Photo: Construction is underway at the Museum of the Bible site in Washington D.C. Several Mennonites have been instrumental in the construction of this exhibit, which will open in 2017. Photo by Allon Lefever. 

Some mornings, Joel Kauffmann would wake up, turn to his wife, Nancy, and say, “I can’t believe I get to work on this project.”

The project he was referring to was the Museum of the Bible, a project to get people all around the world to engage with the Bible through four “pillars”: research, traveling exhibits, education and a museum currently under construction in Washington, D.C., scheduled to open in 2017. The museum will cover 430,000 square feet. To see everything it has to offer will take nine, eight-hour days.

Kauffmann, a screenwriter and creator of the Pontius Puddle cartoon, published in more than 200 publications, including The Mennonite, died suddenly on May 8, 2015. For him, the project represented the convergence of his personal passion for the Bible and his experience with building exhibits, perhaps most prominently at Nazareth Village, an open-air, interactive museum in Israel that replicates village life in the time of Jesus.  “Joel had such a high view of Scripture,” said Nancy Kauffmann, in a Feb. 3 phone interview. “He was interested in finding ways of making the Bible approachable to anybody.”

Joel’s fingerprints will still be seen in the layout and interactive exhibits for the museum when it opens in fall 2017. According to Dr. Gordon Campbell, professor of English at the University of Leicester who worked with exhibit development, Joel was influential in designing the New Testament exhibit, which culminates in the Sermon on the Mount.

“Joel had extraordinary sense of mind,” said Campbell. “He was principled, but could listen intelligently enough to learn what made people tick. Joel was the one with the imaginative sensitivity to ask questions like, How would somebody Jewish think about this? How would somebody from an Orthodox community think about this?”

“When the Museum of the Bible was but an idea, Joel Kauffmann was the first person we asked to join the team,” said Cary Summers, president for the Museum of the Bible, at Joel’s May 11 memorial service. “He loved the Lord, and I loved him. Joel was the thread for our team, and although he is now in heaven, his fingerprint will be seen and felt for generations to come.”

Other Mennonites have also been drawn into work with the Museum of the Bible. Allon Lefever, member of Forest Hills Mennonite Church, Leola, Pa., and owner of Lefever Associates, a consulting firm, joined the Museum of the Bible board because of the broad reach of the organization.

“I like to be involved in things that have impact,” said Lefever in a Jan. 26 phone interview. “I like that

we didn’t get hung up on theological differences but focused on uniting around the common goal. We are focused on engaging anyone who looks to the Bible for moral or religious guidance, including Catholic, Jewish and Protestant communities.”

The D.C. museum is only one piece of the Museum of the Bible’s work. The organization has developed traveling exhibits that were made in conversation with 60 universities and 100 professors. The exhibits have traveled far and wide, including stops in Vatican City and Los Angeles-area museums. The Museum of the Bible staff is also working to develop The Book, a text exploring the historical context and impact of the Bible, that the group hopes will find its way into schools.

“The Bible is the most influential book written in western civilization,” said Lefever. “There was a large survey about influential books of the century, and the Bible came [in] first, yet it’s not allowed in schools. We are working hard to develop an incredibly interesting presentation of the Bible, looking at it from a historical point of view, not religious.” So far, the American Civil Liberties Union has not approved the use of the text in classrooms, but over 7,000 students in Israel are using the textbook.  Lefever hopes the Museum of the Bible will draw people from all across the globe and increase their curiosity about the Bible.

“The idea is that people will come in and have their interest piqued by wanting to see a specific thing, and then they’ll come in and want to come back multiple times,” said Lefever. “People will look at the Bible, and hopefully God’s Holy Spirit will take over from there.”