Meeting proposes use of ICT to spread Bible message

A one-day Bible Society Leaders Meeting was held at the Owen Hall in Port Vila Thursday organized by the Bible Society of Vanuatu to consider says to improve the Society’s participating in the communities of the country and achieve its mission and vision.

This is to “Make God’s Word easily understood and available to all people in all situations” and to make “The South Pacific – A Community of the Word”.

About 30 representatives of the churches including the Vanuatu Christian Council (VCC), the Government, government statutory bodies, and civil society including the women, were at the meeting.

Jacklyn Reuben of the Bible Society of Vanuatu says the participants discuss ways “how leaders in each of these sectors can advocate the Word of God in their communities” for the sole purpose of helping the people live better and fruitful lives.

He says the meeting also discussed the Octigon Leadership and Community Development Program under which the Bible Society has been running leadership training for all the various sector of the Vanuatu society during the last three years.

And the aim of the program is to train leaders to better lead in the communities to positively impact people’s lives.

Discussions centered on how to “unlock situations that are locking people’s lives” and to disseminate the Good News of the Bible.

The challenges facing everyone due to the sectors of the society – the government, the churches, the traditional governance leaders, the women, the youths - “not talking the same language” in regards to this important aspect of their roles, was also highlighted.

Suggestions made to improve the situation included the need for a national leaders’ conference to talk about building up leaders for tomorrow.

Use of the information and communication technology (ICT) was also suggested as a tool to be considered for use to deliver the “Gospel Message” in the country.

The three main tasks of the Bible Society are: 1) they translate the Word of God into various languages with over 20 translation projects currently going on in the South Pacific; 2) they publish the Bible in the right format; and 3) they ensure that the World of God (the Bible) is distributed as widely as possible.