Celebrating 40 years of KYB by Correspondence
During 2023 CWCI Australia has celebrated 40 years of KYB by Correspondence (KYBC). In early 1970 CWCI was made aware of the need for a Bible study course by correspondence and it initially commenced in Western Australia with a set of 10 lessons being made available. Today, there are 60 students doing KYBC by either mail or email and 25 mentors who respond to them. One of the current students, Judy, has shared the following reflection on her time as a KYB Student and KYBC Coordinator.
Judy writes:
I have been very honoured and privileged to be a part of KYBC for some time now. I started as the KYBC Distributor after a friend needed to hand it over due to other commitments. This position later had its name changed to KYBC Coordinator and is still known by that name today. KYBC has seen many changes in the over 20 years I have been involved. When I joined KYBC the students’ used “sheets” for their lessons, and this later changed to the books that the KYB groups used. This opened many more studies that our students could access as well as having the option of large print studies and audio tapes for the students with vision impairment.
When I started with KYBC our students were just starting to use the technology available to become “email students” instead of the normal option of “mail students”. This quickly blossomed and many ladies enjoyed the time-efficiency this option gave them compared to the slower snail mail option. As I was getting ready to hand the position over to someone else the technology had expanded to various online video options that allow women to meet “face to face” and is therefore more interactive and personal than what has previously been available.
Working with all our mentors over the years has been one of the biggest blessings God has given to me in my life. They are my sisters in Christ and were my church family for many wonderful years. We shared birthday wishes with each other and our then KYBC Administrator set up a prayer chain for our group that still runs today and has blessed many students and mentors and people in the many years it has been running. Upholding each other and others in prayer is an honour and a part of our Christian walk that builds relationships and God’s outreach of love in amazing ways.
I eventually had to hand over the role of KYBC Coordinator due to health reasons and I know that the work that CWCI and the KYBC team do will keep KYBC running beautifully, well into the future. There have been so many students who have been blessed by having this “correspondence” type option available to them when getting to a Bible study was not an option for them. Working mums, living in remote and rural situations, not belonging to a church group, no Bible classes available in their local areas, time restraints, were just a few reasons why KYBC was a great option for our ladies. We have had mothers and daughters and sisters join KYBC together. We have had mothers tutor their daughters as students through their studies together too.
I have also been very blessed to be able to be a KYBC Student myself since about 1998 and I started with a lovely lady who walked me through my studies until she went home to be with our Lord. At that time, I was doing my studies via snail mail as technology was too “scary” for me. My job as KYBC Coordinator soon helped me overcome some of those fears!! When I “met” my current mentor, I decided to give email a try and I have been doing my studies that way ever since. I am quite slow in doing my studies, but my mentor has always been very patient and supportive of me, and my circumstances, and she has kept in regular contact with me whether I am regularly sending studies in or not. We also uphold each other in prayer and share family situations, gardening, and general life whenever we are in touch with each other.
One of the wonderful things about KYBC is that it can be as simple as doing your study with a mentor or you can become great personal friends while sharing God’s word together. It’s completely up to the individual! I have also had the wonderful blessing of meeting a few of our mentors (including my own!) over the years and this has blessed us both personally and in our roles in KYBC together.
I would thoroughly recommend KYBC to anyone who cannot access church or Bible study in the usual way, and I would encourage the students to really get to know their mentors and bless each other while sharing God’s word together.
If you have enjoyed reading Judy’s story and would like to find out more about KYBC please visit our website at cwciaus.org.au/know-your-bible/about-kyb