Recently I had a to-do list that I was trying to work through – the only problem was that it kept expanding. For every item I crossed off the list, I added one or two more to it.

When I have a list of things I have to do, there is no greater pleasure for me than to be able to check those items off the list when they are completed.

And to be honest, when I check something off a to-do list, I give it more than a check. When I make the list out by hand, on a piece of paper, I don’t usually put a check mark beside the item when I’ve done the task … I obliterate it from the paper!

It’s like I don’t want to be reminded of what it was that I’d just finished. I draw lines through it about a dozen times so that the best intelligence agent could not decipher what lies beneath the pen strokes.

But I find that I only use pen and paper when I’m in a time crunch and all the to-do’s need to be completed by a deadline. Otherwise, I use a task app which puts a nice little check beside each item and fades the type for a while before it totally disappears. The app is called “Nozbe” and it’s a great little task manager.

This week I’m in one of those time crunches and so out came the lined paper and a pen to scratch out my to-do’s.

The first day I made some progress … not as much as I’d hoped, but I was able to almost rip through the paper with my lines on a few of the tasks.

The next day didn’t turn out as well. I was able to obliterate two items from my list but had to add three more that also needed to be finished by the deadline.

One of the items came as a by-product of completing a task. It was one of those,”well I did this, which means now I have to do that” kind of thing.

Another task was something new that came up. It didn’t really matter; it all felt the same. My list was not getting smaller.

I was inclined to give up on the list all together and just do what came to mind until the deadline, but that would cause me greater grief in the end.

That’s the problem with to-do lists: they don’t end! There is always another thing that needs to be taken care of.

Right now I’m going through my list to determine if there are some things that can wait, and be completed after my deadline.

What would make me happiest is to know that I have gotten to the end of my to-do list. So before I add anything else to the list, I will destroy my current task sheet and start a new one … after my deadline.

Here’s the thing: We need a sense of completion with things, whether it is a to-do list or reading the Bible. When you have a goal in mind, I would suggest that you set up a reading plan and work to complete it before you start your next plan. That way your Bible reading won’t seem never-ending but will have a start and finish date. Then move on to the next plan.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: How do you gain a sense of completion with your Bible reading? Leave your comment below.