contents, or an index that's in here, but they weren't enough pages. There weren't enough index pages. So I just glued it together and then created my index on the first dotted pages. So some more lyrics. Um, and so I just created my index. And I have, I think it's like 10 pages is what I ended up with. And I penciled in a margin. But when I get to that page, I will ink, I'll ink that margin in. And all I did was counted three dots in, and that's where my margin will go. So that way I can write in my page numbers. Okay.
And then I have a list of entry types. This is kind of like a commonplace situation. I just got finished setting up a commonplace book, which I'll share with you in another video. And since I was just coming off the heels of that setup, I kind of borrowed some, uh, uh, technique from that particular project. And so in my commonplace book, I have different kinds of notes that I want to take in that book. And I decided to sort of create the same thing. So in my Bible study journal, I really don't want to call it a bullet journal because it's not. And I don't want to take away from, I don't want to take away from what a bullet journal actually is. But, um, in this journal, I'm going to be writing notes, or pasting in even things like articles. I'm going to create boards. Like, um, basically like this. I call this a board. But I might have a board that, like, I don't know, might be, um, an exploration of a character or an exploration of a theme. So maybe I wanted to do a theme on God's faithfulness, or like, Hed. I could do like a board on Hed, where I like clip out, I print off like different passages where Hed is a, a, um, a key factor. Um, I might add in art. I might draw. I'm not a great artist, so this is why I print off pictures. I might add stickers. So that's the kind of thing that I might do in a board. I can write down notes, just commentary, just straight up quotes, um, from different commentary databases. I originally called it a spreadsheet, but if I wanted to write down like a chart of some kind, so you know how like Bible dictionaries or Bible, um, reference materials will have like charts, like, um, oh, like the miracles of Jesus in the four gospels, right? I might want to do like a chart like that. And instead of calling it a spreadsheet, I wanted to call it a database because it could be like a table or it could be a diagram of some kind. That kind of thing. So I called it a database.
Hot takes. This, this is just for me. Like, it's a hot take for me. Like, this may not be, uh, mind-blowing or important to anyone else, but I may have a thought and go, "I never thought about, you know, I don't know, justification like that. Let me jot that down." That's my little hot take for myself. I had, I had a moment of clarity, you know? So that's what a hot take is. Um, and then lists. That is what it is. That's self-explanatory. Outlines. If I wanted to do an outline of a book, um, and then I can do like, chapter 1, this is what's happening in verses 1 through five, or whatever. So I can outline a book, or I could outline a story even. So if I wanted to outline the storyline of the Book of Ruth, not just like the chapters, but like what happens in succession, or if I want to outline, um, Israel's history from Abraham's Covenant in, uh, chapter 15 of Genesis all the way through when they get to the promised land in Joshua, I could outline that whole thing. That would actually be pretty cool. That would be pretty cool. Okay. So that's what an outline would be.
Reflection. Are my notes on what I've learned. So if I've done all of this, then I would reflect in here. So I've learned a bunch of stuff. I've learned about myself. I've taken a bunch of notes. I want to really sit down and think, and maybe even pray through, what did I learn? What does this mean? How do I feel about it all? That kind of thing. That's reflections. Resources. Um, that could mean several different things. If I am at a conference or something and there's a bunch of resources recommended to, you know, the audience, I could jot those things down. Or if I'm listening to a podcast and they recommend some books or some other podcasts or whatever, I could write those things down. That would be that. Scripture writing. That is what it sounds like. And then quick notes. Are if I'm taking a class, or if I'm listening to a podcast, or I'm reading a book, or whatever, I just need to quickly note what I'm learning from that piece of content, then that would be, that would be a quick note. And when I say quick, I don't mean like it takes me a few minutes because if I'm watching a video, maybe like a sermon or something, then that might not be quick. It might be like an hour long. But I say quick because I'm not going through like a whole inductive process, right? I'm just quickly jotting down what I'm immediately capturing from whatever I'm listening to or watching. Okay.
So those are my 11 entry types. And then from there, I just added in the Old Testament and New Testament overview from Bible Project. Sized it down, cut it out, pasted it in. It's not fancy. Just my little overview. And then here are the books of the Bible in a check-off chart. So here's the Old Testament. And as I fill up this book with study notes, I want to check off which chapters of the Bible are included in my journal. And every time I do a journal, I can just print off a new one. This is free on my website if you're interested. Um, there's the Old Testament and the New Testament. And I just, again, sized it down and printed it off. It's not fancy. Literally just like washi tape done. So there's that.
Then I have a page that is set up for me to write down my favorite resources. So I might write down something like Bible Project, or, um, Blue Letter Bible is a website I often use online when I'm studying. Um, so different things that I really enjoy using, I can just write them down here for reference. Okay.
Now, we finally get to the first entry. Again, if you watched my old Bible study bullet journal videos, you may recognize this. I am using Jonathan Edwards' miscellany system, loosely, but I'm using it. So basically, Jonathan Edwards, American theologian, he's actually who made the first interleaved Bible. So the interleaved Bible that you can get either from, uh, Crossway in the ESV or Thomas Nelson in the NKJV, that was inspired by Jonathan Edwards' work. And so he created a Bible where he had blank pages and he created his own note-taking system. And this is what I'm riffing off of. Um, if you want more information, um, there's another pastor, Pastor Matthew Everhard, who has, who's done the same thing, and he has some video content on all of this. I was inspired by him for this in my own system.
So basically, what you do is, every time you do an entry, now this whole thing, this is not part of, um, Edwards' process. I did this myself based on my commonplace note-taking system. I know we're mish-mashing all kinds of stuff. So every time I do an entry of a kind, I'm going to number it M001. So M is for miscellaneous, and then the number. And then I'm going to write down what kind of entry it is. This is commentary. And then I'm going to write down what book of the Bible I'm in. Okay. And so this is from Barkley's Commentary. I kind of wrote that after the fact, but I was literally just going through, this is the commentary I have for the Book of Mark by William Barkley. And so I just went in, let's see, this is Mark chapter, [Music] five. This the one? Yeah. So Mark chapter 5, verse 17. It should be 14 to 17, but it doesn't matter. So I'm just writing down some of the highlights. He often has like bullet points in his commentary, which I really appreciate. It's very helpful. Even though I may not like agree with all of his conclusions, or I might, you know, just take a different, um, look at things. Um, I really do appreciate, uh, the fact that he's got bullet points because it's just so helpful when you're trying to write notes. So I wrote down some of the bullet points that he had. Um, I didn't highlight or write in this. I don't know why, but I was, I know why because I was focused on writing it down here. I will often underline and circle things in my commentaries. I just didn't here because I was busy writing. So that's what I did. I just wrote down a commentary that I didn't have room for on these pages, right? So if I want to further note something else in a particular chapter that I'm working on in my notebook, I can do it here in my journal.
Okay, now here's what's really fun. And I did not plan this at all. It just happened this week. So I was going to write some more notes for Mark chapter 5 that I didn't fit in here, but I stopped because I was working on something else, or it was the end of the day, or whatever. And found myself working on some class notes for a discipleship program I'm in. And I wanted to write, I really, literally only wanted to write like this quotation. Okay? That's really all I wanted to do. But as I was going through the class, I was like, "Oh, I need to write this down. I need to write that down." And I just ended up writing a bunch of notes. This is really, really cool. I get to illustrate this to you. So I was in the middle of writing commentary on Mark chapter 5. Okay. Turned to the next page. I just needed to quick write down a quote, which ended up into a whole thing. And so I did M002. This is a quick note, right? That's the kind of entry we've got. It's a quick note. And it's for a class that I'm taking on the Book of Acts. And then I wrote down my quote. And then just kept writing notes. And so I've got this page, and this page, and this page.
Now I'm done with that for now. Okay. I either can go back to Mark chapter 5, okay, and write down M001 continued, and then commentary, and then Mark chapter 5, or I can write down M003 commentary, and then Mark chapter 5, and just have multiple entries in Mark 5. So I would do, where's my index, right? So I would go M003 and then commentary, Mark 5, and write down the pages. Okay? Or if I wanted to continue this miscellany, I could just write down here, because it won't fit here, but I could write down here, and it's also on page 25. It picks up on 25, and then maybe 26 or whatever. So I could keep it either part of all the same miscellany, or I could create another miscellany, even though it's a continued, right? So I'm really glad I had that to, to kind of illustrate to you that you can sort of be in the middle of one entry, start a whole new entry, but because you have a sort of filing process, as it were, you don't have to lose track of your notes. But you also don't have to wait. You don't have to be like, "Oh no, I'm in the middle of Mark 5, but I want to write some quick notes on this class. I need to like save some pages, like go down a few pages and then start my notes." Now, you just write on the next page and then categorize it how it needs to be categorized. And then mark it in your, in your index. That's kind of like how a bullet journal functions, right? So it's not terribly off the mark to call it a bullet journal.
So I'm really glad that I was able to illustrate that for you because I want you to know that as you're going through your Bible study notes, not everything has to be perfect. Not everything has to be tied up. If you watched my interleaved Bible tour, my walkthrough, you saw that I have a lot of pages in here that are half done. I have a lot of sticky notes that are just random that need to be processed and fully, more fully developed. Like, there's a lot going on. And I don't often have the time to finish everything. So with my notebook, I have enough boundary to keep me in this like little, uh, encapsulated, you know, process so I can get the chapter done or get the passage done and not feel like I have to go on and on and on. It helps with time management. I don't have to sit here for hours just to get through one chapter. But then I also have my journal where I can continue in the note-taking exercise. I'm really trying not to use the word process here, but I can continue my note-taking and just add on as I want. And I don't have to worry about it all being in here, or it all being in one notebook, or it all being on the same day. I can just do it when I can and visit and revisit when I want to.
Okay, now here's how it works with my interleaved Bible. When I go into Mark chapter 5, I can write. And I'll do it for us right here on camera. Okay. I haven't actually done any work in this Bible because I was actually using my NIV Study Bible as I was working through this, and I didn't write any notes in, in that Bible. So all my notes just ended up in my notebook. Okay. So Mark chapter 5. Okay. And it was regarding verse 17, verses 14 to 17. So what I'm going to do here, I have not, I'm going to do this in pencil first, just to make sure that this is how I want it to be. So 14 starts here, 17 is here. I'm going to write down M001. There we go. So this is cataloged with this. Okay. And then if I ever want to go back to my notes, I know that it's, I guess I need to figure out, um, I guess I could just write that down here. So maybe in the top left corner, I could write M110 or 001 Mercy. Okay. So now everything is connected and cataloged and together. So if I ever want to reference any one of these pieces, my Bible, or either of my, um, notebooks here, I can do that. And I know that everything has, has been accounted for, as it were.
So that's how the process works. This is how I'm taking notes and studying. It has been such a game-changer. I can't tell you enough how good it feels to have a process that actually encourages. Like, now I'm excited. Like, I am encouraged to now come and take notes. Before, I kind of dreaded it because I was like, "I don't really know what I'm doing." And when you lack that clarity, it does not help as you're trying to build routine, or as you're trying to like get into the word. If you're not already excited to study the Bible and you're kind of struggling with it, not having clarity does not help. So even though I love Bible study, not having a clear, systematic way of taking my notes using the inductive method, just, it was really hampering my routine. It was hampering, um, the amount of time I was spending in the work. It's just, it was not good. It was not good. And I needed to figure out how to fix it. And so now I've got it. And I love it.
So, if you have any questions about this, if you have any suggestions, um, please feel free to share them with me. The printable for this notebook, oh, I didn't give you specifics here. So this journal, you can find in several colors on Amazon. I love it. It's really nice, great quality. This situation is not something that you can find like this on my shop, but you can find the printable for it in my shop. So you can find all the pages and you can print them in whatever order you want. I just printed them back to back over and over and over again. The one thing I will say is that make sure if you want your spreads to do, to be two-page spreads where you have the title on this side and the date on this side, observation on this side, interpretation on this side, and then personalize on this side and notes on this side, if that matters to you, then you have to make sure that your first spread starts on this side. Okay? So when I printed mine out, I purposely created like this little notes title page to be the front of the page, so that when you flip it over, the title side, the observation side, falls on this side of the spread. Otherwise, the observation title page will end up on this side of the paper, and then the interpretation will be the back half of the paper. Ask me how I know. I messed it up a couple of times before I got it right. So just be cognizant of how you are printing things so that it ends up falling where you wanted to.
Now, there's no wrong way to do this. If you want the observation page to be first, and then you flip it for the interpretation, that's totally fine. And then you would on this side have the personalize, and you would flip it again to to have the notes. You can do it any way you want. It does not matter. But all the pages are available for you to print out and then assemble how you want. And, um, let's see, the other thing, there was something else. Oh, yes. I have two different sizes for it. So I have this size, which is based on the size of the notebook that I really liked. I don't think it's exact, but it's around 7ish by 9ish. That's kind of what it comes out to. So there's that size. It prints on regular 8 and a half by 11 sized paper. So this is my Bible reading handbook, or quick start guide, that I have on my website, by the way. It's free if you want it. So this is an 8 and a half by 11 sheet of paper. It prints on this size paper, and then you just have to cut it down. Okay? So you just have to cut it down if you want that size.
Now, here's the trick. You're not going to be able to find, I assume, you're not going to have an easy time finding like a binder, um, for this. So if you want to use a binder, then you would choose the 8 and a half by 11 size, which I have. But if you don't mind binding it yourself, I have a cinch, which helps me bind this with the, you know, wire binding. That's an option. If you want to use discs, you can. So you can create your own cover and then use discs. Um, you have options. But it just gets a little bit more complicated if you're using in a regular size. So I have the size that I use because I really love it. But then I also have an 8 and a half by 11 size, which also gives you more space, which is not necessarily a bad thing. So those two options are available if you want to check them out. You can go to my shop and grab those printables and then create your own Bible study notebook.
Now, for the cover, I am not an artist. Okay? So I did not draw, I did not paint this, create this beautiful floral. Um, I got this from Canva. So I created like a boatload of different covers using, um, patterns that I got on Canva. They are free. I'm not selling them. They're for free because I did not make this artwork. I guess I could, but it's the artwork is too big a part of the cover that I just didn't feel right. So I do have a collection of covers. Most of them are floral because I'm kind of on a floral kick. And it just says "The Bible Study Notebook" and then the shop name. So those are available on my site if you want. And, uh, have fun with it. Create whatever cover you want. And, um, just enjoy, enjoy making your notebook, enjoy using it. I do have this, um, um, Bible passage from the Book of Luke on the back of the cover. So you'll, you'll expect to see that. And that's it. I just laminated it, laminated it, and punched it. I had a hard time because figuring out how to space these holes in my cinch and then how to space the holes in the cover and line it all, it was a process. So again, when you're using an irregular size, just be aware that it might be a little bit more complex than just using the regular 8 and a half by 11. So have at it, but just be aware that's, that's what you're going to be dealing with.
All right, I think that's all. I think that is all. So I'm going to put this aside. If you have any questions, let me know. But that is how I'm doing Bible study these days. I'm really loving it. It's been working for me. And I hope that this is helpful for you if you've been trying to figure out how to do, particularly inductive Bible study notes, but even just getting into a good solid routine at all. I hope this is helpful. Let me know if it is. Let me know if you use this and if you put a notebook together. You know, put a picture up on social media. Join Club 119, the collective. Link is down in the description. Join us. Take pictures. Let me know that it's something that's been working for you. I want to see all the things. I want to see all the things. Let me know how it's going for you. Okay, with that, thank you so much for watching this video. I hope it's been helpful. Have a wonderful rest of your day and a great week. And I will talk to you all in the next video. Thanks so much. Bye-bye.