from sacredsandwich.com :
HOW THE USE OF SOME BIBLE VERSIONS CAN TWIST GOD'S TRUTH

William Tyndale, the martyr, who passionately fought for the Bible to be translated into English for the sake of the common man, would be dumbfounded to see how many Bible translations are available today for the masses. By all outward appearances, it would seem that his vision to supply God’s word to the lay person, including the lowly ploughboy, has been fully realized. Based on numbers alone, it might be assumed that Tyndale, if alive today, would be overjoyed with this modern proliferation of Bibles. But would he?

This is a very good article and Sacred Sandwich provides links to learn more about various translations and paraphrases.

Last Sunday I visited Abbey Baptist Church for the second time.  I only took the two youngest with me as we couldn't get the older ones up (time change) and David went back to our regular church after dropping me and the littlies off.   As the pastor was away the pulpit was filled by Mr David Chapman who is secretary to the Association of Grace Baptist Churches (SE).  

With his permission I am posting my notes from the sermon both to help me in remembering the ideas, mostly, but also I thought they might be helpful to others. 

If there was a title, I missed it, and I know I missed some other things but I did try to get most of the points.  The day was the anniversary of the abolition of slavery in Great Britain, so Mr Chapman talked about that to the children before they were dismissed, and then started his sermon by reading all of Philemon, which is the letter Paul wrote to a slave-owner, as he returned Philemon's runaway slave Onesimus to him.  He paused to point out verse 6 as worthy of note, but did not preach on it.

Then he turned to II Corinthians chapter 5, verse 17.    Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.  The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.  (ESV, although the reading was from the NIV I believe.)

I'll type my notes and try to fill in some missing thoughts as I remember them, putting those in italics:

Have you ever wished to be a better person?

Have you met with a good person, seen the Lord in Scripture, or sinned and regretted it, or contemplated God's judgment?  (and thus be provoked to be a better person)

Sadly for many that's as far as it goes.   They have fears or excuses - "I know if I tried to be a Christian I could never keep it up,"  " You can't change human nature"

(Here he gave a quote from Alexander Solzhenitsyn about human nature changing as fast as a geologic epoch, I believe, but I couldn't find it on Google.)

Jeremiah has a verse about the leopard not being able to change its spots. 

Some people don't try to change, others give it a go (like with New Years resolutions), join AA, etc. Failures lead to disappointment.  In trying to change, we have to battle with our sinful nature, and satan.

Again, some people don't try to change, some people try - and some people change the goalposts.  Seeing that they can't meet God's standards, they water them down.

All those ways fall far short of what Paul says in II Corinthians 5:17.  Paul expects God to bring about such a change in a person that it would seem he were a new person. 

How?  God sent Jesus.  From a verse in Hebrews -  the Son was tempted in every way we are, yet He never sinned.  He was condemned, crucified, and died.  He paid the penalty sinners deserved for their sins.  God raised Him to show His acceptance of His payment.    Romans 4:25    He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification. (NIV)

How can this be real in my life?  The Holy Spirit convicts us of sin, convinces us that Jesus died for us and if we confess our sins He will forgive us.  He changes us so that though previously we resisted it we now receive the message.

(Mr Chapman went into a new part and I kind of missed the bridge into it - either I was thinking about what he just said, or was still writing it down!  He started talking about branches grafted into trees and mentioned how his father-in-law used to do this with apple trees.)

We're grafted into Christ - brought into a living relationship with Christ (I'm fuzzy on if I got that right.).

If in Christ we need to go on and draw on all the resources He has (like a graft draws on the tree):

1.  The Holy Spirit - Ezekiel 36:26, II Corinthians 3:17, 18

2.  The Bible - God gave us the Bible but also teachers

3.  The example of Jesus - if we want to know what God would do we can see what Jesus said and did

4.  Our fellow Christians - we need to listen how others have applied God's word to their lives

He provides the resources that we need to be the people He wants us to be. He uses them to show us where we sin, and to remind us of forgiveness.  He encourages us and strengthens us. 

Sometimes the evidence that one is in Christ takes time to show, other times it is immediate, but it will happen.  Paul saw this change in Onesimus.  Onesimus went back - 20 years later he was a leader in the church at Ephesus. (I did not know this, and need to check this out. )

Our aim is to be the people God wants us to be.  Are we a new person?  Do we have a new awareness of God?  Developing character in Christ? Do we have new: principles, purpose, and hope?

End

I'm throwing a question out for you all.  What do you do when Bible reading time gets dull and you are having a hard time? 

I have had times like that, but that is not the case now.  I'm asking because it came up in a conversation my husband had with someone lately, and she said at those times it was helpful to use a paraphrase. 

Now, there are some decent paraphrases out there I'm sure, but there are also some terrible ones.  Which do you think are good, and which are rotten?

I'd really like some comments on this, on what you do, and would recommend for someone really struggling with reading their Bible, and also, do you recommend any paraphrases.

I'll post my answers another time.  I might update this post to include your comments, or leave them in the comment box (I am not sure) - or I might even put the answers into another post.

(h/t - Big Orange Truck)

A great article on the ineffectiveness of evangelism on the mission field, by Garry Weaver, is found on his blog Amazing Grace and Old Chevys.

I think Garry nails it on the head when he explains why so many on the mission field went back on seeming professions of faith after "evangelism" :

... they had not been enlightened by the Holy Spirit as to who Jesus really is and what He demands. They had not been convicted of their wretched and hopelessly lost condition. They had not been irresistibly drawn to Him by the Spirit in repentance and surrender to His Lordship. There is no substitute for that. That only comes through faithfully praying for His power and anointing, and by the faithful proclamation of His Gospel, which is "...the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes..."

Sounds like folk around here, too. 

I came across this article this evening and thought it would be good to share.  I think it has excellent points and advice.

There's a sheep born every second.

If my seven-year-old was still feasting on milk and refusing meat he would not be a healthy kid. He would be weak, sickly and starving. The quick progression from milk to meat is good, natural and necessary.

I recommend An Educated Laity, another excellent post by Tim Challies.

I've been reading this morning about a minister in Cambridge who did not have an easy time of things, yet his faith and devotion to Christ continued to grow.   Although John Piper gave this talk to fellow pastors, to encourage them in their difficulties, I found much to be uplifted by as well, as just a plain Christian (and homeschooling mom).

Brothers, We Must Not Mind a Little Suffering   (Meditations on the life of Charles Simeon)

(H/T : Adrian Warnock's Blog  via The Jolly Blogger )

Someone's personal experience with crime on both sides of the Atlantic.

Seems the US crime rate is going down, and the European rate is going up.  I have heard this a few times now, and one of these days would like to check it out a little more thoroughly, but I do know that many cities in the US are experiencing less serious crime, while here in the UK and continental Europe, they are experiencing more....  "Spyral Notebook" is correct when he says one must realize that changes have taken place and form their opinions/ideas accordingly.

"A nation which does not remember what it was yesterday does not know where it is today."

Robert E Lee

“Suppose you were an idiot and suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.”

Mark Twain

(My 13 year old daughter said of the latter "Well that's not polite!")  (But it's still funny to me!)

who isn't taking any questions during his trip in the US.  

Here we are — all us Americans — at each others' throats about illegal immigration. You have an idea, I have an idea, everybody's got an idea about how we fix this problem, and we're all yelling at each other.

So who is sitting on the sideline saying nothing? The guy most responsible for us having this problem: Vicente Fox, el presidente of Mexico.

And where is Vicente Fox as we speak? Leaving Salt Lake City, where he has been visiting, and heading to Sacramento for a state dinner with the governor of California, immigrant Arnold Schwarzenegger.

When Presidente Fox was in Salt Lake, his people, his hombres if you will, put out the word — you can take his picture, you can record his remarks — but he won't be taking actual questions.
The Desert News put it this way: No questions, no questions, no questions, no questions.

Personally, I take that as an insult. This guy needs to answer a bunch of questions and I've got a list. Gov. Schwarzenegger should ask all or some of them right there over the appetizers at the state dinner.

Read the article.   John Gibson's questions are well worth reading.  I'm not sure we should hold our collective breaths waiting for any answers though.