“If you have your Bible with you, and I hope you do, please open to Psalm 16.”

Next time you hear one of our pastors say this at the beginning of a sermon, sneak a quick look around you. How many brought their printed Bible to church? How many are grabbing one from the seat back in front of them? How many pull out their phones? And how many of us just sit there motionless, because we know the whole passage is about to be shown on the big screens?

In a bygone era, bringing your Bible to church was the expected behavior. Then and now, First Free pastors and Sunday School teachers taught from it, moving through stories and chapters as the congregation or class followed along.

Today, of course, many of us always have a Bible with us on our phones. We also have a camera, social media, our calendar, personal email, work email, music, shopping, restaurants, news, weather, stock listings … even our doorbells. If you’re old enough, think back to the pre-smartphone era and imagine bringing all of that information and equipment with you to church. We’d all be pushing shopping carts.

If our Bible is just one of a hundred apps vying for attention, how is that affecting us?

Here is Pastor Luke Uran’s take:

“Bringing your Bible to church isn’t about tradition—it’s about training. When you open your Bible, you’re building a habit of engaging with God’s Word in a way that sticks with you beyond Sunday morning. A printed Bible has no notifications, no distractions—just the voice of God speaking through the pages. If you want to use the Bible app, do it! Put your phone or tablet on airplane mode to avoid distractions.”

Sensory advantage

Sue Nelson, who runs The Scroll Resource Center at church, and Kari Heckler, Kids Director, have been thinking about all this and wondering: What can we do about it? How do we help adults and kids to read and value the Bible?

Last fall, our church switched its recommended Bible from the New International Version to the Christians Standard Bible. Sue has been surprised that more people haven’t come into The Scroll to browse the many CSB options.

“I started thinking, you know, a lot of people under a certain age do everything on their phone,” she says. “But there’s something about holding it in your hand. We have five senses. So there’s that touch of holding a Bible and not immediately feeling distracted.”

The Scroll has lots of children’s Bibles, too. For Kids Church and on Wednesday nights, kids get points or candy when they bring their Bible. Especially for younger kids who aren’t yet carrying phones, Kari sees it as a window of opportunity.

“Let’s say I’m going to look up something in Ezekiel,” she says. “I can get an idea where that’s laid out in all of Scripture. You get a bird’s eye view of where you’re at. You can skim back. But when we’re on our phones, we tend to just scroll with our thumbs. It’s a lot harder to look in one glance and ask, what did I just read right here?

“I don’t know if it’s sad or what. But I have watched phones change kids. Their imaginations aren’t what they used to be.”

Engaging less

If you’re part of First Free, you very likely agree that the Bible is God’s Word and a primary way we connect with him. And we also could agree that connecting with God more deeply is a good thing, maybe the best thing—impacting our own wellbeing and the wellbeing of our community. Could we then reason that it’s a good idea to look at how, and how often, we are reading or listening to Scripture? And if it has declined, to ask why?

People who identify as evangelicals are the most “Scripture-engaged” Americans, as defined by the American Bible Society. But before we feel too good about that, realize it’s still less than half (46 percent). Yes, in the past decade “evangelical” has become as much a political label as a faith descriptor. Even accounting for this, the stats would say that a substantial number of us in evangelical churches like First Free are barely reading our Bibles. Some aren’t reading them at all.

About 4 in 10 regular Bible readers read it only digitally. Not surprisingly, the older you are, the more likely you still read a print Bible. As non-digital natives, Baby Boomers and older are the biggest consumers of printed books, Bibles included.

“I’m not saying I’m against having it on your phone for like, going to the gym and popping it on,” Kari says. “I’m not an audio person that way, so it doesn’t work for me. I have to have a book in front of me. It makes me concentrate better. So there are all different ways, but just because we have technology and it’s cool and it’s fun, we shouldn’t eliminate the old.”

“There’s something different when you have to dig in it and look and read it for yourself,” Sue says. “It’s taking effort on your part. You’re making an investment. And when you make an investment in something, you’re going to reap a reward.”

The Bible app is a great tool,” says Pastor Luke, who does use the Bible app but generally not for daily quiet time or study. “But if we only engage with Scripture the same way we engage with social media—quick, casual and easily dismissed—it may shape our approach to God’s Word more than we realize.”

He adds:

“There’s something about the physical act of flipping through pages, seeing the context, and marking up passages that help Scripture sink deeper into our hearts and minds. But let’s not also rule out that some people are taking notes on their tablets and are wrestling through it. So much of it is personal preference; however, take time to consider even the ramifications of the way we wrestle and engage with God’s Word.”

Reading plan

Our church is offering a reading plan to accompany the sermon series Encountering Jesus: Gospel of John. The plan starts Monday, Feb. 3. Here’s an experiment: If you typically read the Bible from your phone, do those short, daily readings from a printed Bible. Stick with it, and see if it makes a difference in how you read and value God’s Word.

Next: Our church’s effort to get kids and families reading more.

Photo illustration created with ChatGPT.