Hey everybody, this is Pastor John Ewart from Inglewood
Baptist Church in Rocky Mountain, North Carolina.
Thank you so much for tuning into our podcast.
You're going to hear from God today as we share from his word
about important issues facing your life that can guide you
according to the Bible. All right, So thank you all so
much for being here. Thank you for being in the room
here with us and those who are listening online, I want to say
upfront, please do not let the appearance of the handout, where
are you, scare you, bore you, or in some way thank that boy.
I don't want to even look at this because I'm telling you
this is a lot more exciting, a lot more important than you
might know. So it's going to be a very
important study and I'm going to talk about what's coming up.
I'm also going to share for the very first time publicly, the
current total amount for the
Happy Birthday Jesus offering. I will say this again on Sunday,
but we had, you know, we have a base need of about 174,000 to
just cover some basic things. We set a goal of 185 because we
have some new things happening this year.
We knew we were going to need that buffer.
So right now we have received $228,343.01.
So thank you so much for that and that really is a blessing
and it'll all be used. And that will also go on.
A portion of some of that will go on to the City of Refuge, as
well as to our Lottie Moon International Missions Fund,
which supports thousands of missionaries all around the
world. And then the Annie Armstrong
North American Missions Fund, which supports thousands of
North American church planters. So, so, so you're giving to
thousands of missions projects by by giving that way.
And we'll continue to talk about that and try to educate even
more about that. So we're, we're, we're in a, I'm
introducing a series called Engage the Bible.
This is one of our seven essentials of discipleship.
Tonight, I want to talk about how do I approach the Bible?
That may sound like a, a weird title, but let me let me let me
explain something to you. So here's what's coming up,
Here's what's coming up over the next several weeks, which I hope
will help make sense of why I've been doing what I've done for
these first couple of sessions. So over the next couple of
weeks. And you can also listen to some
podcasts that we're doing already that support some of
this as well. So next time we're together,
we're we're going to start diving into your actual personal
Bible study as well as your group Bible study.
In other words, how do I observe the text?
Now that may sound like a weird thing, but when I first read a
text, I read a portion of the Bible.
What do I need to be looking for?
What do I need to be trying to observe?
What, what do I need to take note of?
So we're going to be talking about that a lot next time.
Very, very practical. And then how do I interpret the
text? We'll be in a session after
that. So, so, so I've noticed all
these things. I've learned all these things.
So, so how do I interpret those things?
Well, last session and this session are going to help us to
understand some of that interpretation.
Part 2. Then after that we're going to
talk about how I apply the text because if I don't do anything
with it, what good is it, right? So, so how does this actually
affect my life? And then eventually, how am I
going to this with somebody else?
So those are some of the things that we're going to talk about
very practically over the next couple of weeks.
Last session was hilarious to me because I had been teaching a
PhD seminar all that day and was still recovering from the Super
flu. And at 729 at in the in the live
session, I was done. I mean, I was fried.
I leaned on this pulpit and I looked at my wife and I'm like,
am I going to make it for 30 more minutes?
So you got out early. Don't plan on that tonight.
So here we go. I feel much better so and
appreciate it. And I've been in some really
interesting meetings all day long.
So I'm fired up, charged up, maybe a little angry.
So here we go. No, been good.
Been a good day, but we really do want to pray as just think
about this as I as I take my Bible.
I do, I do hope and and encourage prescribe that you
would pray that you would say God as I open your word reveal
to me what I need to learn today because what's what's really
fascinating to me and we'll talk a lot more about this at later
in some of the sessions too. What's fascinating about me.
I've read the whole Bible through more than once and I
know some of you have too. You certainly read certain
verses more than once, but it's always fascinating to me.
I can read the same verse for that 50th time.
And because of what's going on in life, because of where I am
in life, because of what's happening on it says something
to me, speaks to me in a new way or a contextual way or an
applicable way because of what I'm going through.
And that's because this is not just a book.
It's because this is living and active.
The Holy Spirit's working through the Word and helping us
to grasp it and and apply it. So it really is really
fascinating. So as you take that Bible in
your hand, I want you to pray God's reveal to me your word and
your will for this moment in my life.
What do I need right now out of John 316 or whatever that verse
is that you know by heart or you've seen a million times And,
and so, but first, let's talk a little more about how did I get
the text? We talked about this a little
bit last session, but tonight I want to talk.
I want to get to the point of talking about translations and
why do we choose the ones we do? Which ones should we choose?
Some of you don't like the one I use.
And so and I remember you in my prayers, but it's OK.
So we're going to talk about that.
But you got to think about it before the invention of the
printing press. You just got to think about the
fact that before all that these things were hand copied and,
and, and that might not seem like a big deal if you're
thinking in English, but you ought to think in Hebrew.
And in the original Hebrew texts, you've got to understand
that they didn't have vowels and they didn't have.
So let me how do I describe this?
Some of you might be more familiar with a Japanese or
Chinese character than you are a Hebrew one, but they're not
dissimilar in their appearance. So Hebrew would be a series of
squiggly lines and dots, and those dots represent vowel
sounds. But in the original Hebrew,
those weren't there. There were no, there was no
indention, there was no punctuation, there were no vowel
signs. So you had a series of
consonants in a block over and over again.
And of course in Hebrew you read from right to left.
And so it's just a series of blocks of letters.
So you can imagine it when you're hand copying this by some
kind of oil lamp light in some cave somewhere, how difficult it
would be to even come close to being accurate.
So one of the one of the great lessons that I want this session
to reinforce in your life is the miracle of the accuracy of the
word of God you hold in your hand.
And I'll prove it to you, I hope, before the night's over.
It's really amazing that you can have something in English and
for some of you, something in English.
You know, down here in, you know, in the South, it's
southern English even. I don't know what that meant,
but yeah, yeah, they did. So you have something in English
that you can hold in your hand. You even have multiple options
of English that you can choose from.
And some are better than others. Of course, the one I use is the
best, but so. But we're going to talk about
that. And so just recognize how
significant this really was. So, but before that invention
and, and, and also remembering, don't let this freak you out.
But we, you know, we don't have, and many of you know this, we
don't have any of the original manuscripts anymore.
There are also called autographs.
And so you'll see in writing the manuscripts or autographs.
In other words, the very first time somebody wrote what the
Holy Spirit was giving them on that papyrus.
We don't have those anymore. They're they're long gone.
It is fascinating over history, though.
And I'll tell you a couple of stories about how some of the
oldest manuscripts were actually found and saved, some in a
wastebasket in a monastery, others that had just been burned
and they pulled some out of the fire.
And so it's a, it's really interesting how the Bible came
about. So let's talk for a few minutes
about the Old Testament. Some of these things will be
familiar with you. Some of these things will not be
familiar to you. Some of these things you're not
going to care about one bit after tonight's over, but the
Old Testament, what you see is you see about four sources to
study when you're talking about the development of the Old
Testament in translation and what's called transmission,
which is that copying process. And so they're about four
sources, general sources to think about. 1 is what you would
just call the Hebrew text. The most famous one of those is
called the Masoretic text, which is often.
If I were to bring my Hebrew Bible in here to show you, it
would be based on the Masoretic text.
Now you got to recognize it was created around 100 AD in a final
standardized edition. Now, that doesn't mean there
weren't things before that, but in a standardized edition with
what's called consonantal Hebrew, which means it's just
that block, block of, of consonants.
Now, later, those punctuation Marks and vowel points were
added to help. And that was really, really
helpful when they were added. And they were added by scholars
who carefully, carefully, carefully analyzed the wording
that was being used. But in that original form of
Hebrew, you're dependent not only on the letters and the
words, but context to understand, OK, what what do we
mean here? So it's really a significant
study. And so these things were first
brought about and then you had several different versions that
came along that in these early days before the Dead Sea
Scrolls. Now, once you get to what we
call the Qumran Dead Sea Scrolls text, you've got everything
changed. These were discovered in 1948.
Some of you who have been to Israel have been to Qumran,
You've seen the caves where the the texts were actually found.
So the story goes that in 1948 a shepherd boy was mad at one of
his goats or sheep. He threw throws a rock in The
Cave the animal went into. He hears a crash and he goes in
there and they're these clay pots and he's broken one of them
open and inside of these old manuscripts that the Essenes
preserved. So during during a certain
period in Jewish history, some of you would know, you have
what's called the Maccabean revolt.
And so in the, in the Apocrypha that we talked about in the
last, last session, you'll have the book in the Maccabees in, in
the Catholic Bible. And there's nothing wrong with
the book of Maccabees. They're just history books.
There's nothing inspired about them.
They're just telling the story of the families that led the
revolts. You can, and if you ever go to
Masada or some of these places in Israel, you'll see evidences
of some of the revolt that happened with the S scenes were
a community that escaped all that and lived out in the
desert. Think about monk kind of
livelihood. It really wasn't, but kind of
like that. And they were preserving
scripture. They were copying it.
They hid it in the caves from the Romans and put them in clay
pots because of the dry, arid climate of the desert.
These fragments and these scrolls were preserved and, and
I'll talk more about them in a minute.
So, so as they come through, what we really see too is that
throughout the Old Testament history, you see these various
dominations. Even the Syrians when they came
in destroyed a lot of the, the, the testaments.
They, they destroyed a lot of the Scriptures.
And so apart from the Qumran writings, no manuscripts of Old
Testament books before about the 9th century AD survived.
And so and so the the Dead Sea Scrolls were a big deal.
Now I'm going to hop ahead just for a second.
Then I'm gonna hop back again. And I'll hop back over there
later because I like to hop. But sometimes the differences in
your translations, especially the older translations, Think
about translations prior to 1948.
King James, for example, we're based upon manuscripts that
weren't reinforced yet by the Dead Sea Scrolls.
But once they discovered these older manuscripts in the Dead
Sea Scrolls, they're able to go back.
And earlier generally is always better.
The earlier you can get, the better the source.
And so later translations are actually able to use better
Hebrew especially, and even some Greek manuscripts.
And so they're often perceived as being one's not wrong and
one's not right. One would just be more accurate
in some of his wording. And So what we see, and so
what's really amazing is is how how frankly, how good a
translation the King James is based upon the manuscripts they
used, it's still a good translation.
And even though they didn't have the very best earliest
manuscripts at that point. And so a lot of this is Indiana
Jones archaeology talk, I know. So what happens then over the
years is that you see some, some earliest known versions of the
Old Testament and they have various names.
You'll see a lot of codex names. And so you have the, the, the
manuscript of the Prophets, which is from about 895.
And then there's an entire Old Testament, which is probably
the, the, the earliest known existing entire Old Testament is
the Leningrad Codex from around a year, a thousand, 1008.
And so you can see how far away and how, how new in a sense,
some of the manuscripts were that we have today.
But anyway, so then you have various fragments and, and you
just got to understand that that there could in in some of these
cases, like in one case that there's a in the rebuilding of
an old synagogue in Cairo, they found over 200,000 fragments of
the Old Testament. And when you talk about the Dead
Sea Scrolls, you're talking about thousands of fragments.
And so this isn't just big one big Longwell, that's really
nice. One big long 35 foot long scroll
they're dealing with with thousands of fragments.
Some of you've seen pieces of that in museums, etcetera.
And so whenever they would rebuild a synagogue, when this
Old Testament talks to we're not New Testament yet that, you
know, they would, they would bury so, so in a synagogue or in
Jewish tradition, once the scroll got too old to use kind
of like an American flag, you know, you're supposed to, you
have a ceremony to, to, to, to honor an American flag and burn
it. Well, with a, with a scroll in a
synagogue, they would bury it. And so whenever you, they're
digging underneath old synagogues, they can often find
fragments of these manuscripts. Isn't that exciting?
I tell you guys, you're here. Yeah, there you go.
So anyway, moving on. So, so then the Dead Sea Scrolls
come along, which produce this incredibly valuable, very unique
source where there there are fragments that go back all the
way to 1:30. So you've got to recognize now
you're at 1:30 BC to AD 70 in some cases.
So you're 1000 years earlier in some cases than what you once
had. That's how significant the Dead
Sea Scrolls are. And so in 1948 when they
discovered that, they realized we could go back 1000 years.
But what's really amazing is, is how little difference there was.
That's the miracle. So one of the trustworthy
evidences of even those, even those translations done prior to
1948 is how trustworthy they were and how accurate, because
they're checking them all the time and, and, and, and nothing
of any theological significance ever.
You might have a little factual thing here or there or a
punctuation thing or something like that, but nothing of any
theological consequence at all. So it's really amazing how
accurate that has been. And so, but it does allow them
to go back even further and study language.
Now, what's also interesting then is this thing called the
Septuagint, which I mentioned last time I should have brought
a copy with. Now I have a copy of the
Septuagint, but the Septuagint then is a Greek translation of
the Old Testament. So you you have Hebrew that was
written in some Aramaic. But because of the large
settlement of Jews in Egypt, it's always interesting to me.
And, and, and I think it's worth noting at one time the center of
Christianity was Alexandria, Egypt.
Now you just got to think about that in today's world, to think
about how things change. Today, Alexandria, Egypt would
be a hotbed of Islam, but in the day it was the place of
scholarship, it was the place of higher learning, it was the
place of teaching of the early church.
And so Alexandria becomes a center of learning and writing
and research, etcetera. And so because of the large
settlement there of the Jewish people who spoke Greek instead
of Hebrew, they they translate. It first began with the first
five books, the Pentateuch, and you're looking at about 250 BC.
Now the tradition says that 70 scholars worked on this, and the
word Septuagint comes from the idea of 70.
So these 70 scholars, and that's an important point for a minute,
because the more scholars who work on a translation tend to be
a better translation. And we'll talk about that more
later, which will help you pick out your translation.
And so then finally, the other Old Testament books come to come
to pass so that by about 1:50 BC, they're complete with the
entire thing called the Septuagint.
Now, what's interesting about the Septuagint is that this was
actually the first attempt to probably translate the Old
Testament. But what's really interesting,
and a lot of people don't know this, this would have been what
Jesus used to a large degree. In fact, Jesus quotes the
Septuagint more than he does any other text.
And so did the disciples. And you can tell they're quoting
from the Greek in Greek when they're doing a lot of that.
Jesus would have spoken Aramaic primarily by the time he was
alive, would have been able to read Hebrew, obviously.
And so, but he very likely most scholars believe, and you can
see it in the language and the structure that when he's quoting
the Old Testament, he's actually taking the quotes from the
Septuagint. And so this becomes a primary
tool because you got to recognize this.
So Christians use it because you got to think this, this.
And then and, and the best manuscript was what's called
Vatican Vaticanus Codex. And it's from around 325 AD.
So we're not just at, we're not just at 1000 anymore.
We're, we're not, we're, you know, some of the Dead Sea score
fragments help us go back quite a ways.
But you're also recognizing here that you have a complete Old
Testament from 3:25. It just happens to be in Greek
and not Hebrew. So the Septuagint is still a
very important source of scholarship to study for people
who are doing translations. Well, things move along.
You need other translations. You know, and so other
translations in Greek follow. There are a lot of those.
I won't list them. You wouldn't remember anyway.
Eventually origin, one of the early church fathers creates a
parallel Bible to where it's called the Hexapla origins.
Hexapla where you basically have all these columns.
It's like some of you might have a Bible like a parallel Bible
like that. Now we have more than one
translation, and this one had a six columns side by side in
Greek as well as in Hebrew. Along the way, some of these
other Greek translations as well as Hebrew.
But what happened is, is Judaism and Christianity spreads all
around the world. And so they're in all these
other places with other languages.
So it became necessary to translate the Old Testament
scriptures into new languages. And that may not seem
controversial. It will be controversial.
In fact, it'll be a death penalty sentence later, but at
this point it's not so. Aramaic was used for synagogues,
Syriac for Syrian believers. I have friends who can still
translate Syriac for those who need a hobby.
And then of course, finally, what happens is Latin comes
along. Why does Latin come along?
What happens? Say it again, Rome.
That's right. So when Rome begins to dominate
the world there and Christianity is, is moving through the Roman
Empire, there's the need for a Latin translation.
So what happens then is, is that the the Latin translation of the
Septuagint, which is the Greek Old Testament, was used by 150
AD and Jerome, another church father.
And this is important, translates it into what's called
the Vulgate around 400 AD. Now what's significant about
this is so now you have the Old Testament in Latin and the
Church would not allow another translation for 1000 years.
So remember, the Roman Catholic Church insisted on Latin and so
for many, many, many, many, many years.
And so they would not allow any other Old Testament other than
the Vulgate for, for over 1000 years.
And when some English translations start, and we'll
talk about it in a minute, especially by a guy named John
Wickliffe, you might call him Wycliffe.
That Wickliffe, he actually, he actually gets a death penalty
for translating the Bible into English because he's violating
the church because they want everything in Latin.
And not only does he have a death penalty, they, they hang
him, they burn his body, they cut it into pieces and they
throw it in the river just to make sure.
So they were, they did not want that to happen.
All right. So that's kind of the Old
Testament. So we go from Hebrew to Greek to
eventually Latin. Along the way you have a few
other languages, Aramaic and Syriac.
None of those really help you, do you?
Anybody here an expert in Latin? Anybody have Latin in high
school? They don't even do that anymore.
Hardly anybody still do that younger.
You all take Latin? Yeah.
I don't have to think so. Me either.
I could.
I barely took English, but I want you to know how many.
If you're a school teacher, raise your hand.
OK. Thank you very much.
Appreciate you. My wife's one.
It was one, too. I just want you to know that
when I went to college and I flunked my English class in
college because my high school did not teach me English, and
then I retook the English class. I made an AI, went back and I
located my 8th grade English teacher, Missus McIntosh, who
taught me how to diagram a sentence and understand the
parts of speech and thanked her because she's the only way I
could go back and remember what I was supposed to know for
English. So thank you teachers, of that
investment. I made Misses McIntosh cry.
But anyway. But I was her favorite student
of all time, so it was great. Now New Testament, just for a
few minutes. So the earliest New Testament
manuscripts now in existence are still on papyrus.
So we still have some early papyrus documents, but after
about the 4th century, everything moves into parchment.
So, So the way that research in the New Testament is broken
down, history of the New Testament, you're going to have
the parchment, excuse me, The papyrus manuscripts and the
parchment manuscripts, they actually divide it by what it
was written on, OK. And so early on, you had people
riding on papyrus. The oldest one of these would be
about 8117. And so they, they, they, they,
they are larger. They, they get bigger and bigger
from about the second and third centuries.
Then the parchments come around by about the four centuries.
Now remember that what happens is I talked last time about what
a codex was. A codex is a book.
Just think like a book. That's all that is.
Instead of a scroll, you got a book.
And so now what you have is you have the Old and New Testaments
in codex form. So you have once again, this
Codex Vaticanus, which is probably the most reliable copy
of the entire New Testament as well from about AD 325.
But then you have a couple others that I mentioned there
and you can see their names. And So what we see is, is that
that that there's no record when some of these were discovered.
It is interesting though, because that one, that, that one
at the bottom, Codex Cyaniticitis, Cyaniticus
Cyaniticus. Mount Sinai, Sinaiticus.
Sinaiticus. For those of you listening
online, that was my brain blowing up.
They actually in, yeah, in about 1859, a guy was visiting a
monastery and he looks in a waste paper basket and he
notices this old parchment and he reaches in there and it's one
of these oldest parchment manuscripts of all time.
And then the the monks tell him, well, you got here a little late
because we just used several of the others in the in the stove
to heat up the place. And so they'd actually burned it
up. And so it's really interesting.
He got 43 leaves out of the basket, but that wasn't all of
them and it wasn't enough. So it's really interesting that
we're able to have any of this stuff.
They said there were two basketfuls that got burned up.
So then again, remember you've got the Latin Vulgate now that
started in in about 400 ish with Jerome.
But then along comes the Council of Trent and it says this is the
authoritative Bible of the church, right?
And and it also becomes the very first book ever printed on the
Guten Gutenberg printing press. And so it began, it goes into
mass production in Latin and no other translations allowed for a
long time. And so they, they, they won't
let you use it. All right now we go through all
that and then, and then let me share with you because I got to
spend a little time here on the middle here.
But then what happens is if you'll notice we kind of hop in
time a little bit, you get to about 1522 and you have a, you
have one of the greatest terms ever in the world, the complete,
the Completensian polyglot. So there's your sentence for
tomorrow. It just means many tongues.
And what it meant was as you had Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, Latin
and columns, it's another parallel Bible that gets
developed along the way, right? It's actually put together by a
cardinal in Spain who puts it together.
And so it becomes a unique thing.
And of course, with the printing press coming along a little bit
later is going to be mass produced too.
So then along the way you have other Greek New Testaments, but
some of these Greek New Testaments were based on very
inferior manuscripts. And I'm going to talk about how
we know that. And so a lot of them weren't
very good. All right, so then we get to
what I want to spend time on. All right, here we go.
So all that was introductory. Welcome.
You're, I'm glad you're here. So welcome to the session
tonight. Let's talk about translation
because this is a big deal and I want you to understand it.
I still do translation, believe it or not, especially out of
Greek sometimes. And so I taught Greek for a
while. And so you have again, 66 books
originally from three languages and the and, and the and so
you've got Hebrew, Aramaic, most of Aramaic in the Bible.
You're going to find some in Daniel in the Old Testament,
you've got passages in Ezra that are in Aramaic.
And then of course some of the some of the sayings of Jesus
were either Greek or Aramaic and then in the Greek New Testament
for the most part. But here's the problem.
Most of you don't know any of those.
I would guess some of you might have studied Greek or Hebrew if
you went to a certain school, but most of you probably don't
know Greek or Hebrew. And so does that scare me?
Should I, should I learn those? Is there any way I can trust
anybody else to help me? Or are the English translations
any good? You know, am I really reading
the word of God? So most of us need a good
English translation and translators.
You got to remember, and don't let this scare you.
Translation equals interpretation.
And you always got to remember that.
And I'm going to talk to tell you why.
That's why you have different translations that have different
words sometimes because there's some interpretation involved.
It's often very difficult. English is a very different
language compared to Greek or Hebrew.
Greek is a very rich, expressive language.
And in English we would say that's a dog.
In Greek, they'd probably have 12 words for dog, depending upon
if there's a big dog, a little dog, a fast dog, a loud dog, a
quiet dog. They'd have all these different
words, all these different combinations.
So it's a very rich thing. So sometimes when you're
translating Greek, you need a paragraph in English to
translate the one word. So when we talk about how
translation works, you're going to have to make decisions.
Is it a word for word translation?
Is it a meaning translation? What are we trying to get to?
I'll talk more about that in a minute.
So So what happens is, is there's translation involved.
So and so it's important AI think that first of all, you
might own more than one translation if you can.
Now in many parts of the world, they can't.
They don't have one. They only have the one, you know
their language, they got the one translation or they don't even
have a whole translation. Again, remember that in the
world today and you'll read different things online, but
it's wrong. I'm right.
And what I'm about to tell you, and I know that because of the
research. So they're about 12,000
languages. By the time you Add all the
dialects of all the languages, you're up to 11,000 something.
The entire Bible has been translated in 600 or less.
OK, so most of the world's population does not have an
entire Bible necessarily in their own language.
If you talk about language groups, not necessarily
population and so, so it's a big deal for you to have an English
translation. It's also a big deal if you have
more than one. I advise you to have more than
one. I'm going to talk to you about
which ones I think you ought to choose from because there are
categories of translations that I think if you could have one
from each of at least two of these categories, it would be
helpful for you to compare and read right.
You're not going to get different theology, you are
going to get different nuance. You're going to get different
wording, you're going to get different word pictures at times
because of that. So it really becomes important.
And so some of you know, how many of you here still use the
the older King James as your primary translation?
Just confess it. Thank you, thank you, thank you
very much. There are some people who
believe it's the only translation to use that Jesus
did, that Jesus did not use the King James Version, but it's not
a bad translation at all. It's just sometimes the language
is kind of tough for modern readers.
We'll talk more about that in a minute.
So remember that. And so for the serious student,
we need help. So we depend upon translators
and to help us do that. And so the science of
translation is really a big deal.
I know people who do this. This is what they do for a
living. They do this as missionaries.
They do this as scholars. I I have a dear friend now who's
probably one of the world's, well, one of the nations anyway,
greatest New Testament translators on the planet.
And so they have to make at least two choices.
You have to make choices in at least these two areas, and one
of those would be called textual.
So you'll hear words like textual criticism, which often
gets painted in a negative light for some reason.
And that's not the same thing as source criticism where you're
you're, you're, you're questioning whether or not the
Bible is real or not. But textual criticism just means
we're analyzing the actual wording.
So be sure that the the Hebrew and Greek are, is as close as
the original wording can be. And your translations of that
are close. So it's it's the actual wording
itself. So they've got to look at least
a couple of things when they're looking at it.
They got to look at both external evidence as well as
internal evidence. And I'll talk about that as we
go. So what we have are we have
these thousands of manuscripts, we have all these different
copies throughout history. And so the issue that these
scholars will, a good scholars will do, a committee of scholars
will do. They'll actually sift through
all those, today's world gets aided by computers, but in
today's world, they can actually sift through thousands of the
various manuscripts to see if there are any variants to see if
there are choices being made in the language being used and what
that means. So, so they'll, they, they try
to sort out what's the best manuscripts.
And so This is why in some of your study Bibles, you'll have
verses that are in the margin and people get mad about that.
I've heard stories about people up here getting mad about that.
And so for example, at the end of Mark, where does Mark
actually end? And then some of your study
Bibles, they'll be, you know, some manuscripts do not contain
the following verses. Well, that's because some
manuscripts don't contain the following verses.
And so they're trying to weave through which are the most
accurate, earliest trustworthy manuscripts.
And so I always want to study a Bible that has it in the margin
to tell me that. And even in those circumstances,
there's, there's, there's not a theological issue at stake.
Usually the verses that are missing or just emphasizing
something that's already been said for most of the time.
So, so this, this seems kind of tough.
And, and so, you know, are, are these translators actually
capable as they work through the external evidence, which is
actually the character and quality of the manuscripts?
Where did this manuscript come from?
Who, who, who put it together? How old is it?
They're actually analyzing the manuscript itself, right?
And then the internal evidence is, is, is how many times has
something been copied? And is this a copy of a copy of
a copy as compared to how early it goes?
So they're looking at both the, the, the, the work that's being
done inside the manuscript as well as how the manuscript was
produced in the first place. But then not only are they
working through the, the textual part of it, they're also going
to work through the linguistic part of it.
So what we see is, is that that language can often be very
interesting. So what's the grammar, what's
the culture, what's the history? What, what did, what did they
really mean when they said that, etcetera.
So there's some interpretation going on depending upon the type
of translation that you use. Some translations are much more
interpretive, others are much more word for word for word.
And so you've got to decide which one you want.
So for the most part, though, rest easy.
For the most part, these translators work straight from
the Hebrew and Greek texts, and they are edited by rigorous,
careful scholarship, right? And, and, and so they're working
through all of these pieces, and then you've got to make
decisions in the linguistics section.
And it's often difficult, again, to convey the meaning.
So are you looking for a literal translation?
Are you looking for what's called dynamic equivalence?
Or are you looking for free? And different English
translations fall into those 3 categories.
So you have some, for example, a free translation, a very free,
not even a translation, a free paraphrase is the Living Bible,
the Living Bible, not the new living translation.
But the Living Bible is not a translation.
The Living Bible was not even intended to be a translation.
The Living Bible was a father who was trying to read Bible
stories to his children at night from the King James and they
couldn't understand the King James.
So he paraphrases the King James into modern English and you have
the Living Bible. It's it's not, it's, it's a
paraphrase based on a translation, right?
I would not ever recommend that the Living Bible be your primary
study Bible. It might be a commentary and
that's how I would treat it. Is the Living Bible is more like
a commentary. And so you have literal
translations where you're trying to get, you're trying to get
more of a word for word type experience where you're actually
looking for what the the Greek word was, what the Hebrew word
was. And then you also have dynamic
equivalence where you're looking more for meaning and also
readability. And so part of the issue between
translations is how readable it is in English and also what how
close it's trying to be to so literal would be word order as
well as as close to a word for word translation as you can get.
So sometimes the translations that you read, including the one
I preach from, which some people don't like, it's because it's a
more literal translation. And so the word order sometimes
can be awkward to an English reader.
Some of our translations are written on a 11th and 12th grade
reading level. Some of our English translations
are written on a fifth grade reading level, and those are
very different from one another. And so again, no theology is
affected, but the wording, the specific words that are used
sometimes, because instead of using a literal meaning of a
Greek or Hebrew word, we're going to convey the meaning and
more of a paraphrase or sentence form or use more than one word
to try to describe what it means.
So literal translations can make things kind of ambiguous
sometimes, but what you call the free translation on the other
end can also be more of a commentary than a translation.
And so when you begin looking at some of the more modern
translations, there's a couple of things that I would say that
I would use as a matrix for choosing which translation I
want to use, right? So the first thing for me is I
do want it to be based on original language.
I'm not looking for a paraphrase.
I want a translation that is based on the Hebrew and Greek.
OK. I also want a translation that's
put together by a committee of scholars and not an individual.
Now I own 5 shelves of bibles, probably 4.
Anyway, I bet it's 5. And I have some like the Philips
New Testament. It's a well known older
translation put together by one man.
That doesn't mean it's not valuable.
That doesn't mean I wouldn't pull Phillips out every now and
to say, what did Phillips say about this compared to what the
entire huge committee that put together the CSB said about this
thing? Right.
And it doesn't mean that he's wrong.
He very likely going to say the same thing.
But you always want to have more than one scholar because I just
know these scholars. I know some of them.
I know some of them have worked on the the CSB, which is a later
translation. And they argue, they argue over
which, which word are we going to use to translate this word?
Because they know they all know original language.
They can all speak it. They could all stand up here and
just preach out of the Hebrew and the Greek to you.
They don't need an English translation.
This is their life. But then they're going to sit
there and argue, well, it has this nuance and has this little,
so should we do this? What tense should it be in, in
English? I mean, they're going to sit
there and argue and debate and argue and debate over every
single word, which is why it takes so long to translate the
Bible and Wickliffe Bible translators who translate into
other languages do the same thing.
Now, again, technology is very helpful today in helping them
work through some of those issues because it has a database
that they can pull on. But I want one that's based on
original language. I want one that's that's
committee, not individual. And I want one that's literal
and I want one that's dynamic equivalent.
I want both of those. I have all three.
But if I'm only picking 2 Bibles, I'm going to try to find
some that fit into both of those categories.
So let me give you a couple of examples.
So for example, I used to only use the New American standard.
I love the new American standard.
My first real Bible was a New American standard.
It's a it's a literal translation.
It's a literal translation. It's a it's a close to word for
word. It's awkward to read for some
people in English because it follows more of a of a Greek
word order in the New Testament, but I like it.
The CSB, which is a newer translation you'll see at the
very bottom. 2016 used to be called the Homan.
It's now the CSB. Dylan would say that's the only
translation you ought to use and that is the most accurate.
And Doctor Chuck Quarles, who teaches at Southeastern
Seminary, is actually a part of that group, and he would argue
that it's by far the most accurate current translation.
But it's going to be word for word.
It's going to be, I say word for word.
It's never word for word, but it's a literal word order.
Closest can be word for word. Now, when you get over into
dynamic, and then you have other older ones like the Rs of the
Revised Standard, etcetera. King James is literal.
It tries to follow that word order.
When you get into dynamic equivalents, the most well known
for you all would be the NIV. And some people just don't like
the NIV at all. Yeah, Right.
Because because of this or that or the other.
Right. But the NIV, the new
International version, is much more readable, much easier to
read. It's on a fifth grade reading
level, whereas the new American standard will be that 11th or
12th grade reading level. And that may not sound like
much, but that's harder than you know.
And so for the NIV, you have a much more modern version.
You have good news for modern man.
If you remember some of those things, those would be somewhere
in between dynamic equivalents and free, right?
And so you have some of those other kinds of versions as well.
The new King James, which I preached through for many years,
Doctor Clover's translation, I believe.
So the primary reason I don't use the new King James Version
is because Michael Clover did. But I hope you're listening,
Michael. That was for you.
Like you would ever listen to me.
But no, I used it for many, many years.
Part of the reason I used it is the very first church I ever
pastored. I was in the pastor church team
meeting and this is a little town of 2000 people.
I was their first full time anything.
It had just kind of moved from being a church plant to a church
and the 80 people wanted a pastor and the committee had a
retired old pastor on the the committee had two of those
retired old pastors. I have says the word old on the
team and and they asked me, well, you are going to preach
out of the King James Version, aren't you?
And this is in eastern Oklahoma, almost Arkansas.
I mean, just literally across the street from Arkansas just
about and we have a lot of King James only churches in that part
of the world. And so I said, well, I certainly
will be glad to do that as soon as I go buy a King James Version
Bible. And so I started off I still
have it. It's really looks nice.
It was a very nice Bible. It was one of the nicer Bibles
I've probably ever owned. It was one of those fancy
leather, you know, because I can't afford those anymore.
But I still have it on my shelf and it looks really nice because
I didn't use it very long. So so I transitioned them to New
King James because it follows a similar word order as the older
King James and it was an easier translate transition.
And I preached out a new King James for 20 years probably.
So a lot of my old sermons are New King James.
So you wonder, why did I ever leave behind the beloved?
Well, I came here and I knew that about Clover, so I had to
do something. So so anyway, so but even like
the good News Bible that that still was put together by one
man got him Robert Bratcher. So you got to be careful when
you're looking at some of these different kind of Bibles as
well. And so let's talk about some
translations for some minutes here because again, it's often
very difficult and and to know. And so you have a, a list of
translations basically with times, you know, when you kind
of see them, some of the early ones, etcetera.
But and then of course, now you have interlinears and parallel
Bibles and you have the message and you have all kinds of stuff.
But when you start thinking about some of these
translations, you can see some of these early versions of, of
English. Some of these were condemned,
some of these were not. Later you'll eventually see
1611, the King James and then you go through various early
versions. The amplified version comes
along. I like, I use an amplified
version a lot. If you don't know what the
amplified version is, is it's a translation that actually
purposely is almost impossible to read out of or to preach out
of because it, it will actually go on and describe what the word
means. So you have a running commentary
of here's what that Hebrew word means.
Here's what that Greek word means.
So it amplifies the meaning. It's really great for study, not
great for preaching, probably your teaching, but but what we
see then is you move on along to the, you know, you see the
living Bible, the new American standard coming along, the new
King James, the living, new Living translation, the ESV,
which I use. And then then you see the CSB at
the end there. And so part of the issue with
these translations here's here's recommendations for what it's
worth. So if I'm picking a translation
AI, again, I want one at least from a literal category.
So I if I like the Old King James fine, new King James fine,
new American standard fine, then ESV fine, CSV fine.
There might be some others that would be fine, but those would
be that short list of literals for me, and some of those would
be a lot easier to read than others.
So think about that then, the dynamic equivalence.
I'm not afraid of the New International Version.
I don't use it as my primary study Bible, nor would I use it
as my primary teaching or preaching Bible.
I'm not saying you shouldn't, I just wouldn't because I want the
more literal one for that. Because the living translation
is going to flesh out more modern English, modern thought,
etcetera. The New Living translation is a
translation. It's not the Living Bible.
And the new Living translation would be a little similar to the
NIV, somewhere in between that and literal.
That would be the the, the new living translation.
So, but it's probably that more dynamic equivalence, but much
more reliable than say the it's not the Living Bible.
Don't get those confused. Not the same thing at all.
And so to think through what the translations are, the question
again, then the balance is, do I want readability or do I want
literal meaning? Right.
And, and, and for me, I think it's helpful to have both and to
mix it up. So in your personal Bible study,
then what I would be working toward is I would be working
toward having more than one Bible.
That doesn't mean you have to use them every single day.
That doesn't mean that you're always reading every single
verse out of both translations. And sometimes you can actually
buy Bibles now that have multiple translations in them.
And of course, in modern day, your, your Bible might be this
anyway to where you're looking at an iPad or your phone where
it's often easiest to switch back and forth between
translations. But it's it's rare time every
single morning. We have prayer time and devotion
with the staff in the office every single morning.
We start that 8:15 every single morning and I bring a passage of
Scripture and we pray together. Often I'm bringing some verse
from my quiet time earlier that morning, right?
So I've been studying, like I say, around Nehemiah, Ezra,
Haggai, Zechariah. Sometimes I'll pull a devotional
book out or something else will happen and I'll use that verse.
But I almost always, even in those moments, I'm consulting
multiple translations. And in fact, this morning I had
Bibles on both knees as I'm just sharing with them.
I had four different translations this morning in our
devotion to show them a word that I think is cool.
And so in fact, turn, if you have a Bible, let me show you
one has nothing to do with it's not going to mess with your
meaning. But I did this because of my
sermon last week that I know you all memorized.
And so you probably know what verse I want to go to even
before I say it. So of course it's Romans 12
because I, I mentioned one verse out of Romans 12 last week.
So what was struck, what struck me about Romans 12 is, is on my
phone, I have a note called and I've shared this with some of
you before. It's called Why I Breathe.
I encourage all of you to do that on my phone.
I have this, this huge long note of of why I breathe.
In fact, I'll just here, I'll pull it up so I won't let you
read it because it's personal. But here on my phone, these are
verses and principles and prayers, just things.
This is why I'm alive. This is why I exist.
This is what God wants of me. I add to it, I reflect on it.
Some days I need to read it more than I do other days.
This morning was a day I needed to read it.
OK, why am I here? Why do I exist?
What should I be doing? OK, and the very first verse on
the Why I breathe note is Romans 12/12.
In my sermon last week, I shared Romans 12/11.
So I thought to myself, huh, there's a theme there.
So let me just show you this. Now, as you can guess, I'm in
the ESV. Some of you make sure you're in
a different translation. I really don't feel bad.
I'm just hoarse because I've had 4000 meetings today.
All right, so listen to this. I'm going to get to verse 11,
but but let me start off earlier just because it's really good.
So verse 9, let love be genuine, abhor what is evil, hold fast to
what is good. Love one another with brotherly
affection, outdo one another and showing honor.
I love that phrase. That was something we talked
about this morning. How can we outdo one another to
show each other honor? You know, not only do we love
one another, we're nice to one another.
How can I outdo you? By showing more honor to you
than you could ever show to me. What a what a challenge for us.
Then look at verse 12. Do not be slothful in Z11.
I'm sorry, 1111, do not be slothful in zeal.
This is what I read last Sunday be fervent in spirit, serve the
Lord and it goes on rejoicing, hope, be patient tribulation and
goes on great little phrases all the way through because you know
it's the word of God is good stuff, but in that verse 11 do
not be slothful in zeal. What do you have in you just
that phrase. Don't read the whole verse.
Say it, Say it again. Be would be what?
Be in business. Oh, do not be slothful in
business. Isn't that interesting?
Yeah, Yeah. Never be lazy.
Be diligent. Now the next phrase, mine is be
fervent in spirit. I really want to hear what words
you use. Fervent.
Who's got something other than fervent?
It's enthusiastically so. This morning I pulled two
different Greek texts out, two different interlinears, because
I was fascinated by the fact that in English I was seeing
these different words. Now, there's nothing about any
of that that changes the meaning and right, it's just a different
adjective or it's just a different adverb depending upon
how it's worded. So I pull out the Greek text and
one of them says, be burning in the Holy Spirit, right?
I love the other one. The second one said be boiling
in the Holy Spirit, so guess what that original word probably
referred to? You don't have to be a scholar
to guess, I know, but you can just tell me.
Burning or boiling, What does that say to you?
We're on fire. Yeah, we're on fire.
We're smoking, right? So we're not going to be lazy.
We're on fire. We're boiling over with the Holy
Spirit. We're burning with the Holy
Spirit. We're enthusiastic about the
Holy Spirit and we're going to see how we can honor one another
more than we can, You know, you can honor me.
I'm, I'm going to compete with you in honoring.
See how I can do that. So you can just see how even in
the Greek itself, there were choices made in the very
interlinear work that they were doing to show the, the, the
actual, a actual literal translation.
So the original word means to burn or to boil, you know, and
it's a cooking term. You're on fire.
You're, you're over the fire. I'm sure that if we went back
and broke the Greek word down, it could you break them down
into pieces, you'd probably have some meaning that said you're
being held over the fire. You know, that's what the,
that's how we're supposed to be with the Holy Spirit.
See, that's if we studied that way.
And I'm going to show you over the next few weeks how to do
that. How can I break this down to get
that to I, I don't, you know, I may not get through a whole
chapter. Man, that one phrase in one
verse filled me up today. You know what I mean?
That's how rich, that's how alive this word is.
This is not just a book. And so to be able to break it
down that way and to understand the dynamics of that, rejoice
and hope, be patient tribulation, be constant in the
prayer, contribute to the needs of the Saints and seek to show
hospitality. Look at the end of verse 13.
What's your last word? Is it hospitality?
Say it again. That's good.
Bless those who persecute you. Bless and do not curse them.
Rejoice with those who rejoice. We put those who weep.
Live in harmony with one another.
Do not be haughty. Does yours?
Have haughty Proud. But associate with the lowly.
Never be wise in your own sight. This pretty good passage.
We might want to pay attention to this, you know, and so it's
amazing when you begin to just compare translation to translate
because a lot of you, you know, the Greek's not going to, it's
just going to be Greek to you, you know, Hebrews worse for
most. But but if you begin to even
just look at the different English translations, if you
speak any other language, pull the Spanish Bible out.
How did the Spanish language translate that if you speak
Spanish? And so sometimes I have friends
who'll do that. I have international friends.
They're looking at their home and heart language and they're
looking at English and they'd be looking at original language and
saying how? And then when you sit there and
start comparing, this is what that word really means.
That's how deep our Bible study ought to be.
That's how rich this meal is. See.
And so, you know, I, I, I, let me tell you a funny story.
So so growing up, you're going to crack up growing up growing
up, we used to go to Gore, Oklahoma.
Now if that sounds like a fantastic place, Gore GORE, you
can look it up. It still maybe exists.
And we went to the Finn and Feather Resort on Lake
Tinkiller. Whoo, now we're talking big
time. Now, wait a minute.
Now you didn't just go to Finn and Feather anytime you want.
You know, not that wasn't an every week thing you did.
You had to load up in the car, you know, and, and pile up in
the back of that Ford station wagon.
No seatbelts back there. Probably no seats are in the
back of the pickup truck. And it was 45 minutes to an hour
to get the Finn and Feather from my house.
So, I mean, this was not just in the old night of the week, you
know, you didn't do that. This is luxury.
And the Finn and Feather Resort have these 1940s and 50s
cottages. They're still there.
You can still rent them if you're there.
And but that wasn't a big deal. It was the destination of every
bus tour, every senior adult foliage bus tour in the entire
world because they had an all you can eat buffet.
Now you can understand something.
We're talking 1970 or 1969 or earlier, right?
And, and, and they didn't have all you can eat buffets in
Cherokee County, Oklahoma. You know what I'm saying?
So, so you get up and you can work.
We're going, we're going Fin and Feather.
So that meant you put on your stretchy pants and you got in
the back of that station wagon and you got out to Fin and
Feather and Fin and Feather. And here's the thing.
And Teresa laughs. Because because we would still
go to Fin and Feather in more modern days.
And it hadn't, it hadn't changed a bit.
And you stood in line, I mean, a lie to get to the buffet at Fin
and Feather, right? Because you ever be.
I mean, it's Fin and Feather. There's a parrot that talked to
you in the cage. The parrot probably died.
And and then there was a guy who played an organ.
He was a blind man who played the organ.
And we're talking about one of those wrap around organ things
with about 6 different levels and and and things you pushed
and feet things and he would take requests and do happy
birthday. And the waitresses at Fin and
Feather every night was a theme night and they dressed up and
danced. Whoa, it's Fin and Feather.
I'm getting to the point you waited in that line and you can
see it. You're walking along glass the
whole way. So there's people in there.
You're especially your nose up almost like are you done?
Are you done? Can we have your seat?
Are you done? You know, when are you done?
Are you done? And finally you get up to the
line where you pay. And of course, I was a kid so I
never paid nothing. And, and there was a white
haired man who worked at Fin and Feather for 1000 years, looked
like Johnny Carson. Anybody remember Johnny Carson
when he had Gray hair? And he would, he would tell you
where to sit. And it was a, it was like a
tropical furniture kind of place.
But it might be western night or it might be, it might be a 50s
night. You know, if they'd be put, you
know, poodle skirts. And these are all like high
school girls who working there for the summer, you know, but
they had this all you can eat buffet and you could go down
both sides and you'd feel your plate up.
And then they had this whole thing of desserts.
And Mama and daddy didn't care if I got dessert 1st.
And you get that pile of food on your plate and you get about
four pieces of pie or cake surrounding that plate, you
know, And you go sit down and listen to the blind man play
happy birthday or happy anniversary for somebody.
And you would just start diving in, diving in and diving in.
And you were so looking forward to that big old mound of food
and you just stuffing yourself as fast as you can because you
want to go back. It's all you can eat.
You know, you got to go back. You can't just go through once.
I mean, that'd be so you got to go back.
It's like raising the flag at the Mexican place or the
Brazilian state, how you got to do it.
You know, whether your stuff you're going to do it.
And, you know, by the time I was done, I was sick about fin and
feather. I've stuffed myself and so fast,
just shoveling it in so fast. I have no idea what I ate, have
no idea what it tasted like, and be every single trip home.
It's curvy old road back home from Gore now I'm telling you,
every single time, sick to death 'cause I just rushing through
it, 'cause I thought it was all you can eat and I had a big old
mound of it. Cut it slowly, smell it, taste
it, chew it those 30 times before you swallow.
See, we we got to be really care.
I'm not opposed at all to reading the Bible through in a
year. Great if that's your goal, but
that better be not that doesn't anybody like all you're doing go
back and say boiling, burning enthusiastically, fervently.
Is that me? Is that really me today?
And earlier this morning I had to go back and even ask God why
I existed. And then I'm confronted with
that and I have to sit out there in the office and tell the staff
that that we need to be boiling and fervent for the Lord.
And is that even me today? Chew on it, taste it, swallow
it, be nourished by it. Don't just be made sick because
you stuffed yourself. And sometimes I worry about
church friends because people come, they're not here on
Wednesday night. So I'm, and I'm literally
preaching to the choir, but I see they're here on Sunday
morning and that's the only time they're here.
And, and they, they hear the sermon, which is never going to
be that good because it's me, but they're here and that they
think that's good enough. They think that's the diet.
They think that that they've they've been filled somehow.
I've always and be care. I'm going to be careful.
Don't misinterpret what I'll say.
I've always found it funny when somebody comes to me and says
I'm leaving my church because I'm not being fed.
Now, sometimes it's a legitimate complaint the the the preacher
teacher's not doing a good job and leadership.
But sometimes it's also just a sign of immaturity.
Why aren't you feeding yourself? How old are you?
Learn to feed yourself too, see, because whoever stands up here
may not always do a good job, but you alone in the word, one
word at a time, 1 syllable at a time.
Think about it that way, just for a little bit.
So in my personal quiet time, I'm going to close with this, my
personal quiet time. Here's the way it's designed.
And then starting next week, we're going to dive in.
How do you do this? How do I do this?
What do I need to look?
We're going to take passages of Scripture and we're going to use
them as examples. What do I see in that passage of
scripture? What do I need to chew on?
Where's the stake that I need to pull out of that passage?
How do I do that when I'm alone in my quiet time?
We're going to talk about that starting next week.
But the way I do my personal quiet time, I'm not trying to
read a chapter. I'm not trying to read a whole
book all at once. I actually, and I'm not, I don't
know if this is a good thing or not, but you know how in your
Bible you have the little subheadings?
That's what I do. I've been doing that for years
because I figured there's the story.
That's a story, here's a teaching.
I'm not going to go any further than that.
I may be in the same chapter for a week and 1/2 because there's a
subheading, subheading, subheading, subheading.
And I'm just I want to read that subheading.
Now if I feel like that's a story related in there, I'll
keep going. But but often that's that's
context and I just I'm going to read that and I journal.
I'm a notorious journaler and I'm writing notes.
They don't mean a thing to anybody but me, but I'm trying
to isolate the steak. And so I want to read and I want
to digest, and I want to absorb so that there can be
applications. So over these next few weeks,
how do I observe it? All right?
How do I look at it? What does it mean?
I mean, And what we're talking about is what did it mean in its
original context. One of the basic truths of
hermeneutics is the Bible can't mean what it didn't mean.
It means what it meant. We can't make it mean something
else. That's called isagesis where
we're making it mean something. We want it to mean that it
doesn't mean then So what? How does that apply in my life?
How does it change who I need to be and what do I need to do?
And so these next few weeks, we're going to walk through that
very diligently, very as deeply as we possibly can using using
Scripture and using examples to help us do that.
But in the meantime, I get asked on a regular basis what
translation I'm using and why. I started in the ESVA few years
ago. And so am I saying it's the
perfect translation? No Am I saying it's the only
translation? No.
If you want to follow along with me when I'm reading mine in the
slides, it's going to be ESV. Dylan's working hard to get me
to change to CSV. Let's see.
I can't go back to New King James because that's Clover and
I can't go to CSB because that's Aunt, you know, that's Dylan.
So I'm pretty stuck at ESV. That's how we decide things
around here. Scientifically.
It's a scientific method. Mine, mine, mine.
No, it has nothing to do with any of that, obviously.
But, but I've been in ESV for a long time and I'll just be
honest with you, we used it as a textbook in seminary life a lot
because of its literal life. So when I was taking Greek, let
me finish with this. I'll pray.
Sorry, thanks for keep popping in my head.
So when I was so I took Greek. It's a long story flunked my
first semester in Greek had to take it over again.
Then I became AI took I became a minor.
I did a minor in Greek and made A's and became real close to the
professor, etcetera. So it was a different experience
even then. Eventually taught it overseas.
But but I remember in class I had a professor who wrote his
own Greek textbook and he was about 5 foot 6 and wore about a
15 shoe. And so it's kind of like Bozo
the Clown teaching Greek. But Richard Cutter the third,
he's long dead. So I'm safe baby.
And you had to translate in class so he just call on you.
You can't do that. Y'all don't know.
You young UNS don't know. See, in the old days, you know
you, you and, and if you didn't know it, he'd throw a piece of
chalk at you and hit you right in the head.
That's no exaggeration. Or, or, or an eraser.
And so you knew that if you didn't know, you ducked because
that chalk, because it was chalkboard, you know, it wasn't
whiteboard stuff. And so that that that piece of
chalk or that eraser was coming right to and he was good at it.
And so we learned a long time ago that, you know, we'd have
our greet. He had a big 8 1/2 by 11 Greek
book that he wrote. So, you know, it's pretty good
size. And we learned a long time ago,
if you just kind of tilted that up, you could have your Bible
right there. So we learned a long time ago
that we needed to use a literal translation.
So part of my love for the New American Standard was the fact
that I could tilt my little new American Standard right up in
there and my little 8 1/2 by 11 Greek a textbook.
And when I got called on, I could, I could, I could read.
I learned to read the New American Standard in Greek word
order to make it sound really good.
And then the chalk was coming. That's why that's I used to have
hair. So thank you all so much.
Let's pray together and, and I really do want there's a last
sentence on your old handout. Be thankful to have the
opportunity to engage the Bible in your language.
I'm telling you, it's a privilege.
It's also a responsibility. You have no excuse not to know
what that book says. And so take that privilege and
responsibility seriously. Father, we are so grateful that
we could learn more about how your word came together.
And Father, we very carefully, seriously, cautiously
acknowledge that this is indeed your word.
Father, it's a miracle that what we hold in our hands today could
be so incredibly accurate to ancient, ancient manuscripts.
There's no way in the world that could happen without your
sovereign hand, your Holy Spirit guiding that.
And Father, we know those original manuscripts, those
original autographs, those original documents were fully
inspired and infallible and inerrant.
And so we're so thankful that we have translations today that are
accurate and reliable, trustworthy.
Help us to be wise and the ones we select.
And then, Father, help us to be fervent, help us to be
enthusiastic. Help us to be burning.
Help us to be boiling in your spirit, to read and to chew and
to study what that word really says.
Not to rush through it, not to just pile it on the plate, see
how much we can stuff in and move on.
But Father, to savour it, to let it soak in, to to marry it to
prayer and to allow it to change us and transform us to make us
who we need to be. And then Father, I do pray very
seriously that we will stop and we will say thank you for not
only allowing us to have a personal copy of the Bible that
we can study like that. But thank you for the ability to
come to a church and be in connect group and study with
friends who want to help us dig in, who want to help us apply,
who want to encourage us to be enthusiastic to to see how we
can outdo one another with honor and love.
And we can come and we can hear the words sung and we can hear
the word preached and we can come back and, and, and engage
in a study together about that word.
What a privilege, what an honor. And Father, I just pray, Lord, I
fear for him. Father, I fear for them, for the
people who have this opportunity and do not take advantage of it.
Because, Father, one day I believe with all my heart,
they're going to be reminded and held accountable.
And so, Father, help us to be disciples.
Help us to pursue, help us to seek, help us to find in your
word. And I pray, Father, that you'll
feed us, lead us to be fully satisfied.
Thank you. Thank you for the the group here
tonight. Father, we do lift up friends
who are sick. And Father, we know many who are
healing. I pray, Father, you'll bring us
back Sunday for us to worship you and to bring you the glory.
Thank you, Father in Christ's name, Amen.
Thank you so much for listening today, and I also hope that
you'll go to ourwebsite@englewoodbaptist.com
as well as our app and find many other resources that will bless
you and your families. Thank you once again.