(RNS) — Bobby Gruenewald may know more about how Americans read the Bible than anyone else in this country. Gruenewald, an online entrepreneur turned pastor, has been running the popular Bible app YouVersion for the past 15 years. This free application has been downloaded over 700 million times in the US and around the world.
Gruenewald said that when people log on to an app, they typically don’t want to know what the Bible thinks about politics or hot social issues. Instead, they usually seek reassurance that things will be okay.
“People are turning to the Bible and using it in a way that reminds them of God’s faithfulness and hope,” Gruenewald told RNS in a recent interview.
That search for hope is reflected in a list of the top 10 Bible verses searched by users in 2023. The No. 1 Bible verse for the third year in a row was Isaiah 41:10, which begins, “Do not be afraid, for I am with you.” You; don’t be disappointed. for I am your God. ” is written in the New Joint Translation.
Other popular searches include John 3:16, Jeremiah 29:11 (which talks about God having a plan to prosper his people), and “Do not be anxious about anything.” It also included familiar verses such as Philippians 4:6, which says,
YouVersion is also one of the places where Americans don’t discuss God or politics. Gruenewald said the app includes hundreds of multilingual translations of the Bible, a place to share Bible reading plans, devotions and prayer requests, and seeks to avoid political and culture war feuds. said.
That’s partly because the app has a global audience, and partly because the app’s developers hope to draw people into the Bible rather than push them away.
“We didn’t want the Bible app to become a battleground for these issues,” Gruenewald said.
The YouVersion app has evolved dramatically over its lifetime. Gruenewald, a staff pastor at Oklahoma City-based Life Church, one of his largest megachurches in the United States, died in Chicago in 2006 as he waited in his line for security at O’Hare International Airport. I first came up with the idea for his YouVersion. At first it was his website where people could search for Bible verses online, but then it turned into an app as smartphones became more popular.
In its early days, the app focused on providing access to information about the Bible, Gruenewald said. Currently, there is also a focus on the relationship with the Bible. In recent years, the popular “Verse of the Day” feature has expanded to include devotions and everyday experiences with the Bible, Gruenewald said. The app also includes guides on how to pray and ways for people to share prayer requests and receive prayer reminders.
“You can ask a friend to pray for your wishes and receive a notification every time someone indicates they are praying for you,” Gruenewald said.
Much of the app’s recent growth has been in regions such as India, Latin America, and Africa. More than 80% of his more than 100 million downloads in 2023 were outside the United States, where a lite version of the app for less rugged smartphones is popular, according to YouVersion.
The success of the YouVersion app comes with great responsibility, Gruenewald said. YouVersion collects data about tens of millions of users, which requires strong data security. That data will be of great value to advertisers and other external groups.
But that’s not for sale, Grunewald said.
“We are approached by everyone on the planet who wants to buy data,” he said. “We don’t even entertain the conversation. We don’t monetize the data.”
Instead, the app is funded by donors inside and outside the church. This app is owned by Life.Church and runs YouVersion as a separate operation. The church also created a second nonprofit organization, YouVersionINC, in 2023 to support the app, according to IRS documents.
Considering the issues with other popular social media websites, especially X, formerly known as Twitter, and TikTok, the YouVersion team feels a responsibility to keep the app true to its mission and honor the trust users have placed in the app. said Grunewald.
“There are millions of people who rely on apps to do their jobs,” he says. “And it’s not a simple problem.”