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Kalled2Preach said:
Yeah. Paraphrases are not my big thing either. Just curious.

And I agree with Brimstone to a point. I think, like any book about the Bible, a paraphrase can be useful to some extent. I would never preach from one or use it as my main text. But it does help to get one man's interpretation of the Bible.
When a paraphrase purports itself to be a "translation" of the Bible, it is lying and/or the translators have denied the doctrine of inspiration to one degree or another. Did not the Holy Spirit inspire the authors? Was not every "jot" and "tittle" the very Word of God written? Then by what authority does any man have the right to cast off the words for some alleged "meaning" so as to make the very revelation of God more "readable"?

Think about this, just for a couple of seconds. <img src="/forum/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> How does one come to understand what another is saying? Is it not from the individual words themselves and also in the array in which he speaks them? Thus, if you hold that the "meaning" is most important and not the individual words . . . then from whence does this "meaning" come from, if not from the individual words set in a specific grammatical structure? [Linked Image]

One final thought/comment. I am of the mind which believes that in the majority of cases, the inability to comprehend the Word of God is due to the fact that the reader is "dead"... spiritual dead. It is only when the Holy Spirit gives eyes to see, a mind to comprehend and a heart to embrace God's special revelation, that one is able to grasp the truth of which he/she reads.

In His Grace,

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simul iustus et peccator

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