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“I joined a Bible reading small group in year 10, and the Word of God changed my life.”

What age were you when you began to follow Jesus?

Reach4Life is our ground-breaking youth discipleship Bible and app. We developed it specifically for young people (12-25) living in challenging situations around the world – where they are dealing with poverty, discrimination, disease, lack of rights or even imprisonment alongside all the usual trials of being a teenager.

You can read more about it and watch a video here.

This special resource has so far helped over two million young people around the world to read the New Testament in small groups together, and to apply its wisdom to the pressing issues in their lives. There have been clear changes in teenagers’ behaviour and life choices where Reach4Life is being used, along with many finding new life in Christ.

We’re continually adding to the number of languages Reach4Life is available in, being strategic about where the need is greatest. Last year we launched a Russian translation.

This year we printed Reach4Life in both formal and colloquial Arabic for the first time. We found that there is nothing like this for young people in North Africa and the Middle East, offering guidance and the opportunity to grapple with the issues they face like the pressure to be married young.

“I took Reach4Life with me to start a secret Bible reading group.”

Reach4Life takes the reader on four journeys: how to be saved, how to grow in Christ, how to face challenges, and how to be an agent of change yourself. One young man from North Africa told us about the incredible journey God took him on after he met Jesus as a teenager through a Reach4Life discipleship group.

“I joined a Bible reading small group in year 10. I had no relationship with Christ. After four months, the Word of God changed my life, and I committed my life to Christ.

I left behind bad friends and found that my grades picked up. Despite difficulties, I got a scholarship, trained to become a doctor and moved to Cuba.

When I went, I took several copies of Reach4Life with me to start a secret Bible reading group with other young medical staff. I love getting to share about Christ with my colleagues and patients.

I do not think I would have become who I am today if the Word of God had not touched me and changed me through reading the Bible with other youth.

May God’s Word keep shining the light and bringing hope to many kids like it did for me.”

Reach4Life is part of Biblica’s mission to make God’s powerful Word accessible to the Rising Generations who will shape the future of our world.

More than half a million Turkish speakers live in London, having emigrated generations ago or more recently from places like Turkey, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Greece or Macedonia.

Many of them have never had a chance to hear the full story of the Gospel. Living in the UK, there are more opportunities for them to openly explore the Bible – but reading it in a second language like English isn’t the same. It feels foreign, sometimes confusing and doesn’t speak to the heart.

To help break down these barriers, partnering with others, the Biblica team has recently translated Luke’s Gospel into the simplified variety of Turkish usually spoken at home by those living in Europe – the Colloquial European Turkish NT translation. Our Luke Explained booklet contains some extra notes to help people from this context understand certain words and concepts that may be problematic for them.

This Easter, a group of Turkish children and teenagers shared Luke Explained and their own stories of faith with others in their London community and saw God do something amazing.

God’s Word in the hands of children

Every Easter and Christmas, one of London’s Turkish churches works with Operation Mobilization (OM) to bring over international volunteers to share the story of Jesus with more local Turkish speakers. This year, Covid travel restrictions made it too difficult for volunteers to come from overseas, so OM decided to ask young people from London’s own Turkish churches if they would like to do the Easter outreach instead.

They were very keen! In fact, younger children wanted to take part too, so parents brought along their 8, 9 and 10 year-olds to join the teens.

Throughout Holy Week, the children and teenagers took to the streets of their communities and told fellow Turkish people that Jesus loves them. They freely shared their own stories of why they believed in Jesus, and smiling and excited, offered people a Luke Explained booklet. These happy young people from their own cultural background were very non-threatening and everybody took a booklet away to read.

The kids began to ask people if they would like to pray with them, and plenty did. As the week went on, one person decided to follow Christ right there on the street.

 

New life breaks out on Easter Sunday

By Easter Sunday, the team had seen dozens of people from the Turkish community come to Christ, so they decided to hold an Easter baptism event at the local lake.

20 new believers got baptised that day, with lots of their friends and family coming along to watch and enjoy a picnic. The team set up a book table for those who wanted to find out more, along with a prayer tent.

Dennis, the church leader who led the outreach, was bowled over by the power of God in the prayer tent. He said:
Many came and asked for healing. The glory of the Lord covered that tent. Whoever touched it, whoever was around it, the Spirit of God touched their hearts deeply. When I was in the tent, a Turkish-speaking man came in saying, ‘I don’t think I am worthy of Jesus, I have too many sins.’ I explained that God accepts us all just as we are, that thanks to Jesus you don’t have to be perfect to come to him. I offered to pray with the man, and at the end of the prayer, he accepted Jesus.

His wife came and held hands with him as he prayed. She had come to know Jesus many years ago and had been praying for her husband for a long time. Then his friend came in saying, ‘I want to accept Jesus too!’ He was another man whose wife had come to faith previously and had been praying for him. But that wasn’t all. As we were praying, another two people came into the tent, also wanting to follow Christ!

This wonderful Easter story demonstrates why we’re so determined to provide the Bible in accurate, contemporary translations that connect with people’s hearts. Together, we’re breaking down barriers to God’s Word so that everybody from any background has the opportunity to be transformed by Jesus.

Biblica and partners are aiming to complete the whole Colloquial European Turkish New Testament translation by 2023.

You can give today to help more people access the Bible in a way that connects with them.

In Ukraine, you can live, work and spend your life speaking Ukrainian, but, for many people, only read the Bible in Russian. 

This was a huge issue before the events of the past month. But now more than ever Ukrainians need the scriptures to speak to them in their own heart language, not the language they associate with oppression.

We’d been working on a contemporary Ukrainian translation since 2018 – it was due to be released in print this June. In response to the crisis in Ukraine, we managed to push out the electronic version of the New Testament on the app a few months early. We knew that:

a) God’s people in Ukraine would be looking for comfort and courage from his Word at this time.

b) They would struggle to keep hold of any Bibles they had when taking cover, but were likely to keep their phones with them.

c) They would be feeling especially conflicted about reading the Bible’s words of comfort in Russian while Russian bombs dropped overhead.

In the app’s first few weeks, we saw a much bigger uptake of the Ukrainian translation than we’d expected. On our monitoring software, we could see thousands of downloads by refugees entering neighbouring countries, and over 150,000 downloads by people still within Ukraine.

That figure hit us hard. It means that Ukrainian soldiers, families trapped in bomb shelters, and those who don’t know if they’ll survive are desperately pressing into God at this time. It’s very sobering, but we are glad we’ve been able to do this one thing – give them a source of strength through God’s powerful Word in their own heart language.

We can pray with them too – let’s do that today.

To find out more about the translation project for Ukraine, watch this short video:

Can you support our work to get the Bible in Ukrainian to those who need it? visit our giving page

Biblica has a long-standing partnership with Eastern European Mission (EEM), which began with the licensing of Romanian and Russian translations for children’s illustrated Bibles for schools and churches in Moldova, Romania, Ukraine and Russia.

EUROPEAN EASTERN MISSION

EEM was established in 1961 in Vienna to provide God’s Word in print in the languages of the nations behind the “Iron Curtain”. As times changed, the organisation evolved but continued to focus on its core mission of providing Bibles, free of charge, to the countries of Eastern, Central, and South-Eastern Europe. EEM currently operates in 30 different countries and provide Bible and other biblical resources in over 25 different languages. EEM has field offices in Russia, Ukraine, Czechia, Romania, Greece, Belarus, and Serbia, and partner with hundreds of churches and ministries to distribute the Bible to all who want to read it. In recent years EEM has been distributing over 1 million pieces of literature per year.

Mark Finnie, Biblica Vice President for Europe and the Middle East said “Biblica’s vision to reach the marginalised and vulnerable is shared by EEM… tens of thousands of Arabic and Farsi Bibles have been given to refugees fleeing Iran and Syria and other troubled areas of the Middle East…. At Biblica we love working with EEM as they bring God’s word to new believers and those who have never heard the story of God’s love and forgiveness”.

Bartosz Rybinski is the Vice President of European Operations for EEM. Originally from Warsaw, Poland, he has a background in business and ministry. Bartosz has been a follower of Christ for nearly 30 years and currently serves with EEM in Vienna, Austria since 2007.

BIBLES IN ROMANIAN

Biblica recently provided EEM with Bibles in Romanian, and we were keen to find out from Bartosz how they were being used. Bartosz said “Romanian Bibles are requested by churches, mission organisations, and schools in Romania, Moldova, and Greece. The Bibles are distributed during evangelistic campaigns, outdoor events, door-to-door, as gifts for Christmas or Easter and used in public and private schools for religious education classes. They often go to the most neglected, forgotten, and poorest of the society. Even though COVID-19 restrictions have impacted some of these efforts, the demand for the Romanian Bibles remains high. From the 33,000 copies we produced in partnership with Biblica in late 2020, about 5000 copies remain in our inventory as of end of May 2021. We expect to have completely distributed them by August 2021.”

YOUNG PEOPLE ENGAGING WITH THE BIBLE

Mitru and Ica Doboș are partners of EEM working in Arad County, Romania. They work particularly with schools providing resources for children. A Religious Studies teacher, Poduț Dănuț, in one of the schools said

“I gave out the Bibles as a prize to some of my students. I was surprised when some colleagues asked me for Bibles so they could also give them out as prizes! The following year a teacher asked me if we could give the Bibles to each student in the preparatory class through the eighth grade, which I did. So going from giving out a few Bibles in my classes, I was giving out 680! Then, Religious Studies colleagues from other schools asked me for Bibles for their schools!

We have been very encouraged to hear of grandparents, older siblings, and parents reading the Bibles. I have had many of my students engage with the Bible and other resources and they want to discuss more about what the Bible says.”

The desire of EEM to get the Bible into the hands of more people is clear. Bartosz said

“Our close partnership with Biblica is critical to the success of our ministry and has an impact on access to Bibles all over Eastern and Central Europe. In addition to the recently published 2^nd edition of the Serbian Bible, we are working with our friends at Biblica on new editions of the Russian and Romanian Bibles, Serbian and Romanian Bibles in Large Print, for the older generation and Bibles in Sorani for the refugees in Greece and beyond. Without the long-term vision of Biblica to provide translations in these and many other languages, the work of EEM would be much more challenging and thousands would not have access to a modern Bible text in their own language.”

 How encouraging is to hear about this work to get God’s Word into the hands of those who need it in a contemporary translation that they understand!

Can you support this work? visit our giving page

A Message from our CEO Geof Morin.

As we approach the end of 2021, I wonder what this past year has held for you and your family? Perhaps you are feeling tired, overwhelmed or burdened by all that has been going on in our world. Perhaps you have been struggling with personal, health or financial challenges this year, or you may know those who have suffered significant loss. But whatever 2021 has held, together we can rejoice and celebrate the amazing truths Paul shares with us in Romans 15:13.

God’s Word assures us there is always hope, not a fairytale Christmas kind of hope, but a hope that is sure and certain, in a God who is faithful. A God who will keep his promises. A God who always remains true.

True joy is a gift which comes only from God – it means that whatever our circumstances, we can still experience profound joy, deep within our soul.

Once we were enemies of God, but because Christ came to dwell with us on earth, we can rest and trust in him.

As I have chatted to our ministry leaders and partners around the world this year, it is clear that God’s hope, joy and peace is still very real and evident in the world today, even in the most challenging situations. In 2021 we have seen first-hand the Word of God, through the power of the Holy Spirit, bringing hope to people who are in difficult circumstances, those who are refugees, those facing persecution for their faith, people who are facing dire financial hardships. But in the midst of all these challenges, God’s can still bring true hope, joy and peace.

As we reflect on these profound truths from God’s Word, I would love to share two short stories of hope with you from our ministry partners in the Middle East….

A Rock in Troubled Times As the raging battles drew closer and closer, Amani* fled from her home in Syria. With her husband and three young children she crossed into Lebanon and was placed in a temporary refugee camp of tents not far from the border. Five years later, this temporary accommodation has become their permanent home. Our good friends and partners from Mokattam Evangelical Church have been reaching out to the camp, and a volunteer student team recently visited Amani and her family, bringing food, Christian literature and the gift of a Bible in Arabic.

Amani shared her frustrations with the team, “Our government is not stable, our situation is not stable, our financial system is not stable, so we don’t believe there can be any stability in this world.” One of the students answered, “All worldly things are unstable, but we are here to tell you about the only one who brings security – and you can trust him and His Word as a rock to build your life on.” Amani turned away from the food and supplies, reaching instead with a smile on her face for the Bible and asked where she should start reading.

“No-one has ever visited us before…..” The Pastor from Mokattam also shared with me another story from their work in Cairo. Azbet al-Hagana is a slum area, home to thousands of Sudanese refugees who live in tight, cramped homes, waiting without hope for their asylum papers. Recently, another group of volunteers from the church visited to distribute supplies and bibles. The families were shocked, as no Egyptian had ever visited them in their homes, saying they had previously felt rejected as outcasts. But the students were able to share that it was the Holy Spirit living inside them that motivated them to visit and demonstrate God’s love. The families received the gifts and Bibles with joy.

Will you join with me in praying for our brothers and sisters across the Middle East who are seeking to bring God’s hope, joy and peace into difficult situations this Christmas?

Perhaps you would like to support us with a gift to help us continue to get God’s Word into difficult situations, and to those who are struggling to afford daily essentials.

As we celebrate this Christmas season, my prayer for each of you is that “as you trust in him…you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”

Thank you for standing with us prayerfully and financially.

Praying God’s peace and blessing on you and your family this Christmas time and beyond.

Yours in Christ’s service,

Geof Morin

Can you support our work? Please visit our giving page

GOD ANSWERS PRAYER

Arriving at St Stephen’s Primary School, a team from Fields of Life were welcomed into Head Teacher Margaret’s office, where they saw a 3-year strategic plan on the wall. Incredibly, detailed among the plan, was the pressing need to find children’s Bibles for chapel time.
“God answers prayer!” exclaimed Margaret when she saw the Treasure Hunt Bibles that Fields of Life brought to gift the school. She was amazed by God’s timely provision. Every Thursday, the pupils attend chapel hour where they learn Bible stories and memory verses. Up to this point they had been doing this without Bibles for the children to follow.

The pupils’ faces lit up as they received 100 new Bibles and learnt how to use them.

Based in the UK, working in East Africa, the ambition of Fields of Life is “to transform the lives of the most vulnerable and marginalised people through the provision of quality education, clean water, health promotion and other community-based programmes.”

In Uganda children and young people in vulnerable communities face challenging circumstances that can negatively impact their physical, emotional, and spiritual development. Many carry the pain and trauma of extreme poverty. Many drop out of school at a young age and are vulnerable to exploitation and teenage pregnancy, often lacking access to quality Christian education and child-friendly Bible resources.

The experience of the Fields of Life team is people will donate money to drill a well, or help to build a school, but they struggled to raise money to provide Bibles and Bible resources. Discussions between Biblica and Fields of Life began, and a valuable began a number of years ago, with 10,000 copies of Dear Theo, and continues to this day.

Recently Biblica partnered in a project where Fields of Life were investing in the holistic development of young people, equipping them to emerge as inspirational, Christian leaders shaped by Kingdom values, by providing Treasure Hunt Bibles and Reach for Life booklets.

A representative from Fields of Life said “Thank you Biblica for your vital partnership on this project. The Treasure Hunt Bibles and Reach for Life booklets distributed through this project will be used by schools and churches in lessons, afterschool clubs, school libraries and Sunday Schools.”

PROJECT IMPACT

Even with COVID-19, Fields of Life have been able to roll out the project in 9 schools and 2 partner churches impacting 2,200 young people. Project highlights so far include:

• 1,000 Treasure Hunt Bibles distributed.
• 2,200 young people given access to the scriptures in an age-appropriate format; and
• 48 teachers and church leaders trained on how to use Bibles and Reach for Life resources.

 

 

“The provision of these beautiful Treasure Hunt Bibles is a dream come true. It is incredible to give the gift of God’s word to the schools and communities we know and love.”
Monica, Fields of Life Community Development Officer

“I always wanted a Bible, but my parents could not buy me one. I thank you very much for giving me a Bible. I am very happy and excited about my Bible. I will be reading it daily and tell my sisters about what I read…. I thank Biblica for working with Fields of Life to give us these Bibles”
Abraham, Primary 7

Can you support us as we work to get Bible resources into the hands of children like Abraham? To support our work, visit our giving page

Oleg Yakimenko came to Christ when he was a university student in 1993. Some Christians gave him a New Testament and encouraged him to read about Jesus in the gospels. The Word of God changed his life and incredibly he is now working to get God’s Word into the hands of others.

For twenty years he and his wife served as missionaries, planting a church in St. Petersburg, Russia. He is currently the National Director for Russia/Kazakhstan/Belarus in the Eastern European Mission (EEM).

EEM is an international ministry that, together with partners, focuses on providing free Bibles and other Bible-based resources across Eastern Europe.

Working in partnership with local churches and ministries, EEM has been distributing Biblica’s New Russian Translation (NRT) Bibles across Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan.  Some of the Bibles are sent by mail to individuals who request a copy. Others are distributed to small local churches that would struggle to purchase copes, for their new members.

Many of the Bibles are provided to people through outreach projects ran by partners. This includes prison ministry, evangelism in rural areas, ministry to recovering addicts, visiting the poor and single-parent families and at special events.

We asked Oleg to tell us one thing about the distribution of these Bibles in each of the countries. This is what he told us:

RUSSIA
In Russia, many believers still use an older translation of the Bible from the 19^th Century. However, more and more requests are coming from conservative groups like Russian Orthodox churches for the NRT Bibles to use in their Bible-reading sessions, recognising that they need a quality contemporary translation so that people can understand the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

 KAZAKHSTAN
Reflecting on the demand for NRT Bibles in Kazakhstan, Oleg said “The production/distribution of Christian literature is limited in this country. The level of poverty is also a big factor for the big need in free Bibles.”

 

BELARUS
Oleg said that “In Belarus, a lot of believers used the NRT Bibles as a sign of peace when they marched on the streets of Minsk and other big cities. The believers expressed their opposition to the violence during the political unrest in Belarus in 2020.”

 

In the spring of 2021, Oleg received this encouraging story out of difficult circumstances. A young man called Alexander had undergone spinal surgery and lost feeling in the lower part of his body. He was diagnosed with cancer and he was bedridden for about 2 months. He asked his mother for a Bible and requested that people pray for him. Local Christians brought Alexander a gift of the NRT Bible – he was so glad to have a Bible he could read and understand. Oleg said “The fear of an unknown future, with questions about whether he would survive or be able to walk in the future, made him run to learn more of the One who is our Hope!”

Oleg’s life was transformed because Christians shared God’s Word with him. Please pray for him as he now directs the work of sharing God’s Word in Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus for EEM.

Can you help us get God’s Word into the hands of those who need it most in Eastern Europe and Central Asia? Please consider giving to support projects like this one with partners including EEM, working on the front line in the region.  To support our work, visit our giving page

Biblica serves ministries and churches on the frontline of the Gospel by creating Scripture outreach resources tailored toward those who desperately need God’s Word – the unreached, unengaged, unchurched, unwanted an unseen. Our work started by reaching out to immigrants arriving on Ellis Island, and an important aspect of our work today continues to be among refugees.

If you want to find out more about our work serving those on the frontline, visit our website

Helping Hands has been working among refugees in Greece since 2016. Ben* lives in Athens with his wife and two young children, and since 2020 he has had the role of Program Coordinator.

Ben said “We want to see lives transformed and we therefore plant gospel seeds in the lives of our refugee friends that, by God’s grace, will grow and bear fruit.”  He continued “We are always amazed how God uses his Word to touch people. For many refugees, it is the first time they have had access to God’s Word without needing to fear.”

In May 2021 Helping Hands were able to begin distributing 700 New Testaments in Farsi, provided by Biblica to help resource their work. Ben said that Easter each year is the best time for them to share their faith as it is a significant part of Greek culture and celebrated as a religious holiday. Helping Hands usually celebrate by proving meals to a large number of people, but due to COVID-19 they had to creatively adapt their plans in 2021.

Over four days, twelve families per day were invited to a park, in 30-minute intervals, to play games, and hear the gospel through storytelling and watch a 3-minute video from the book of Matthew.

One of the activities was a scavenger hunt through the park. At the end of this each person received traditional Easter sweet bread and red egg (which represents the blood of Christ), an Easter coloring book for the children, an SD card containing 2 videos from ‘The Bible Project’ on the Crucifixion and Resurrection, and a copy of the New Testament in Farsi. What a great gift pack!

Ben was able to share about a refugee family who were invited to the Easter in the Park celebration. On their journey as refugees they had heard the gospel and were intrigued by the teaching of the Bible. As a result of following Christ, the man had been transformed, and he no longer treats his wife badly. In the park, the woman was deeply affected when she heard that Mary, Jesus’ mother, had been a witness to His suffering. And as she has thought more about this, she is coming to better understand what her salvation means.

Ben said “Please pray for this family as they, along with their two young children settle, if only for a while in Athens and that we would be used by God as vessels of His hope, helping them grow on their journey with Him.”

*not his real name

Can you help us get God’s Word into the hands of more refugees? To support our work, visit our giving page