Author and theologian R. C. Sproul writes:

One of my dreams for heaven is to learn how to play the violin. We started a church a few years ago. We have a string quartet, and they're so beautiful. I listen to violin music all the time. So I said, "Why wait? Why not get started now?"

My teacher is a world-class performer from Russia. She trained with some of the best teachers in Russia, so she tries to impose the same rigid Russian strictness on me that she went through. When I'm doing something wrong, she smacks my hand and says, "nyet, nyet, nyet." I'm learning more Russian than I am violin from this woman, but I am having an absolute ball. When I have the opportunity, I'll practice three hours a day. I just love it. It is hard; I screech so much. But it is beautiful and worth it when I do get it right.

It is a discipline, and we are called to be disciples. Millions of people start on piano lessons. They play one note with one finger and then they go to two fingers, and then two hands. There are different plateaus. At each plateau another percentage of people get off the boat and give it up.

With people who start out learning the Bible, it's the same thing. I'll frequently ask people if they have read the whole Bible cover to cover. Not just new Christians; —we're talking about people who have been Christians 20 or 30 years. A very small minority says that they've read the whole Bible.

Almost everyone has read Genesis because it is narrative. People start off with good intentions to read the Bible through, but when they get into the technical dimensions of the Levitical purification codes and that sort of thing, it's so foreign to the world they're living in that they get confused: they get lost; they lose interest; and then they give up.

In violin, if you're not trained yourself, you have to get under the discipline of somebody else. I have to see this teacher every week and put up with her smacking my hand and saying, "nyet, nyet, nyet," because if I didn't I'd never get anywhere. For people who start out learning the Bible, it's the same thing. If you have trouble being disciplined, get in a Bible study group.