How many of you have a bible that's falling apart? You wonder what to do with them. I've had a few and they sat on a shelf. The signature page was falling out, the maps were falling out, and the text block itself was falling apart and had fallen out of the bible cover. I had notes written in them and while the bible had sentimental value it was of no practical use because of it's condition.

 

I stumbled across on YouTube some videos detailing how folks had rebinded (put a new leather cover on) their bibles. I thought about this but being a bi-vocational pastor there just didn't seem enough time to learn this new skill and put it to use. Then I remembered at our local antique show there's always a vendor who sells leather skins. So, the next time we went to the Bouckville Antique Show I bought a couple skins of goatskin leather. One was green and the other black. I bought them and they sat unused for about a year.

 

After about a year I decided to commit myself to this task of rebinding my first bible. It was a Thompson Chain Reference King James Version Bible I used in bible college. Pages were falling out and the cover was falling off. I watched a few more videos and found some motivation and there began my bible rebinding work. I started with my own bibles before attempting to do other peoples bibles. I didn't really intend to do it for others but wanted to fix my own.

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The first was a Thompson Chain (I used the black goatskin) and my next was a Ryrie Study Bible. My Ryrie Study Bible was falling apart in chunks. The Ryrie was bound in brown calfskin. Next was a bible in good condition but I wanted the practice. It was a King James Study Bible (I did this one in green goatskin).

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Now that I had an idea of what I was doing it was time to do some bibles for friends. My friend John (the man who discipled me as  a young Christian) had two bibles that needed repaired. He had an Open Bible given to him by his father in 1977 and a Thomas Nelson NKJV Wide Margin Bible. Next, our previous pastor has a bible he wants rebound. It's an Inductive New American Standard Study Bible. I'm halfway done with this one. 

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I thought I would post pictures of the bibles I've rebound. Pictures tell a story. The pictures won't give the complete story but they do give some idea of the process involved. There's many rebinders who are much better than I am but if i can be of encouragement to help someone else learn this art of bible rebinding that a good thing. If I can use this skill to bless someone who's bible is falling apart and needs repaired that's a great thing. It's a joy to take a bible that's falling apart and make them readable again. In one sense it's good to see a bible that's falling apart (hopefully due to much use) because it belongs to a person who isn't falling apart. 

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I've added some tabs under this menu that shows some pictures of work done. God's word is a great gift to us to enable us to know him better. Let's read and enjoy our bibles. Hope you like the pictures and God bless.

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Allen Wayne

 

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