Audio Bible ministry Faith Comes By Hearing has just launched its popular Bible.is app in Arabic.

The app already exists in English and Spanish. Now accessing the Bible will be easier for the world's more than 221 million Arabic speakers.

The ministry is working on other translations as part of its longer-term goal to make the app available in the top 20 most spoken languages in the world.

The localisation of the app was a collaborative process and aided by a strong partnership with the Bible Society of Egypt. Funding was provided by the 2010 Ministry Award, presented by Counsel & Capital.

Since Faith Comes By Hearing started its Digital Bible Project last year, Arabic has consistently been in the top five languages accessed across the multiple platforms offered by the ministry.

In addition to the Bible.is app, the ministry makes its audio Bibles available free of charge via podcast on iTunes, as well as streaming and download directly from their website.

Faith Comes By Hearing currently has audio Bibles in 538 languages, with 188 of these available for reading and listening on the Bible app, making the Digital Bible Project the world’s largest resource of Bible recordings and texts.

“Today’s technology has created access points to directly deliver God’s Word like no other time in history,” says Troy Carl, the ministry's national director who also oversees the Digital Bible Project.

“The possibility of the Scriptures being freely available to all who will hear is no longer just a hope – it’s quickly becoming a reality.”

Around half of the world's population either cannot read or lives in an oral culture. In addition to the Bible.is project, Faith Comes By Hearing is continuing its work to make audio Bibles available in the heart language of every nation, tribe and people.

The ministry’s goal is to record audio Bibles in 2,000 languages by 2016, creating access to the Gospel for 97% of the world’s population.