Which Version Do You Preach From?

Most scholars would say it's pretty far down on the list.

 

Niv

I preach from the NIV.

I started out preaching from HCSB and I got stopped in my Sermon introduction and asked what Bible I was reading from.. True Story.

The people I preach to don't know a lot about the Bible, but I did notice they mostly had NIV's, so I switched to my NIV to help them follow along better.

I will even on most Sunday's step out from behind the pulpit to help someone find the verse I'm preaching on. It doesn't really bother me, I just want to help them.

 

I find it a little odd also, not that it is wrong, just odd.

What would make some pastor think he knows the original languages better than the hundreds of scholars who have worked on the dozens of reputable translations we currently have?

 

Uh...it's more common knowledge. There are many pastors who use it, but not who are also top-notch scholars. Go to a reputable evangelical institution that has esteemed, published faculty. Not a one of them uses King James, mostly because it's not as accurate as a lot of more modern ones.

Start with all the professors I had in undergrad and grad school at evangelical institutions. Then you could include some of the neo-reformed guys like Piper, Hughes, Mohler. Wright, Fee, Carson...I don't even know where to stop.

It's not that the KJV is terrible. It served its purpose well for centuries. It's just now way down the list.

I rarely preach, but whenever I speak or teach, I would go in an order like:

1.TNIV
2.NASB
3.NLT
4.NIV
5.NRSV
6.NEB
7....maybe ESV

Near the end would be:

Next to last: KJV
Last: NKJV

There are others below them, of course, but those are texts I wouldn't really ever use.

 

If you'd like to get an idea of what translation scholars prefer, look at those who worked on modern translations. They consist of the best these days. None would say the KJV is a translation for study purposes in the 21st century.

Look at the books authored by Bible scholars, in the last 40 or more years. If the KJV is even mentioned, it's for reference sake --nothing more. The NIV reigns supreme as the most quoted version. Years before L.Ryken was on the ESV team he quoted from the NIV most of the time (I know he's not a ture Bible scholar but ...).

The NRSV would be the next most used in scholarly works. The RSV still gets some treatment. The ESV,NLT and HCSB would round out the top five in my estimation.

Anyone please furnish exceptions to the above. (And they would indeed be exceptions to the general rule.)

 

You know, Bro. Robert, I thought it was a little odd initially, but with some thought on it, I came to the realization that we all do this. We may not take "pen and paper" and do this literally, but we dig deep, take a greek and hebrew book(I use Strong's) to find out what certain words mean. So, even though I haven't tried to translate the bible with my "pen and paper", I do so with my mind, and with what knowledge I get from Him. So I venture to guess we all have done this to a certain extent.

i am I am's!!

Willis

PS I preach out of the KJV, not because it's the only one, but because I love it!!

 

Probably not. The NIV reigns supreme.

 

It's clunky and in need of an overhaul.

 

I prefer the ESV but I'm looking forward to reading through the NIV2011 next year. Maybe it will grow on me even though the previous version did not.

 

Do you base everything you do based on what the scholars say?

 

We don't have many top notch evangelical scholars here, though.

I love the King James. I love that it was the standard for so many years and helped bring many people to faith. I love that most of the memorizing I did as a young child was in the KJV. I especially love the beautiful language in which it speaks.

But I don't use it for personal study, and neither do reputable scholars, and I'm talking about faithful evangelicals who hold the Bible as the standard rule of faith and practice.

 

The NASB still finds broad usage, too. I like it way better than the ESV, although it's not the best reading text.

 

"Scholars" are nothing more than learned men who preserve and push forward the ancient faith and texts that we ALL use in our worship and understanding of God and God's church.

There is no such thing as a purely un-learned man able to do the first thing for God or God's kingdom, unless God personally reveals Himself to that individual in ways that we have not typically seen since Jesus walked the earth. Jesus (the supreme scholar, knowing "all things") taught men, who taught men, who taught men... We stand on the shoulders of those who came before, and without them we do not have the Word, we do not have the traditions, and we do not have the theology (good or bad) or doctrines upon which we base our faith and actions.

We also do not have the Internet that you are using to argue your point... :thumbsup:

Now, perhaps you are thinking that we should just go out, Bible in hand, and re-discover the entirety of God's plan and God's church. That is possible, but many have done just that and have ended up in cultish situations. I think of other famous un-learned men in history who have take the Word and tried to figure out a system for themselves instead of relying on church scholars: The Jerusalem Church of the 1st Century, Marcion, Muhammad, Joseph Smith, Mary Baker Eddy, William Miller and Charles Taze Russell, and David Koresh, among a host of others, including some amount of back-holler preachers that have come up propagating what they've learned from kin that came before.

I'm not sure you want to be in that camp, but I'll stand corrected if you do indeed want to identify with that level of anti-intellectualism. At least we'll know where you stand.

 

At the Christian bookstore where my wife works, they have had three copies of the ESV on the shelves for over a year. They are yet to sell one. They do sell a lot of NIV's, NLT's and KJV's.

BTW, they have not had much luck in selling HCSB's either.

http://www.cbaonline.org/nm/documents/BSLs/Bible_Translations.pdf