2009 – a year of highs and lows

We’re coming to the end of another year. This means that WordLive is almost two years old – Happy Birthday is the 1st January.

The year has seen us build on the success of our first year with more people than ever deepening their relationship with God through reading the Bible and praying using Wordlive.

We’ve also developed our facebook and twitter presence, and we’d love for you to join in the conversation there. Our YouTube account is also hosting all the WordLive vidoes, making it very easy for you to embed and share them with your own communities.

WordLive itself went through an upgrade (lovingly called WordLive 1.5 to the team). It now has an image each day as well as tools to share each and every activity around the net.

But the year has also been painful for the team. The current economic climate has hit us and we’ve had to look at new ways of delivering WordLive content in the future. As part of a bigger SU re-shaping our team has been affected, and we have had to say goodbye to several wonderful people.

So the year has been what most years are; times of joy and sadness, contentment and yearning. And next year will be the same, although the specifics are not yet known.

One thing we can be sure of though, is that we can have faith, and trust in God.

What are your memories of 2009?

WordLive - The Sequel

I’m delighted to announce that we have launched a new version of WordLive. You will see a few changes, including:

• A new simplified splash page (you’ll need to log out and type in http://www.wordlive.org/ again to see this).
• A new welcome video on the splash page to entice people to dive right in.
• A new visual way in to the content for each day. You’ll see a photo as part of the Pray First activity
• The content that is common for the whole week is now moved to the side of the page reducing some of the busyness of the wheel.
• If you click on ‘Give’ you will see some exciting new icons and some simplified procedures around donating. It is now possible to donate via direct debit.
• The blog (woohoo, that's this) is now pulled through directly on the main page.
• A newly created section called ‘About God’. This is a set of introductory items on the basics of Christianity. This section is ideal as a way in for those who are new to the Christian faith.
• There are also changes in the email making it a lot easier to read.
• You can also share content from WordLive using the Share button at the bottom of the activity. This can link through to key social network sites such as facebook etc.
• We’ve also radically revised the text in ‘About WordLive’. I recommend you read that through – it will equip you to talk about WordLive!

There are also a host of other changes which you won’t see which do various things such as making the log in process easier.

But don't take my word for it, take a look yourself.

Grab a God moment at WordLive.

Freedom to choose

WordLive offers a large amount of content each day. We do this partly out of love, partly because we can, but primarily because we want to offer the user, you, the best chance of hearing God through the Bible. With this in mind we create different activities for each day, as displayed in the revolving carousel. (If you can't see the revolving carousel, then you'll need to install Flash from Adobe, it is a free plug-in, and makes WordLive even more alive.)

Wordive is built around a central Bible passage. This Bible passage is explored in the activities for that day... BUT you don't have to do everything on offer. Some of the activities will make the same point in a slightly different way, perhaps being more creative, more practical or in a deeper more studious way (it may even use long words). Some activities use music, others images, while others are more interactive.

The point is, there is a lot of material for each day, but you may not find all of it useful. Some content works better for some people while other content works better for others. Of course, you may want to click on everything and that is fine, but after reading the Bible passage, the choice is yours. You can do a little or as much as you like. WordLive is for you.

What exactly is WordLive?

We're keeping the fine print under wraps at the moment, but in the next couple of months you'll be hearing a lot about WordLive. In the meantime you can go to the homepage and read about WordLive, PrayLive and what Scripture Union are going to do via the Internet.

http://www.wordlive.org/