A Brief History: Why the Digital Bible Society?

At Digital Bible Society, we leverage basic access to computers and internet technology for those in persecuted regions to bring them valuable digital tools like printable Scriptures and audio Bibles.

The global challenge facing believers regarding Bible access is immense. Many serving minority language groups have long given up hope of finding Bibles in their own languages. Often, Bibles in these languages become expensive collector’s items. In some cases, missionaries are unaware that a Bible even exists in the language they are working with. Confronting this problem is what first inspired our ministry.

Our journey began in Houston in 2000. Two long-time friends, Pastors Amy and Hong Sit, welcomed a missionary named Jon Lee into their home. Jon had worked in China for over twenty years, where he had seen very few Bibles or Christian books. He was amazed by Amy’s library, which housed an unabridged copy of Matthew Henry’s six-volume, 12,000+ page Bible commentary and her father’s Bible. Her father, Leland Wang, along with his disciple, Watchman Nee, were instrumental in launching the Chinese House Church Movement.

Jon immediately began scanning Hong and Amy's books into digital formats, intending to take them back to China on CDs to share with his friends.

He started with the unabridged Matthew Henry commentary. It wasn’t long before Jon sought help. Pastor Hong reached out to his friend, Ken Bitgood, for advice on how to scan such a large book. Ken, a Bible enthusiast and self-taught computer programmer, met with Jon and introduced him to the commercial Bible software of the time: PC Study Bible and Logos. Jon, overwhelmed by the abundance of resources, began to weep. He then asked Ken to provide copies of the software for distribution in China. Ken refused, saying, “No, that’s illegal. It’s against copyright law.”

Jon, puzzled, replied, “What does American copyright law matter when we are going to jail for distributing Bibles?”

Ken explained that it was a matter of conscience and asked, “Why would you even want Bibles and books in English? Wouldn't it be better to distribute them in Chinese?”

“Of course,” Jon said, “but English is better than nothing, and in China, we have nothing!”

At that point, Ken suggested, “Why don’t we pray that God helps us find Chinese resources for which we could secure permissions, and use our skills to build deliverable libraries?”

They prayed a simple yet bold prayer and committed to follow through as God provided. That prayer marked the beginning of our ministry. Within days, they began connecting with various ministries creating Chinese Christian resources for distribution in China. Six months later, Jon was traveling by train across China, distributing a CD library called “Chinese Treasures” to friends and colleagues. Despite the library’s rudimentary form, its distribution was a resounding success.

Recognizing the need for improvement, Ken and his wife, Deborah, along with their three homeschooling boys and a dozen friends, set to work producing a better product. They soon established a 501(c)(3) ministry called Digital Bible Society. Over the next ten years, this all-volunteer team partnered with over 100 Chinese missions and resource agencies, producing five major versions of “Chinese Treasures” and distributing hundreds of thousands of free-to-copy CDs to Chinese-speaking people around the world.

Arabic, Farsi, and Bible Libraries for the World

In January 2010, friends from the World Bible Translation Center (now Bible League International) invited leaders from 14 ministries to Fort Worth, Texas, to review our work in China and discuss the dream of creating resource libraries in Arabic and Farsi for free distribution across the Middle East. On that same day, five major organizations urged us to accelerate this initiative by hiring full-time staff and pledged the necessary funding to make it a reality.

We immediately began hiring programmers and designers to help us assemble these new libraries. At the same time, we were flooded with new content as partner ministries reached out to their networks to gather additional resources in Arabic and Farsi.

In that same month, Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple, introduced a revolutionary new device—the iPad—which forever changed mobile computing. Meanwhile, new devices were appearing almost weekly: tablets, MP3 players, MP4 players, handheld projectors, book readers, and smartphones were flooding the market, particularly overseas. All these emerging devices had one thing in common: the ability to read data from a tiny chip called a MicroSD card. These small storage units were not only easy to carry but could hold more than fifty times the data of a CD-ROM. With proper compression, we could include not only dozens of Bibles and a wealth of reference materials but also hundreds of hours of video and thousands of hours of audio—all on a single chip. By the end of that year, our libraries in Arabic and Farsi were many times larger than our earlier Chinese projects.

In the Beginning (5 minutes)

An Alliance of Ministries

In July 2011, several like-minded organizations came together to form the Digital Bible Alliance, a fellowship of ministries dedicated to continuing the work of Digital Bible Society. Additional funds were committed to the development of Bible libraries in ten new languages: Russian, Spanish, Urdu, Vietnamese, Burmese, Indonesian, Malaysian, Turkish, Bengali, and Hindi.

This funding not only provided the resources to build these libraries, but it also expanded the distribution networks for their content. By the end of 2012, Digital Bible Society had facilitated the creation and distribution of over 30 million digital Bibles and Christian resources, as well as over 250,000 copyable digital libraries for closed-access nations—with no way of knowing how many more had been copied and shared.

In the autumn of 2012, the International Forum of Bible Agencies entrusted Digital Bible Society with a monumental task: to index every print, audio, and visual Bible ever made. The goal was to easily identify what was available and secure the necessary resources. Work on the Find-A-Bible project began in February 2013, and by 2017, three major updates had been implemented, with the project continuing to grow in scope and content.

In 2014, the Digital Bible Library from ETEN made hundreds of Bible translations available for widespread distribution. We refer to this year as "the year the Bible went free." Our focus then shifted toward ensuring these Bibles were compatible with a wide range of formats. To achieve this, we built an online distribution platform called “Bible.Cloud.”

The Bible Cloud

The Bible Cloud is the Bible resource center of the Digital Bible Society, where you can access, read, and download thousands of biblical resources in multiple languages. It was created to support Christian workers worldwide by helping them secure and share the message of the Bible in every language for which resources are available. The tools and filters in the Bible Cloud are designed to offer a seamless discovery experience, connecting users with audio Bibles, Bible players, visual Bibles, and print-on-demand Bibles—all within a single, user-friendly interface.

Print on Demand & Audio Devices

As mission agencies and workers began discovering these free downloadable Bibles, we started to receive requests for printed versions. Meanwhile, “Print-On-Demand” processing was emerging as a reliable and affordable means of printing books, especially for low-volume orders. Consequently, we began processing and making Bibles available at the cost of printing, on behalf of partners like Wycliffe and Pioneer Bible Translators, through services like CreateSpace, Amazon.com, and Lulu.

In response to the growing demand for high-quality, affordable, and easy-to-use solar-powered audio devices, the Digital Bible Society developed the "Pearl Players"—a new line of cost-effective devices designed for the widespread distribution of audio Bibles.

Each of these audio players can permanently lock media onto the device and comes preloaded with Bibles in your choice of over a thousand languages, sourced from respected organizations such as Faith Comes by Hearing, Davar Partners, Biblica, Bible League International, and others.

Find-A-Bible & the Global Bible Need

In 2006, the Forum of Bible Agencies International (FOBAI) recognized the growing challenge faced by individuals and organizations trying to locate Bible translations and biblical resources in a rapidly expanding digital landscape. While it had become easier to search for Scripture and Bible-related content online, the sheer volume of material made it difficult to find specific Bibles, particularly in minority languages. To address this issue, FOBAI launched Find-A-Bible, a comprehensive web directory designed to ensure that the world’s Bibles and biblical resources would be accessible, easy to find, and simple to share across every language.

Find-A-Bible (FAB) provided links to Bibles and resources in over 6,000 languages. Yet the increasing demands of maintaining this expansive directory called for a new approach. In 2013, FOBAI entrusted the Digital Bible Society with the task of updating and maintaining Find-A-Bible, transforming it into the central online hub for people seeking Bibles and Biblical resources. By consolidating access to these materials in one location, Find-A-Bible became an invaluable tool for Christian workers, missionaries, and believers worldwide, simplifying the process of discovering and obtaining Scripture and related resources.

Through this ongoing partnership, the Digital Bible Society has continued to ensure that these vital resources remain accessible to all, fulfilling the mission of making the Bible available to every person, in every language.

Since its founding, the Digital Bible Society has sought to not only provide Bible resources but also identify regions where these resources are most critically needed. Recognizing that Bible distribution efforts are uneven across the globe, the Society has worked diligently to assess where the greatest needs lie and which organizations are actively working toward the availability of these resources.

To further this mission, the Digital Bible Society partnered with Open Doors International, the creators of the World Watch List, a well-known ranking of countries where Christians face the most severe persecution. Together, they embarked on a data-gathering effort to pinpoint regions in dire need of Bible resources. This collaborative research aims to assist donors, content creators, and distributors in prioritizing Bible production and distribution efforts, directing them to regions where the need is most urgent.

In line with these efforts, the Bible Access Initiative was conceived as a tool to highlight areas of critical need for Bible resources. This initiative is set to guide both global distribution efforts and the strategic allocation of resources, ensuring that the Word of God reaches the most underserved areas. The Bible Access Initiative is scheduled for formal release in the second half of 2025, which we trust will be another significant milestone in the ongoing work to make Scripture accessible to all.

The Digital Revolution: A Turning Point

The Digital Revolution has transformed every major industry—communications, banking, entertainment, commerce, transportation, and publishing. Yet, it has not altered humanity’s deep spiritual need to know God. Across the world, people continue seeking answers, and many are finding them in Christ.

The 20th century saw Christianity explode in unexpected places. At the start of the 1900s, fewer than one million Christians lived in China; by the year 2000, that number surpassed 100 million. Similarly, the church in Africa grew from less than 9 million in 1900 to an estimated 625 million in 2025. Despite persecution, especially in places like Iran, the growth of the Persian church has been phenomenal, with a reported 20% annual growth rate since 2012. These expanding communities all share a common need: access to biblical resources and training materials to nurture their faith and share it with others.

The Digital Revolution has made it possible for individuals in almost every country to access the biblical resources they need in their own language. This vision has driven the work of the Digital Bible Society since 2001, and with continued support, we aim to provide everyone with full access to the Bible and Christian resources.

Digital Bible Publishing: Expanding Access

Despite technological advancements, nearly half of the world’s population still lacks access to the Bible in any language, and two-thirds live in nations where government censorship hinders Bible distribution. The Digital Bible Society seeks to address this by distributing Bibles and Christian resources using SD cards, flash drives, DVDs, hard drives, solar-powered audio players, and print materials to spread God’s Word.

Since 2001, the Digital Bible Society, in partnership with over 300 content providers, has legally distributed hundreds of millions of Christian resources worldwide, both offline and online. We’ve compiled libraries in hundreds of languages, and all are free to copy and free to distribute.

Our materials are available free of charge or at production cost to churches, missionaries, and disciple-makers like yourself. The work of the Digital Bible Society is sustained by the generosity of our donors, whose prayers, financial gifts, and hands-on involvement allow us to continue fulfilling the Great Commission.