Pentecostal Blogger

How to choose and use a wide-margin bible
Randy Brown
www.biblebuyingguide.com
ASIN: B00AFJXUQC

This review of How to choose and use a wide-margin bible by Randy Brown is my own, honest evaluation and opinion, and I was not paid for this review, neither did I receive any compensation, including a review copy for this review. Disclosed because of FTC blogging disclosure guidelines.

How to Choose and Use a Wide-Margin Bible: A Bible Buying and Marking Guide by Randy A. Brown is an e-book self published via Amazon for Kindle devices. Randy’s e-book is a collection of a large amount of his work on his Bible Buying Guide website, as well as a decent amount of new material. Topics included in this e-book guide include:

• What makes a quality bible
• Choosing a translation
• Bible features and tools
• Color coding and highlighting

I enjoyed the chapter on bindings and covers the most, and I would recommend to the author that he expand this section to include more details and coverage on this section. I do realize that this e-book is not a book on bindings, but rather the effective use of a wide margin Bible for studying God’s word, but it would be nice to see this section grow in future revisions.

The author’s tips for effective note taking and use of symbols or color highlighting and underlining are useful for the new Bible student, to get them interested in using these types of memory aids in assisting their Bible study. In the layout section of the chapter on Bible features, I am in agreement with the author in that I, as well, enjoy the readability of a single column paragraph style Bible, my only qualification to that statement is in regards to preaching. I find that a one-verse-per-line format is faster when preaching, and you need to quickly turn to a verse to quote from. The paragraph, while acceptable for study, and superior in readability, is inferior when it comes to speedily looking for a particular verse as the verse numbers are not readily apparent, having been embedded somewhere in a paragraph.

Another area which could be further expanded is the inductive study methods, including symbology and highlighting. the author does give details for beginners, but for more advanced students, it feels a little wanting. I would include more examples, and perhaps some new or innovative techniques in a future revision to this excellent guide.

Overall, I recommend Randy Brown’s e-book as an excellent introduction to Bible Study and wide margin Bible usage.  You can find it for sale in the Kindle store at Amazon.