Earlier in the school quarter, I had to read a book for my Bibliology (study of the Bible) class.  When I first saw the title, I was not very thrilled: One Bible Only? Examining Exclusive Claims for the King James Bible.  I am not that interested in the KJV-only debate.  I don’t think the KJV-only people are right, but it’s not a battle that I am willing to devote myself to fight.  Thus, I was not very excited to read this book.

However, once I began reading it, I could hardly put it down.  It is not merely about the KJV-only debate.  Rather, it discusses many, many important topics related to Bibliology in general.  It does speak much about the KJV-only debate, but what it says about other topics related to the Bible is invaluable.  I highly recommend reading this book.  It will give you an appreciation for the issues surrounding the KJV-only debate, and it will also provide you with many other key concepts related to the Bible in general.

In my opinion, the book deals very fairly, yet honestly and intelligently about the issues concerning the KJV-only debate.  It’s conclusion is that there should be no reason to dogmatically support one Bible version over all others.  Which Bible version one reads should not be a test for orthodoxy.  All Bible translations have some value, so none should be made the standard version of evangelicalism.

Far more importantly, however, the book discusses in understandable yet deep ways the complex issues affecting the Bible.

• The history of the OT and NT Texts in the original languages are discussed at length.  This part proved to be particularly fascinating to me.  I had always wondered how we got our Bible’s Text, and this answered most of the questions.  I came to realize that the issue of the Text of Scripture is not so simple as we might hope.  There is no one perfect Hebrew or Greek manuscript.  We have to study all the available manuscripts (some of which are faulty) and “create” a reliable manuscript which most nearly represents the original manuscript by comparing the variant manuscripts.
• The matter of the preservation of Scripture is considered.  Do we have the exact words with which the original manuscript was written?  Do we have to have them in order for our Bible to be the Word of God?  How do we explain errors introduced into the manuscript copies by copyists?  Does our Bible represent the original message God gave to the writers of Scripture?  These are vital questions, and this book considers them very well.
• The matter of Bible translations is weighed.  What is the best translation to use?  Is the KJV okay?  Is the NIV okay?  What about the NLT or the TNIV?  Which is better: dynamic equivalent (aka, functional equivalent: “thought-for-thought”) translation theory or formal equivalent  (“word-for-word”) translation theory?

All in all, this book is outstanding in its consideration of these matters.  Once you read this book, you will realize that the matters of translations and the preservation of Scripture is not as cut-and-dry as you once thought it was…  If you have any interest in these matters, this is an excellent introduction to the subject.  Please take the time to read it.  It will prove invaluable to your consideration of Bibliology-related matters.

One Bibly Only? Edited by Roy E. Beacham and Kevin T. Bauder.  Grand Rapids, Mi: Kregel, 2001. {here}

Today, Tuesday, April 21, is Yom HaShoah–Holocaust Memorial Day. It is a very sobering day as people around the world, particularly those in Israel, pause to remember the murderous atrocities committed by Hitler and his regime against the Jews and other undesirables. Some 6,000,000 Jews were killed during the years of World War II, and millions of others were scarred for life.

I have written a lengthy post elsewhere on how you and I can today remember those who died in the Holocaust.  Please read it {here}, and take time out of your busy day to honor those who perished.

This week, as you well know, is Passion Week.  This past Sunday was Palm Sunday, this coming Friday is Good Friday, and this coming Sunday is Resurrection Sunday (Easter).  That means that this week commemorates the last week of Jesus’ life before His crucifixion and resurrection.

One helpful thing to do this week as you remember these most significant events is to retrace what Jesus did on each of the days of His last week.  I just attended a seminar with one of my favorite college professors that dealt with this very topic, so my excitement with this remembrance scheme is quite timely.

Dr. Doug Bookman’s basic Passion Week chronology, which I 99.9% agree with, is:

Sunday: Triumphal Entry
Monday: Cleansing & Controlling the Temple
Tuesday: Confronting Enemies, Olivet Discourse
Wednesday: Silent day
Thursday: Passover, Arrest, Trials
Friday: Crucifixion
Saturday: Body in Tomb
Sunday: Resurrection

{Here} is someone’s chronology chart which agrees with the above.  Other very helpful charts are {here}, {here},  and {here}, with only minor differences. [I cannot fully endorse any of these since I have not fully reviewed them, but a cursory review of them seemed satisfactory.]

Thus, I think it would be most appropriate to read the corresponding Gospel accounts of these events on each day of this week to powerfully remind ourselves of our Lord’s death and resurrection for you and me.  I have been intending to prepare a list of readings for two years now, but still haven’t gotten around to it…  However, a very good friend’s blog post and list is {here}.

Below is a list of audio sermons you can listen to by Dr. Bookman wherein he amazingly communicates the chronology of the Passion Week: {here} [11.22-11.24.02], {here}, {here} [2.21-2.22.09], and {here} [10.24-10.26.08].  Dr. Bookman is definitely one of my favorite and most influential teachers ever.  He will make your reading of the Gospels come alive!  I really encourage you to take the time to download and listen to the sermons to which I have linked.

I posted this on my personal blog the other day: I don’t know if you would be, but perhaps you may be interested in a paper I wrote recently for a Church History class.  The paper is a discussion and contrast of the ecclesiology (the theology of the church) of the Reformers and the Anabaptists. Their views of the church were very different. The Reformers held that the church is composed of the Corpus Christianum–all those who had been baptized (usually as infants). The Anabaptists held that the church was composed of the Corpus Christi–only those who had believed in Christ as Savior. These two differing views led to vastly different worldviews which affected their evangelism, their view of the church & society, their use of coercion, their view of baptism, and their conduct. After reading some of the things Calvin said so harshly against the Anabaptists, I prayed that the Lord would always keep me from being so fiercely and dogmatically wrong. He hated the Anabaptists, but from our perspective in history, the Anabaptists were right! It serves to remind us that we must be careful, cautious, and humble about what we believe. You can read the paper {here} if you would like.

This article is somewhat lengthy, so if you don’t read it all,  that is fine.  Here’s the point, though: Pornography is a great evil.  Don’t start it!  If you are already struggling with it, get out of it!  A great free service from OpenDNS.com offers pornography-blocking.  Please read further to find out more.

One of the great paradoxes of the Christian life is that God has called us to be holy, but He has permitted the sin nature to continue to reside in us, though having had its power broken (Rom 6:6).  So we experience times where we obey God well and times where we disobey God by sinning.  There is always that tension in the Christian life between the two natures as we seek to “put to death” and “put off” the one and “put on” the other.  Yet that is the lot God has given to us–to wage war in this matter.

What further complicates matters is the fact that our bodies through both physical (hormones, etc.) and “spiritual” (sin nature) means tries to get us to sin constantly.  The drive we have to sexual immorality is a prime example of this.  So, it is hard to fight this particular beast.  God has called us innumerable times in the New Testament to not engage in any kind of sexual immorality, and yet our bodies and fallen nature try to convince us that sexual immorality is so great and feels so good.  To make matters worse, the world we live in constantly promotes it as well!  “It is only natural,” says the world; “you shouldn’t fight it!”  But God asks us to fight it.

Pornography is a great evil.  It often leads to self-stimulation/self-gratification, and it will ultimately lead to committing sexual immorality with another person if it continues to be indulged.  It will usually lead to “treating your marriage partner pornographically,” as one of my wisest professors in college has observed.  It leads to the objectification of men and women.  One who engages regularly in pornography loses the understanding that persons of the opposite sex are real people, not just objects for my pleasure.  It enforces the idea that love is a physical feeling, not an attitude of self-sacrifice.  It makes us concentrate on ourselves, not on other people as the NT urges us to do.

The path down pornography’s way is a slippery slope that is easy to descend, but incredibly difficult to come back out from.  It only leads to further engagement in pornography,  and it will ultimately lead to other kinds of sexual immorality.  It is a way of futility because it will never ultimately satisfy.  One always wants more.  He can never find the “perfect” picture or movie to satisfy himself.  Once the habit of pornography is built, where one indulges sexual temptation every time it comes about, it can only be broken with great pains and difficulties.  The images, sounds, and movies that you feed yourself remain in your mind forever.  They surface in your mind’s eye constantly, even during prayer or conversation with others.  Once you put these things into your mind, you can never get them out.  You must always live with them.  They tend to bring feelings of guilt and can corrupt friendship relationships with those of the opposite sex.

So, the bottom line is: “Watch your beginnings.”  Don’t start down the path of pornography.  You will save yourself so much grief and difficulty if you never begin.  Please, for God’s sake, don’t start in pornography!  If you have already started down that path, then you must take much more drastic measures to rid yourself of that wickedness.  It is like cancer.  It continues to grow if you do not fight it.  If you have already started, please, for your sake, for God’s sake, for your marriage partner’s sake, for your children’s sake, for your friends’ sake, for your future’s sake, get out of it!!  It can only destroy!  Please, pray about it, confess your sins to God, ask for God’s help in fighting it, find friends to keep you accountable, tape verses on your computer screen, memorize Scripture’s commands about not engaging in sexual immorality.  Fight it!  God is always faithful to forgive (1 Jn 1:9),  and He will always help those who earnestly seek His help to get out of sinful habits.

Thankfully, there is another way to help you fight.  A service at OpenDNS.com {here} has, among other things, a wonderful pornography-blocking option.  It is free and very effective.  It can block out all pornographic and/or suggestive content.  It can be customized to display verses and a photo (like of your wife/husband or kids or a cross, etc.) on the pages that it blocks.  It requires no software to install,  and it is very easy to set up.  It can be used on individual computers or an entire network.  Please, consider using it!  It can be a first defensive step in your fight against the beast of pornography.  Please check it out.  You can also use a Firefox Add On called “BlockSite” for basic blocking purposes {here}.

However you end up fighting it, please stick to your guns and with the indwelling Spirit of God’s help,  fight this beast all your life!  Do not give in, even upon occasion.  Fight it always!  It will be well worth your struggle, I promise.

If you are interested in learning Biblical Greek, there are a couple of resources posted over at www.TheBibleStudent.info that may help you.  There is a reference chart for Indicative verbs of all tenses and two reference sheets for Participles.  They may be helpful to you.  Check them out if you’re interested.