I love books. This isn’t a secret if you’ve been around my blog for a long time or follow me on Instagram.

And now is a great time to be reading and finding great books (and to broaden your reading).

So, here are eight ways to know if you are limiting your reading and what to change to find the best books:

Every book you read is from your theological camp. There are a lot of crazy religious ideas out there, so you need to be wise about what you read. But the reality is though, you don’t know everything, and you certainly don’t have the bible and every theological idea all figured out. I don’t either. It is good to read authors who believe differently than you so that you can be challenged. Now a short note, if you are new in your faith, this isn’t a good idea as you don’t have the foundation to question yet. If that’s you, ask your pastor or a respected Christian for some book recommendations.

Every book you read has bible verses in them. You should read some books by authors and leaders who don’t follow Jesus. As a pastor, one of the reasons is to learn how to communicate with people around you. To learn something, you may not know but also to see what people who walk through the doors of your church believe. This also helps when you have conversations with people who don’t follow Jesus so that you can relate to things they are thinking about and books they are reading.

Every book you read confirms what you already believe. This is similar to the first one, but if you put a book down and have not learned something new, you wasted your time.

You finish every book you start. I get asked a lot why I don’t write negative book reviews on Instagram. People will often say, “all you ever say is how great a book was or how much you loved a book.” The reason? If I don’t like a book by p. 40, I put it down. Life is too short to read a book you don’t like or isn’t teaching you anything. If it’s poorly written or boring or not challenging, it’s off the list. Don’t feel the need to finish every book you start or to read every chapter of a book; they may not all be relevant.

Books don’t challenge your heart. Similar to point 3, but you should be challenged or convicted from a book. You should find ways to improve your preaching, leadership skills, or your faith, being a spouse or parent. If not, put it down. If a book does not put the magnifying glass up to your heart and life, it isn’t worth the time.

You never read a novel. I love novels. I love stories about spies or lawyers in particular and have recently started to read more and more historical books. As you can see, I always have a historical book on the reading list.

Every book you read is for a sermon. This doesn’t apply to everyone. But if you’re a pastor, this is easy to do because you have to write a sermon each week and are always creating content for social media or classes. You should read books that have no application in a sermon. It also sometimes happens that you are reading a book that you discover something that will work in a sermon, that’s great too. If you are doing a series on marriage, you should be reading a book on money or grace just to keep growing in other areas.

Every book you read is by a pastor. You should read books by CEOs, bankers, doctors, trainers, money managers, scientists, not just pastors or speakers.