International (MNN) — Close your eyes and walk through your house to find your Bibles. Search every bookshelf, desk drawer, and nightstand. How many can you find? If you’re like the average American household, you can probably find at least four.
Maybe that’s why it can be difficult for some of us to understand just how precious a copy of God’s Word really is.
How Far One Bible Goes
Jason Woolford of CRI sees value in each Bible and knows how far just one copy of the Scriptures can go. On average, a book is read by 20 people during its lifecycle, he says. That means that at a minimum, providing one Bible means exposing 20 people to the Gospel.
But in some parts of the world and in some pairs of hands, it can go even farther than that. For example, “When you look at a pastor of a church in Uganda or Kenya or the Philippines, or Bangalore, India that gets a Bible from us, you’re talking about congregations of church plants [where] sometimes even the pastor doesn’t own the Bible,” Woolford says.
In those situations, “the impact is literally millions of people with the amount of things that we sell.”
Ongoing Bible Drive
Photo courtesy of Mission Cry
That’s why CRI hosts an ongoing Bible drive to bring in used Bibles and Christian books and send them around the world. Donate Bibles and Christian books you have around the house, and CRI will ship them to pastors and believers around the world.
The demand is high. Typically, CRI sends almost $13 million in Christian literature around the world every year. Yet even with that many books, they’re still coming up short; people are just that desperate for access to the Gospel.
Their Bible drive will continue for another month, so if you’d like to participate, collect Bibles from your own home or from a church Bible drive and send them to CRI using this information.
Custom CRI Bibles
CRI isn’t just sending used Bibles. Thanks to a partnership with the NASB Bible, they’re publishing customized CRI New Testament Bibles for pennies on the dollar and shipping them all over the world.
In addition to the books of the New Testament, hese CRI Bibles include a plan of salvation, a basic guide to reading the Bible, a discipleship program outline, a code of conduct, and other tools for new Christians looking to leave a legacy of servitude to God. One of these Bibles can be purchased, printed, and shipped for just $2.
How to Help
Photo courtesy of Mission Cry
Want to get involved? If you’re interested in sending your own Bibles and books, you can contact CRI right here or call them at (517) 223-3193. Consider organizing a Bible drive or sending this article to your own Christian community. You can also simply donate directly to CRI and their mission.
Most of all, you can pray, especially for persecuted members of the global Body of Christ.
“The Word of God, they’ve been beaten for, but now they just want to read about the very God they’re being beaten or martyred for,” Woolford says. “God reminds us in His Word, time and time again, that everything will perish. Everything returns void except His Word. And so you have the ability to give that to someone overseas. God bless you.”
Header photo courtesy of Unsplash.
