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Participatory Bible Study Methods, One Door to More Engagement

By the Participatory Approach Support Team, LEAD Asia-Pacific 

When Bible Study Practices Don’t Produce What We’re Hoping They Will Produce

While our specific areas of ministry may differ, we all want to create environments for those we serve that help make studying the Bible active, engaging, creative, meaningful, and accessible! We long for spiritual transformation and empowerment in their lives, but this sometimes requires taking a closer look at the way things have always been done and what may truly help others to know God more intimately.

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Translation Technology: Accelerating the Spread of God’s Word

  • by EMDC

Technology Images - Free Download on Freepik

Technology can be a polarizing word. The idea of artificial intelligence or robots can seem exciting to some of us but scary to others. But did you know that technology is playing a critical role in building God’s Kingdom?

Andrew Flemming, vice president of global partnerships engagement for Wycliffe said,

These tools include things like: Starlink satellites, which provide stable internet; Render, which records oral Bible translations; and Chameleon, which enables the Bible to be translated into sign language in persecuted areas.

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The Dramatized Audio Bible

  • by FCBH

‍The Audio Bible: Multi-voice, dramatized, high-quality, pure Word of God. It’s a standard of Faith Comes By Hearing and the typical model employed by our recording teams worldwide. But who came up with such a ground-breaking methodology?‍

It all started on a bus. Anet Jackson, co-founder of Hosanna (the original name of Faith Comes By Hearing), found great joy in sharing the Gospel with children via puppet shows in the various towns her family would visit during their itinerant ministry days. At Vacation Bible Schools around the western United States, Anet and her four children brought Scripture to life via dramatized portrayals of biblical stories.Read More »The Dramatized Audio Bible

How can ChatGPT help in Bible Translation and Scripture Engagement? #2

Artificial Intelligence is not a replacement for Actual Interaction …in other words we still need to talk to real people!
One of the current challenges of ChatGPT and other AI chatbots is that they use their existing experience to create plausible sounding answers that aren’t always accurate. Real people tend to do the same, they may tell you what they think you want to hear or tell you what they think based on their interpretation of your question and upon their existing knowledge and experience. (I’ll comment further in a moment but the next three paragraphs are generated by ChatGPT)
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How can ChatGPT help in Bible Translation and Scripture Engagement? #1

Should you let chatGPT translate the bible into languages that it hasn’t been available in before?
No, it can help in various ways but AI is a tool that helps rather than replaces humans. Don’t take my word for it. Here’s how ChatGPT answered the question:

“As an AI language model, I am capable of translating text into different languages, including the Bible. However, it is important to note that the translation of the Bible is a sensitive and complex task that requires a deep understanding of the source text, as well as the culture and linguistic nuances of the target language.

While I can accurately translate words and phrases, I am not equipped to provide the necessary contextual and cultural understanding needed for an accurate and meaningful translation of the Bible. Therefore, it is recommended that any translations of the Bible be done by trained human translators who are well-versed in both the source and target languages, as well as the cultural and historical contexts of the Bible.Read More »How can ChatGPT help in Bible Translation and Scripture Engagement? #1

God on the Move: Changing the Landscape of Deaf Bible Translation

In 2020 an exciting milestone was reached in the world of Bible translation when the American Sign Language Version (ASLV) of the Bible was completed! After nearly 20 years of work, Deaf Missions and partner organizations finished the complete translation — making ASL the first sign language to have the whole Bible.*

Today there are more than 350 sign languages known around the world representing 70 million signers. Of this population, less than 2% have encountered Jesus in a language and format they clearly understand.

With only one full sign language Bible complete, the Deaf represent the largest unreached people group in the world. But God is on the move, and technology is being developed that could change the landscape of Deaf Bible translation for sign languages around the world.

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My Meatpacking Home

“In the last days the mountain of the LORD’s temple will be established as the highest of the mountains; it will be exalted above the hills, and all nations will stream to it.” (Isaiah 2:2)

Hometown Diversity

“Miss, I forgot my house key. And my sister won’t be home from work until after midnight.” We scrambled to figure out a plan to get this Somali teen home safely from tutoring. My husband, Steve, decided to swing by the meatpacking plant on his way to taking kids home, to see if our young friend could acquire a house key from her sister on her work break. 

Steve and three teens from three distinct ethnolinguistic groups sat together in the parking lot of our local meatpacking plant and waited. Each of those kids had a family member in the plant. Their families had relocated to Greeley, Colorado because the meatpacking plant would offer them employment–ASAP. They didn’t need to speak English or be literate to start supporting their families as they resettled after various long and difficult refugee journeys.

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MMU (Media to Movements)

Media to Movements is changing how teams and churches around the world use media strategies to find seekers and “persons of peace” so spiritual multiplication results. Check out these stories from teams around the world! Live, mentored courses are available twice a year. The next sessions begin soon.

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How God Uses the Diaspora to Reach Across Borders

Sunny Hong

As a Korean American, Sunny Hong understands firsthand the critical role of diaspora people groups in translation work. (Diaspora are dispersed people groups who settle outside of their homeland.) But Sunny’s own path to serving in missions took many unexpected turns.

Sunny moved to the United States after college and looked for ways to serve in missions as a computer programmer. “I realized that even though I did well with computers, I didn’t enjoy working with computers, and I was trying to use that for God’s glory for the rest of my life,” she said. “Whenever I tried to take one step forward in that direction, God blocked the doors.”

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One Matchstick – The Senga Fire

  • by FCBH

“When we work together with our different gifts, we can say, ‘God has accomplished this.'” 
Rev. Katete Jackson Jones, BiLTA, Zambia

One year ago, Faith Comes By Hearing‘s video team set out to capture an incredible story of community transformation through God’s Word in audio. Now, the organization is ready to share that story with the world.

One Matchstick: The Senga Fire, tells the incredible true story of the Senga of Zambia receiving the Bible in their language for the first time in the tribe’s 2,000- year history.

Prior to this monumental breakthrough, no written or oral translation of Scripture existed in the Senga’s mother tongue. For years, interaction with the Bible in any meaningful way required the Senga to learn the languages of neighboring tribes. Though they desired to know and understand the Bible, their tribe was deemed too small to receive a written translation.

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Healing From Trauma Through Scripture

“Nobody we know can really identify with all our trauma. I feel so alone,” my friend breathed, her words barely audible as she slumped in her chair. She was wearier than I’d ever seen her, weighed down by her family’s ongoing journey through a series of extreme crises and shocking losses.

I sat beside her in silence, considering all the devastation my friend and her family had experienced over the years. She was right. I could think of others who’d suffered intensely, but no one who’d walked a road similar to theirs. While many people loved my friend deeply and wept along with her, none of us could fully understand.

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Pencil Bible

Pencil Bible is a beautifully simple Bible app for journaling, crafting notes, and visually capturing scripture. ✎ It doesn’t matter if you’re a notetaker, artist, prayer warrior, journaler, or just a daily reader. Pencil Bible helps you experience the Bible on a whole new level.

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Sunday School Lesson Resources and Teaching Materials

Sunday School lesson plans based on the “Good News” and “Look, Listen and Live” series of audio-visual materials from Global Recordings. (https://globalrecordings.net/en/teaching)

The ‘Good News‘ and ‘Look Listen & Live‘ flipcharts, and the digital Bible Picture Pack, are invaluable aides to those working in children’s ministries. We have developed lesson plans to accompany the ‘Good News‘ and all eight of the ‘Look Listen & Live‘ books. These lesson plans, and the accompanying black & white outline drawings for colouring-in, are free to download.

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EMDC.guide – The Scripture Engagement Guide

EMDC.guide – The Scripture Engagement Guide

The Scripture Engagement Guide (SE Guide for short) is designed to help you understand your situation and decide how to encourage your people to use the Bible. It is a web-based tool for local communities to explore a variety of topics to consider their needs, then find the resources to help them get there. It empowers communities to make informed and sustainable decisions for their future. This is more about the process than the products that may be created or used along the way. We believe that working through the journey with others will benefit your community by helping you understand your situation better. Then, you will be able to choose wisely from the many scripture engagement resources on this site or design your own special SE activities. Your answers to the questions in the Journey and the list of resources here can be used again and again to find new ways to hear or read the Bible.

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BibleBooster

BibleBooster is an initiative by Bible Societies for Bible Societies. It provides a website and a mobile app which focus on optimising the experience of online Bible reading and supporting Bible engagement. It can serve the needs of those with little or no experience in Bible reading, as well as people with deep knowledge of Scripture.

“The digital landscape is changing very quickly, and so are user expectations. It can be a struggle for a single Bible Society to keep pace with it all. There are so many questions to consider, on number of levels… It can be overwhelming for one Bible Society to handle this all alone. The good news is: you don’t need to anymore! BibleBooster offers you products and services to help you to develop and implement your digital strategy.”

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