The Bible, YouVersion and You
Posted by Randy | Labels: Accordance, Bible, Bible apps, Bobby Gruenewald, Gutenberg, LifeChurch.tv, Mac, Willowcreek Community Church, YouVersion, YouVersion Live | Posted On Saturday, October 29, 2011 at 11:01 PM
Our church, Gateway Community Church, has just begun using a new mobile Bible app called YouVersion. It's an amazing - and free - app that allows anyone to access dozens of Bible translations, use one of many different daily reading plans, and it now offers a Sunday morning option called YouVersion Live.
That's very different from how many of us think of the Bible. Maybe it's leather-bound, or maybe it's a simple paperback, but for hundreds of years when anyone thought of the Bible, they automatically assumed it to be a printed book (and before that, a hand-copied book). In fact, Johannes Gutenberg printed about 180 Bibles as some of his first work in the mid-1400s after he invented a printing press with movable type. Since then, it's been estimated that more than four billion have been printed, in hundreds of languages and thousands of editions. The Bible has been the number one best seller for so long that it's not even included on the lists anymore.
But in my lifetime the first truly new Bible has emerged in hundreds of years - the digital Bible. First seen in computer software programs, I began using a Bible software program called Accordance several years ago, designed specifically for Mac computers (Yes, I'm a Mac guy). It allows me to search the Bible and study in ways I never imagined twenty-five years ago in seminary.
And now, the Bible has spread to mobile apps. By my guesstimation, there are over 2,500 different Bible-related apps in the iTunes App Store alone.
For many folks, there's no substitute for a bound Bible in your hand. But for others today, using an app on your phone or tablet is becoming just as comfortable, or to have handy when you're out and can't keep a bound Bible with you. That's why we decided to put the YouVersion into service. Many folks already had it when we first mentioned it publicly. YouVersion is one of the most complete apps I've seen, and it's free.
According to an article I found at ChurchLeaders.com, the idea for YouVersion first came to Bobby Gruenewald on a layover at the O'Hare airport in Chicago in 2006. He said, "I was going through the security line, and for whatever reason at the time, I was sitting there processing what today's technology could mean for the Bible and could it be transformational in our engagement, and if so, in what says."
He talked about it with some of the folks at his church, LifeChurch.tv in Edmund, Oklahoma, a rapidly growing, multi-site church. In 2007 they created YouVersion as a Bible website, and the results were good but not revolutionary. Not long after they created the website, they decided to try a free mobile version. There was a lot of initial skepticism, even among the team, as to whether people would want to read the Bible on a mobile screen. But they discovered it worked!
Within days of launching it, 80,000 folks had installed it on their iPhones. They actually went live with the app before Apple went live with their App Store, and it was one of the first apps released in the store. Earlier this year they passed the 25 million downloads mark, and continue to expand at the rate of two million downloads a month, making it the world's largest mobile Bible app.
Today Bobby Gruenewald is the Innovation Leader at LifeChurch.tv and was recently named one of the top 100 most creative leaders by Fast Company magazine, alongside people like Oprah Winfrey and Conan O'Brien. In fact, his is the only name in the religion section of this list.
But Gruenewald never set out to get famous - he set out to reshape our culture through the power of God's Word. He said, "It's possible we could see the most engaged generation in history as far as the Bible is concerned, which is a pretty big leap because of all the trends and all of the data points were pointing to people reading the Bible less and less decade after decade."
For Gruenewald, it not about the number of people who install the app - it's about the number of people who become really engaged with the Bible. A church named Willowcreek in the Chicago has done some amazing research across hundreds of churches and thousands of Christ followers, and they have discovered something many Christians have known for years: "The Bible is the most powerful catalyst for spiritual growth, ... (and) reflection on scripture is the most influential spiritual practice." (Follow Me, pp. 105, 115)
To that end, Gruenewald has created the YouVersion Bible app, and we at Gateway have decided to promote and encourage it. We began promoting the use of the Life Journal reading plan a couple of years ago, and we were thrilled to discover that among the many plans available on YouVersion is the Life Journal. There have been over nine billion collective minutes spent reading the Bible using YouVersion on mobile devices. What's more, people are sharing scripture on their social networks every day at the rate of about 25,000 posts from YouVersion on Facebook and Twitter.
According to the churchleaders.com article, Gruenewald says YouVersion isn't meant to replace the traditional print-bound Bible. Instead, it's there to offer and create more opportunities for Bible reading and to take down barriers that keep people from engaging God's Word.
That's exactly what I want to see happening in our church and beyond. I am convinced that as we engage God's Word (and by this I mean more than simple reading; I mean spending time reflecting on what we read and how God is speaking to us in that moment), we will not only help people grow spiritually, but we will see lives radically transformed! The Holy Spirit works through God's Word to speak into our lives and change us. It's incredible!
So, we're promoting YouVersion (or any Bible app or program or website that gets folks into God's Word). If you don't have it yet and would like to try it, download it for free for your mobile device by clicking on YouVersion. You can also access it on your computer by clicking here. And you can even link them together. I'm not out to "sell" anything, but I do want to help you know God better, and I know for many folks, YouVersion is working. Try it out - see what you think! And let me know how it goes.
That's very different from how many of us think of the Bible. Maybe it's leather-bound, or maybe it's a simple paperback, but for hundreds of years when anyone thought of the Bible, they automatically assumed it to be a printed book (and before that, a hand-copied book). In fact, Johannes Gutenberg printed about 180 Bibles as some of his first work in the mid-1400s after he invented a printing press with movable type. Since then, it's been estimated that more than four billion have been printed, in hundreds of languages and thousands of editions. The Bible has been the number one best seller for so long that it's not even included on the lists anymore.
But in my lifetime the first truly new Bible has emerged in hundreds of years - the digital Bible. First seen in computer software programs, I began using a Bible software program called Accordance several years ago, designed specifically for Mac computers (Yes, I'm a Mac guy). It allows me to search the Bible and study in ways I never imagined twenty-five years ago in seminary.
And now, the Bible has spread to mobile apps. By my guesstimation, there are over 2,500 different Bible-related apps in the iTunes App Store alone.
For many folks, there's no substitute for a bound Bible in your hand. But for others today, using an app on your phone or tablet is becoming just as comfortable, or to have handy when you're out and can't keep a bound Bible with you. That's why we decided to put the YouVersion into service. Many folks already had it when we first mentioned it publicly. YouVersion is one of the most complete apps I've seen, and it's free.
According to an article I found at ChurchLeaders.com, the idea for YouVersion first came to Bobby Gruenewald on a layover at the O'Hare airport in Chicago in 2006. He said, "I was going through the security line, and for whatever reason at the time, I was sitting there processing what today's technology could mean for the Bible and could it be transformational in our engagement, and if so, in what says."
He talked about it with some of the folks at his church, LifeChurch.tv in Edmund, Oklahoma, a rapidly growing, multi-site church. In 2007 they created YouVersion as a Bible website, and the results were good but not revolutionary. Not long after they created the website, they decided to try a free mobile version. There was a lot of initial skepticism, even among the team, as to whether people would want to read the Bible on a mobile screen. But they discovered it worked!
Within days of launching it, 80,000 folks had installed it on their iPhones. They actually went live with the app before Apple went live with their App Store, and it was one of the first apps released in the store. Earlier this year they passed the 25 million downloads mark, and continue to expand at the rate of two million downloads a month, making it the world's largest mobile Bible app.
Today Bobby Gruenewald is the Innovation Leader at LifeChurch.tv and was recently named one of the top 100 most creative leaders by Fast Company magazine, alongside people like Oprah Winfrey and Conan O'Brien. In fact, his is the only name in the religion section of this list.
But Gruenewald never set out to get famous - he set out to reshape our culture through the power of God's Word. He said, "It's possible we could see the most engaged generation in history as far as the Bible is concerned, which is a pretty big leap because of all the trends and all of the data points were pointing to people reading the Bible less and less decade after decade."
For Gruenewald, it not about the number of people who install the app - it's about the number of people who become really engaged with the Bible. A church named Willowcreek in the Chicago has done some amazing research across hundreds of churches and thousands of Christ followers, and they have discovered something many Christians have known for years: "The Bible is the most powerful catalyst for spiritual growth, ... (and) reflection on scripture is the most influential spiritual practice." (Follow Me, pp. 105, 115)
To that end, Gruenewald has created the YouVersion Bible app, and we at Gateway have decided to promote and encourage it. We began promoting the use of the Life Journal reading plan a couple of years ago, and we were thrilled to discover that among the many plans available on YouVersion is the Life Journal. There have been over nine billion collective minutes spent reading the Bible using YouVersion on mobile devices. What's more, people are sharing scripture on their social networks every day at the rate of about 25,000 posts from YouVersion on Facebook and Twitter.
According to the churchleaders.com article, Gruenewald says YouVersion isn't meant to replace the traditional print-bound Bible. Instead, it's there to offer and create more opportunities for Bible reading and to take down barriers that keep people from engaging God's Word.
That's exactly what I want to see happening in our church and beyond. I am convinced that as we engage God's Word (and by this I mean more than simple reading; I mean spending time reflecting on what we read and how God is speaking to us in that moment), we will not only help people grow spiritually, but we will see lives radically transformed! The Holy Spirit works through God's Word to speak into our lives and change us. It's incredible!
So, we're promoting YouVersion (or any Bible app or program or website that gets folks into God's Word). If you don't have it yet and would like to try it, download it for free for your mobile device by clicking on YouVersion. You can also access it on your computer by clicking here. And you can even link them together. I'm not out to "sell" anything, but I do want to help you know God better, and I know for many folks, YouVersion is working. Try it out - see what you think! And let me know how it goes.
