Parallel Bible: New app merges Scripture with photography and social media

A page in the Parallel Bible showing pictures and the verse Mark 4:1: 'Again Jesus began to teach by the lake. The crowd that gathered around him was so large that he got into a boat and sat in it out on the lake, while all the people were along the shore at the water's edge.' (kickstarter.com/parallelbible)

A new app has been developed that tells the story of the Bible with the readers' own personal images.

The app, called Parallel Bible is the brainchild of American missionary and street artist Andrew Breitenberg, who spent seven years in impoverished South African villages sharing his mural-painting talent and the Word of God.

Breitenberg told CBN News that the app takes Bible reading to a whole new level as it merges Scripture, photography and social media. He and his brother Chris are currently planning to create a physical book using the images sent by people and will start with the Gospel of Mark, which will require a thousand pages of images and 678 verses.

"We are hoping that people can understand that buying the book is a way of furthering this work that we are doing, trying to bring the Bible into the hands of people that don't have it," Andrew said.

They have already started a Kickstarter campaign in hopes of getting the $60,000 needed to push through with their project. So far, they have already secured the backing of 118 people and received $15,564.00 as of Sunday.

Breitenberg described the project as "a breakthrough in conceiving the way a Bible is made."

"This will be the first ever printing of the Bible that sources all of its visual content from its readers. Your pictures, your stories, right next to Scripture. It's the Bible as a community experience: a beautiful and vivid reflection of how the Bible can come to life in our lives," he said.

"The Bible shows us what a life of faith looks like. It shapes who we are by inviting us into its world. And, in a way, the Bible holds our own stories. It partners with us by modelling our journeys of discovery and faith," he continued. "We tell our stories to make sense of our experiences. We share them to find community for our joy and our pain. And we see them reflected in the pages of the Bible."

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