BYOF – three

(my apologies…but i am posting this same thing on my other blog for today…just to make sure it gets read.  it’s that important)

sorry…i’m a little slow in posting this week.  

this was a good series.  i see more and more people opening their bibles during the sermon and a new awareness of the need for taking personal responsibility for feeding oneself.  mission accomplished.

i am continually amazed at our ability to understand (and even act on) the concept of taking responsibility for our marriages, for our personal health and well being, for our education, for our front lawns, for our baseball swings, for…well, pretty much anything…

except our personal spiritual lives and our experience with god.

we are so quick to complain about how boring church is…or how we aren’t feeling close to god…or how we are struggling with sin or doubt or anger or forgiveness or lust or temptation or any number of other things…but we won’t do anything about it.

people just drift away into ambivalence about their faith.  or they go looking for a better church.  or they complain about not being fed well enough.

why doesn’t it occur to people that the answer is sitting right on their nightstand?  why the reluctance to open the book, take out a fork and start shoving it in?

man, it’s time to wake up!

we start a new series next week.  i’m pumped.  don’t forget you can listen to the sermons online at www.npcc.cc (click on resources).  pass it on to a friend.

1 John 3:1-10

pretty simple lesson yesterday, don’t you think?  you’re a child of god.  act like it.  here’s a few highlights from my week of study:

• i feel like i tread on hallowed ground when i openly challenge the translation of the bible.  it’s sacred.  bible translators are people far smarter and of greater renown (or any renown) than i have ever established.  but i just don’t think the niv translators got the beginning of this passage right. 

How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! 1 John 3:1 NIV

Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God.  1 John 3:1 KJV


• “behold” is a call to wake up.  it screams pay attention…this is really big stuff.  
• it’s completely missing in the niv.
• “manner of love” is a specific descriptive term that john uses to tell his readers that no matter what they think or know of love, the love of god is different.  the word he uses means from another country or from another location.  
• it’s completely missing in the niv.
• “bestowed” is simply the common word for give or given.
• there is no question that god lavishes his love on us, but it doesn’t not say that in this text.
• it this all just a small issue?  i don’t think so.  
• the power of this passage resides in the fact that god’s love is so different, so profound, so life-changing…it changes us.  
• it has the power to change our identity.  to change our orientation.  to draw us from a spiritual orphanage to belonging to a family.  
• this is no small issue.  this is the heart of relationship.  this is what the love of god does.
• this is why john can say: you are a child of god.  act like it.

 

what do you think about bible translation?  what questions do you have?
what translation of the bible do you use?  do you use more than one when you study?
how serious are you taking your study of god’s word these days?