How do you mark you Bible?
I have an NIV Bible that my grandmother gave me when I was baptized. Though it’s fallen to pieces, I can’t bear to part with it. Inside it is filled with highlighted versed and notes in the margin. There are color chained verses on various topics from Genesis to Revelations. Memorized verses are colored in yellow. I get nostalgic when I read from it b/c it reminds me my desire to understand the Word during my teen years. However, somewhere around high school I stopped marking my Bible. I remember hear a quote saying a famous missionary, perhaps Jim Elliot, didn’t mark his Bible b/c every word is important. Markings can keep you focused on the same things and prevent you from seeing new insights. Even since, I’ve kept a pen from my Bibles, until yesterday.
I made the first markings in my ESV Study Bible underlining a few phrases. I’ve always been attracted to marking my Bible as it’s a reminder to me that I’ve actually read it and thought about it at one point. Now that my Bible is no longer pristine I started looking for good ways to mark it. I bought some pigment pens based on this suggestion. (The 05′s prismacolors are alright though a little thick, even for underlining. I have an 005 Micron that I haven’t tried out yet.) As I read my old NIV Bible, I’m a little ashamed at my immature thinking. The notes written in it are simplistic and sometimes obvious now, not reflective of my current thinking. I’m sure if I were to write notes in my current Bible, another 10 years later I’ll think the same thing about these notes. One idea I have is to write them on post-its and stick them to the pages. That way I can remove and add notes easily.
I’m interested in how you mark your Bible. Do you use a highlighter or underline? Do you write notes in the margin? Do you use any old pen/highlighter or are there specific ones? Do you color code things? If you have any suggestions or useful links, please share.