Posted by Anne Witton on Thursday, August 22, 2019 Under: Video
Over the summer, I studied a module on 'Scripture Engagement' for my Master's course. It's all about how to connect people with the Bible so that they can understand it and experience its truth for themselves. One of the fascinating aspects is how to engage non-literate communities with the Scriptures. It's easy to assume that this isn't really an issue in the UK, where the literacy rate is 99% (Knoema, 2014). However, the reality is more complicated, with 16.4% of adults in the UK having very poor literacy skills (National Literacy Trust).
Our culture is changing too, with attention spans shortening and many people preferring to get their information from YouTube videos and social media rather than reading books. Many also prefer to listen to audiobooks rather than sit down with a paperback or Kindle. So how do we communicate the message of the gospel to people who don't read?
For a while, I've been making 3 minute videos to talk about faith, Bible stories and teaching. I've made 31 in the 'Picture This Thought' series so far which you can watch here. I also wanted to do something which just let the Bible speak for itself, so I've started a series reading out Mark's gospel a chapter at a time whilst highlighting bits of the text. I hope that it will help those who aren't used to reading, and those who speak English as a second language, to understand the message for themselves.
Here's the first one (I'm going to try and improve the technique for future videos, and especially try not to get the tripod legs in!)