‘A moment for the Bible’: YouVersion marks milestone with stadium worship event featuring Lauren Daigle, CeCe Winans

More than 13,000 people filled the Paycom Center on Nov. 17 to celebrate the q billionth download of the YouVersion Bible App, turning the Oklahoma City arena into a large-scale worship service featuring top Christian artists, testimonies of personal transformation and reflections on Scripture’s global reach.

The free Bible app, developed by Edmond-based Life.Church, has become one of the most widely used digital faith tools in the world, offering Scripture in more than 2,000 languages. But YouVersion founder Bobby Gruenewald told attendees the milestone was not about technology.

“I just wanted this to be a moment for the Bible,” he said. “Not something we’ve done, not something our team has done, but something God has done.”

The event featured performances by CeCe Winans, Lauren Daigle, Chris Tomlin, Brooke Ligertwood, Phil Wickham and others, along with a full orchestra. Winans led “Goodness of God,” Ligertwood performed “King of Kings,” Wickham sang “Awesome God,” Tomlin offered “Holy Forever,” and Daigle closed with “You Say.”

Gruenewald told The Christian Post the musical lineup was intentional: “I didn’t want to just say ‘praise God.’ I wanted us to actually praise God.”

Between performances, pastors, speakers and ministry leaders appeared either onstage or by video to share stories about the impact of the Bible. Messages were sent by Rick Warren, Manny Pacquiao, Tim Tebow, Priscilla Shirer, Joel and Luke Smallbone, Ernie Johnson Jr., Bubba Watson, Dan Cathy and others.

One of the evening’s most emotional moments came when a mother shared how the Bible App for Kids helped her nonverbal autistic son, Kent, develop speech shortly after the death of his father.

She said Kent failed to reach early developmental milestones and did not speak. While she was seven months pregnant with their second child, her husband, Gabriel, began experiencing seizures and died in 2013 following a fatal episode.

“I felt hopeless,” she said, adding she downloaded the Bible App for Kids for her children in 2014 or 2015. She said Kent began quietly reciting stories from the app even though he still wasn’t talking in other settings.

“It was one of the only times I could hear his voice,” she said.

Today, Kent is a high school student, a member of the marching band and an honor roll student. His mother credited Scripture for grounding her family and supporting her son’s growth.

“I believe the Word of God gave my son words,” she said, quoting Psalm 121.

Filmmaker Dallas Jenkins, creator of the hit series “The Chosen,” also spoke at the event. He recalled a conversation with Gruenewald in which YouVersion engineers noticed a sudden spike in searches for “Nathanael," an increase that corresponded with the release of a new episode introducing the biblical character.

Jenkins said searches routinely spike 100% to 300% when episodes feature specific characters or storylines.

“That’s exactly why I do what I do,” Jenkins said. “I am a flawed man using the imperfect medium of television to point people to a perfect book.”

Life.Church Senior Pastor Craig Groeschel shared how Scripture changed his life while he was a college tennis player with no church background. After announcing a Bible study among fraternity brothers, he was handed a free Bible by a Gideon outside a classroom building.

“We didn’t know what we were doing. We just opened it and read,” Groeschel said. He pointed to reading Ephesians 2:8-9, “for by grace you have been saved through faith, as the moment that led him to convert to Christianity.

Groeschel said he later contacted the Gideons to identify the man who handed him the Bible. “His name was Mike,” he said. “God sent one man to one campus on one Tuesday afternoon.” The pastor concluded his message by emphasizing the power of the Word and issuing a call to salvation. 

“I want you to know when we stand here today and celebrate a billion downloads of the Word of God, that my life was one changed by the Word of God … one witnessed to me. No one played a song to me. It was the living Word of God that changed my life," he said.

“I want to talk to the one who's depressed. I want to talk to the one who feels guilty for what you've done or what you said,” he continued. “I want to talk to the one who's ashamed of your sins, I want to tell you that the Word of God says that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord would be saved. And when I called on the name of Jesus, not by works, not by religious effort, but by grace, through faith, I was made new.”

Author and speaker Christine Caine delivered one of the night’s longest reflections, describing how Scripture helped heal trauma from childhood sexual abuse, cultural marginalization and the later discovery that she was adopted.

“If you do not know what God said, you will believe what culture says,” Caine said. She emphasized that engaging Scripture renewed her mind and reshaped her identity. “The Word of God absolutely saved my mind.”

Holding up a birth certificate listing her as “unnamed” and documents describing her as “unwanted” and “unqualified,” she contrasted those facts with biblical passages she memorized as a young Christian.

“Facts are real, but truth is higher,” she said.

Caine urged the crowd to view the billion-download milestone not as an endpoint but as a beginning: “There is no greater project than taking that 1 billion and turning it into 8 billion.”

Gruenewald used part of the evening to highlight global Bible engagement trends, noting increased demand for both digital and print Bibles. He said the surge reflects cultural uncertainty and the rise of AI-generated misinformation.

“When people aren’t sure what’s real, they look for what can be trusted,” he said. “God’s Word stands alone.”

He told attendees that if every major stadium and arena in the United States were filled to capacity, it still would not equal the number of people who open YouVersion each day.

“Right now it’s being opened almost 300 times every second,” he said.

The app’s growth has also been notable among Gen Z, which Gruenewald described as “one of the most open generations we’ve seen.”

Throughout the night, speakers emphasized that the celebration belonged to Scripture rather than to any organization. Gruenewald repeated that message in his closing remarks.

“There’s a hunger right now for God’s Word,” he told attendees. “Our milestone is just one data point in what God is doing around the world.”

He said the app’s global reach, and its surprising origins in a failed early website and a “below-average Bible reader,” points to something beyond personal accomplishment.

“It’s been a humbling thing to be a part of, but it is 1,000 percent something God has done,” he said. “It makes absolutely no sense that it’s happened other than just Him. We want our milestone to be an indication that God is doing something special globally with His Word. It’s not about us. We’re just a small part of it.”

Watch a recap of the event here.