Don't have time to read the Bible? That's ok.

With the Bible app on your smartphone, you can listen to the Bible for free, anytime anywhere. And you can choose what passage and translation you want (even foreign languages). Sure, it's not technically "reading," but it's listening to Scripture, which is how ancient people came to the text in the first place.

So take on the challenge to listen to the Bible. While you're driving the car, going for a jog, or doing household chores, you can allow the Word of God to fall fresh on your ears and take root in your heart. You'll be surprised just how easy and convenient it is!

There are seasons in life when you just might not have time to sit down and read the Bible the way you wish you did, and you know what? That's okay. There are ways for us today to read the Bible even when we don't have time, and it's pretty incredible, so today I want to share with you my favorite way to read the Bible when I don't have time, and that is actually to listen to the Bible, the audio Bible, and if you have a smartphone, then chances are, you have one on your phone or you can get it easily.

So I'm going to walk you through a super simple way to get an audio Bible and be able to listen to it. The first step is to download the Bible app. This is my favorite because it has so many different versions and reading plans and all different things you can do. The icon looks like a little Bible. It's free to download, and you just sign in.

Once you log in, you'll see the home screen. Again, a lot of different things that are offered, but what you want to do is go to the bottom where there's a little book icon that says "read."

When you tap on the book icon, it will open up to a passage of the Bible. If you want to change the passage, click on the reference to navigate. So in this example, you'd just tap on John 1.

It'll bring up different books of the Bible that you can read. Say you want Matthew. You'll tap on Matthew right here and then select your chapter and verse.

We want to read Matthew 5, and you can see the text is right here, so you can just read it on your phone that way.

Or you can have the Bible app read it to you. Do you see the little volume button? Just tap that button and hit "play".

You can speed it up if it's kind of slow for you.

But that might sound a little weird.

You can also listen to different versions of the Bible. So tap on the reference again, where it says Matthew 5, and you'll see the list of translations. This one's King James Version. You can get Amplified, Christian Standard Bible, ESV, NIV, NLT, all the different translations, and you'll be able to see which ones have an audio version by the little loudspeaker. The little loudspeaker right next to the letters will tell you that there's an audio version for that.

Okay. So you download the app, you open it up, you find the passage you want to read, you hit the little play button, and then you just listen to it read scripture to you.

So practically, how can you use that?

Well, for me, when I had my firstborn, I went through a really dark season, and besides being sleep-deprived, there was postpartum depression, and honestly, if I tried to sit down with a Bible, I would just fall asleep. So what I did in those first few months right after she was born is I would pull out the Bible app during those midnight feedings when I would have to be up anyway, put my headphones in, and just listen to scripture being read, and it was like a balm for my soul.

It really brought healing by just listening to chapter after chapter being read, and that truth pouring into my life during a season when honestly, I didn't have the time or the ability or the self-discipline or even the desire to sit and read Scripture. This is such a gift that we have audio Bibles at our fingertips and we're able to listen and read scripture by listening to it, letting the Word fall on our ears. It's also a great way to memorize a passage, too, but now I'm getting in all these little things that you can do with it. So fun. Just listening to the same passage over and over again will help you memorize it even without trying.

So those are some ways that I've used the audio Bible. It's an easy way to spend time in the Word, with the Word, when you might not necessarily have time to sit down and read. So I hope you try it out.