Serving Your Local Church First Through Reading Plans

Some Plans in the Bible App that function like a resource—something people start with good intentions and quietly abandon by day four. And then there are Plans function like a discipleship on-ramp—something that moves people to become active participants in a community reading God's Word together.

The difference rarely comes down to the quality of the Plan itself. It comes down to how it’s deployed. If you’re a Content Partner with an Easter Plan, you already have a tool that churches, including your own, need right now. The question is whether your Plan is being used as a resource or as a strategy.

Think Community Before Content

The most effective Easter Plans aren’t just well-written. They’re done in community. A Plan that a small group reads together, checks in on, and discusses has a fundamentally different impact than the same Plan sitting in someone’s queue.

When you’re thinking about how to serve your church with your Easter Plan, start by asking, “Who could read this together?”, not just “Who would benefit from this content?”

That might look like a small group curriculum built around the Plan’s daily readings. It might look like your Easter sermon series running parallel to the Plan so that what people read during the week comes alive on Sunday morning.

The Plan is the spine. Community is what makes it come alive.

Connect Your Plan to Your Church’s Easter Strategy

You wrote this Plan for your people. Now make sure it actually reaches them—not just as something to add to their week, but as something your church does together.

The most practical step you can take right now is attaching your Plan directly to your Easter Events in the Bible App. When someone opens your Good Friday service Event or your Easter Sunday Event, your Plan is right there—not a separate thing to go find later, but the natural next step built into the moment itself. That’s how a Bible Plan stops being a resource and starts being a strategy.

Sign in to the Events dashboard at events.bible.com to create an Event and attach your Plan to each Event you’ve created for Easter weekend. Write a short line in the event description that frames it in a personal way.

Then, take it one step further and give your small group leaders a heads-up before Sunday. Send them the Plan, tell them you’re featuring it in the Easter Events, and ask them to invite their groups to start it together. When a Plan is launched relationally, completion rates go up, and the content actually gets discussed.

Getting People to Actually Read—Not Just Start

Starting a Plan is easy. Finishing one takes something more. Here’s what actually moves the needle on Plan completion, especially during a busy season like Easter:

1. Keep it short and accessible. 

If your Plan is longer, consider highlighting a specific stretch of days that maps most naturally to the Holy Week and Easter window. A five to seven-day Plan that your congregation finishes together is worth more than a thirty-day Plan most people abandon by day three.

2. Use Posts to encourage your church throughout the Plan. 

The Posts feature lets you check in with your congregation as they read. A simple word of encouragement, a reflection question, or a reminder that others are reading alongside them can be the difference between someone finishing and someone drifting.

3. Build in community and accountability. 

Plans with Friends is one of the most underutilized features in the Bible App. When people read a Plan together and can see each other’s progress, conversations start happening. Invite your congregation to start the Plan together rather than on their own.

The Bridge From Easter to Pentecost

Here’s the longer vision worth holding onto: Easter is a beginning, not an ending. For many of the people sitting in your seats on Easter Sunday, the weeks that follow are when real discipleship either starts or stalls.

A well-timed Bible Plan that picks up where your Easter message leaves off and carries people through the weeks toward Pentecost can be the bridge between a single Sunday experience and a sustained rhythm of Scripture engagement. If your Plan has that arc, lean into it. Frame it not just as an Easter Plan, but as the next leg of the journey.

The season between Resurrection Sunday and Pentecost is rich with theological depth and spiritual momentum. Your Plan could be what helps a first-time Easter visitor take their very first steps into that story.

You wrote it for your people. Give them every chance to actually complete it.

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