Some helpful thoughts on bible translations from Scot McKnight.
“…there is an absolute necessity to translate because (1) cultures change, (2) languages change, and (3) as Christians move into new areas there is a need for others to read the Bible in their own language. In addition, (4) as we learn more about the earliest manuscripts of the Bible, we are led to more refined translations.”
I love what this guy has to say. His is one of the most helpful blogs I keep tabs on. I’m so appreciative of the work he does it moves me to tears. Here is an excerpt from a recent entry in which he brings some definition to being missional:
As a missional community of Jesus, each local community is designed to be a Kingdom missional community. Missional communities are not so much “buildings” and “places to go” but a community of faith where a society brushes up against the grace of God because the community of faith is a presence of grace. The singular grace the community of faith has to offer to society is Jesus Christ and this grace is “performed” by the local community of faith.
This means that the missional community is essentially generous: it is the “gift” of God of humans who are filled with grace and minister the grace of reconciliation and justice and peace and love to the local society. It is essentially “for others” and ministering “to others” and serving others.
Kingdom work that is marked by Generosity is manifested in the five “Ls” of Love: a missional community mediates the love of God (God’s grace) to others by Looking into the neighborhood, Listening to the needs of that neighborhood, Learning about the needs and how to meet the needs, Linking to the neighborhood in concrete ways, and doing so in a Local context. This is what it means to be a missional community in the Kingdom of God. It is not enough to listen and learn about the Bible as it is preached, nor is it enough to sit in a local church and ingest the Sacraments. Word and Sacrament are designed to create Missional communities of faith that aim at the Kingdom of God.
from Scot Mcknight
What often passes for Christianity may be religious but is not Christianity–not yet at least (and one wonders if it ever will be given such a start). Culture-Christians are not terribly interested in Jesus of the Bible who said such silly things like: “love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you . . . . Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful” (Luke 6.27, 36) and “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me” (Mark 8.34). No, their god is not the One who says such outlandish things; their god promises safety, security, and abundance–in short, the American Dream. Jesus of suburbia. Culture-Christians and the churches that form them will never see things this way; their Jesus has been fashionably refashioned to be the god of safety. “Jesus died to get me to heaven.” “Jesus wants me to get others to heaven.” “Jesus blesses the guns and bombs and planes and policies that keep me safe and happy until I get there.” So much of this non-Christian Christianity is really about creating a safe world where I’ll never have to love my enemy, deny myself my creature comforts, or die as a witness to Jesus Christ. This is a gospel but it is not the Gospel.
“… The church has been summoned to be, a community of broken people, painfully honest, undomesticated, rid of the pretence and suffocating niceness to which ‘religion’ is so often prone. They love, inexplicably and unflinchingly, because of having been so loved themselves…” (Belden Lane)