is far from perfect, but are some suggestions I’ve found worked.
Listening to the Bible today One of the most common reasons I hear from people who struggle to spend time in God’s Word is: “I don’t like to read.” These are not comments from illiterate people—two recent comments came from both Gen X- and Millennial-age young men who were business owners. Their professional work was creative and physical, and both explained that they rarely read much on any subject. They listened to podcasts, watched videos, read short social media posts, but sitting down to read a big book just wasn’t going to happen in their lives. Both were excited and intrigued when I told them, “No worries! People didn’t read the Bible through most of human history. They listened to it.” I went on to tell them that there was nothing super-spiritual about sitting down to read the Bible: the content was the same if they listened to it, or watched it, or however they wanted to take in the content. I shared my favorite way to do this through the YouVersion Bible: https://www.youversion.com/. It’s a free download for any electronic device—computer, tablet, Kindle, or phone. You can read it, but you can also use it to listen to the Bible in nine different versions including contemporary ones like The Message and the New Living Translation. One of these guys told me later that not only had he just never thought about doing this, but it was such a relief to know this was possible because although he grew up in a Christian home, and knew he
should be spending time in the Bible, he honestly just didn’t read anything anymore. When he realized he could listen and that was OK, he was excited about re-engaging with God’s Word in his life. In addition to younger generations enjoying listening to the Bible, seniors are another group with whom I’ve shared this method of listening to God’s Word. For many seniors, reading has become difficult, and to be able to listen to the Bible is a comfort and a joy. With this age
though God’s Word never changes, we need to stay open to the exciting ways He gives us to share his timeless truth through ever-changing technology. group someone must spend some time with people showing them how to do this either through their phone, computer or tablet, but it can be a wonderfully enriching experience for them.
Drama—seeing the Bible acted out today My experience with sharing this method with people makes use of an incredible, free online resource: www.freebibleimages.org. This group has both illustrations and photos online of Bible stories. This is no cheesy Christian
clip art site. They use a variety of illustrators and their photographs are particularly useful. The site uses actors who are ethnically correct (no white Anglo-Saxon Jesus!) and in culturally appropriate settings. All of the images are available in many formats and sizes—and none of them have text attached to them (though they list the Bible passages they are based upon). They do this intentionally so that they can be shared in any setting or language. There are many ways you can use these images. Following are two videos I created as illustrations for Sunday School classes. I took the images, downloaded them in PowerPoint format, loaded them into www.animoto.com (an extraordinary program for quickly creating videos), added the text, used music from the animoto library and ta dah! You have little teaching videos! Here’s a link to one of my finished products—just a couple of minutes long. This one is on my church communication website, and the post also goes over how you can create your own. It’s based on the story of the Prodigal Son and uses photographs from the site: http://www.effectivechurchcom.com/ how-to-create-a-bible-teaching-andstory-video-using-free-bible-images/ Though I haven’t done this as yet, the same images could be projected on a wall (make it really big: the resolution will work!) and a teacher could stand to the side and tell the stories. This would work especially well for kids who will watch a screen without punching each other nearly as much as they do when the teacher attempts to get them to simply listen to the sound of her voice. (Cont. on page 10) September 2016 | 9