Most Christians in the Western world own at least one Bible. You may even have multiple Bibles in your home right now — and easy access to the Bible online.
Unfortunately, many Christians in the rest of the world don’t have the blessing of God’s Word. They’re experiencing a Bible shortage, which means there are not enough Bibles to meet demand. Keep reading to learn why there are Bible shortages in other countries and how you can join ANM in helping solve this problem.
Reasons for Bible Shortages
There are four main reasons for Bible shortages: persecution and destruction, financial limitations, lack of translated materials, and few Bible distributors. Some countries experience all four, while some only experience one or two. Believers in these situations may live their entire lives only hearing the Bible from others, never owning one. Regardless of the reason(s) behind the shortage, the lack of Bible access is still a problem for believers, churches, and evangelists.
Persecution and Destruction
Christians in 50 out of the 195 countries in the world experience extreme persecution for their faith. Some of these countries even claim a Christian identity, but corruption, gang violence, and other problems increase the persecution risk.
Persecution in many of these countries includes Bible destruction. Bibles are often illegal and if someone is found with a Bible, they will go to jail and a government official will destroy the Bible. Even if the government allows Christianity and believers can own Bibles, social pressure and radical groups from other religions can still persecute Christians and destroy their Bibles.
Some of the places with the most extreme persecution are experiencing the greatest number of Christian conversions. It’s easy to see that as Christians lose their Bibles to destruction, they and new believers are desperate for Bibles.
Financial Limitations
Another reason that people are desperate for Bibles is because they cannot afford one. Poor believers in developing countries may work all day and barely earn enough money to survive. They don’t have any extra money to spend on any type of reading materials, including a Bible in their language.
If their country or groups within their country persecute believers, then Bibles are even harder to find, which makes them more expensive.
Lack of Translated Materials
Imagine that Bibles are legal, safe, and easy to obtain in a country, which is possible. A believer may even have enough money to afford one or a missionary is giving them away for free. Unfortunately, a new problem often arises: this believer is from a minority people group that speaks their own language. All the Bibles that missionaries or book stores supply are in the majority language.
The believer from the minority group may speak enough of the majority language to greet someone or ask directions. However, even if they can speak that language to survive, they often don’t understand enough to grasp the Bible. And sometimes the Bible isn’t an easy read! Can you imagine trying to read Revelation, but only understanding every third word?
Lack of translated materials is a major factor in Bible shortages, especially in countries with diverse people groups and languages.
Few Bible Distributors
Perhaps the saddest reason for Bible shortages is that there are few Bible distributors. A 2020–2021 study found that there are only 430,000 missionaries in the world. According to Joshua Project, there are 3.42 billion unreached people. If we divide that out, that means there’s only 1 missionary per 7,953 people. And these 7,953 people may not even live close to each other.
While anything is possible with God, all humans have limits. How can one missionary afford 8,000 Bibles, especially in different languages? How can they distribute them alone, especially to remote locations?
Unfortunately, the common answer is that they can’t. They buy as many Bibles as they can afford and distribute them as much as possible, often with the help of volunteers. However, due to natural human limitations and circumstantial limitations such as lack of translated materials, they may never distribute enough Bibles. And so the Bible shortage continues.
Where We’re Sending Bibles
The Bible shortage situation seems bleak. Thankfully, missionaries and their organizations are working to shine a light in this darkness, including here at ANM. With over 26,000 missionaries serving in their native communities, we have faster and easier access than other organizations to both Bibles in native languages and unreached people groups. Several countries and areas benefit the most from these native missionary Bible distributors: Ethiopia, the Middle East, and East Asia.
Ethiopia
Ethiopia has a large Orthodox Christian population but surprisingly few Bibles and low Biblical literacy. Many of the Orthodox Christians that our missionaries meet don’t even own Bibles. They tend to favor the Book of Mary and other church-approved literature instead. Our missionaries distribute Bibles to help these people realize that salvation is possible through Jesus alone.
After Orthodoxy, Islam is the second most popular religion in Ethiopia. Muslim-background believers are in desperate need of Bibles so they can ground themselves in the Truth and stand firm in their new faith. ANM’s native missionaries distribute many Bibles to these believers as well.
Middle East
Similar to Ethiopia, most believers in the Middle East are from a Muslim background with little to no exposure to the Bible. They are in desperate need of God’s Word, especially as they face persecution from loved ones, religious extremists, and the government. Our native missionaries distribute many Bibles in Middle Eastern countries to meet this demand and shrink Bible shortages in the region.
East Asia
Several countries in East Asia are anti-religion, especially anti-Christian. Like the Middle East, believers there are desperate for God’s Word as a source of hope amid fear and persecution. Our native missionaries know safe and secure ways to smuggle and distribute Bibles in these countries so that the church can continue to grow.
Impact of Bible Distributions
While Ethiopia, the Middle East, and East Asia are three of our most popular Bible destinations, we distribute Bibles all over the world. Some of the most recent recipients were new believers in Cambodia, a predominantly Buddhist country in Southeast Asia.
Took, a 49-year-old man from the Brao tribe, shares, “I am so excited to have this one copy of the Bible. Because I am so poor, though the Bible is not so expensive, I could not afford to purchase one. Now, I am really thankful to God and to the donors for blessing me with this one new Bible. I hope and believe that through this one Bible I will grow my faith in God deeper and stronger. I commit to reading this new Bible daily so I can know God more, then I can share with others too.”
Receiving a Bible changed Took’s life, and as he continues to read and grow, he’ll impact others. The impact of a single Bible often multiplies like this, blessing other Christians as people share their Bible and reaching non-believers as empowered people share God’s Word.
You can contribute to this multiplying impact and solving the Bible shortage in other countries through ANM.
When you donate at least $10, you send out a native missionary with a Bible for someone who desperately needs one.
Your gift helps a brother or sister grow in their relationship with Christ and will touch many lives beyond them too.
