I don’t think you need to read the Bible to know God or anything like that. It’s just a good roadmap to find your way back to him if you are lost.
You don’t want to read it to remember anything, as that’s what the Bible thumpers do. Intellectuals don’t know God, they only know about him. (it even says in the Bible that God likes to use foolish things to confound the wise, because God and this world are at odds with one another)
I just pick it up from time to time and read parts of it. I always find some hidden gem, and I think that’s just God knowing what I need at that moment and teaching me.
Other times I learn directly because he just shows me. I always thought it didn’t make sense for God to communicate through text alone. He is God. Then I learned about the Holy Spirit and it all made sense. We have a direct connection to him.
You know those “aha” moments where things click and you just know something to be true without being able to explain it? It’s just this deep sense in your gut that you know what needs to be done? That is God communicating with us.
I wonder if this inconvenient fact is removed in new translations.
I wouldn’t be surprised. The new ones teach that God is female lol, and promote homosexuality as good, at least from my understanding. I stick with King James, but I’m not a snob. I don’t think any Bible is perfect.