Podcast: Jackie Hill Perry on Recording the Entire ESV Bible: “It Changed Everything”

May 08, 2024 by: Crossway

This article is part of the The Crossway Podcast series.

How It Feels to Read and Record the Entire Bible

In this special episode, Bible teacher, author, and hip hop artist Jackie Hill Perry shares what it was like to spend over sixty-five hours reading God’s word aloud in a recording studio with unsaved audio engineers listening in the whole time. She also shares how God used that experience to change the way she views the Bible.

ESV Audio Bible, Read by Jackie Hill Perry

ESV Audio Bible, Read by Jackie Hill Perry

Crossway

The Bible is made up of 66 books that tell the magnificent story of God’s redemptive work through Christ. In this audio recording of the full Bible, that story comes alive in a fresh way through the voice of poet, Bible teacher, hip-hop artist, and author Jackie Hill Perry.

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | YouTube | RSS

Topics Addressed in This Interview:

01:06 - Preach the Word

Matt Tully
Jackie, thank you so much for joining me today on The Crossway Podcast.

Jackie Hill Perry
Thanks for having me.

Matt Tully
About a week ago, you posted a quote on Instagram from the late Francis Schaeffer. Francis Schaeffer is someone that maybe Crossway readers will know and appreciate. He’s published books with us. But that quote seems really relevant for the conversation that I’m hoping we can have today about the Bible. So I wonder if you could start us off by reading that quote, and then just tell us why you posted it.

Jackie Hill Perry
I’ll read it. It’s from Francis Schaeffer’s Death in the City. It says, “I would say to you who call yourselves Bible-believing Christians, if you see the Word of God diminished as it is in our day and are not moved to tears and indignation, I wonder if you have any comprehension of the day in which we live. If we as Bible-believing Christians can see God’s Word, God’s verbalized, propositional communication, treated as it is so often treated and are not filled with sorrow and do not cry out, ‘But don’t you realize the end thereof?’—I wonder: do we love His Word?” I had just spoken at Liberty University for their convocation, and the text that I spoke from was 2 Timothy 4, where Paul addresses Timothy, telling him to preach the word. It was a heavier, harder, aggressive word that I gave to the students, but it really was the emphasis that we have to preach the word and not a word, but the—God’s revealed word in the Scriptures. And so that’s where that came from.

Matt Tully
For the student convocation, why did they need that, in your mind, a more aggressive, more straightforward, challenge or charge to preach the word?

Jackie Hill Perry
I just pay a lot of attention to what’s happening on social media, what’s happening in churches, what’s happening from pulpits. And one of the things that I kept seeing is just a lower emphasis on the power and value of just flat-footed preaching of God’s word. There just seemed to be an imbalance of self-centered teaching—teaching that leaned more on illustration than it did doctrine. I just felt burdened. I felt a way. And so around December, I told my husband, “I think I’m going to write a message on 2 Timothy 4, and every venue that invites me to teach I’m teaching that same message.” So it isn’t even just particularly Liberty, but every single place (besides two) that I’m teaching at this year, I’m teaching 2 Timothy 4 about itching ears and preaching God’s word. Because it needs to be heard.

Matt Tully
Jackie, you’re a bestselling author. You’re a hip hop artist. You’re a Bible teacher, as you just said. You're a poet. And you’re now an audio Bible narrator. What do you make of that?

Jackie Hill Perry
Grace. Grace. I mean, I shouldn’t be in this position to be able to influence people, to be able to teach or preach or write poetry. I really shouldn’t. I’m literally not on some false humility type of stuff. I really shouldn’t be doing this if you knew where I came from. Not only did I come from Adam but I came from St. Louis. I came from a place that was just dry and estranged from life. And so I think for God to not only call me to himself but to also release me to be able to walk in my gifts in a variety of different ways, that’s a privilege. And it’s exciting to show people the possibilities of what can happen to a life when the Lord snatches you up, because he surely snatched me up.

Matt Tully
Do you feel like you have a deeper appreciation and gratitude to God because of coming from St. Louis and some of the particulars of your own story? Does that feed into the way that you think about the way God is using you today?

Jackie Hill Perry
Yeah, because I think, from a worldly vantage point, it seems like the people who are influential have been positioned to be so. So they were born in the right family, they are a part of the right denomination, they have been to the right seminaries and Christian institutions. I had none of that. Absolutely none of it. And so even with me and my husband, on either side of our family we are one of maybe two Christians. And so when I look at my life and I look at the lives of other people that I’m associated with, it’s just clear that when God has something to say, he will use anybody to say it.

Matt Tully
And the truth of that is that all of us are just as equally saved by God’s grace and are desperate for his grace, but it is cool when there are people who can testify that to that in a unique way and in a powerful way, and it can remind all of us of our shared desperation for him.

Jackie Hill Perry
That’s it. That’s it.

06:12 - Vocal Strain, Audio Technicians, and Verbal Expression

Matt Tully
Your recording of the full ESV Bible clocks in at sixty-five hours, ten minutes long. I asked, and that is it right there. That’s a long time to spend in a recording studio, reading out loud. So I just wonder if you can give us a picture—what was that like for you?

Jackie Hill Perry
Painful because I underestimated the vocal strain of recording for an extended amount of time. So I would talk to my friends who were singers and just ask questions about how do you maintain vocal stamina and endurance. I would attempt to read for four to five hours at a time, and my voice couldn’t take it to the point that when I would teach the following weekend or communicate, I was hoarse. And so I had to just start taking better care of my voice. I think on the other end, it really was a gift to just read the Bible out loud. If there’s something about saying it that gives life to it in a particular way. And one story that I’ve been sharing, and I haven’t shared it publicly, but my engineers in the studio—because you have to have an engineer to monitor the sound and all the things—they would have to read the Bible along with me to make sure that I wasn’t missing any words or sentences. And so the Lord just sovereignly had it where the engineers, none of them were Christians.

Matt Tully
Wow. What was that like for them?

Jackie Hill Perry
I think they enjoyed it. I think it was interesting because I would talk to them about their engagement. The last engineer I had, he was with me—I started backwards. I started in the New Testament and then the Old Testament—he was with me while I was reading all the prophets, and then I ended up having to re-record Genesis. And so we read through all the prophets, and at the end, I don’t know what the last prophet that I read was, it might have been Jeremiah or something, I asked him before the session started and before I started Genesis, “What have you been thinking about these books? How do they feel?” And he was like, “Man, I don’t read the Bible. It’s like they just don’t get it right. It’s like they keep forgetting that God keeps saying the same thing over and over again.” And I was like, “That’s literally what the prophets are doing is just repeating the same thing that God has been saying.” And I told him, I said, “Well, this book that we’re about to read, Genesis, will show you why God has to keep repeating himself. Because of sin.” And so just the testimony of how God used the recording even to expose people to his word, that type of stuff is a very special memory that I will have.

Matt Tully
Yeah, absolutely. You mentioned a minute ago that there was just this vocal strain that maybe you weren’t expecting with reading out loud for so long. You’re a recording artist, you’re a hip hop artist, you do spoken word poetry. Do you think that experience that you’ve had with verbally expressing yourself in different ways, did that come to bear and have an influence even on Scripture, which is full of poetry? Did you feel a connection there? Did you have things that you could draw on that helped you in that studio?

Jackie Hill Perry
Oh, for sure. I went into the recording with the intention to give life to the words, because I think sometimes the Bible is read as if it isn’t God’s word. And reading it with the intention of giving the particular life that book required. So if I’m reading a psalm of lament, there should be a measure of lament in my voice, right? If I’m reading a psalm of praise, there should be a measure of praise in my tone. Everything shouldn’t be the same as if the writer had the intention of it being heard in the same way. But there’s also this kind of moderation that I had to take when it came to an epistle, for example, or the narratives in particular. Your tone can also function as interpretation. And so in places where I did not necessarily know the angle of the text, I had to make sure that my voice was neutral so as not to communicate a tone that wasn’t actually true to what the writer intended. And I think that’s me being a teacher, knowing how to approach the text.

Matt Tully
As a Bible teacher who’s spoken to hundreds and thousands of people, the teaching power of what you emphasize here, what you slow down and say over here—I would imagine you’re having to make some choices there on the fly as you’re reading.

Jackie Hill Perry
Yeah, where I didn’t know what I was doing, it was just neutral. You’re just going to get plain. Not boring, but not an overly articulate approach emotionally to my tone of voice. So I would pull it back in. But books I’ve read or studied or that were very clear, like you know when Jesus is angry. You know that like. “Get behind me, Satan.” That’s intense. But when he’s crying and weeping over his people as he comes into the city, there’s a sensitivity. So I think your voice needs to match what God is trying to communicate. I really think that’s important.

11:15 - To Know the Bible More

Matt Tully
What went through your head when Crossway first approached you about this project? Were you initially excited about it? Oh, I’ve been waiting for this! Or were you thinking, This is not for me. There’s no way I want to do this. And then what ultimately led you to say yes?

Jackie Hill Perry
I was excited. I had been telling people all the time that I wanted to do an audio Bible, but it was a comment I would make. “I really want to read the Bible one day. I think it would be fun!” So when they approached me, it was an automatic. The yes was really easy, but it was really the how because I was also pregnant, this was during the pandemic, and so there’s all these factors. So that was a part of the reason why I think my portion was delayed for a long time. And I really appreciate y’all for giving me so much patience, because I was having babies, I was writing books, I was doing too much. So I said yes at the wrong time, but it worked out.

Matt Tully
Did you ever have thoughts in the middle of the recording process of, I don’t know if I can keep doing this. I don’t know if I want to finish this? Or were you always like, Nope, I’m going to get this done?

Jackie Hill Perry
There was a selfish motive, but that I think is actually a Christian motive, is this is going to help me serve people better—to know more Bible. So it was a way for me to know more Bible. So I was committed to the process for that reason alone.

12:44 - Over a Million Downloads

Matt Tully
Your recording is available as a CD, a digital download, and is soon going to be up on Audible. But we’ve also made it available as a free podcast, which features a few different Scripture readings every day, and so people can sign up for free and hear that every day. And the response to that show has just been amazing. Since this past January, which is when we launched the show, it’s been downloaded over a million times, and we’ve received just tons of really encouraging feedback from people. And I actually just wanted to read a couple comments and just hear your thoughts on those. Just three comments here. One listener writes, “For me, as an auditory learner, J. H. P.’s audio sticks. It’s easy to follow along with. I listen daily. So just sit back and delight in the word of God.” Another listener writes, “I’m a seventeen-year-old senior in high school, and listening to your podcast soothes my mind.” And then just one more. A listener says, “I just gave birth two months ago, and now I’m a mom of three, with two kids under the age of two. This is such a helpful way to meditate on God’s word when I’m not able to grab my physical Bible. I can pop in my headphones while I’m feeding my baby, and I can hear the word of God. It’s so awesome.” I could go on. There’s been so many comments that we’ve received like that. What goes through your head when you hear people say that?

Jackie Hill Perry
Oh man. I feel humbled. I guess it’s exciting to hear people excited and delighting in and being changed by God’s word, especially through this medium. Because when you think about the Bible—these letters and these these books—they were heard. So I think we’re engaging with the Scriptures in the same way that when the Scriptures were being written the people engaged with them. So it’s kind of even cool to see the power of not just reading Scripture or being preached Scripture but just listening to Scripture. I think it affirms what Scripture even says about itself. Either the word of God works or it doesn’t.

Matt Tully
I’ve thought about that a little bit. Just so often in our culture and even in our churches, the emphasis can so often be on reading the word. And that’s so important for us to read god’s word, to have a physical Bible. Obviously, we (Crossway) publish tons of physical Bibles every year. But there is something special and unique about hearing God’s word read aloud. Have you experienced that? Even before recording this Bible, have you had experiences where you just felt like there is something special about hearing the Bible read out loud?

Jackie Hill Perry
Yeah. I’m going to mess this moment up, but I remember when I was a fairly new Christian, we went to this poetry event. And this girl got up and again, it’s a poetry event, so you think she’s going to do poems, but what she did was recite Scripture. And there was a sentence, and I don’t know what the sentence was, but let’s say it’s John 3:16, she would repeat the sentence over and over again, emphasizing different words. So she said, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son . . . . For God so loved the world . . . .” And she just would emphasize the words, and I had never experienced something like that in my life, where it was like just even the tone and the emphasis that she placed on different words made it really come alive. And that has always stuck with me. It is the power of communicating God’s word in a way that just does the thing.

Matt Tully
I feel like I’ve heard you do that. I couldn’t cite a message I’ve heard of yours, but I feel like I’ve heard you do that in your own speaking and teaching.

Jackie Hill Perry
I got that from her. I got that from her. For sure.

16:46 - When Engineering and Bible Translation Collide

Matt Tully
That’s so cool. What’s something about this whole project that surprised you? As you got into the booth and you got recording, were there things that were just different, maybe good or bad, but different than what you were expecting?

Jackie Hill Perry
I expected what I got, for the most part. Those names, though, man. Those names were tough, and the cities. But it humanized the people for me. Because I had to reflect and say, You are saying the name of people that lived, that had life, and that God decided to record in his word. And so that added a level of importance for me when it felt like going through this endless genealogy and just all the things. It just felt begrudging. I think when I remembered that I’m saying out loud the names of people that God knew, and I had to reflect even back on myself and say, God knows my name. He cares about me. He cares about us as individuals and as a unit. And so I did not expect to end up appreciating the genealogies, but I do now.

17:52 - A Life-Long Impact

Matt Tully
It’s funny. In addition to just remembering that these were real people, but just also I know for me sometimes I can read the Bible and we kind of approach the Bible as this special book, as we should, but we can kind of forget that there is real history here. These were real people, real places, real events, and they were people, in many ways, just like us today. Do you feel like you got an even closer sense of the historicity of the Bible as you were reading it like that?

Jackie Hill Perry
For sure. But I don’t remember how I felt about it, but I did. I definitely walked away with more faith after reading it because I think when you read the whole Bible in a couple months—over the course of some years, too, but like really concentrated into some months—you get a sense of his lordship and his hand over everything. To see his hand over history, and then to reflect and say, Oh! You’re still the same. Malachi says it, so surely your hand is still here. Even if we don’t have a book or an epistle to read that gives us very specific words like God’s hand is over your life on Tuesday when you walk down the street, we don’t need to know all that because the Bible already tells us that that’s true. I think I’m more committed now to reading through the whole Bible more often for that reason. And I think everybody should.

Matt Tully
So much of our experience with the Bible can be, and again, this is all so good, but we can do Bible studies where we’re kind of looking at one book of the Bible or a preacher will be preaching through one book of the Bible expositionally, verse by verse, and there’s just so much richness that we get from that approach. But sometimes we kind of lose that bigger picture, that big swath, that reading the whole Bible in a year, or even less time, can really give us.

Jackie Hill Perry
Yeah. It’s important.

Matt Tully
For me as a parent, I’ve got three young kids, and I know you have young kids. I think you have four young kids, is that right?

Jackie Hill Perry
Yes.

Matt Tully
I would think that if I was doing something like this, one of the most exciting things about this kind of a project would just be knowing that my kids would forever have a recording of their dad reading the Bible. Something that they could listen to even long after I’m gone. Did you ever have similar thoughts as you thought about your husband, your children, even your grandchildren someday?

Jackie Hill Perry
I didn’t, and I feel like I should have! I didn’t, but now, yeah, that is true. When I’m dead and gone, they can listen to the Scriptures in my voice. So I guess that is cool. I primarily have thought of that when it came to my books. I don’t know why. I guess I felt like my books would be easier preserved, but yeah, that is a special thing.

Matt Tully
Would you say that this experience of reading the Bible—the whole Bible out loud like that—do you think that has already had an impact on your writing and speaking ministry? Do you see that continuing to have an impact in the years to come?

Jackie Hill Perry
It’s changed everything. It really has changed the game for me because it’s given me more tools in my toolkit. So when I’m having conversations with people, I have just more memories of different passages and different texts. When I’m encouraging myself, I just have more resources to pull from by which to place my confidence in my faith. When I’m teaching now, I just think differently because I know more Bible. And so it’s changed everything for me, because I had never sat and read through the whole Bible. I’ve been in the faith since 2008, and I’ve read a lot of it, but I ain’t never sat there and just read all of it.

Matt Tully
That’s probably true for most of us listening here.

Jackie Hill Perry
To read through all of Revelation, Amos, Habakkuk, Lamentations, 1 and 2 Kings, 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Timothy, Genesis, Exodus, Deuteronomy, Numbers—all of it? It’s different.

Matt Tully
So I know this is maybe a bad question. It’s kind of like asking you to pick between your kids, which is not a good question, but if you had to pick, what was your favorite book of the Bible to read out loud as part of this? And then I want to know what your least favorite book was to read, or the most challenging?

Jackie Hill Perry
I’m going to answer it a little differently. I think the one that was most exciting to learn from was honestly 1 and 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings, because they all felt like one continuous story really. So that was just interesting to read. But I think my favorite might’ve been the Psalms. Which, duh, but it was the way it just ministered to my heart while reading it. It had a simplicity about it. My least favorite by far was Matthew. I love the Lord, but I did not enjoy reading Matthew’s work. Matthew has a lot of parables. So there’s a repetitiveness to the cadence that just felt like it was irritating me. I can’t even explain it. If I had a Bible, I would read it for you. I’m at my friend’s house and I don’t have one. But it was like, “There was a vine dresser, and the vine dresser looked at the vines and said, Do you have three vines?’ And he said ‘No, I don’t have three vines.’ Well, I have four vines. Well, if you have four vines and I have six vines . . .” It was just like this kind of thing, and it wasn’t fluid. And so to break it up I would often read a Gospel with an epistle so that if I had to read this book that felt more redundant in some ways, then I would read something that felt more straightforward. So I I didn’t enjoy that at all.

Matt Tully
When you’re doing a Bible study, those repeated words are so helpful. You’re kind of looking for that as a way to get keyed into what really matters. But I can imagine how that would be maybe harder to read in a way that felt fluid, like you said, or kind of felt interesting.

Jackie Hill Perry
It feels like hypnosis. You’re just saying it over and over. I would have to stay focused so not to get into autopilot while reading. And John is different than Matthew. So I enjoy reading John. Maybe because it doesn’t have 30,000 parables. John felt like a story about the beauty beauty and deity of God while Matthew just felt so much more picturesque for me.

Matt Tully
When did you actually finish the recording? And what was the last book? Or maybe you had to do some kind of pickups after you were done with the bulk of it, but take us to that moment when you were wrapping up the last bit that you had to record and then you kind of said, All right, that’s it. I’m done.

Jackie Hill Perry
It’s funny because my intention was to start from Genesis to Revelation because I wanted to read it straight in order. And I had did it in my home office while I was pregnant. When I had my child, the book of Genesis did not read well because I was pregnant. So I couldn’t breathe, the tone of it, the breathiness of it. And so I had to re-record Genesis. And so I finished by re-recording something that I had already read. It felt like an accomplishment. It really did. I don’t think people can understand how difficult it was and how much of a task it is to work through the entire Bible using your voice. It felt special. It felt fun. But it also felt like, Thank God I am done! Thank God!

Matt Tully
Have you listened to the recording?

Jackie Hill Perry
I listened to the first day of the podcast, and I listened to maybe the first chapter of John once it was released. But I don’t listen to it generally because I start to critique myself. So I listen to Ray Ortlund’s a lot. Michael Reeves, right?

Matt Tully
Yeah. Yeah.

Jackie Hill Perry
Those are my go-tos, especially Ray.

25:49 - A Prayer for the Listener

Matt Tully
They’re all so great. They’re all so good. Jackie, maybe just one final question. I wonder if you can just reflect a little bit on what your hope is, or even what’s your prayer, for those who listen to your recording of the Bible, the full Bible, whether it’s on the podcast, the CDs, or on Audible? What would be your prayer for them as they settle into maybe their most comfortable chair, or maybe they’re on a run, maybe they’re driving to work, what’s your prayer for them?

Jackie Hill Perry
Intimacy with God, and intimacy that comes by faith. The Bible says faith comes by hearing, hearing of the word of God, and intimacy isn’t a practice that you can have apart from faith. I have to believe you exist to even talk and to think that you’ll respond. I have to trust God when I’m suffering so that I can lean into him instead of leaning into idols. And so I guess that would be my hope is that as people engage with the Scriptures, that they’re learning something of the nature of God and the supremacy of Jesus and the finality of his reign and the eternality of his reign and how he is good all the time. And so when they go back into the world after the podcast is turned off, after the the audio Bible is a wrap, when you got to go back to work, when you got to go back to changing the diapers, when you got to go back into the world, you have this weight of glory on you that carries you. And so that’s my hope—intimacy by way of growing in faith, as a byproduct of your knowledge of God.

Matt Tully
Jackie, thank you so much for taking the time today to talk with us, to share a little bit about the big task of recording the whole Bible. We so appreciate you taking the time today.

Jackie Hill Perry
Thank you. I appreciate it.

Popular Articles in This Series

View All

Podcast: Help! I Hate My Job (Jim Hamilton)

January 06, 2020

Jim Hamilton discusses what to do when you hate your job, offering encouragement for those frustrated in their work and explaining the difference between a job and a vocation.

Crossway is a not-for-profit Christian ministry that exists solely for the purpose of proclaiming the gospel through publishing gospel-centered, Bible-centered content. Learn more or donate today at crossway.org/about.