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Andy Rau
February 25, 2009

The Lent Bible reading plan starts today!

Today is Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent—and it’s also the first day of our Lent reading plan! The Lent reading plan walks you through each of the four Gospels during the Lent season in preparation for Easter. If you’ve been thinking about spending more time in Scripture during Lent, this is a great way to do it.

Each day’s reading is fairly short (average of 2-3 chapters per day), but over the course of Lent you’ll read the entire account of Jesus’ life, ministry, death, and resurrection. There’s a reading for each day of Lent except for Sundays, which you can use to reflect on the previous week’s reading (or get caught up if you’ve fallen behind).

Reading the plan is simple. Just go to the Lent reading plan page and start reading! Check that page each day; the daily reading updates automatically. (You might wish to bookmark that page in your browser to make it easy to return to each day—press Control-D while viewing the reading plan to do so.)

If you prefer to read the plan through RSS or an iCal calendar, use the links provided to the right of the daily reading.

We hope you’ll find the Lent reading plan useful. (Special thanks to Central Presbyterian Church of Baltimore for making it available.) It’s a good way to spend a bit of time each day focusing on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, and the readings are short enough that it isn’t too difficult of a time commitment. Enjoy the reading plan, and let us know if you have any questions about it!

February 20, 2009

Coming Soon: Lent Reading Plan

Beginning on Ash Wednesday (Wednesday, February 25), the Bible Gateway will kick off a Lent reading plan that covers all four Gospels in 40 days. It works out to about 2-3 chapters a day, with a catch-up day every Sunday. The plan ends on the Saturday before Easter with 1 Corinthians 15, which eloquently summarizes the meaning of Jesus’ resurrection for the Christ-follower.

On Monday you’ll be able to sign up to receive the reading plan via RSS or iCal or bookmark the page. We’ll post more detailed instructions next week. Please pray about joining us, and pass the word along to your friends, family and churches.

Special thanks to Central Presbyterian Church of Baltimore for divvying up the Gospels and making the plan available for us to publish online.

January 28, 2009

How to Add Bible Gateway to your iPhone Home Screen

We’ve appreciated all of your feedback on the mobile version of Bible Gateway. A number of people ask us how to add a link to the Bible Gateway on their iPhone home screen. Thankfully, it’s pretty easy to do! Here are some step-by-step instructions.

  1. Open Safari and browse to mobile.biblegateway.com (or m.biblegateway.com) on your iPhone.
  2. Tap the “+” icon located at the bottom of the screen once you’ve reached the Bible Gateway homepage .
  3. Tap on “Add to Home Screen” to bring up this page:

    addtohome.png

  4. Change the name that will appear under the icon on your home screen if you want to.
  5. Tap “Add” when you’re finished. Your iPhone should automatically navigate back to the home screen where you’ll see the Bible Gateway icon listed among your other applications:

    homescreen1.png

  6. Access mobile.biblegateway.com by tapping this icon.
January 8, 2009

M.BibleGateway.Com

A quick piece of news for all of our mobile Bible Gateway users: you can now access the mobile site by using m.biblegateway.com. You can still access the site using mobile.biblegateway.com. We made this change as a result of the feedback we’ve been receiving concerning the mobile site.

If you have any suggestions or comments or thanks for us please let us know using our feedback forms. We love hearing from you!

Andy Rau
January 1, 2009

Read through the Bible in 2009, starting today!

The new Bible Gateway Bible reading plans start today! If you’ve ever wanted to read through the entire Bible but weren’t sure where to begin, now is the perfect time to start. You can head over right now to read today’s reading. That page updates each day with the new day’s reading, so bookmark it and come back each day!

There are several different reading plans available in many Bible versions, all of which you can choose from the Bible reading page. You can also subscribe to your reading plan via RSS or iCal. Read more about how to use the Bible reading plans.

Spending about 15 minutes a day with each reading will take you through the entire Bible by the end of the year. So if you haven’t made a New Year’s resolution to read through the entire Bible in 2009, consider doing so—it’s never been easier!

Andy Rau
December 30, 2008

Read through the Bible in a year with new Bible Gateway reading plans!

Have you ever wanted to read through the entire Bible? If you’ve ever decided—perhaps as a New Year’s resolution—that you’re going to read all the way through the Bible, you’ve probably learned two things the hard way: 1) the Bible is very long, and 2) parts of the Bible, especially in the Old Testament, can be a real challenge to read straight through.

All the same, there are few things more spiritually rewarding than reading through Scripture in its entirety. And we at the Bible Gateway want to help. So we’ve added new tools to help you read through the entire Bible in a year: our new Bible reading plans. Starting on January 1, 2009, you can start reading through the Bible, one short daily reading at a time. You can read your daily reading online here at the Bible Gateway, or receive the daily readings via RSS or iCal.

There are four different ways you can read through the Bible—choose the one that works best for you! These plans are graciously provided by BibleYear.com:

  • Old/New Testament: each day features a reading from both the Old and the New Testaments, so you read through both Testaments together.
  • Chronological: reads through the Bible in the order that its events occurred historically. For example, Job lived sometime after the beginning of creation (Genesis 1) but before Abraham was born (Genesis 12). As a result, the Book of Job is integrated into the Book of Genesis.
  • Beginning: starts at the very beginning of the Bible and reads straight through to the end.
  • Historical: reads through the books of the Bible in the order in which they were written historically, according to the estimated dates of their writing.

To get your daily reading, visit the daily reading page each day starting on New Year’s Day, where your Bible reading for the day will be displayed. You might want to bookmark that page for easy reference (right click on this link and choose “Add to favorites/bookmarks”). You can also receive your reading via RSS or iCal.

We hope you find the new reading plans useful—and we hope you’ll use them to make your way through the Bible in 2009, whether you’ve read through it many times before or have never done so!

Andy Rau
December 10, 2008

Take the Bible Gateway with you at mobile.biblegateway.com

iphoneNow you can take the Bible Gateway with you wherever you go! We’ve added a new smallscreen-friendly site for use with your iPhone, BlackBerry, or other internet-capable mobile device: mobile.biblegateway.com. We’ll be improving it and adding new features as we hear from you, our users, so try it out and send us your feedback.

The mobile version features the Bible Gateway search box (look up a passage, keyword, or topic), the Verse of the Day, and the latest Bible Gateway news. To access it, just bookmark mobile.biblegateway.com in your mobile device.

Our vision is to get God’s Word in front of as many people as we possibly can, wherever they are and whatever technology they’re using. With smartphone usage on the rise all around the world, a mobile version of Bible Gateway is a natural step toward that goal. Give it a try—and if you have ideas for how we can improve it, let us know!

Andy Rau
December 8, 2008

Reading multiple Bibles in parallel

One of the most frequently-asked questions we receive at the Bible Gateway is “Can I read more than one Bible in parallel?” Yes, you can! You can view up to five different Bibles simultaneously, and you can display them side-by-side to compare a passage in several different versions. Read on for a short tutorial that shows you how to do so.

A parallel Bible view is easy to set up. First, go to the Passage Lookup page (located in the navigation bar on the left).

Type in the passage to look up, like you normally would–but before you click the button to perform the search, take note of the version selector:

Click the “Lookup passage in multiple versions” link below the selector. Several more drop-down selectors will appear, where you can choose additional Bibles to add to your search. Choose the additional Bibles you want to view:

Then click on the Lookup Passage button to look up the passage you entered.

There! The same passage is displayed in each of the Bible versions you chose. By default, the versions are displayed in a list (scroll down to see the passage in all of the Bible versions). However, if you’d like to view all of the Bibles side-by-side, click on the “Columns” layout option:

The end result should look something like this:

You can toggle between a List and Column layout by switching between those two options.

And that’s it! You can update the multiple versions (or change which versions you’re viewing in parallel) from the passage results page. If you have questions or problems viewing the Bible in parallel that aren’t answered in this FAQ, don’t hesitate to contact us.

Andy Rau
August 8, 2008

Three new Bible versions now available

The Bible Gateway team has been busy this week—we’ve added three new Bible versions to our library! The new additions are the Uspanteco, West Central Quiché, and Mam de Todos Santos Cuchumatán versions.

These versions are in three more Mayan languages still spoken today in Guatemala; they range from rather obscure (Uspanteco is spoken by only about 3,000 people) to relatively common (300,000 people still speak West Central Quiché). Like the other Mayan language versions we’ve added recently, these translations are provided by Wycliffe Bible Translators.

In keeping with blog tradition, here’s John 3:16 in the Mam de Todos Santos Cuchumatán Bible:

mam

See you next week!

Andy Rau
August 1, 2008

Kekchi New Testament now online

We’re finishing out the week with yet another addition to our library of online Bibles: the Kekchi New Testament. Here’s a bit of context, provided by the translators:

Kekchi (kek) is one of 50+ Mayan languages still spoken in Guatemala today. The Kekchi number approximately 700,000 and are located in Alta Verapaz in northern Guatemala. They do extend into Belize and many are migrating to California and New York. Kekchi is a Mayan language, but it is more closely related to the Mayan languages of southern Mexico. They are animistic and are greatly influenced by the trend to switch back to the old Mayan religion. However, the Kekchi Bible has had a tremendous impact on the Kekchis resulting in a people’s movement in the ‘80 when thousands turned to the Lord. They continue on today with a concern for reaching their own people with the Gospel. The Nazarene, the Southern Baptists, the Mennonites, and various Pentecostal groups are all using the Kekchi Bible and hold their services in the Kekchi language. They are proud of their Kekchi culture and language, but still burdened to reach others with the true Gospel message. It is an indigenous work that will continue on long after all expatriates have left the country.

Wikipedia’s got more on the Kekchi language and culture. And here’s John 3:16 in the Kekchi language:

We’ve got more new Bible versions scheduled to go live next week. Enjoy your weekend!

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    The Bible Gateway Blog features the latest news, announcements, and reflections from Bible Gateway. We hope what you find here will add to your understanding of and appreciation for the Bible.