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Scripture Engagement

Media Training & Certification

   IMS Media Training & certification

 

IMS (SIL International Media Services) offers you a selection of core and specialized training modules to choose from, allowing you to be better equipped for the specific ministry context you are in.

If you are wanting to be certified as a Media Specialist, our obligatory four core modules are: Audio Production, Video Production, The role of media in ministry & holistic development, and Facilitating media. In addition to this, we offer a range of additional specialized courses for those seeking to become Media Consultants such as Dubbing biblical films, Using social media effectively, App building or Participatory radio drama.

Our training helps you…

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Recording God’s Word by Any Means

  • by FCBH

Imagine: You live in a secluded village on an island in the Pacific. You have only ever known the religion and rituals of your community, but you know in your soul that there must be something more. You yearn for truth and peace. Once, a foreigner brought a book in the local trade language and tried to tell your people about God, but your heart language does not have a written form. Only a few of your family members and friends can read the trade language to a small degree. The book that the foreigner brought contained complex wording that made no sense even to them. You eventually resign yourself to the fact that if there is a God, He doesn’t care about you enough to speak His truth in your language.

…Until one day, your neighbor shows you an interesting device. Emitting from it are words you recognize. Your neighbor tells you that at last, because of this device, your community can hear God speak—in your language.

Faith Comes By Hearing strives to ensure that every last person has the chance to hear God’s Word, no matter where they live or what language they speak. To carry out this work, we employ a variety of methods in recording and providing Scripture to more people.

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Finishing a Bible Recording

  • by Sarah T

If I had to describe the audio processing team at Faith Comes By Hearing, I’d use the word precision. Much like a tool-machining company, audio engineers have to produce an individual product with extreme accuracy—again and again. They have to get each Audio Bible recording just right.

Every workday, the 20 audio editors buckle in at their desks, strap on their headsets, and enter the culture of another people group through their recorded words. But these aren’t ordinary words: they are God’s words, which were painstakingly translated into the community’s mother tongue.

The Greek New Testament has 138,000 words; the English has 180,000. What?! That’s a big gap. The New Testament might have a unique number of words for every language. Let’s take an average of 160,000 words. Since Faith Comes By Hearing has more than 1,460 New Testament recordings, that means audio technicians have already recorded 234 million words, more or less.

 

Words are essential in everyday interactions, education and business, and most certainly in spiritual matters. Because 50% of the world’s population can’t read at a level high enough to understand the Bible, the audio recordings produced by Faith Comes By Hearing are crucial to the salvation and spiritual growth of millions of people. This drives our need to be accurate. Each word matters.

An audio editor focuses on one language at a time. If all goes well, he can check the audio files, add music and sound effects, and complete the master in about three and a half weeks. As many as 30 languages are in the studio at the same time, and the team produces an average of 10 Scripture recordings a month.

How does an editor in Albuquerque follow a biblical text and recording in totally foreign language? Some languages use the Roman alphabet, like English and many other European languages. This makes listening and following the text relatively easy. Otherwise, audio processors refer to a transliteration of the recorded language, which changes the sounds of the words into Roman script. The editor can now identify if there is an extra word or if one is missing. Finding simple errors like these is an essential step in verifying the accuracy of a recording. The text also helps the editors place markers in the right location to add the background music and sound effects.

Quality control (QC) for Scripture recordings is built into the recording and editing processes from start to finish. It begins in the language community, where the trained director and technician constantly monitor the sound quality, the person reading, and background noise. Adjustments are made on the spot to ensure the highest sound quality possible. In the studio, Faith Comes By Hearing’s audio editors can remove some extraneous noises, adjust volume levels, eliminate pauses, etc. As you can imagine, it takes a lot of time to check the approximately 160,000 words in each New Testament recording.

But we’re not done yet. There’s one more person who does a final check in the QC process. He listens for balance between the volume levels of the narrator’s voice and the background music and effects. He checks to make sure every chapter is announced, and he spot-checks the entire recording to ensure we’ve produced the best possible Scripture recording for each people group. At last, the recording is formatted to play on the Web, the Bible.is app, and a Proclaimer.

As I contemplate the complexity of recording Scripture in every language that needs it, I feel a sense of awe. And I have a whole new appreciation for the audio editors. They experience a great sense of accomplishment when they complete each new language. One put it this way: “Having a job where the whole mission is to get the Word of God to the whole world is awesome and very fulfilling.”

It’s not a task to be taken lightly—they are responsible for handling God’s Word in audio with precision so that every person can hear the pure Word of God in their language.

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YouVersion scripture in over 1660 languages

Scripture in 1660 languages on YouVersion: tell someone!

Six months ago YouVersion hit a milestone of scripture in 1500 languages via Bible.com and the YouVersion apps for Android, iOS, Amazon Echo. Since then they have added over 200 versions in over 160 languages.

The answer to “And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?”, isn’t that they can Google.

Romans 10:15 doesn’t say, ““How beautiful are the phones of those who bring good news!”

Technology is a huge asset but for most people engagement with scripture still involves someone telling them about it. Who will you tell?Read More »Scripture in 1660 languages on YouVersion: tell someone!

Global Bible Apps

  • by Joshy K

God is limitless. Access to His Word, the Bible, should be too! The mission of Faith Comes By Hearing (FCBH) is to provide people everywhere with free access to God’s Word through Audio Bibles in every translated language.

The Global Bible App initiative makes the Word of God available to the worldwide community of Android smartphone users. The major focus is on people who are not connected to the internet. Global Bible Apps are designed and built by Faith Comes By Hearing using SIL’s Scripture App Builder tool for Android devices and contain the Bible text and audio in the language of preference. These standalone Bible Apps synchronize the text and audio in a “karaoke” style, enhancing the user experience.

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Paid and Unpaid Scripture Promotion With Facebook

  • by EMDC

This blogpost is based on a presentation made at EMDC.Online about paid and unpaid promotion of Scripture and Scripture-based resources through Facebook. The discussion of paid ads is focused on ads for specific geographic locations and includes a discussion of analytics from the ads. Unpaid promotion includes using the Facebook page directly and also personal accounts. The names of the presenters are not included due to security reasons.

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Measuring Scripture Engagement in Digital Ministry

Discipleship and Digital Ministry 

If you are in a digital ministry setting, you know it can be difficult to decide how to differentiate between digital engagements and digital Scripture Engagement. We can get caught up in how many “impressions” we obtain, but forget that our end goal is to make disciples. The video below gives you a taste of how we at FCBH have been working to make disciples and engage with people digitally during this pandemic season. 

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Why We Don’t Start with Bible Translation

When a new programme starts it’s often tempting to set it up as a Bible translation programme. Sometimes that’s appropriate. In many cases, for a variety of reasons, it’s not. This is because:

  • It’s a minority language
  • People tend to be bi- or multi-lingual (at least if they live in towns, or have been educated)
  • They’re oral preference
  • They’re illiterate or semi-literate, or literate only in the language of wider communication
  • They aren’t yet Christian believers
  • etc.

If any or all of the above are true, then it’s good to start with language development and Scripture engagement rather than full-blown Bible translation, where you translate whole books of the Bible, and aim for a full Bible or New Testament + Psalms or Panoramic Bible. Sometimes the only reason for doing the latter is the kudos of the team, which is not a good reason. We’re aiming for transformed communities, not team kudos!

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Audio/Visual Scripture & Outreach Media Sources

The following is a question that I regularly get asked by “on-the-ground” workers- “How can I find out what scripture/ministry media is available online in my people’s language so I can download and use in our outreach?” The below are the main websites I know to point people to that allow them to search for and download media in their language:

Read More »Audio/Visual Scripture & Outreach Media Sources