Bible for Church: Digital or Paper?
00:00:00.000 | [Music]
00:00:05.000 | Josh, a listener in Bel Air, Maryland, asks, "Dear Pastor John, today most people have
00:00:10.000 | an iPhone or an iPad with a Bible app. Is it okay to use a digital Bible, an ESV app,
00:00:15.000 | U-version, etc., during church? And how about community groups, small groups? Is there a
00:00:20.500 | specific context when a digital Bible is just not acceptable, and just how important are
00:00:25.000 | paper Bibles for Christians today?" So, Pastor John, there's a mix of questions bound up
00:00:29.000 | here for you.
00:00:30.000 | That's right. And my answer is going to seem strange for those who remember me saying in
00:00:38.000 | preaching how, back in the early days, few sounds were more pleasing to me as I stood
00:00:45.000 | to preach than the swish of 500 Bibles and all the pages opening, as I said, "Let's turn
00:00:52.000 | to the text," and everybody's Bible turned. You can even hear them. And that's a beautiful
00:00:56.000 | sound in the congregation, and I don't think there's a similar sound for click, click, click
00:01:01.000 | on your iPhone or your tablet. But here's my answer. I hope it's okay because I do it.
00:01:10.000 | My wife does it and my daughter does it at the church we're attending now. So am I just
00:01:15.000 | biased and self-defensive now, or is there a real warrant for that? So, it seems to me
00:01:21.000 | there are two issues here in public use of digital Bibles. Number one is, what is the
00:01:27.000 | Word of God? And the second one would be, are there downsides and upsides to reading
00:01:33.000 | a digital Bible in public? The answer to the first question is the Word of God is not paper
00:01:40.000 | and ink, but the words in their grammatical context, whether on paper or on a screen.
00:01:49.000 | So I don't think, and the reason I say in their grammatical context is because words
00:01:53.000 | by themselves don't have any meaning. They only have meaning when they're connected with
00:01:56.000 | other words, and we learn the rules that govern how words get meaning in context. And so God
00:02:02.000 | provided those contexts as He put paragraphs together in the Bible. And we have to say
00:02:07.000 | the Word of God that we can understand is the words in their grammatical context. So
00:02:14.000 | I don't think there is any intrinsic reason for not reading your Bible digitally or on
00:02:20.000 | paper. That's my answer to the first question. There's nothing sacrosanct about paper as
00:02:26.000 | opposed to screen. The second one is a little more difficult, namely, are there downsides
00:02:31.000 | or upsides to reading a digital Bible in public? I think the main downside is to using, say,
00:02:39.000 | a phone or tablet in public worship or in small group is distraction. People around
00:02:45.000 | you may not be used to it. It may not be typical for them still, and they may be dazzled by
00:02:53.000 | you taking out your mini television in the middle of the service and turning it on. It
00:03:00.000 | just may feel so, "Whoa, that's bizarre. You're going to watch TV while the text is being
00:03:06.000 | read." And another distraction is you may be tempted, this may be even worse, you may
00:03:13.000 | be tempted to read text messages or click through to an email that just buzzed on you
00:03:18.000 | and you want to see, "Oh, is it really an emergency?" Blah, blah, blah. That would be
00:03:22.000 | a significant loss of reverence and attention to the Word of God and creating of a moment
00:03:28.000 | in which God Almighty addresses this people in the reading of His Word. But having said
00:03:35.000 | those downsides that are real, frankly, I think the issue of distraction is mainly owing
00:03:42.000 | to the newness of it and not the intrinsic nature of it since there are other ways we
00:03:47.000 | could be distracted to and we've gotten used to those and gotten over those. The coming
00:03:52.000 | of the digital reading of the Bible is inevitable. And therefore, I think any pastor or small
00:04:00.000 | group leader who tries to prevent it is fighting a losing battle that he cannot win and that
00:04:09.000 | he should not fight instead. Now, this is something pastors should really give heed
00:04:15.000 | to. Rather, a small group leader, a pastor should preach and teach about how to use them,
00:04:21.000 | how to think about them in reverence. What would reverence mean? How do you digitally
00:04:29.000 | use your phone reverently in worship? There are irreverent uses like answering your phone
00:04:36.000 | while the pastor's preaching. It's irreverent and there would be others. So, I would say
00:04:41.000 | instead of trying to prohibit, let's teach on it and bring it under the meaning of worship.
00:04:49.000 | Good, good. Is it irreverent to try and capture something the pastor just said in a tweet
00:04:55.000 | on your device to get it out online immediately? Yeah, I think you should wait for that. That
00:05:02.000 | raises a whole new question about note-taking. People used to have their pads and the pastor
00:05:09.000 | would even hand out sheets. He encourages people to take notes and now, of course, people
00:05:15.000 | have their little iPad right there in front of them. They can type right on it and I think
00:05:19.000 | that's inevitable. If we're really going to care about note-taking, then we better not
00:05:25.000 | tell people, "Well, you can only take notes by writing on paper." Now, as soon as I say
00:05:31.000 | that, it's only, what, two button clicks away to sending it out. And my sense is that we
00:05:41.000 | would do well probably not to be thinking that way. We should be thinking, "God is addressing
00:05:48.000 | me right now. I am dealing with God Almighty. It is a wonderful thing to be able to tell
00:05:53.000 | somebody about what God is doing in me." But let it have its hour-long effect on you and
00:05:59.000 | then afterwards, in prayer and due consideration, share with the world what you've heard and
00:06:07.000 | seen in God's Word. Now, I've got, I just think this whole, he asked about the whole
00:06:15.000 | impact of digital Bible reading. I've got lots of thoughts about private digital reading,
00:06:21.000 | but I think probably we should save that for another time.
00:06:23.000 | Very well said. Tomorrow, we'll talk about the pros and cons of personal devotions using
00:06:28.000 | a digital Bible. Until then, check out thousands of books, articles, blog posts, and sermons
00:06:33.000 | from John Piper at DesiringGod.org, all free of charge. I'm your host, Tony Ranke. See you tomorrow.
00:06:38.000 | [End]
00:06:41.000 | Transcription by CastingWords
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