CSB Turns 5, Ukraine Relief, & Reaching Your Neighbors

The award-winning Christian Standard Bible translation reached its fifth anniversary in March, a milestone marked by a 10 percent market share of Bible sales, according to top industry tracking data.
Andy McLean, Lifeway’s director of Bibles and reference, said the sales milestone is rare for new translations. Lifeway Christian Resources’ publishing arm, B&H Publishing, released the CSB in March 2017 as a significant revision of the Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB).

The CSB’s fifth-place sales ranking puts it just below the top-selling New International Version, New Living Translation, English Standard Version and King James Version.

University Baptist Church in Houston commissioned one of their own to go out to the furthest mission fields.

Astronaut Bob Hines, a member of UBC, is scheduled to launch into space on April 19. There, he will spend 144 days on the International Space Station and be the pilot on the SpaceX Crew-4 mission, a four-person team that will launch out of Cape Canaveral.

March 27 was the last Sunday before Hines went into a three-week quarantine as preparation for launch. Associate Pastor of Student Ministries Kyle Wilson led the congregation in a prayer over the Hines family, including Bob’s wife, Kelli, and his three daughters. In addition to praying for safety during the mission, Wilson also emphasized that it was the church’s duty to take care of the family during Hines’ absence.

Hines expressed his gratefulness to God that he was fulfilling a childhood dream. He spoke of his excitement at seeing Earth from afar.

“[I] want to look at this amazing creation that God has given us and just be in awe of it,” he said.
Hines is an active member of the church, where he has served as a Sunday School teacher. His daughter also sings in the praise team.

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In a First Person article on Baptist Press, Ben Mandrell, president of Lifeway, encourages Christians to consider that they can learn from their neighbors who are not religious.

Mandrell encourages believers to keep in mind that non-religious neighbors:

• Can be discerning
• Can have things to teach us
• Take notice when we honor things that matter to them

Mandrell says in his experience, his non-religious neighbors have wanted to learn who he is as a person before they learn about his faith beliefs.

Find more stories at BaptistPress.com.