accessible bible Archives - Biblica Europe

Mistakes and miracles – how God’s Word reaches Iranians

Posted on May 16, 2024 by Biblica Europe

A couple of years ago, Biblica completed the first translation of the whole Bible into modern Farsi, the official language of Iran. In one recent year, 300,000 Bibles were received by Iranians hungry to read them… despite the fact that it’s against the law to distribute the Bible in Farsi.

Our brave distribution partners tell us one incredible story after another about how Jesus is speaking to Iranians and miraculously providing Bibles to people seeking them.

The taxi driver and the box

In one Iranian city lives a man who works as a taxi driver.

One day, he picked up a passenger who had a box sitting next to him on the back seat. As this passenger left the car, he forgot to take his box. The driver thought he would contact him to pick it up the next day. He took the parcel home with him for safekeeping.

The thing is, this taxi driver was also a house church leader. That night, the secret church meeting would be at his house. For many years, these ten believers had gathered regularly, sharing one Bible between them – the one belonging to the taxi driver. The ten of them had been praying for months: “Lord, we would each like to have our own Bible.”

This particular night, when it was time to pray they said, “Let’s pray for Bibles again!”

As they prayed, the group leader suddenly wanted to know what was inside the box that had been left in his taxi. He got up very quietly and walked into the kitchen where he’d put it. He opened the box, and, astonished, brought it out to the praying group.

What was inside the box? Ten Bibles! The group was so, so happy.

The Lord delivers!

The man who left that box of Bibles in the taxi was one of our partners’ delivery guys. His role in getting Bibles to Iranians who need them is to collect the Bibles from a secret, safe warehouse and then carefully deliver them to house church leaders. Sometimes the delivery guys are just guided by the Holy Spirit about where to take the Bibles.

We don’t think this brother meant to leave those 10 Bibles in the taxi – he didn’t know the driver was a house church leader. But God knew very well. Our partner said:

“It gives me goosebumps to think about the Holy Spirit working together with people, fallible humans, and even using their mistakes.”

Your impact is huge

Our partner in the Middle East has a message for everyone who gives to Biblica:

“I want to personally thank you for making the financial investment in Biblica to make the Farsi Bible translation possible. God is using your gifts and multiplying them, sometimes more than tenfold.

“Now the translation is done, we need funding to print more copies. We can’t start printing Bibles until the money’s in. Anyone reading this can make it possible for more people in the Middle East to read the Bible, which for many will be their first time.”

To support this ministry and others like it, you can give a gift here today.

A ‘lite’ Bible app reaches 70 more countries

Posted on April 23, 2024 by Biblica Europe

Although technology has made it easier than ever to share God’s Word around the globe, most smartphones are less powerful in the developing world than they are in developed nations, and most users have a lot less data to use. This means the average person has remained cut off from digital Bible apps like YouVersion.

Until now, that is.

This year, YouVersion partnered with Biblica to design, pilot, and launch Bible App Lite — a lightweight Bible app specifically designed for people in developing communities.

“Lightweight” means that the app is exponentially smaller in terms of megabytes while still offering key Bible engagement features in an offline context, including the full text of the NIV.

More downloads than TikTok

After a pilot in Ghana, Kenya, and Nigeria, Bible App Lite is now used in over 70 countries around the world. More than 16 million people have installed Bible App Lite in the last 12 months. More importantly, there’s over 1 million people using it every single day. And in multiple African app stores (Kenya, Uganda, and DRC), this digital Bible has even ranked as the No. 1 overall app —more popular than TikTok and Facebook!

“God is using this app — not just to get the Bible into people’s hands, but also into their hearts,” says YouVersion Founder and CEO Bobby Gruenewald. “Our desire is to reach every person, in every part of the world, with God’s Word in their heart language.”

Bobby adds, “Our team loves Biblica. We couldn’t do what we do without you.”

The stats

The new Bible App Lite:

16 million total users
1 million daily users
The number 1 app in multiple African app stores

We keep innovating to share the Bible everywhere

Technology like this is a gamechanger in getting the Bible to previously inaccessible places. In many countries it’ s much easier to download an app than get your hands on a paper Bible. Last year, we launched 53 more single language Bible apps for basic smartphones.

Read more about the impact of your support
over the last year in our inspiring annual report.

Shining for Jesus!

Posted on November 16, 2020 by Biblica Europe

The Big House Ireland is a Christian charity that exists to help young people know God’s love, especially when they are dealing with difficult life situations. Katherine Dickson said

“We believe that young people are precious, valued and deeply loved by God, regardless of who they are, where they are from, or whatever difficulty they may be facing. We want young people to know that they are not alone in difficult situations and that there is no difficult day, no dark experience that God cannot bring hope and life into”.

The Big House provide counselling, camps & weekends, youth group sessions and training for leaders. The camps and weekends are designed around the needs of young people and seek to respond to their experience of difficult life situations. Whether it’s a long-term illness, a family difficulty, or a personal issue, Big House camps aim to help young people encounter Jesus in the midst of their difficulties and grow in their knowledge of God’s love and care.

Working on a collage

Biblica have been able to support The Big House by providing copies of The Accessible Bible: New Testaments for one particular camp called Shine. Shine camps are for young people with learning difficulties and the aim is to provide:

A safe, non stereotypical, welcoming residential setting for young people with additional needs (as well as their siblings and youth leaders) where they can connect with others, whilst hearing the message of the gospel in relevant, engaging and creative ways
Vibrant, and accessible spaces where young people are encouraged to spend time with their Heavenly Father, and have the opportunity to pray on their own or with the help of a mentor
A place of joy and fun, where young people are able to try new activities and discover independence in areas where they normally wouldn’t have the opportunity to do so
An opportunity to be away from home for the first time, pastorally and physically supported by an inter-generational team of volunteers (fully trained) who have a heart for sharing the joy of Christ with others; regardless of age, culture, illness or special educational need.

As you read this it will not surprise you that in 2020 the Shine camp was not able to go ahead due to COVID-19 restrictions. However, The Big House did stay connected with the campers by posting activity kits which included a bible-based activity, craft, links to worship songs and lots of sweets!

In December, the campers usually attend an annual reunion. This year they are planning to meet on Zoom, with the theme ‘The Greatest Gift’ and plans are underway to share copies of the Accessible Bible: New Testaments. Katherine said

“This Christmas, we are especially thankful to Biblica for their generous donation, allowing us to celebrate The Good News of the gospel. Through Biblica’s donation, each of our campers will literally receive the gift of good news this Christmas, AND have the opportunity to gift a copy of the Accessible Bible: New Testament to a friend or loved one”.

Some of the campers do not communicate verbally, so gifting a bible enables them to shine as they share the good news of Jesus with others.

At Biblica we are delighted, humbled and greatly blessed knowing that these special campers will be shining for Jesus!

Katherine said “Our SHINE campers will be beacons of hope as demonstrated in Romans 10:15 “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!””

The Accessible Bible Project – Urban Saints

Posted on October 20, 2020 by Biblica Europe

Mark Arnold is the Additional Needs Ministry Director at Urban Saints. Urban Saints has been in existence for 120 years, reaching out across the UK to support children’s, youth and family workers.

Urban Saints partnered with Biblica at the start of the Accessible Bible Project. Mark said

“We dreamed big dreams, we produced a big list of things that we hoped the Accessible Bible would include, and bit by bit we saw it taking shape…… It’s been great to be involved in such an exciting project that has reached out and enabled children, young people and indeed adults across the UK and across the world to be able to access God’s word in incredible ways for the very first time”.

In this video Mark reflects on how he and Urban Saints got involved in the project; how they continue to use the NIrV Accessible Edition: New Testament; the impact that the project has had; and the excitement for the launch of the NIrV Accessible Edition: Psalms.

Mark shared this story from the launch of the NIrV Accessible Edition: New Testament:

“As the …. New Testaments were being handed out…, I found one of our Trustees …. close to tears. This friend of mine is Dyslexic himself and has a Dyslexic daughter and as he opened the New Testament he could immediately start to read it himself and he was so thrilled that not only would he be able to have a Bible in his hand that he could easily and accessibly read, but he knew that his daughter would be able to read it too”.

Please watch this video. At the end you will find a link to read more about the Accessible Bible Project.

The Accessible Bible Project – Tio Associates

Posted on September 7, 2020 by Biblica Europe

Tiō Associates is a small charity based in Northern Ireland. Their vision is to see people with intellectual disabilities and their families being welcomed, valued and participating in the church and in society by promoting an authentic Christian perspective on intellectual disability. The charity does this by speaking, teaching, training and consultancy, celebrating and supporting best practice.

Early in lockdown we supplied Tiō Associates with some NIrV Accessible Edition: New Testaments to distribute to those who would benefit from them and we were keen to find out how they were used, so we had a chat with Rachael Mackarel.

Biblica: Rachael, what is your role and how did you get involved?

Rachael: I studied a Masters of Theology under our founding director Ian Dickson on the topic of Biblical Pedagogy* for people with intellectual disabilities. We piloted theological education for people with intellectual disabilities at Belfast Bible College in 2012 and completed 8 terms with our students.

Subsequently I have been leading Tiō’s Accessible Bible study group for adults with mild and moderate intellectual disabilities. Our members have successfully taken part in leading church services and speaking at events including New Horizon as well as our own Tiō Associates conferences.

Biblica: Tell us how your group has been using the Accessible New Testaments

Rachael: Our group have been using the New Testaments since they were published and we always promote and model the use of them at all Tiō training, services and events especially those which are intentionally accessible for people with disabilities.

We often take our time over passages to learn, process and begin to apply the text into our own lives. Each term we have a theme or section of New Testament text to cover, for instance one theme was ‘Friends of Jesus’. We read and used drama, arts and activities to learn about the people Jesus was friends with and how he related to them. We were able to bring out applications to help us all build positive relationships and be a good friend. These topics we addressed pastorally through share and prayer time and peer support e.g.; those of us that struggle with conflict were able to learn from the patience and assertiveness of Christ; Those of us who feel lonely and friendless were comforted by His friendship with us.

Before lockdown started, we ceased meeting in person with our group to safeguard and protect the well-being of our volunteers and members. We moved to online video conferencing and increased our frequency of meeting from fortnightly to weekly because so many other aspects of our members’ lives and routines were closing down, and we were keen to be a support to them. More of our members were able to read from their own Bibles at home because the weight and size of them made them difficult to transport for some when we were physically meeting up. We focused on memory verses of hope through the Spring and Summer e.g., Romans 15:13 and we learnt the Makaton signs online together to help us to learn it. We used this verse to springboard into praying for each other especially those with mental health struggles related to lockdown.

One of our members was sadly bereaved during the time that we were meeting online. We were unable to visit his family or support them at the funeral due to restrictions. Sometimes the topic of death and loss can be a bit taboo in the intellectual disabilities community because we do not want to upset people. Like others, for people with intellectual disabilities being a witness to a friend’s grief can stir up feelings of loss they have also experienced.

The week of the funeral we all gathered online and wore black together as a sign of our collective mourning. Then we read from our NIrV:

Give praise to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! He is the Father who gives tender love. All comfort comes from him. He comforts us in all our troubles. Now we can comfort others when they are in trouble. We ourselves receive comfort from God. 2 Corinthians 1:3-4 (NIrV)

The group members were given time to think about a time that they were sad and needed God’s comfort and then we prayed for God’s comfort to be known to our friend and his family. This verse helped us to process our own sadness and at the same time think about the feelings of our friend.

Biblica: Is there something that has encourage you during lockdown?

Rachael: Many adults with intellectual disability do not own their own Bible. Some live in supported living where staff do not share their faith or are not aware of different types of Bibles. To be able to put the NIrV in the hands of people in these situations has been wonderful. The simpler translation helps us to teach the meaning of texts without having to regularly stop and explain difficult words. Before lockdown we would meet in a church building and do our Bible study in a separate space from the rest of their lives. Now we are meeting online from our homes and the process of opening our Bibles and reading together is actually being shared with carers and staff, and so we are connecting with some of them in ways that we didn’t before.

*Pedagogy is the discipline of study related to the field of education and teaching methods

“That’s the first time I’ve understood the Bible!”

Posted on November 27, 2019 by Biblica Europe

Within Biblica Europe, we are delighted to work with a range of partner ministries and publishers across the UK, Europe and further afield. We regularly receive sample bibles from these ministries which we keep for archive purposes. But from time to time we are delighted to be able to pass on some of these to other ministries working in the UK and beyond. This is the second story about a ministry who are doing fantastic work getting the Word of God into the hands of those who need it. This time we catch up with Sharon Wilson from the Shankill Community Fellowship in Belfast.

Shankill Community Fellowship is a Gospel outreach project sponsored by Baptist Missions Ireland. The Shankill Road in Belfast and the surrounding areas were some of the most deeply affected by the violence of “The Troubles” in Northern Ireland. It is recognised as one of the most deprived areas in Europe.

Working in the heart of this community, the Fellowship has been serving the local people since 2009 to help make the Bible apply to people living in this part of Belfast.

Sharon Wilson is part of a small leadership team of three in the Fellowship, working as an Associate Volunteer Missionary.

Speaking about the Bibles they received from Biblica, Sharon said “Each Bible is prayerfully given out. They are an invaluable resource to us, as a Bible wouldn’t be at the top of the list of things for people to buy. It is an absolute privilege to be able to give out God’s Word in this way.”

One of the ways that Shankill Community Fellowship (SCF) serve the local community is by regularly having a table outside of their premises which has clothes, and other essentials, that people are able to stop at and take whatever they need. Very often people will have conversations with Sharon and others, which results in the offer of a Bible, which more often than not is accepted.

One particular story stands out in Sharon’s mind “A lady had been coming to SCF for a while, and we got into conversation one day. I asked her if she had a Bible and she said no. I sensitively explained to her about the NIrV and she said she would accept one. A week or two later, she arrived back, and in her words said…’That’s the first time I’ve understood the Bible’. She had started learning the books of the Bible, so we made her some cards with the books of the Bible on them and numbered them on the back in case she dropped them. There’s much, much more to the story……The change in this lady is remarkable!”

Sharon says that she counts it an absolute privilege to be a small part of the work God is doing on the Shankill.

In Biblica Europe we count it a privilege to be able to support Sharon and Shankill Community Fellowship in their work in this community.

Tag: accessible bible