Only once I admitted by Faith in public by getting baptized in Christ Jesus, and then buckling down with discipline to study God's Word line upon line, chapter by chapter.
I used the 19th century British Bible scholar E.W. Bulllinger's study Bible which has scholar level notes in the side margin next to the 1611 KJV text. It is called The Companion Bible. Just all the info in the Appendixes in the back alone makes it worth having a copy. And The Old Testament contains many Massorah notes, a system the Israelite scribes used to make certain their copies of The Old Testament by hand from generation to generation. The Companion Bible is the only English study Bible that contains those Massorah notes from the scholar Christian David Ginsberg's work on the Massorah.
I also used BibleSoft's software of Bible versions and Bible study tools, which is fast. But going slow through the whole Bible, taking the time to look over in the side margin at Bullinger's notes, which contain Scripture references to other Bible sections on the same topic, and archaelogical notes, and historical notes, forces one to go slow and really let God's Word to 'sink in'. Always begin Bible study with a prayer asking The Father for understanding in Christ's Name too.
There would even be times when I would be studying a certain Bible Book and Chapter, and I'd rest for the day. And then within a week or so, something about it would be revealed to me. And sometimes it even involved places where I'd traveled overseas, where I didn't realize what the ruins I was seeing was really about. But the Bible history I was covering in my Bible study pointed to it.