Best Bible Note-Taking System: Jonathan Edwards's Miscellanies 

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Thanks for sharing, I'm a minister from Hong Kong, a place deep in political trouble right now, but I still want to set my eyes on the Bible and also teach people how to read the Bible, what you are sharing is really good.

Love love love this! I recently threw out a bunch of notes because I knew there were too many to organize! Having ADHD does not help!

This Edwards Miscellanies system looks kind of like building your own personalized concordance. Thanks for posting this video.

I was inspired by this video a while ago and created a new bible study system for my class of 9-13 year olds based on it. We're referring to it as the "moos" and its been received amazingly well. Thanks for the vid

One thing that works great with a table of contents is to put the table of contents on the last page working backwards, and the notes starting in the front. That way, you never run short on ToC space.

Excellent. Much more organized than my system. Thanks for taking the time to share...

Matthew! This is a brilliant system! Thank you for sharing. Definitely going to follow suit.

I can't believe I never knew about Edward's note taking! I have been sharing this with friends since I learned about it a few days ago and using it with my study over Psalms. I also look forward to reading The Miscellanies Companion. Thank you Pastor and God bless.

This video was in my feed-I am so blessed that it was! I really love this idea!! Thank you so much for sharing-Blessings

This is my first time watching one of your videos. This idea is great. Now I need to go through previous notes and start coordinating them between my Bible and journal. Thanks so much for sharing this.

Thank you for sharing this wonderful concept. I have already prepared myself to begin this bible note system. God bless you.

THIS IS AWESOME!!!! I get so frustrated not being able to find notes I made during my study times! Thank you for sharing! This just popped up in my recommended list. SUPER EXCITED to start!

This is the best video. This note systems is hands down the best I have ever seen and I can't wait to buy a nice journal and use this system and pass it down to my daughter and for her to do like wise for her children. God bless you pastor and your family.

“Geek out,” lol. Huge Bible, journal, book nerd here! Thanks for sharing a great note taking system.

FYI for anyone who may see this. If you like KJV, Bearing Precious Seeds has a bible where the margins are all the way around the text, similar to the Cambridge, for about $50+tax.

Thank u I hv been looking into a system to praise and study and even hold myself accountable to prayer request and daily worship- this will work best I hv seen yet 🤗

Thank you! This was wonderful. I've always bounced between frustration coming from no organization and frustration coming from overbearing organization. This looks simple, and I can do it easily. Also, i can use simple inexpensive journals and expand it whenever necessary. Thanks Matthew

It's inspiring to see the dedication you have and the appreciation of all the people in these comments.

Thank you Pastor Matt. You are always so inspiring and have great ideas for us.

Funnily enough, I've developed exactly this system myself over the years through trial and error (but with the index at the back as someone explains below) and it's SO helpful. BUT I didn't think of putting the reference into my Bible! BRILLIANT idea!! Now just have to go through several years of notes to do so!! ;) THANK YOU for this video.

This is an immensely helpful system! I am using it in my private devotional life, and it's been fantastic for keeping track of how my thoughts, ideas, and reactions to the Bible develop.

Where have you been all my life?! Lol! Seriously, this is such a great idea and I intend to implement it into my bible studies immediately. Thank you so much for this video. God bless you!

It's a superb system -- orderly & flexible enough to grow with one's study depth. Thanks so much for sharing!

this is exactly what I have been needing. I got my wide margin but have been putting off writing in it until I got a good note taking system and this is perfect. This is going to make my life much easier.

I love Edwards! I already keep a commonplace book for my thoughts, etc. this is brilliant for Bible study. Thank you.

Great video thanks for uploading! Always looking for new notetaking ideas. Thanks

Thank you for sharing this system. I appreciated the thoughtful progression of the demonstration. I did not know this system and I will consider using it. New subscriber.

Thank you for making this video! God bless you, man.

I think this is the solution to how I want a notebook and bible for each pastor I follow. I can actually have one bible with a colored misc index for each pastors sermon so I can see “X” pastor referenced this verse in “Y” sermon, and so did “A” pastor in “B” sermon. Thanks for sharing!

This reminds me a lot of the Zettelkasten system of note taking. I've been using a version of this to organize a lot of my Bible notes to turn into a commentary for myself. If you want your notes to be searchable digitally, you can use software like Obsidian (a Markdown note editor) to easily transcribe your notes and the links between ideas. It works great for surfing around and gathering ideas on a topic. This is a great idea. The idea of writing the miscellany number in the margin of the Bible is particularly genius. Thanks for the video!

Thank you for showing this format... SO USEFUL! I have decided to make mine through MS Word so that I can add diagrams charts and pictures and hyperlinks ect. but I also keep the Table of Contents List at the back of my note taking Bible 💡 this would be a great way to give access to all siblings or children anytime they want to see the misc notes

Thanks Pastor Matt I love your channel.

I love this method of note-taking. I use a journal for notes and sermons and my reg Thomas Nelson KJV Bible . Thank you for sharing and God Bless You and your family❣️

I read a lot of Dostoevsky this year, The Brothers Karamazov is what started my journey towards Christ

What an awesome system! I just grabbed a blank journal and am setting it up. I am totally excited to use this for the rest of my life. Thank you for this video. Blessings.

Honestly, really good way of jotting dowm ideas and observations! Love it, God bless you🙌🏻

This is so helpful. I bullet journal and this very similar with applying it to Bible study. Thank you!

Thanks for sharing this. I have started doing something very similar on my own and never knew Edwards would have thought of that with the Miscellanies itemization. That is just great. My stuff is everywhere and sometimes hard to find. I will work on compile using the same logic he did.

This is an amazing system! Thank you so much for sharing the genius of Johnathan Edwards.

Awesome, straightforward system that is easily expandable. Thank you for sharing this!

Thank you brother !! God bless...will start my Bible study immediately following this system

Awesome and practical! Thanks for sharing the fruit of your experience!

This is so helpful. I'm gonna intergrate this in my own study and notetaking. Thanks Matt!

This system is awesome !! Thank you for sharing

This was very helpful. I am setting up my study for the next year and this will help me stay organized.

Thank you so much for this video! I’m here at the recommendation of Elyssa Nalani. I can’t believe I went to a Christian college for three years and got 80% through seminary without anyone ever sharing this awesome system with me.

Ty for your work. The respect you have for your mentor is admirable.

This system is great! Have you heard of the Leuchtturm 1917 notebooks? Their A4+ Master notebooks are perfect for this. Hardcover bound and already numbered pages, with a good index on the front.

Many thanks for sharing this ultimate note taking system. I'm a brit and never heard of it. I think it's genius and I will follow it. Keep up the good work. God bless.

Thank you for sharing your insights. Quite helpful.

Great video. I have experimented with different systems, but I think I will adopt this one. Thank you.

Started one to day. It is an awesome system. Had a Notebook for years called "Spiritual Epiphanies" where I noted insights etc. Never thought of mapping it to the related bible passages like this : )

Great video - I needed your explanation of Edwards system. Thanks.

Matt thank you! This is a very practical note tacking system.

Elyssa’s video recommended your video!! Love your method also!!

Just came across this, I have a huge amount of faith but no assigned religion per say and was struggling to find a system to help in my progress and I believe I have found it x thank you for sharing my friend 🙏🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 xx

Thank you. What a brilliant system!

This is awesome, thank you. I use Google Keep quite a bit and I really love where I might see an article in a magazine somewhere and I can take a picture of it and can grab the text or of it to use in an outline or other notes. The labeling makes it easy to break stuff up to find it easier and it works across my phone, Mac, PC, etc. Good bless you...

This was super helpful, thank you so much! I'm definitely going to be playing around with this concept for myself :)

This is really helpful for me. Thanks for sharing.

Thanks for sharing this - a brilliant system.^^

Thank you Matt. That was really helpful.

Thanks for sharing. It’s been a blessing to use this personally

Yes, luv this manner of tracking. As a minister who studies often this is a truly helpful system!

Thanks for sharing Matthew. God bless you

Love this. Would be a great source for developing out one’s theology for apologetics, evangelism, etc.

I’m not a Pastor, but I love reading and studying the Bible. I have a number of wide margin and notetaker Bibles, and I’ve been trying to figure out a way to better organize my note taking. These tips are definitely a blessing, and thank you for sharing. God bless.

Thank you! This was very helpful information. 😊

Thank you for sharing this method it will help me for sure.

Thanks for sharing this wonderful method. I have tried Bible journaling with detailed notes in the margin and tipped in papers, verses marked in color and outlined and just don't like the clutter of it. I tried putting all my notes in a notebook, but I have a very real problem with perfectionism and get upset when I get to the end of a page and make a handwriting mistake. So, I put mine in a binder. I type up my notes after a sermon or Bible study and put them in a binder. I have just started the process so I can fit everything in one binder. I have it divided into sections like, sermons from church, RU-vid sermons/studies, my reflections on verses and testimony, my favorite verses, etc. It just helps me to remember what I have studied by taking notes and then processing those notes. Thanks again.

This really helped such a great method! Thank you! 🙏🏼

Solid. I think I'm going to do this with my Schuyler Journal. Now I just need a new wide margin. My Cambridge is pretty much filled up!

Thank you for making this video! My scripture note taking system is similar to this one minus the cross reference note in the bible, which is the key to making this system useful. It shouldn't be too difficult to go back and add them.

Good to see my reform brother.❤️ Thank you 🙏🏻

Great video Matt! I've recently started to bullet journal and have been thinking of how I can use another one for my personal reading and study of Scripture. I would have probably done something similar to this when I was pastoring a few years ago. Shalom friend. P.S. Spurgeon is one of my favorites to read, like Edwards is to you.

Thanks for sharing this!

Thank you so much. I am slow coming to technology but have just put system into OneNote and now I can reference my notes on the go and so very quickly! E.g. Bible studies, or at this Covid moment Zoom bible study.

Great video, very helpful info

Excellent note taking and Bible reference system. I will apply your advice.

Thank you, nice system. I use many files like Google Docs in four categories/folders of Christ, Doctrine, Practice and Misc. Then a separate folder for Notes on each book of the Bible.

Great "geek out" video new friend Pastor Matthew! Had I mastered Cousin Jonathan's microscopic note taking I might have used it to create sinner cheat sheets and graduated from the University of Georgia with way better than a B minus average. But I was a Marketing major, not a Divinity major. Sadly, marketing people are often rewarded for dishonesty. Jonathan's grandfather Solomon Stoddard also cherished hard to find paper and wrote microscopic notes and sermons. Blessings!

This is amazing. Until now I knew I needed a better way to organize my notes so I could know how to find them later.

Thank you so much. I have tried multiple different ways to take notes, none that I liked. This is so much better than trying to glue pages into my Bible.

I was making a grocery list and starting wondering how I could take better notes, then better notes for bible study. And I searched it up and I found your video. NOTE 6:50 The Holy Spirt works in amazing ways! I also have a Wide margin KJV! Looks just like yours black and same design! God is so Good. Praise our Lord Jesus Christ!🙏🏼

Thanks Ptr Matt this gave me a good idea in my future note taking specially when I am reading a theological book, not it gave me the idea how to cross-reference it to my Bible. I think using electronic notes or journal will work as well... The important part is Miscellany. Very useful. So I think I'm gonna do that. I just need a new Bible.😊...

This is a great idea and ill start taking bible notes using this!

This is an interesting system but why not use a binder with tabs where you can add more pages instead of a bounded notebook?

THANK YOU....for taking the time to share (very effectively) your pursuit. I take this as an answered prayer! I've been doing quite a bit of searching for the right "systems". Just bought an ESV journaling bible (because I'm so bad at penmenship) the lines really help me..... Have been doing some research on journaling....want it more to be about God's speaking vs my "feelings" etc.... I have a new category...the best of the SOAPs...(a longditudenal look at what God has been saying via Scripture Observation Application Prayer) Thank you for the abundant provision of teaching/reference...much appreciated... I like the numeric...plus topical keyword

Thank you for this. Will try this one.

Very well done and most helpful! Thanks pastor!

Brilliant! Thanks for sharing this with us. One idea to consider would be to incorporate a Bullet Journaling table of contents method. This means that you don’t have to pre-write the table of contents’ pages. Rather, Whenever you start writing on a page, you put that entry into the ToC (title and page), and when you decide to continue a Miscellanie later on, that page(s) is not added to the ToC because you’ve got the cross-reference written on the page of the previous page where it was continued from. The Bullet Journal ToC would include every future page number added to the one ToC line entry, but you don’t have to with Edward’s cross-reference idea.

Your vocabulary is wonderful bro

This is GENIUS!

I landed on this by God's grace LOL thank you so much for sharing. wonderful ideas. I have a NIV wide margin Bible that I purchase a few weeks ago. I just didn't know how to start or what to do. I've been hesitating writing in it. Yesterday I ordered some pens. that was a way of hesitating and not doing anything and not taking action. So I'm waiting for the pens to come in. But now with your system that you're sharing here. I can bring out all those journals that I have not used and are empty. Lots can happen

GENIUS!!! Implementing this method today!

Awesome! Thanks for sharing

This is kind of off topic, but I always thought it would be cool to have a Bible Wiki where you can store your notes and choose which notes you want to make public. And the public Wiki would have notes from people all over the world (in theory). Granted you would get all kinds of wild stuff in the public Wiki, but it could be edifying also to read other's notes.

Brilliant. Thanks for sharing.

Wow this is so good. I have 4 or 5 notebooks full of stuff over the course of years. Everyday I write what I read that day, and if there are any questions, thoughts, connections, etc I'll write about those. But many pages are just multiple dates and what section of scripture I read that day. I rarely go back to them though and sometimes I wonder, why do I do this? It does help me remember things to write them down, so that's part of it... but I don't often go back to reference something that I've already thought through or questioned, and then answered in my notes. Table of contents, numbering your pages, and especially the putting your M# in the margins of your bible... such a good idea. I'll be doing this from now on. Wish I would have known this 5 years ago when you uploaded this video. Just now finding it lol