Coram Deo (Latin: “in the presence of God”) is a Bible study web app built around one idea: the verse is center of attention. Started in mid-2025, currently paused for research.

Live app: Coram Deo

What It Is

A static site (Vite and React, no backend) that features the full Bible (World English Bible translation) in a clean reading view. Scripture data is stored in JSON and is read straight from the browser; user data such as saved projects, reading position, and theme preference all live in localStorage, so there’s nothing to log into and nothing running on a server.

Why I’m Building It

Not as a business, not as a resume piece, and not as a way to learn web development . It started because I wanted to engage with Scripture differently: to meditate, link, and share in digital form. I wanted to create something that feels as intuitive as a physical study Bible. Most Bible apps online don’t feel good to me, and figuring out why — and whether I can do better — is the actual point of the project.

Features

• Reader — the full Bible in a distraction-free with keyboard navigation between chapters, light/dark themes, and reading position remembered between visits
• Projects — select individual verses while reading and save them into named collections for study
• Share by link — send a project to anyone with a single link; no account needed, the link itself carries the passages
• Works offline after the first visit, with instant repeat loads
• Cross-reference data from OpenBible.info’s Treasury of Scripture Knowledge dataset

The Journey So Far

MVP (complete): Shipped a first version and shared it with a few people. Users can navigate the entire Bible, select verses into projects, create and delete projects, share projects via link, open shared projects from others, and toggle light/dark mode. Rough edges remain, but it’s usable.

Phase 2 — research (current): With the core features working, the temptation was to keep bolting on functionality to make it feel more “professional.” A quick look around showed no shortage of similar Bible apps already out there, which raised the real question: why build this at all? The answer — wanting a better way to personally engage with Scripture — pointed away from feature work and toward research: spending time deepening actual scripture engagement and talking to others before deciding what, if anything, to build next.

Status

Paused The project intentionally stepped back from feature development to figure out why existing Bible apps don’t feel as intuitive as a physical study Bible, before adding more to Coram Deo just because it’s easy to. Full project details are on GitHub: github.com/fangmike/Coram_Deo_Scripture_Study_Tool

Next In person research. I want to learn more about how people engage with scripture and design the project from the pain point.