USA (MNN) — Americans are quickly becoming a listening society. Evidence to that are statistics that say 58% of all Americans won't read another book after high school. 42% of all college graduates won't read another book after college.
Shockingly, American Christians are equally falling into this pattern. According to Roger Hunter at Faith Comes By Hearing, 65% of all American Christians haven't read the entire New Testament.
Unfortunately, if Christians aren't reading the Bible, they're not growing. Hunter says, "What do we do about it? We need to get them into a position where they will engage in God's Word, and we believe it's through listening."
Faith Comes By Hearing has recorded the Bible into the heart languages of 360 languages recorded, with the goal of recording 2,000 by 2016.
Hunter says most American Christians say they just don't have the time. That's why they've started "You've Got the Time."
"What we've developed is what we call a 40-day listening program — 28 minutes a day for 40 days, and you can listen to the entire New Testament," says Hunter. "So the strategy is to get a church to literally do this."
The ministry has compressed the entire New Testament completely dramatized on one mp3 CD. You can play it in your car stereo, computer, or download to your mp3 player.
Faith Comes By Hearing will be launching the campaign in Houston, Texas to encourage churches to listen to the entire New Testament.
Hunter says this could have a huge impact. "When people get connected to God's Word and understand the responsibility that we all have in the Great Commission, it does become evangelistic in that they take the seed that they have received and plant it elsewhere."
Hunter says they plan to launch similar campaigns. "We are focusing on the top 25 markets in the country because we know that if we can get the top 25 markets involved in this program, we can reach 60% of the country's believers."
Participating churches report "26% of the churches have higher attendance, 26% had new converts and new baptisms, and 50% of the churches had an increase in Bible questions — 30% from children."
