A Year-End Spiritual Review: Questions to Look Back With God

It is the last week of December. A list of fifty reflection questions is open on your phone. “How did you grow this year?” You type an honest-sounding answer from memory, then another, and by question twenty the answers have started to sound the same.

There is a shorter way to look back on the year with God, and it starts with one thing you can actually check. It takes about an hour, a Bible, and a pen.

Why Christians look back before they look ahead

Looking back is older than the calendar. “Let us examine our ways and test them, and let us return to the Lord” (Lamentations 3:40, NIV). The examining is not the goal. The return is.

Paul tells a church to do the same: “Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves” (2 Corinthians 13:5, NIV). The next line reminds them that Christ Jesus is in them: a relationship, not a courtroom.

“Search me, God, and know my heart” (Psalm 139:23–24, NIV). The psalmist asks God to do the searching. A year-end review is not a chance to prosecute yourself.

That is also the shape of the examen. The University of Notre Dame’s McGrath Institute explains that Ignatius asked every Jesuit to pray it twice a day, beginning with a request for “the grace to see yourself honestly” and then gratitude. Our suggestion, not theirs, is to stretch that shape over twelve months: thanks first, then an honest look, then sorrow where it is due, then grace for what comes next. If the daily version is new to you, how to pray the examen walks through the steps.

Don Whitney, whose new-year questions Justin Taylor shared at The Gospel Coalition, puts the value of such questions plainly: it lies “in the simple fact that they bring an issue or commitment into focus.” For that you need a few good questions and one honest fact, not fifty.

Before the questions: what you actually read this year

Most year-end question lists ask how you grew and then let you answer from memory. Memory is a generous witness.

One part of a spiritual year can be checked instead of remembered: what you read. Start there. Open the plan, the app or the Bible you used, find your bookmark, list the books you finished, and set them beside what you meant to read.

This is not a scorecard. It is evidence for the conversation the questions start. Begin with what was read, the way the examen begins with thanks. Copy this worksheet onto paper and mark each group.

Beside it, write three short answers:

• The book that met you. Where did a passage stop you?
• The book you avoided. Name it without explaining it away.
• The book you want next. One title, not a list.

Why bother writing the plan down at all? In the American Bible Society’s State of the Bible 2026 (2,649 interviews with U.S. adults, January 8–27, 2026), 74% of people who use a reading guide, schedule, plan or program said they had read most or all of the Bible. That is a survey correlation, not proof that plans make people finish, but it is a fair reason to keep a plan you can review against.

Where a January plan would be now: the checkpoint table

Here is where a one-year plan started on January 1 would be at each month’s end. Find the row closest to your bookmark, not the row for today’s date. It tells you how much of the Bible is already behind you.

Words and books tell different stories. The Old Testament is 552,304 words, 76.2% of the whole, and it runs all the way to day 279, when Malachi 3–4 and Matthew 1–2 share a day. The New Testament is the last 87 days. So a reader who stalled at the end of August has read two-thirds of the Bible’s words but finished only 25 of its 66 books. Check the share column before you judge a thin book list.

Leviticus fills days 33 to 43, which is why a January start often meets its first wall in February. Psalms runs from day 172 to 192, three weeks of midsummer.

A worked example. Say your bookmark on December 31 sits at Habakkuk 1, the September 30 row. You are 92 plan days from the end: 182,822 words, about 831 minutes, roughly 14 hours of reading. At the usual nine minutes a day, that is about three months. If you want to finish, how to catch up on a Bible reading plan lays out the options, and none of them is cramming a week into one sitting. The nine-minute figure itself comes from our breakdown of how long it takes to read the Bible in a year.

Twelve questions to bring to God, in four groups

With the reading list in front of you, the questions have something to rest on. Pray them rather than grade them, and skip any that do not fit your year.

God and me

• Where did I sense God near this year, and where did He feel far away?
• What am I most thankful for, looking back over all twelve months?
• Don Whitney’s question: “In which spiritual discipline do you most want to make progress this year, and what will you do about it?”

Scripture

• Which passage do I still remember, months after reading it?
• Where did my reading stop, and what was happening in my life that week?
• What did I learn about God that I did not know in January?

People and church

• Who carried me this year, and have I thanked them?
• Whom do I need to forgive, or ask to forgive me?
• Where did I belong to a church this year, and where did I drift from it?

Time and the phone

• Whitney again: “What is the single biggest time-waster in your life, and what will you do about it this year?”
• What did I reach for first most mornings?
• Which hour of the day was most open to God, and which was most crowded?

Twelve is enough. Past a dozen, most people start answering for the sake of finishing. Give the time to the answers that made you pause.

Turn the gaps into next year’s plan

Most reviews end in a resolution, and most resolutions are gone by February. A year-long plan rarely ends in one decision either. It loses its thread in a quiet week that turns into a month.

So write something smaller than a resolution. A resolution names an outcome. A rule of life names a practice and a place in the week. How to write a rule of life covers the method; here you need one or two lines.

Write each line as a practice plus a cue:

• “After I pour my coffee, before I open my phone, I read the day’s chapters.”
• “On Sunday evening I read the Psalm I skipped during the week.”

Put a date two months out on the page and review the line then, not after two weeks.

If the reading list showed a plan that was too fast, change the pace before you change the plan. A one-year pace is about nine minutes a day; a slower plan is a real choice, not a lesser one.

If the review is mostly gaps

Some years the list is short. That is a normal year. Lifeway Research surveyed 2,130 U.S. Protestant churchgoers in March 2025 and found 61% read the Bible regularly, 31% every day, and 9% rarely or never.

So read the empty rows the way Lamentations reads them: as a reason to return, not a reason to stay away. A missed month is a number, not a verdict. Write down where your bookmark is and start from there.

Sometimes a review surfaces something heavier than a reading list: grief, a sin you keep returning to, a doubt that will not settle. That is a conversation for your pastor or a trusted friend, not for a worksheet. If you are between churches, our church finder is a place to start looking.

The Psalms give the year its last word: “Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom” (Psalm 90:12, NIV). Numbering days is not counting failures. It is asking for wisdom with the time that comes next.

Frequently asked questions

What questions should a Christian ask at the end of the year?

A dozen is enough, grouped around God and you, Scripture, people and church, and time and the phone. Ask where you sensed God near or far, which passage stayed with you, who carried you, and what you reached for first most mornings. Pray them rather than grade them.

What does the Bible say about reflecting on the past year?

Lamentations 3:40 says, "Let us examine our ways and test them, and let us return to the Lord." Psalm 139:23-24 asks God to do the searching, and Psalm 90:12 asks Him to "teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom." The point of looking back is returning, not keeping score.

How long should a year-end review take?

About an hour is enough. Spend the first part listing what you actually read this year, then pray through about twelve questions, then write one or two rule-of-life lines for next year. You can split it over two evenings.

What if I barely read the Bible this year?

Then the review is still worth doing, and it is a normal year. Lifeway Research found that among 2,130 U.S. Protestant churchgoers surveyed in March 2025, 31% read the Bible every day. Write down where your bookmark is, start from there, and choose a pace you can keep.

Should I start a new Bible reading plan on January 1?

Only if it helps. You can pick up from your bookmark instead of restarting at Genesis, and if last year's pace was too fast, change the pace before you change the plan. A one-year Protestant plan is about nine minutes a day.