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RELIGION/Sliie $attt
Thursday, January 29,2004
Scholar hopes to see new
translation emerge as ‘the’
Bible for all
By Douglas Todd
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Alan Jacobs, an English
professor at Wheaton College
near Chicago, said the new
English Standard Version
Bible, whose translation was
overseen by Vancouver’s J.I.
(James) Packer, is the only
one with the potential to
become the universal Bible of
aU Enghsh-speaking Chris
tians.
Jacobs, a respected profes
sor at Wheaton, a major
evangelical university, said
he laments the end of the era
when most English-speaking
Protestants read and quoted
from the same Bible — the
King James Version, first
published in England in
1611. “Everyone who grew up
with the (King James Ver
sion) feels the loss of a shared
language, of particular words
and phrases that resonated
in the common ear,” Jacobs
wrote in the recent issue of
First Things Magazine, a
scholarly Christian journal.
With more than 100 Eng
lish-language Bible transla
tions now competing against
one another, Jacobs called
the English Standard Ver
sion “the best available Eng
lish Bible.” It was created two
years ago by a team of about
100 conservative Protestants
led by Packer, of Regent Col
lege, an evangelical postgrad
uate school on the University
of British Columbia campus.
However, some Bible scholars
believe Jacobs’ high-profile
campaign to champion one
common English-language
Bible is quixotic and misguid
ed at best and imperialistic at
worst. “It sounds hke ecclesi
astical and scholarly tyranny
we shouldn’t put up with,”
said Professor Lloyd Gaston,
a veteran Bible scholar at the
Vancouver School of Theolo
gy. “The more Bible transla
tions we have the better,”
Gaston said in an interview.
It’s good for people of faith to
realize, he said, that there'
are many different ways of
interpreting ancient Bible
stories, which were first told
orally and then written down
in Hebrew, Aramaic and
Greek.
“It seems to me anyone who
suggests using just one Bible
is simply making a pitch for
their ovm favorite transla
tion,” said Gaston, whose stu
dents come from a variety of
Christian backgrounds,
including Anglican, United
Church, Presbyterian and
Cathohc. “It creates the dan
ger of not truly hstening to
the Bible in all its complexity,
but just hstening to one voice.
It narrows the range of possi
bilities, which some Chris
tians might like, but not all,”
Gaston said.
Although Jacobs had no
role in translating the ESV,
he is a fnend of Packer and a
fellow evangelical. The liter
ary chairman of the ESV
translation team is Jacobs’
English faculty colleague at
Wheaton College Leland
Ryken, who routinely criti
cizes modem Bible transla
tions.
In his esSay Jacobs glosses
over how Roman Cathohcs,
for instance, have never used
the King James Bible, while
many have read the Douai-
Rheims translation, which
reflected similar language.
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THE PROPHET’S COLUMN INC.
9626 FELDBANK DRIVE • CHARLOTTE, NC, 28216-2131
“GOD REPROBATING A SINNER ”- FIRST PART
J. M. LITTLE - TEACHER
I’ll never cease to praise and thank my blessed heavenly Father
for electing me to salvation in Christ before the foundation of the
world. We find that great truth in Ephesians 1A “According as
he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world,
that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:”
Get this truth if you can; “every sinner who has ever been
saved, or ever will be,saved, was chosen by my heavenly
Father and given to the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, before the
foundation of the world.” That is God’s election. Our subject at
this time is not election but; “GOD’S REPROBATION, OR GOD
REPROBATING A SINNER.” I was asked the question some
years ago; “is God still reprobating people today?” My frank
answer was: “right before my eyes.” My friends, these two great
truths are taught throughout God’s Word, I am not to blame for
your ignorance in not seeing them. One day I was blinded and
on the road to hell just like you and I could not see them. But
when the blessed Holy Spirit opened my heart (Acts 16:14) as
He did Lydia’s heart. He began to teach me all about my totally
depraved and hell-deserving condition. And He taught me the
truth of every sinner’s salvation, that is; “Christ died for sinners
and Christ alone could be my Salvation. And He taught me my
vile, helpless, hopeless, rotten and hell-deserving condition, let
ting me see that if God did not choose to save me, I never would
be saved. The trouble with you who argue against the doctrine
of God’s Reprobation is that you have never seen under Holy
Spirit conviction (John 16:711) that God is Sovereign and you,
the sinner, are at the disposal of the Sovereign God of the Uni
verse. You’ll never learn these truths and that God does not have
to save you as long as you go on in Satan’s syrup, the religious
syrup of “I accepted Jesus as my Saviour.” I would you could see
these great truths I am setting forth, but I know you never will
unless the Holy Spirit awakens you to your lost condition.
DR. AND MRS. ANTHONY L. JINWRIGHT
Sunday. February 8 - Sunday. February 15
OfarlotteWestin Hotel
February 14,2004-6:00 P.M,
Pastor Juandolvn Stokes Dr. Frank .Madison Reid
Februarv9.20()4-7;OOP,M, Februarv 15.2004- 11:00A.M.
Call 7()4..A99.5448 for more inl'ormation
Obituaries
A.L. Jinwright Funeral Service
Marcus N. Bellinger, 36, died Jan. 15. Funeral held Jan. 20 at A.L.
Jinwright Funeral Service Chapel.
Alexander Funeral Flome
Reatha Bradley died Jan. 1 at Presbyterian Hospital. Funeral was
Jan. 8 at Zecheriah Alexander Sr. Memorial Chapel. Burial at Beat-
ties Ford Memorial Gardens.
Oscar Boyce Jr. died Jan. 3 at his residence. Visitation and funeral
held Jan. 8 at Oak Grove Missionary Baptist Church. Burial at VA
Cemetery in Salisbury.
Ebony Horton died Jan. 3 at Carolinas Medical Center. Visitation and
funeral were held Jan. 7 at St. Paul Baptist Church. Burial at Gethsemane
Memorial Gardents.
Virginia Williams died Jan. 4 at Wesley Care Center. Visitation and funeral
were Jan. 9 at Mount Carmel Baptist Church. Burial at Beatties Ford Memori
al Gardens.
James Limbacker Jr. died Jan. 4 in New York, N.Y. Visitation and funeral were
held Jan. 10 at Mission Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. Burial at Beatties Ford
Memorial Gardens.
William Boyd Jr. died Jan. 3 at his residence. Visitation was Jan. 9 and funer
al Jan. 10 at New Zion Baptist Church. Burial at Beatties Ford Memorial Gar
dens.
Caven Grier died Dec. 30, 2(X)3 at residence. Visitation and funeral held Jan.
8, 2004 at St. Paul Baptist Church. Burial at Beatties Ford Memorial Gardens.
Mary Gary died Dec. 30, 2003 at Presbyterian Hospital. Visitatio and funeral
held Jan. 2, 2004 at Zecheriah Alexander Sr. Memorial Chapel. Burial at Beat-
ties Ford Memorial Gardens.
Charlie Taylor died Jan. 2 at his residence. Visitation and funeral held Jan. 7 at
Greater FYovidence Baptist Church. Burial at Beatties Ford Memorial Gardens.
Alexander Jackson Sr. died Dec. 28, 2003 at Carolinas Medical Center. Visi
tation at funeral held Jan. 3,2004 at Zecheriah Alexander St. Memorial Chapel.
Burial at Beatties Ford Memorial Gardens.
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