Attention Living Faith & Living Hope! Many of the people in our church know the Bible fairly well and are able to place themselves in the narrative when we share something…but this is notthe case for our region. According to the most recent Barna Survey for the “Bible-mindedness” of cities in America – Providence is ranked last and Albany is second to last.
report reading the Bible in a typical week and who strongly assert the Bible is accurate in the principles it teaches are considered to be Bible-minded. This definition captures action and attitude—those who both engage and esteem the Christian scriptures. The rankings thus reflect an overall openness or resistance to the Bible in the country’s largest markets.
So new folks that come into our church may not know what we mean when we say certain terms, reference certain things, etc. I don’t think we need to change our Bible focus to accommodate people who don’t have this, but we need to be mindful of the world around us. We certainly need to make sure do not talk down the spirit-inspired and God-preserved Scripture. It should be our go-to guide for teaching people about our great God and helping them know and observe all that Jesus commanded. And we want to ensure that people hear the gospel and receive the spirit so this sacred text may come alive to them.
This is the second half of an article about the Comma Johanneum. To read part one click here.
Greek History
Now that I have recounted some of the Latin history of the Comma, I turn now to set forth the Greek evidence. In the following chart are some relevant Greek editions beginning with the most recent first.
How the Most Trinitarian Verse in the Bible
Proves that the Bible Does Not Support the Trinity
The most Trinitarian verse in the Bible is found in 1 John 5.7 where the text reads “For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one.”1 Recently in conversation with an acquaintance, I was challenged to accept the doctrine of the Trinity on the basis of this text. However, this scripture is fraught with difficulties and its history is long and dubious, involving both Greek and Latin manuscripts. Before turning to examine the Latin and Greek histories, I will begin by comparing two of the best known and most influential translations in English and German to more recent ones so as to demonstrate the exact difference between them. The words in bold below are known as the Comma Johanneum (henceforth Comma).
Read the rest...(2783 words, 1 image, estimated 11:08 mins reading time)
“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one
another John 13:34 & 35(NASB)
The words of Jesus are very explicit in John chapter 13 so we must ask ourselves some big questions.
1) How did Jesus Love?
2) Did Jesus show his Love to his followers?
3) Did he restrict his Love simply to his follows?
4) When we see the Cross do we see LOVE?
Recently we had a discussion about the reliability of the New Testament. In past discussions also, the work of Bart Ehrman has been cited, especially his book, Misquoting Jesus. In a recent episode of the radio program, Unbelievable, Bart Ehrman himself has a discussion/debate with Bible scholar Peter Williams, who questions the validity of some of Ehrman’s points. You can listen to it HERE.
Ehrman’s book Misquoting Jesus has been on the best seller list and has been influencing the views of many people regarding the texts of the Bible, especially the New Testament. But while it gives a good introduction to the field of textual criticism in the first four chapters, his conclusions in subsequent chapters are at best overstated and misleading, according to those who have critiqued it. Peter Williams, who debated Ehrman on Unbelievable, also has a further analysis of the book, which you can listen to and read HERE.
Are you familiar with word clouds? They specify frequency using font size so that words that appear more often are larger and vice versa. What if this way of displaying data were applied to books of the Bible? Well, it seems, someone has already had that idea. Check out the following Youtube video. Thanks to Brian (not Keating) for sending this over. Here are each of the books of the Bible displayed in order.
Here is another similar video from the same person which displays the frequencies for the entire Bible at once:
Modern day Judaism – especially Counter Missionaries, like to dismiss that the “Suffering Servant” of Isaiah 53 perfectly fits Jesus of Nazareth. The typical response from them is that Isaiah 53 is about the nation of Israel and not the Messiah. Therefore Jesus doesn’t fit it because it is not even about him in the first place. But is that really proper exegesis? Does the text really point to Israel? Or does it more properly belong to the promised human Messiah?
Take a look at this article and see what you think. Seems to me the writer has some very valid points. Also check out the link a little over half-way through the article about how at one time Jewish Rabbis did indeed believe and write about how Isaiah 53 was actually about the future Messiah.
