How Must I Approach Bible Study | Dr. John Ewart

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

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.

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?

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

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you and your families. Thank you once again.