You might be surprised to learn that one local church has a strong connection to one of the most popular phone and tablet apps in history.
Life Church, which has a location in Wellington, recently announced that the YouVersion Bible App is now available in 1,007 languages on more than 230 million devices worldwide. Through the gifts of generous donors and the contribution of Bible content from a global network of partners, it is now the first app to be made available in more than 1,000 languages.
“Our mission is to use technology in any way we can to help people worldwide engage with God’s word,” said Bobby Gruenewald, founder of the YouVersion Bible App and innovation pastor at Life Church. “We’re thrilled to partner with the many Bible societies and translation groups that make it possible for us to offer the Bible in more and more languages every month, because our goal is that eventually every person with a mobile device will have access to the Bible in their native language through the Bible App.”
The 1,000th language added is Sukuma, the primary language of 7.6 million people in Tanzania, Africa, and home to Mount Kilimanjaro. With the BibiliaIlaganoLya Kale 2015, developed by the Bible Society of Tanzania, people who speak Sukuma can more easily engage with and share God’s word.
“In this digital age, we tend to forget that people have spent decades of their lives, and in some cases sacrificed their own life, to make it possible for people to read the Bible in their own language,” Gruenewald said. “Though we’ve come a long way, more than two billion people still don’t have a Bible in their language, so we are dedicated to continuously increasing the number of languages offered through the Bible App to get it into more people’s hands.”
Bible societies, Bible publishers and copyright holders have worked together to generate a detailed list of languages that do not have their own Bible. Of almost 7,000 languages in the world, nearly 2,000 still need to start translation projects.
To learn more about YouVersion’s mission, or to download the Bible App, visit www.youversion.com.
