Heal The Healers Podcast

39. Reading the Bible Daily: Practical Plans for Busy Physicians

• Inga Hofmann

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Behind on clinic notes, buried in research projects, and already maxed out? The idea of reading the Bible in a year might feel completely overwhelming. But what if time in God’s Word wasn’t just another thing on your to-do list—what if it became the source of peace, clarity, and strength that fuels everything else?

In this episode of Heal the Healers, Dr. Inga Hofmann shares practical, Spirit-led ways to make space for daily Bible reading—even in the middle of a demanding medical career. You’ll learn how to choose a reading plan that fits your season (chronological, historical, or blended), and hear how reading Scripture without commentary this year transformed her ability to hear God’s voice directly.

Don’t wait until January to start—begin your Bible reading journey today and let God’s Word renew your mind, strengthen your spirit, and anchor your daily walk with Him.

👉 For deeper mentorship and encouragement, check out the Heal the Healers Mentorship Program or join one of my upcoming retreats.

⏰ Timestamps
00:00 — Introduction and Welcome
01:52 — The Importance of Spiritual Retreats
03:52 — How to Create Daily Bible Rhythms
06:30 — Practical Bible Reading Plans
09:57 — Recommended Bible Reading Plans
12:44 — My Personal Bible Reading Journey
16:05 — Committing to a Yearly Plan
18:15 — Final Encouragement

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In today's episode, we are gonna talk about how to read the Bible As a busy physician, I know that is something so many people struggle with because we are just strapped for time. So if you have struggled reading the Bible as a busy physician, then this episode is for you so stay tuned for after the music and we will be right back. Hey there. Welcome back friend, and thank you for tuning into another episode of the Heal the Healers podcast. I'm your host, Inga Hoffman, and if you're new to me, welcome. It's so good to have you. And if you have been tuning in for a while, I appreciate you so much and thank you for coming back to tune in for another episode of Heal the Healers. I apologize upfront for a little break in my podcast recording. I was actually gone for a couple weeks to different type of conferences and training in the prophetics. So I did not get a chance to record that many episode upfront. I wanted to, but time got away from me. In any case, I'm back and I'm so excited to be back with you and share new things the Lord has laid on my heart. So just stay tuned. But just as a side note, if you are not finding ways to spend time with the Lord. Outside your daily quiet time, which by the way, you should be having, we're gonna talk about that today. But if you are looking for times to go deeper with the Lord and retreat perhaps in a company of other believers, I highly encourage you to do so. I've talked about this on this podcast before. I'm gonna link the episode in the show notes You should go away. Go to conferences, invest in yourself, find mentorship go to different retreats or conferences to really get close to the Lord because those type of special set aside times and immersive experiences can be radical, transformational. And I have to say, the last two trips I took to Tennessee and to Glasgow, Scotland. Weren't any different. I might share in upcoming episode what I was doing there and how it went. But needless to say, I'm a big believer in that you are actually investing in your spiritual growth and that comes in many different sizes and shapes and forms and time and financial investments. These are things beside your quiet time you should be doing. And I would encourage all of you to go on a journey and actually go deeper with the Lord by looking at a Christian conference where you can really be amongst spiritual believers that are perhaps not even a medicine. Or maybe there are, and you can join one of my upcoming retreats, but really focus on. Immersing yourself and getting stretched in a new way to get to know the voice of God, to go deeper in His word, but also in the things of the Holy Spirit and even impartation and activation in your spirit of gifts that the Lord has for you. Oh, there's so much to be said. But I don't wanna get us all sidetracked. So let's dive into today's episode. And what I wanna share with you today is really focusing on reading the word of God. I know have done episodes on this before. This is a bit different because I want you to really get encouraged to read the word and read the word every day. And I know that oftentimes this can be feeling very overwhelming. So this is gonna be super practical. How do you actually read the word of God in a practical sense? How can you read the Bible in a year? Because that's what should be our sort of first step goal. If you are having struggled with your quiet time. Get back on a Bible reading plan.'cause I was just talking with another gentleman, physician colleague, just a half an hour ago. And we talked about how to step out in faith as physicians in our daily medical practice. And one of the pearls of that conversation of the nuggets, I can just let you in on it right now, was he was sharing that. The times when he was distant from the Lord and he felt it was really hard to make the Lord, Lord of his day admits the basic clinical schedule. Was the times when he typically also struggled with his quiet, time and being in his word. And I was like, yes, I can totally relate because we all struggle with this capacity and I just wanna say to you it does not have to be this way. You can trace back and get back into the word of God. So, having said all that. I know that many of you might be feeling disconnected from God's word, or you're struggling to stay consistent in your Bible reading. And how do I know that? Because I totally have been there. And I just wanna say that as I radically transform my quiet time and my time with the Lord. I transform my relationship. You cannot know God and his character and who he is and who you are in him if you don't read his word and hear from him directly. And there's different ways to hear from the Lord. Number one is you read his word, and number two, you have the Holy Spirit and he can talk to you directly. That is something we're gonna talk about another time today. We're gonna focus on specific. Bible reading plan suggestions so that you can get fresh fire into reading the word and the scriptures and do it with consistency. So how does that actually look like? For me, I realized there is different methods, how I can read my Bible. But the key part is really daily consistency. That is the most important part. But then what. People might ask me, okay, so how do I actually read the Bible? And what are some other reading plans that you recommend? And rather than giving you, oh, you have to read this specific plan, or that specific plan, I'm gonna give you some frameworks for you to pick from. And then sort of my personal journey and my take on it, even just for this year, what I decided to do. Bible reading plan come in many shapes and forms and sizes as I mentioned many times before. And in prior episodes, I strongly encourage you get away from devotionals. They're sort of the cherry on top. I wouldn't even call them the cherry. They're sort of the extra if you wanna do something just for fun. But I would say read the Bible in a year is what we should be benchmarking for ourselves and it is easier to do than you might think. And go back to prior episode. I forgot the number right now, but I'm gonna put it in the show notes. It can be done basically in 15 minutes a day. So what are the Bible reading plans you could follow? There are different principles. So one is basically the first one go cover to cover basically Genesis, all the way through to Revelation. And that's one way to do it. And that is great. You can go in chronological order, which basically. Means that it will go chronological sort of as it happened, meaning you will read and fragments the stories as we believe they have occurred. So that can be very insightful. Sometimes a little bit more. Cumbersome or challenging in some ways because it pulls you out of the context of that specific writer. And then another reading assignment will be a different location about the same story in the scripture. However, it can be very meaningful and I would definitely say, you know, try that out for one year. Then there is a historical perspective where you basically read the Bible in the. Whether that the current research beliefs it was written, that can give you new little insights. And that's something I'm doing this year. And it can be helpful to just get a different nuance and. Thinking, okay, this is how the Canaan of scripture was assembled, and this is the order of which the books were written. You can do sort of a balanced spiritual diet, so to speak, where you take a little bit of the Old Testament and the New Testament and maybe some Psalms on a daily basis. And that's actually how a lot of Bible reading plans work. That certainly works. If you feel like you, you cannot go through the Old Testament. You need a little bit of new test. With your diet at the time to be able to stomach it, so to speak. Well then that works too. Again, all these different Bible reading plans, just go to the Bible app. It's called you version. And you will find a multitude of Bible reading plans under all these categories. And again, I encourage you to do them in a year, but of course people ask me, Hey, can you recommend something more specific than that? And I would say the basic ones, especially if you are just. Kind of restarting, starting out, and maybe are not a theological scholar. These two plans bible recap is quite popular Ly Kabul. I found that certainly a pretty solid reading plan, especially if you are, a beginner, and by that I don't mean you have been a question for five seconds. By that I mean you haven't really read the Bible in a year, or you haven't done it in a long time and or you really need some sort of extra motivation and accountability. She does a really great job in doing so. And I think this is a great Bible reading plan for those people that say, you know, I really want to read the Bible in a year. I wanna create a habit around it, and I want to have a little bit of context around what I'm reading. She does it in a very. Solid way without being totally over intellectual and theological, but keeping it very practical. And I think that's a great place for you to start. And many people find it quite helpful, and I've done that for one year. I would point out she does go through in a chronological order and she explains exactly why she likes it that way. And I think it has validity and you should give it a try. The other one that I find can be very helpful and I've certainly done in the past a couple times as well, is using one of the Bible project Bible reading plans in a year. They have a couple different ones, I think one that focuses on basically the story that leads to Jesus or something along the lines. They have a. I believe he perhaps they have a chronological one. They use one where they really go through the canan of scripture like it was intended to be read. So in the big chunks of, the Torah, which is the five books of Moses. And then going through historical prophetic as well as poetic literature. And then there are other reading plans that actually combine new and Old Testament quite a meaningful way. That is the Bible project. So go take a look at that. What I find really great, they are a little bit more theological rich, I would say. Then then the Bible recap in my personal opinion, they also have great visuals. So if you are a visual person, they have videos going along with a Bible reading plan that give you historical background discuss the big themes of the books that you will be reading. And it is very easy to digest, but has, really good accuracy, I feel like on the theology. So good foundations, I would definitely recommend that. Now before I finish up, you might be curious, Hey Inga, what are you reading this year? The year is almost over actually, I'm almost done with my Bible reading plan. But this year I was very intentional to choose a Bible reading plan without any commentary and anything alongside with it. So I've done the Bible recap a few years ago. I've done Bible project a number of times, but this year I really wanted to focus on something that didn't give me anything extra in the devotional section, in the Bible app. And that was very intentional. I actually thought about, oh, let me do this or that again. But the Lord really pulled me away, I feel like, and I felt uneasy to do another Bible recap. I feel like I've done that well, even the Bible project, even though I love them very much. I felt, for me personally, it was key to read the word un. Commented, what do I mean by that? I really only got a Bible reading plan and it just told me what scriptures to read in. Historical context, but not any commentary, questions, reflection questions, background information or theological thought in the devotional section of the Bible Reading Plan that I have in the Bible app. And the reason why that is, I think the Lord in this stage really has me very fine tuned to read the Bible. By hearing his voice. So I did not want to be led. Not that there's anything wrong with the other Bible reading plans. As I mentioned, I have done all of them, not all the plans that are out there, but the key ones are mentioned. I've done all of them that, I felt the Lord really had me very intentional to learn, to not rely on any outsourced information, not even good theology, and really be radical focus on. Lord, what are you saying to me now? And it's not, I haven't done this before. And I certainly believe with all the other Bible reading plans that have done, the Lord spoke to me because what do we know the word of God is? Life and active in a sharper than a double edged sword. It is convicting, it speaks to you. So the word of God certainly speaks, and the power of the Holy Spirit will uncover what you need to know. So that happens every time you open the word with an open heart posture. For me this year was key to go to another level, read it without any commentary and depend solely on the voice of the Holy Spirit. And I think for me that was just a part, of the journey. The Lord is taking me on personal as I am diapering Deeper in hearing the voice of God and being prophetic voice in the medical community. So, but that is my unique assignment. So I'm wired for hearing the voice of God. In fact, we all are. I will do another podcast episode. On that. So you are wired for hearing the voice of God. But for me, this was just a very special situation and I'm glad I did it because I think there were things that I was uncovering that I wouldn't have seen otherwise. So with that said, what plan should you choose? We, any, don't overthink it. Just pick one and go with it. Of course, pray and say, Lord, what do you want me to focus on? But really, if you haven't done any for a while, it won't weather too much. The key that I want you to get out of this, read the Bible in a year. Pro tip. You do not have to wait until January to make that commitment. You can start today. It doesn't matter. When you start, start today is the best one. Don't just wait until January and make a New Year's resolution out of it because you have another two month to go on this. So please don't waste time. Start today with whatever seems interesting to you and get started on a yearly Bible reading plan. And what I would say, is don't be scared to just commit to the yearly plan and worry about flexibility and, and having the Lord speak to you through scriptures, wherever the Bible pops open and those kind of things, sort of the baby Christian thought, I'm just gonna let the Lord open the, the book wherever. He feels lit. We will talk about that actually in the next podcast episode. I want to get you out of that mindset that the Lord cannot work through reading plans in terms of flexibility, but I would also say you can build in extra flexibility if the Lord impresses on you to study something specific, which you should make room for. We are gonna talk about that in the next episode, so stay tuned for that. But in summary, read the Bible in the year, commit to it today, ask the Lord. Or just, just really pick one. This is one you don't have to pray and fast for a week to decide on a Bible reading plan. Just give it a go and give it a start and say, I'm committed to the word of God and I'm gonna read it. Every day for 15 minutes a day. It is not that hard. You have time, 15 minutes in your day for other things. You have time for this, no matter how busy your schedule is. And I really encourage you for that. So read the word. It is healing to your mind, to your body, to your spirits. Or read the word, get into the word. If you have questions, send me an email. You can email me at inga ING inga@ingahofmann.com. That is I-N-G-A-H-O-F-M-A-N n.com. I will put it in the comment section as well, be blessed. Stay tuned for an upcoming episode on the question of flexibility. But for now, I bless you in the name of Jesus to get started on reading the Word of God on a daily basis. Because as you read, as you begin to read, let the word of God immerse you into the knowledge of God and his understanding so that you know his character, his will for your life, and the will. For the nations in this hour. So I pray that you will be consistent, that you will not succumb to the devil's lies that I don't have time or cannot make it work. I declare now over you that you will make time, that you will make it work and that it will. Accelerate your spiritual growth in ways that you never envisioned before, in Jesus' name, amen. I hope that blessed you. If it did, please leave me a review. That really helps others to find the show and blesses me big time. Until next week, God bless you and have a great day.