The word of God gives us the boundaries to live our lives with. A live without boundaries will be extremely confusing. Thankfully, technology has given us an opportunity to explore the unchanging word of God along with our teenagers, right where they are in this ever-changing world.
Teenagers naturally don’t like to study the bible. A study showed that only about 3% of teenagers engage their bibles daily though they know it’s the word of God. They come up with excuses for being busy, boredom and some say they don’t even understand what is written. The current situation of the world makes this even more difficult because the contact most of them have with the written word of God is within the four walls of the church. However, these teenagers enjoy interacting with each other in communities hence their presence on social media. It is therefore important to know that teenagers can and must be encouraged to start and enjoy studying the word of God in virtual and interactive communities.
The YOU-VERSION Bible app provides interactive communities for both young and old alike to make bible reading fun and interesting for them. The YOU-VERSION bible app, also known as bible.com, is a web/mobile platform that has been downloaded and is being used on over 425 million devices all over the world. It has 2,062 bible versions in 1,372 languages. It is available for free download on google play store and apple store, and compatible with android, ios, windows and many other operating systems. On this app, you can read the bible, watch videos, read and listen to devotions and most importantly do all this with your friends in a virtual community.
EXCITING FEATURES ON THE APP
There is a verse for each day so you can create a memory verse challenge for your teenagers to memorize the scriptures.
There is a verse for the day and a short video devotion on the verse hence you can encourage your teenagers to start their morning or day with the word of God.
There is an opportunity to create a prayer list. This can get your teenagers into the habit of praying.
They can highlight verses of the scriptures that they love or find engaging.
They can bookmark their favorite scriptures
They can create bible verse images of favorite scriptures and share them.
They can make notes of thoughts that come to them while reading and meditating on the word of God.
HOW THE APP ENCOURAGES READING.
The app keeps a record of the number of days and weeks you have read the bible in a year and gives badges, awards and confetti for the number of days and weeks you have spent on the app. It alsio gives these same virtual rewards for the number of highlights and for the completion of activities such as reading plans, devotionals and so on.
You can also set notifications that can help remind you when it is time to read your bible, pray and do devotionals.
HOW TO ENGAGE YOUR TEENAGERS
1. Download the app and encourage your teenagers to do the same
2. Explore different features on the app in order to have a better understanding
3. Create a community of friends by inviting your teenagers to join you as friends.
4. Choose bible plans and study together. Plans exists on different topics such as anxiety, low self-esteem, love, fear, purpose, friendship, gratitude (the list is endless).
5. Plans can be shared and studied together within your community
6. It is better to start with short plans to encourage teenagers to get started. There are 3 days to 5 days plans.
7. Watch and listen to videos together and pray together.
BENEFITS
You can get your teenagers to start and to enjoy reading and studying the bible
Parents and teachers can ensure their teens are not experiencing spiritual neglect at any point
Distance barriers are overcome by the creation of virtual communities
You can get to know what is on the mind of your teenagers as you discuss various topics together with the devotional plans.
LET’S GET MOVING!
Armed with this powerful spiritual nourishment and development tool, let’s not waste any more time connecting with our teenagers on the Youversion app. It is very important that our teenagers must be trained to crucify the flesh even in this technology age.
Download and ensure all your teens, (their parents, if necessary) and fellow teachers get on the app and start an enriching journey together in the Bible. You will see the powerful impact of teens engaging constantly with the word of God.
Let’s not forget” TECHNOLOGY IS A GIFT FROM GOD”
God’s grace and blessing as you get into His word
We also encourage you to share your experience as you get started. This will definitely encourage others to try
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