Wycliffe Associates Installing Print On Demand Systems for Quick, Easy Access to Printed Scriptures in Dangerous Areas
(Orlando, Florida, USA)—Wycliffe Associates has launched a program that enables local Christians to print the Bible on demand in nations where owning a copy of the Bible can lead to arrest or worse. The program will facilitate the printing and distribution of the Scriptures for language groups without any of the Bible.
“Following Christ can be a death sentence in many hostile countries around the world,” says Bruce Smith, President and CEO of Wycliffe Associates. “Christians are persecuted, arrested, hunted down, and may lose their lives for translating the Bible. Wycliffe Associates provides the most effective technology and equipment to empower national translators in this life-changing work—especially when it means keeping translators safe in the most dangerous areas imaginable.”
Each high-speed digital printing system provided by Wycliffe Associates includes a computer, printer, binder, laminator, and paper cutter. Local Christians are trained to operate the system, which is set up in a safe house. Then, when a language group is ready for printed copies of the Scriptures, they can be printed from a flash drive and discreetly hand carried and distributed.
“Even in a hostile nation where it is life-threatening to follow Christ, Print On Demand will allow Bible printing and distribution to proceed,” says Smith. “A group of believers secretly meeting in a closed country are already asking us for one of these systems. I am deeply committed to helping national believers share God’s Word, while doing everything we can to protect them. Now, with Print On Demand, God’s Word is available in increasing measures.”
In one West African nation where a system has been installed, hundreds of copies have been printed of the newly translated Old Testament books of Hosea, Amos, and Haggai, and the New Testament book of Luke.
“The systems not only print Scriptures and Bible resources with great speed, but they are also cost efficient,” Smith says.
Wycliffe Associates is currently raising $225,000 to provide 15 Print On Demand systems at a cost of $15,000 each for Christians in hostile nations who are without the Scripture in their language.
“Right now, we have the opportunity to provide a remarkable resource for printing and distributing God’s Word,” says Smith.
About Wycliffe Associates
Organized in 1967 by friends of Bible translators, Wycliffe Associates empowers national Bible translators to provide God’s Word in their own language, partners with the local church to direct and guard translation work, harnessing their passion and desire for God’s Word, and engages people from all around the world to provide resources, technology, training, and support for Bible translation.
Because millions of people around the world still wait to read the Scriptures in the language of their heart, Wycliffe Associates is working as quickly as it can to see every verse of God’s Word translated into every tongue to speak to every heart. Last year, 2,544 Wycliffe Associates team members worked to speed Bible translations in 73 countries.
