The familiar observation that the Bible is the best-selling book of all time obscures a more startling fact: the Bible is the best-selling book of the year, every year. Calculating how many bibles are sold in the United States is a virtually impossible task, but a conservative estimate is that in 2005 Americans purchased some twenty-five million Bibles -- twice as many as the most recent Harry Potter book. The amount spent annually on Bibles has been put at more than half a billion dollars.
And if that doesn't raise your secular eyebrows, check THIS out...
According to the Barna Group, an evangelical polling firm, forty-seven percent of Americans read the Bible every week. But other research has found that ninety-one percent of American households own at least one Bible --- the average owns four -- which means that Bible publishers manage to sell twenty-five million copies a year of a book that almost everybody already has.
The article goes on to describe the wide array of Bibles available that target specific audiences. Revolve, for instance, was created after a marketing executive came in "with a variety of teen-girl magazines and threw them on the table...And then she threw a black bonded-leather Bible on the table and said, 'Which would you rather read if you were sixteen years old?'" The resulting product looks indistinguishable from a teen-magazine for girls. Inside there are "quizzes, photos of beaming teen-agers, and sidebars offering Bible-themed beauty secrets." Here is one of their tips.
Have you ever had a white stain appear underneath the arms of your favorite dark blouse? Don't freak out. You can quickly give deodorant spots the boot. Just grab a spare toothbrush, dampen with a little water and liquid soap, and gently scrub until the stain fades away. As you wash away the stain, praise God for cleansing us from all the wrong things we have done (1 John 1:9)
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