Category: NLT Resources

by Kim Adetunji, Bible Brand Manager

You, of course! Your time, your smile, your kindness, a note, a call—or in some circumstances, your apology or forgiveness. That’s probably the absolute best gift you could give this Mother’s Day!

If you’re like me, you’re always looking for a meaningful gift to give Mom—so we pulled together a list for you:

5 Reasons a Bible Is the (Second) Greatest Gift for Mom on Mother’s Day

#1: Your Mom deserves the very BEST, and what gift could be better than the living and powerful Word of God? (Plus, there are so many options to choose from that you are bound to find one that she’ll love!)

#2: What other gift—besides prayer, maybe—connects Mom so directly to God than the Bible? When Mom (or you or I) reads through the Bible, God speaks to her (and us)!

#3: It will be a gift your Mom will cherish for a very, very long time—and not just because it’s from you (which is a really huge reason!), but also because being a student of the Word and growing in knowledge of God and his plan for us is a life-long journey. We will never fully mine the riches and depths of this treasure house that is the Bible.

#4: No matter where your Mom is (or isn’t) on her spiritual journey, a new (or first!) Bible could be the fresh inspiration she needs to make spending daily time with God a (new or renewed) priority in her life.

#5: As Mom reads her Bible and reflects on its truths, the more she will become transformed into Christlikeness. The Bible promises us that time spent in God’s Word will never return void! (We saved the very best reason for last!)

Inspire Mom This Mother’s Day!

The #1–selling Inspire Bible line is available in 6 unique editions (pictured above, from left):

Inspire Bible for Girls

Includes 500+ illustrations to color, 300+ devotional readings and prayers, 160+ journaling prompts, fun facts, a beautiful two-color interior & so much more!

Inspire PRAISE Bible

Over 500 all-new Scripture line-art illustrations to color, wide margins for journaling, plus 32 beautiful full-color vellum pages (pictured below). It’s the only Bible with vellum pages! Now available in large print.

Inspire: Proverbs

A square-trimmed, coloring-book-style complete book of Proverbs that is beautifully designed with line-art illustrations to color and extra-wide margins for journaling. Printed on thick art paper.

Inspire: Psalms

A square-trimmed, coloring-book-style complete book of Psalms that is beautifully designed with line-art illustrations to color and extra-wide margins for journaling. Printed on thick art paper.

Inspire Bible (the original)

Over 400 Scripture line-art illustrations to color, plus wide margins for journaling. Available in full-size and large-print editions.

Inspire Catholic Bible NEW!

Our latest addition to the line, the beautiful rose gold Inspire Catholic Bible has over 450 Scripture line-art illustrations to color, plus wide margins for journaling.

Inspire has drawn people of all ages and stages of faith deeper into God’s Word.

Let the Word of God Inspire You.™

All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realize what is wrong in our lives. It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right. – 2 Timothy 3:16, NLT

Taken from the HelpFinder Bible

The scene is played out before us many times every year: A man is dramatically rescued from a swollen river; a child is pulled by firefighters from a burning apartment building; a woman is delivered from a would-be assailant by a brave bystander. Each scenario includes a situation of impending peril or destruction, a rescuer or deliverer who intervenes, and a second chance at life for the one saved.

Although the word is rarely used in the media, each is a picture of salvation. The Bible teaches that sin threatens us with broken relationships, spiritual death, and judgment. But God, through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, has provided a way to rescue us from sin’s consequences. He offers us salvation so that we can have a second chance at life, an opportunity to experience a spiritual rebirth into a new and abundant life in the Spirit, and ultimately, eternal life with him forever.

If you’ve gone to church you’ve probably heard people talking about being saved. But what does the Bible say that it means to be saved? Using the HelpFinder Bible index let’s dig into that question.

ROMANS 4:8 | “What joy for those whose record the Lord has cleared of sin.”
ROMANS 3:24 | “Yet God, in his grace, freely makes us right in his sight.”

Being saved, spiritually speaking, means your sins no longer count against you toward an eternal death sentence. Instead, they are forgiven by the grace of God, and you are given the free gift of eternal life. Being saved does not spare you from earthly troubles, but it does spare you from eternal judgment.

PSALM 103:12 | “He has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west.”

Being saved means your sins have been completely forgiven and removed.

PSALM 51:9-10 | “Remove the stain of my guilt. Create in me a clean heart, O God.”

Being saved means the stain of guilt has been washed away. Guilt doesn’t just appear to be gone—it is gone! You are given a clean slate!

JOHN 10:28-29 | “I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one can snatch them away from me, for my Father has given them to me, and he is more powerful than anyone else. No one can snatch them from the Father’s hand.”
JOHN 5:24 | “I tell you the truth, those who listen to my message and believe in God who sent me have eternal life. They will never be condemned for their sins, but they have already passed from death into life.”

Being saved means you are assured of living forever in heaven, which will actually be a new earth where there will no longer be sin, pain, and suffering. What greater hope could you have?

Learn more about the HelpFinder Bible

How often do we think “I don’t have the skills to make a difference” or “I don’t have the resources to make it worth it”? Throughout the pages of Scripture we are reminded that it’s often the least likely people who can make the biggest impact, and the same is true today.

It’s so exciting to hear stories of how God uses everyday people who are sold out to him to accomplish things that they could never imagine (check out Jeff Hilliard’s story). But it doesn’t have to be on a large scale. Maybe it’s just talking to a friend who needs support, connecting with someone at an outreach event at your church, meeting a new neighbor, or being Christ’s hands of compassion to a person in need.

Here are a few inexpensive resources that can help as you reach out:

Abundant Life Bibles are value-priced and offer readers insights about living the abundant life through a relationship with Jesus Christ. They cover topics such as joy, peace, and dealing with life’s tough issues and offer practical guidance for daily life.

Economy Outreach Editions are softcover Bibles with the entire NLT text that come in three different editions, depending on audience, and can only be ordered in bulk.

The Economy Outreach and Large Print Editions feature resources such as “Welcome to the Bible,” “How to Know Jesus Personally,” “Where Can I Find It,” and “The Apostles’ Creed Bible Reading Plan” that provide helpful guidance to readers who may be encountering the Bible for the first time or are reconnecting with its words of hope and healing.

The Children’s Outreach Edition includes kid-friendly features that answer kids’ questions about the Bible, has a graphic of the books of the Bible, and has a quick guide to the Bible’s big story using 30 images—each described by a single sentence. It also includes first steps to following Jesus and a 10-day reading plan to help kids in their first steps after they accept Christ.

New Believers Bible is uniquely designed to help the new Christian read, study, and understand the Bible. It includes features that help Christians develop and deepen their faith while providing a foundation for their new life in Christ.

HelpFinder Bible makes it easy for anyone, whether familiar with Scripture or not, to find help in the Bible for their immediate needs. Application notes connect the Bible’s truths to today’s issues, and the extensive index points readers to verses where answers can be discovered, issues resolved, and freedom found. The HelpFinder Bible is God’s Word at your point of need.

Tyndale Bibles also has Scripture portions such as an Abundant Life New Testament or the Gospel of John that may be easier for someone just getting to know the Bible.

A verse often quoted by a member of our team reminds us of the power of sharing God’s Word.

“It is the same with my word. I send it out, and it always produces fruit. It will accomplish all I want it to, and it will prosper everywhere I send it.” Isaiah 55:11, NLT

Glenn Paauw, Institute for Bible Reading

Many adults are struggling to read the Bible. We know this. At some level it’s understandable because the Bible is a big, complicated, and very ancient book. Yet the Bible is where Christianity gets its story, so the faith community needs to be deeply committed to knowing it well regardless of the challenges.

If adults are struggling, what should we expect from kids? If the Bible is tough going for the grownups, it’s going to be even tougher for young readers, right?

In a word . . . yes. But maybe it’s time to look at how we’ve been trying to introduce kids to the Bible. What, exactly, has been our goal? What’s the right expectation for kids reading, knowing, and understanding the Bible? And what would the path to solid Bible fluency look like for kids?

Where We’ve Been

Simply from looking at our standard Bible curricula, it would seem that what’s actually happening is that we have other goals besides fluency (spiritual formation, teaching morals, building faith, etc.) that cause us to use the Bible in certain ways. The intended purpose is not often to foster a deep engagement with Scripture itself. As a result, within any given lesson the Bible is encountered merely as either a theme verse or two, or a safely paraphrased version of a “Bible story.”

Perhaps this approach is seen as a good and necessary adaptation of the Bible for readers who are young and not yet proficient. That makes sense, right? Well. . .

The problem with giving children only a verse or two is that this approach tends to stick around as readers get older. Even into adulthood we continue to show and teach the Scriptures by referring to select Bible verses. The consequence of this is that many people persist in thinking the Bible is in fact a collection of these verses (and if they are honest, admitting that some verses are better than others).

And the problem with an ongoing diet of paraphrased Bible stories is that such narrations are not actually the Bible. They are typically told with any age-inappropriate elements toned down or taken out. And of course, any paraphrase represents someone’s interpretation of the essence of a particular story.

All of this is appropriate in a sense, but there’s also a danger here. Many of these “safe” versions of the stories are never replaced with the actual biblical texts as kids turn into teenagers and then young adults. This means that young readers often wind up not learning the way biblical language actually sounds and actually works. And older kids never learn to engage with the stronger, stranger, more complex versions of these stories that the Bible actually tells.

When do we get around to teaching young adults how to handle the real Bible?

Furthermore, these collections of paraphrased stories are often treated as stand-alone lessons, so kids don’t ever learn how the stories are connected and how they build on each other to tell the bigger biblical narrative. And rarely are different kinds of literary writings acknowledged. A curriculum constructed of “Bible stories” will naturally have difficulty incorporating letters, songs, wisdom sayings, and other literary varieties in Scripture.

So are we discipling kids into not being Bible readers?

What would the average child take away from their long-term experience with the Bible in our current teaching approach? Have they taken the first steps toward receiving the Bible on its own terms? Or have they been taught to use the Bible in simplistic and misleading ways?

I’m reminded of a conversation we had with a prominent publisher of children’s Sunday School resources and Bible curricula. After reviewing their programs and comparing them with our perspective on Bible engagement, one of their executives, deep in thought, looked up and said, “So you’re telling me that if our programs are successful, we are actually producing generations of non–Bible readers.”

Are kids growing up learning that the Bible is a book to be read? Do kids have any inkling of the big story? Are they falling in love with Jesus—that is, with Jesus as understood in the context of the overall narrative?

What To Do?

At the Institute for Bible Reading, we’re working on answers to these reading problems. As young people within the church grow up, graduate, and head out on their own in various ways, a healthy and hearty appetite for Bible reading doesn’t seem to be going with them. It shouldn’t be a surprise, then, that there is a low number of adults in the church who are engaged in Bible reading and comprehension. People are following the path that’s been laid out for them, and then we scramble to convert adults into Bible readers. We are failing to show them the way in the first place.

So what would change look like?

The downward trajectory of Bible engagement in the church needs to be reversed if we are to fully receive the profound gift that we have in God’s Word. A Bibleless Christianity won’t be a vibrant and affective Christianity.

Let’s chart a course for a new future for kids and the Bible, so that kids know the Bible the right way at the right age and stage, and appropriately grow into the Bible. We want kids who not only love the Bible but also learn how to read it intelligently and well, so they don’t turn away from it the first time they encounter its opponents.

Read more about Bible engagement from the Institute for Bible Reading

Learn more about Immerse: The Bible Reading Experience

Hear what happens when a group of high school students read the New Testament

“Our students have heard a lot of words about the words of the Bible. When it comes to actually reading or hearing the words of Scripture themselves, they find it more interesting than the words about the words of Scripture that they have been hearing their whole lives,” Matt Laidlaw, Dean of Students, Calvin Christian High School.

Hear what happens when the sophomore New Testament class at Calvin Christian High School is immersed in the life-transforming Word of God—not simply being told about the Bible but reading the Bible without distractions.

Learn more about Immerse: The Bible Reading Experience

by Carolyn Larsen, taken from the Inspire for Girls Bible

“If wicked people turn away from all their sins and begin to obey my decrees and do what is just and right, they will surely live and not die.” Ezekiel 18:21, NLT

So who’s wicked? You are. What? Scripture tells us that all people are wicked. We are all sinners, so you are also a sinner. That means that you are prone to disobey and disappoint God, even if you don’t mean to or want to.

But there is hope. When you talk to God, admit your sins and tell him you are sorry. He grants forgiveness and second chances to those who sincerely believe and are sorry.

Don’t give up hope for your own redemption from God just because you mess up big time. When you recognize your need for forgiveness and ask God, he will forgive you. Don’t get so filled up with pride that you don’t think you need God’s forgiveness. Be honest with God and yourself. Admit that you mess up. Admit that you need his forgiveness. Ask God to forgive you and to help you do better. He promises to forgive you and to help you learn to obey him.

Dear God, I need your help. I can’t obey your commands without your strength and help in my life. Please help me. I want to obey you! In Jesus’ name, Amen

Learn more about the Inspire for Girls Bible

Throughout the Beyond Suffering Bible Joni Eareckson Tada shares personal insights on how God can use anything, even suffering, to bring us closer to him and display his glory. When our lives don’t go the way we want, when the suffering and pain seem too much to bear we have a choice, we can either rely on God or let bitterness consume us. Read what Joni has to say about a time when God brought her face-to-face with her own tendency to hold on to bitterness.

By Joni Eareckson Tada

Troubles. Hardships. Calamities. Ever heard that old adage, “Bad things come in threes”? It’s only folk wisdom, but somehow it seems true.

Bitterness was a temptation for me in the early days of my paralysis. Deep inside I knew it was wrong, but I justified myself by saying, “Surely God won’t mind if I let off a little steam now and then. After all, I am paralyzed!” But as many of us have learned, indulging in bitterness leads us down a path to even more despair and bitterness.

As if that trouble wasn’t enough, God added a second hardship. Several months into my hospital stay, I had an operation on my lower spine. After the surgery, I was forced to life face down for fifteen days while the stiches healed. “I am sick and tired of this,” I complained out loud.

Then, the third distress came: I caught the flu. Suddenly, not being able to move was peanuts compared to not being able to breathe. I was miserable! But as I thought about it, I understood what God was doing. No longer was my bitterness a tiny trickle; it was a raging torrent that could not be ignored. It was as if God was holding my anger up before my face and saying lovingly but firmly, “Stop turning your head and looking the other way. This bitterness has got to go. What are you going to do about it?”

The pressure had gotten so strong that I was either going to give the situation over to him completely or allow myself to wallow in bitterness. Faced with that ultimatum, I was able to clearly see what a wicked course bitterness would be. Sometimes troubles, hardships, and distresses—in groups of three (or more!)—back us into a corner and force us to seriously consider the lordship of Christ.

Lord, when troubles pile on, may I look to you for help and hope.

Looks Inside the Beyond Suffering Bible

“You will not reject a broken and repentant heart, O God.”
Psalm 51:17b, NLT

Devotional from the Dancing in the Desert Devotional Bible

David had sinned against Bathsheba and her husband, Uriah, and then
seemed to live in denial about the gravity of the situation. Only when Nathan the prophet confronted David with a piercing parable did the king see his sin. And unlike many kings who would have put the pesky prophet to death or banished him from the royal courts, David broke down in confession and repentance. He grieved. And he saw his offense against Bathsheba and Uriah as a sin against God himself (51:4).

Few things in life seem as hopeless as our own guilt. The sense of futility
and alienation is crushing. While many run from a painfully honest admission of guilt, we know that’s the only place to find restoration. And God is a restorer by nature. He doesn’t reject a broken spirit. He absorbs the penalty of sin himself. When we overcome pride and admit our brokenness, he repairs it and renews our joy.

Chris Tiegreen is an award-winning author of more than 50 books and discussion guides that have been translated into more than 30 languages and read by more than 5 million people worldwide. He is also a collaborative/supporting writer for other communicators (i.e., ghostwriter) on more about 20 book projects, and writer of hundreds of magazine and newspaper articles on a wide variety of topics. His experiences in media, ministry, and higher education bring a unique perspective to his writing, which often focuses on cultural commentary and devotional themes. He and his family currently live in Atlanta.

by Glenn Paauw, Institute for Bible Reading

Reading the Bible well doesn’t happen automatically. There are steps we must take to ensure we’re receiving the Bible on its own terms.

We read a well-translated Bible, and we read it holistically. We read complete literary units. If at all possible, we read in a nice, clean, elegant Reader’s Bible. They’re built to make reading easier and better, so no surprise there. But wait. Who is reading? We are. We are reading.

Really? We? Yes.

Why?

Because, first, research shows that most of us are not really reading the Bible very much. And second, when we do read it, it’s not really we who are reading. It’s more like me or you. In other words, those who are doing something with the Bible are overwhelmingly doing it alone.

The fact is, we’ve largely privatized our experiences with the Bible. We hold up the “daily quiet time” as the center of what we’re supposed to do with the Bible. We’ve created a culture in which an individual Bible experience is at the heart of what a serious Bible reader does.

Alone with a Bible, I have my private time with God.

Which is fine.

Of course, none of this is a problem as far as it goes. It’s great to read your Bible alone. Lots of very good things can and do happen.

But not all the good things that God intended. Two historical points are really important here. First, when the Scriptures were first experienced by God’s people, they were always experienced in community. There were very few copies, so a village in ancient Israel or one of the earliest Christian gatherings would at most have a copy of some of the books that now make up the Bible. As such, these Bible portions would be read aloud for the community, and people would simply listen.

Now, they could listen well and remember what they heard because they lived in an oral culture, a far cry from our context, in which written materials are so readily available. The historical evidence also shows that these listening experiences were interactive, not merely one-way communication. Everyone (including the leaders) was processing the sacred words together.

Secondly, and just as importantly, the original audience knew that the Bible itself was a community-formation book, not a private me-and-God book. The word you in the Bible is most often a plural word, not singular. God’s Word is addressed to the gathered people of God and is intended to speak to them in their corporate beliefs and actions. As a group, they were being invited to get caught up in God’s great restoration movement.

We’ve moved away from this ancient, oral, community-based culture in lots of ways. In fact, it is worth noting that the Bible first became widely available to individuals in their own language right at the same time that modern individualism was growing as a cultural force. We live and move and have our being in this individualism. It is the air we breathe. Without even thinking about it, we think and act in independent, self-oriented ways.

So for us, recovering a deep, transformative engagement with the Scriptures has to include rediscovering ways of experiencing the Bible together. And this means more than doing a Bible study together. We must back up a step and find new ways of simply reading the Bible together, listening to it being read and letting the words wash over us.

Then we must craft new ways of interacting openly and honestly with what we’ve read or heard. We must learn the humility to speak our own views respectfully and well, and then listen closely and seriously to what others have to say.

This communal engagement will look more like a book club than a traditional Bible study.

Finally, we need to think about the communal implications of a passage, not just the personal impact for ourselves as isolated individuals. Our Bible reading must explicitly raise community-based questions. What kind of community will embody this teaching or instruction? How can we become that kind of community?

Bringing community-based engagement back to our Bible reading won’t happen unless we are intentional about making it happen. The Institute for Bible Reading has created a whole-church-based Bible reading program called Immerse precisely for this reason.

We don’t see, hear, experience, or know enough to experience the Bible sola me. We are too small to try to read this grand story only by ourselves. Together, we are the people of God’s new creation, and we need each other—even in our Bible reading, understanding, and, yes, living.

Learn more about Immerse: The Bible Reading Experience

Read more from Glenn on how to receive the Bible on its own terms.

Zephaniah might be a book that is often overlooked but the prophet brings an important message about pure worship. Read more from the Dancing in the Desert Devotional Bible 

Only decades before Jerusalem’s fall and one generation before
Jeremiah, Zephaniah warned of judgment. On the surface, he was an
unlikely source for such severe words. He was a descendant of one good
king (Hezekiah) prophesying during the reign of another (Josiah). Josiah
was early in the process of tearing down unholy altars and revitalizing the
nation’s worship. Things seemed to be moving in the right direction. What could be so bad that God would overthrow his people?

But Judah’s idolatry was too deeply entrenched to be reversed by Josiah’s reforms, though God would promise to withhold judgment until after the
good king’s death (2 Chronicles 34:28). So Zephaniah predicts the worst: “a day of terrible distress and anguish, a day of ruin and desolation, a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and blackness” (Zephaniah 1:15). At times, his words seem broader than for just Judah and point to a greater, later judgment. But they are painfully urgent for his hearers. These spiritually complacent people are sabotaging their own destiny and are apparently desensitized to God’s voice. Zephaniah’s words are meant to jolt them out of their apathy. They need to know they will begin to experience God’s painful discipline in less than a generation.

Zephaniah’s prophecy doesn’t end in despair, of course. A restoration is coming, and God will delight in his people and rejoice over them with songs
(3:17). Again, Zephaniah’s words seem broader than for his nation alone. God’s restoration will have global consequences—the purification of all people for unified worship. Entire nations will come to worship him (3:9). Israel will be the centerpiece of a much bigger salvation than its people have expected.

That’s the goal of God’s plan. This ongoing battle throughout Scripture
and history is about one primary issue: worship. Idolatry, along with all its
symptoms, derails our ultimate purpose. Pure worship fulfills it. And God
will do everything necessary to bring the hearts of multitudes into alignment with his own.

Take a look inside the Dancing in the DesertDevotional Bible