Do you think God can accomplish big things through simple acts of faithfulness?
That’s why I’m excited about a simple, powerful opportunity on October 8. It’s Bring Your Bible to School Day (@BringYourBible)–a day when thousands of students across the United States will share the hope and love of God with their friends and teachers, simply by taking their Bibles to class with them.
You might wonder what good taking a Bible to school can do in a world plagued by war and violence, and in a culture where traditional morals and values are dismissed as irrelevant. Can taking a Bible to school really do any good?
Faithfulness to God allows Him to act. The writer of Hebrews tells us that the Word of God is alive and active, sharper than any double-edge sword. It penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.
Today, the thought of showing up at a public school with a Bible in hand seems downright radical. Given the political, cultural, and media environment we live in, it’s easy to forget that America was founded on the principles found in God’s Word. The first pilgrims who sailed over from Europe on the Mayflower signed a compact that they were undertaking their journey “for the glory of God and the advancement of the Christian faith.”
Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and many other major colleges and universities were established by Christian ministers. In 1802, Thomas Jefferson, then president of the Washington, DC school district, required that the Bible be used in classrooms. And until the mid-1900s, nearly every textbook had biblical references.
[See our blogpost: American History’s Entwined Relationship with the Bible: An Interview with Angela Kamrath]
A lot has changed since then.
Through a series of rulings, the Supreme Court began to push both prayer and the Bible out of public schools. By 1963, school-sponsored Bible reading in public schools was ruled as unconstitutional.
But, we have not relinquished our freedom to be Christians. That’s what makes Bring Your Bible to School Day (#BringYourBible) so powerful. It’s a simple way for students to share their faith and God’s Word with their friends and teachers.
Bring Your Bible to School Day was launched last year by Focus on the Family (@FocusFamily). More than 8,000 kids participated, from every state in America.
At Biblica (@BiblicaMinistry), our mission is to share God’s Word with people all over the world and to help people draw closer to Jesus through God’s Word. So, Biblica is partnering with Focus on the Family to help build momentum for this nationwide campaign. We’re looking forward to seeing children and young people–all the way from kindergarten through college–bringing God’s Word to their schools.
Our goal is to see 40,000 kids mobilized to live out their faith. We want to encourage them to not only bring their Bibles to school, but to share their faith, and live it out.
There are at least four ways you can help.
- First and foremost, if you have kids, encourage them to take their Bibles to school on October 8.
- Second, tell others about this great opportunity to take God’s Word back into the classroom.
- Third, let your church know about this. Talk to the youth pastor. Get as many kids involved as you can.
- And finally, please pray. Pray for this to be more than just a social or political statement. Pray for God to move in our nation, to instill courage in our young people to witness God’s love, to draw people closer to Him and to change us all from the inside out.
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Bio: Dr. Carl Moeller (@carlmoeller) is CEO of Biblica, which translates the complete Bible into the world’s top 100 major languages and is the translation sponsor and worldwide publisher of the New International Version® (NIV®) Bible, the most widely used contemporary English translation in the world. Prior to Biblica, Dr. Moeller founded Sequoia Global Resources, and served as president and CEO for Open Doors, USA, and a pastor at Saddleback Church.