Digital Bible?

A few years ago I raised the question:  What are the gains and losses that come with using a digital Bible?  It's not a simple situation; there are pros and cons.  After exploring the range of issues, I concluded with this recommendation:  "Use the digital tools to supplement a primary and focused practice of reading Scripture in print."  Have your own bound-book Bible, pages and all, make yourself at home in it, and use it for personal study and small group discussion and church worship services.  I'd say the same today.

Just recently Trevin Wax gained some insight on these issues from his middle school daughter who walked away from Instagram.  He tells the story of her counter-cultural act--as well as the story of his high school son's very positive experience with the YouVersion Bible app.  Again we see that this topic is not simple; there are costs and benefits when it comes to using (or not using!) a digital Bible.  Wax makes a thoughtul case for using print and digital versions of the Bible in different ways and for different purposes.

Since I came to Goshen in 2006 (i.e., the year before the iPhone struck), I've seen a major shift in our worship gatherings when it comes to Bible use--especially in the last three or four years.  As I preach, and especially when I read from the Bible, I've always seen a great many people turn their attention to the Bible (this is great; it's the way to position yourself to benefit from the proclamation of God's Word!).  I used to know this not just from the dipping of heads to look down but from the whirring and rustling of pages being turned.  Today I still see heads look down, but I don't hear many pages.  And now when the heads look down, many faces have a certain glow from the illuminated screen before them.

Let me leave you with a question (and this is my biggest concern when believers allow themselves to settle into a pattern of digital Bible use):  Are you able to get to know the terrain, the topography, the texture of the chapters and paragraphs and sentences and sections of a Bible you scroll through as well as you did when you carried your own personal Bible with you and leafed through those pages and could envision the location of a verse on a page--that bulky Bible complete with marginal notes and underlining and highlighting and all?  Is your soul better off engaging with God's timeless truth on a digital platform, or not?