Before anything else, read through the text before diving deeper.

Shoot for: 3+ times before moving on

What do you see? Slow down and observe the text, word by word and phrase by phrase.

Shoot for: 25-50 observations

You will probably have many questions naturally come to mind while thinking through observations. Some might be answered later in the text and others might be found through other resources, either way write them down to keep a list.

Shoot for: 15 questions

What are other scriptural texts that are similar?

Shoot for: 5 correlations

How would you answer your own questions you wrote down?

Maybe you’re putting some of your observations together and seeing a connection the text is putting together.

Shoot for: 10 interpretations

How would you apply this text to your life? How should this inform your view of God? How does this text inform your view of humanity or yourself? How should your life look different applying this text to your life? Should you act different, think different, be different after having read this text?

Shoot for: 5 applications

We want to be cautious that this is consistent with scripture but if we just observed, asked questions, discovered correlations and drew interpretations, then we’re hopefully close to what scripture is wanting to teach us.