A Faith-Nurturing Boardgame

Being a believer with strong faith is not just simply setting faith standards and habits like reading morning devotionals every morning, going on evangelisms, or going to Church every Sunday. Those faith standards are absolutely vital to our spiritual health; yet, walking the path of faith also calls for renewing the individuals faith day by day.

Sharon Bartley, 44, has devised a game to reach out to all ages to let the messages in the Bible grow in a different and new method.

"I want people to know more about the word of God," said the Willing-boro resident. "I pray that we renew our commitment to Christ while playing this game. I pray multitudes upon multitudes will come to know the Lord."

The game¯s name is "Bible Word Up!" To play the game, players spin a wheel, provide answers to questions categorized into several types such as °Quote the Word," and play their pieces in what it looks like to be path across the board towards the goal of °crown of righteousness.±

The roots of all the questions and themes come from the Bible. Questions examples test Bible Trivia such as naming the books of the Bible that begin with the letter °E± or asking to name Ruth¯s second husband

"It¯s not a game based on opinion or denomination,¯¯ said Bartley. "It¯s Old and New Testament. I hope it¯s a game for everyone."

Bartley created the game when she was teaching vacation Bible school in East Orange in order to help her students enjoy what they were learning. The origins of the game was first devised and initially drawn on a white board.

Eight years later, Bartley is selling "Bible Word Up!" on the web (http://www.biblewordup.com/), and 5,000 copies of it are being printed and added to the store stock to sell for $29.99 in Christian bookstores and other retail locations. Bartley¯s peers testified that the game combines both faith and fun together.

"It¯s almost Monopoly-esque except instead of going to jail you go back to learn more Scripture," said Tony Hopkins, who lives in Willing-boro. "It¯s sort of like the game of Life, the way you gain insight. It¯s exciting when you start to win and realize you retained something from Bible class or from watching ®The Ten Commandments.¯ "

"It has no other choice but to be successful," said Joy Hopkins, Tony¯s wife. "It reveals how much you know, how much you need to know, and brings you closer to God."

With clear goals to make the future of the game a success and working at as a customer service representative for Horizon Blue Cross in Mount Laurel. "It can¯t be just a game, because it¯s the word of God," she said. "God gave this to me. It¯s a Holy Ghost-inspired game."