Burn These Bible Translations?! A Pastor Explains | Live Free with Josh Howerton

Summary

Podcast Summary: Burn These Bible Translations?! A Pastor Explains | Live Free with Josh Howerton

Podcast: Live Free with Josh Howerton
Host: Lakepointe Church
Episode: 59
Date: January 19, 2026

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Main Theme:

This episode digs deep into practical questions surrounding Bible reading: which translations to choose (and which to avoid entirely), how to build a regular Bible reading habit, choosing effective reading plans, approaching the Bible as a family, and helping children grow to love God’s word. Pastor Josh and his wife Jana Howerton offer candid, engaging, and occasionally fiery advice with memorable stories, theology deep-dives, and practical parenting wisdom.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Wrestling with Temptation and Bible Understanding

• Temptation Is Not Sin:
  • "Just because you wrestle with a desire to sin doesn't mean something's wrong. Actually, the fact that you're wrestling with it means something is right." (A, 00:00)
  • Temptation proves the Spirit’s presence; guilt over the mere presence of temptation is misplaced.
• Posture Over Translation:
  • "What will keep you from understanding the Bible most is not the translation in your lap, but the posture in your heart." (A, 00:15)

2. Theological Deep Dive – Temptation & Dominion Theology

• Satan’s Power and God's Sovereignty:
  • Satan is a real enemy but always under God’s control (“Martin Luther called Satan a dog on a leash.” – A, 09:33).
  • Multiple biblical examples (Job, Luke 4, Luke 22) show that Satan needs divine permission to tempt believers.
  • Jesus’ temptation mirrors the three core temptations all believers face: lust of the flesh (desire to feel), lust of the eyes (desire to have), and pride of life (desire to be).
    (Breakdown at 12:44–15:22)
• The Hook Analogy:
  • "Satan temptation is like the bait on a hook...he's a fisherman that's only got three lures—lust of flesh, lust of eyes, pride of life." (A, 15:21)
• Dominion Theology Explained:
  • Why did Jesus not correct Satan’s claim over the kingdoms of the world? (19:03–32:41)
    • Detailed explanation of dominion, original ownership by God, Adam & Eve’s loss, Satan’s reign, and Jesus as “Kinsman Redeemer” buying back dominion at the cross.
    • Thoughtful connection from Jeremiah 32, the Book of Revelation (chapter 5), and the Great Commission.
  • "Pull the Bible’s thread and you see: Dominion was God's, lost to Satan, redeemed at the cross, and given to the church." (A, 32:32)

3. Building a Bible Reading Habit

• Start Now, Don’t Wait:
  • “Don’t wait for a ‘less busy’ season; start now. Give God your first and your best. For me, that’s mornings.” (B, 34:01)
  • Practical Tips:
    • Go to sleep earlier to prioritize morning reading.
    • Start small (“Don’t despise small beginnings.” – B, 36:50).
    • Don’t check phone/social media before reading (“Don’t go digital before you get biblical.” – A, 42:01).
    • If you miss a day, just pick up with the current reading—don’t get bogged down.
  • Mom-Specific Advice:
    • Discipline kids and routines so parents (especially moms) can get alone time in the Word (39:13–42:00).

4. Bible Reading Plans: How to Choose & Use Them

• Which Plan? The One You’ll Do:
  • “Bible reading plans are like diets. What's the best? The one you’ll do.” (A, 44:05)
• Lakepointe Church Resources:
  • Daily chapter reading plans synchronized with sermons available via the church app (45:23).
• Higher Commitment Plans:
  • Robert Murray McShane Bible Reading Plan (theological, about 5 chapters/day).
  • The Bible Recap by Tara-Leigh Cobble (chronological, helpful for seeing context in Psalms/Acts, etc.).
  • Mix it up to grow your appetite for Scripture.

5. Studying the Bible as Individuals and Couples

• Do Josh & Jana Study Together?
  • “No—we each have our own rhythms, but at night we sometimes read a short devotional together.” (B, 53:39)
  • Encouragement for husbands to lead family prayer/devotionals, but “wives: don’t badger; enthusiasm works better than nagging.” (A, 54:07)
• Methods and Tools:
  • Use a good study Bible (ESV highly recommended).
  • Use commentaries (MacArthur, ESV Study Bible).
  • Pay attention to cross-references and footnotes (69:42).
  • “Read with a pen in hand.” (A, 62:03)
  • Use the SOAP method (Scripture, Observation, Application, Prayer) (A, 71:26).
  • Deepen understanding with Systematic Theology (Wayne Grudem), Epic of Eden (Sandra Richter), and lecture series by Tim Keller/Edmund Clowney.

6. Pushing Through Boredom or Dry Seasons

• Keep Planting Seeds of Faithfulness:
  • “When you keep reading in a wilderness season, you’re planting seeds of faithfulness; you'll reap a harvest.” (B, 58:36)
  • “Consistency beats intensity—more happens in your soul than you think.” (A, 60:39)
  • Change it up—work through new reading plans or study deeply in one book.
• Other Tips:
  • Pray for renewed hunger (“Restore me to the joy of my salvation…” – B, 64:16).
  • Confess sin if you sense a barrier.
  • Experiment with reading, studying, memorizing, meditating, praying, singing Scripture.

7. Instilling a Love for the Bible in Kids

• Modeling Matters:
  • “When they see parents who love the Word and are changed by God’s grace, that’s contagious.” (B, 77:24)
• Habitual Actions:
  • Nightly Bible reading using The Action Bible or age-appropriate versions—make it fun! (different “voices” for characters, etc.)
  • “Anytime your kids are interacting with the Bible, it needs to be fun.” (A, 80:24)
  • Family memorization (Psalm 1 prompted by Dad, 83:13).
  • Dinner routines: No eating till Mom sits, singing the doxology, conversational integration of Scripture.
  • Let kids pick new Bibles and pens for notes (make it an event!).
• Forming Christian Heroes:
  • Read Christian biographies and testimonies to teach kids whom to admire (89:25–91:59).
  • “Kids will imitate whoever they idolize; work to make sure they have the right heroes.” (A, 89:52)
  • Never criticize the church/pastors at home—respect breeds affection for faith.

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Segment: Ranking Bible Translations (93:19–134:02)

Categories Explained (98:06+)

• Word-for-Word: Most literal; best for deep study (ESV, NASB, etc.)
• Thought-for-Thought (“Dynamic Equivalence”): Balanced; easier to read, still fairly accurate (NIV, CSB, NLT).
• Paraphrase: More reimagined, not direct translation (The Message, The Passion Translation).

Detailed Translation Reviews

HOT GARBAGE – Burn Them (93:48–98:06)

• New World Translation (Jehovah’s Witness “Bible”)
  • “Literally corrupted by Satan himself to demean Jesus…they went in and changed all the Bible verses that refer to Jesus as God.” (A, 94:48)
• Book of Mormon / Joseph Smith’s Translation
• Queen James Version: “Terrible, literally sacrilegious.” (A, 97:07)
• New Revised Standard Version, “woke” editions: “Remove stuff about God being father…” (A, 97:08)
• General Rule: If a “translation” fundamentally rewrites basic doctrine—throw it out.

Word-for-Word Translations

• NASB: “A very good word-for-word translation, favored by many scholars and ‘high church’ expositors. Not widely distributed due to a high royalty fee.” (A, 105:15)
• ESV: “My favorite for personal study; strong on New Testament, a little wooden in OT poetry/prophecy. Excellent Study Bible edition available.” (A, 131:54)
  • Recommended study Bibles: MacArthur, ESV Study Bible.
• KJV/NKJV:
  • “Decent but based on much later manuscripts; KJV-Only folks are weird. Also, Elizabethan English can make for unicorns and confusion.” (A, 106:06)
  • “God chose to reveal Scripture in street-level language (Koine Greek), so elevated language may hinder understanding.” (A, 108:03)
  • NKJV (popular with Pentecostals) is a minor update to KJV, but still relies on late manuscripts.

Thought-for-Thought Translations

• NIV: “Most widely read. My go-to for preaching as it’s what most people recognize. 1984 version highly regarded; recent versions incorporate some gender-neutral language.” (A, 113:49)
• NLT: “Hugely readable and highly recommended for new Christians or for daily reading. Not ‘woke’ in any problematic sense.” (A, 119:19)
  • “Great for difficult Old Testament passages or poetry.” (A, 120:42)
• CSB: “Solid Baptist-backed translation blending word-for-word and thought-for-thought.” (A, 128:05)

Paraphrase & Below

• The Message: “Not a translation—one scholar’s paraphrase. Can be helpful in poetry, but chapters/verses don’t line up and it’s not suitable for primary study.” (A, 121:35)
• The Passion Translation: “Not a translation—one guy (Brian Simmons) basically inserted a lot of his own theology; some editions almost 50% longer than the original! Use with extreme caution.” (A, 126:07)

Best Bible for You?

• “Which translation of the Bible is the best? The one you’ll read. It’s not about the book in your lap as much as the posture of your heart.” (A, 134:04)
• “Pick a good word-for-word for study (ESV, NASB), a thought-for-thought for readability (NIV, NLT, CSB), and rotate them year-to-year.” (A, summarized from full segment)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Martin Luther called Satan ‘a dog on a leash.’ I like it.” (A, 09:33)
• “Just because you wrestle with a desire to sin doesn't mean something's wrong. Actually, the fact that you're wrestling…means something is right.” (A, 00:00)
• “Bible reading plans are like diets. Which is best? The one you’ll do.” (A, 44:05)
• “Don’t go digital before you get biblical.” (A, 42:01)
• “If you want your kids to grow up hating the Bible and hating the church, just nitpick your pastor and church at home.” (A, 91:52)
• “What will keep you from understanding the Bible most is not the translation in your lap, but the posture in your heart.” (A, 00:15 & 134:04)
• “When your kids are interacting with the Bible, it needs to be fun.” (A, 80:24)
• “Unicorns in the King James? That’s just how Elizabethan English called wild oxen!” (A, 108:03)
• “At dinner, nobody’s allowed to eat till mom sits down—mom is the queen of the house and we honor mom in this house.” (A, 85:36)
• “Kids imitate who they idolize—give them the right heroes.” (A, 89:52)

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Useful Timestamps

• Temptation & the Devil: 05:07–16:00
• Dominion Theology Deep Dive: 19:03–32:41
• Practical Habits for Bible Reading: 34:01–43:36
• Reading Plan Recommendations: 43:41–53:38
• Bible Study as a Couple/Family: 53:39–58:21
• When Reading Gets Boring: 58:36–65:04
• How to Study the Bible (Tools & Methods): 65:04–75:53
• Raising Kids Who Love Scripture: 77:16–93:19
• Ranking Bible Translations: 93:19–134:02
• Lightning Round: What’s the Best Bible? 134:02–135:30
• Closing Prayer: 135:36

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Resource Recommendations

• Apps: Lakepointe app for daily reading, sermon guides, show notes.
• Study Bibles: ESV Study Bible, MacArthur Study Bible.
• Books:
  • Systematic Theology (Wayne Grudem)
  • Epic of Eden (Sandra Richter)
  • Devotionals: Spurgeon’s Morning & Evening, Note to Self (Joe Thorne)
• Bible Reading Plans: Robert Murray McShane, The Bible Recap (Tara-Leigh Cobble)
• Children’s Bibles: The Action Bible
• Lectures/Podcasts: Preaching Christ in a Postmodern World (Tim Keller/Edmund Clowney)

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Tone & Final Thoughts

Down-to-earth, funny, direct, and passionate about the authority, clarity, and joy of the Bible. This episode is loaded with both deep theology and street-level practical tips–whether you’re a complete beginner, a parent, or a would-be Bible nerd.

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Essential Takeaway:
Your heart posture matters more than your translation—but choose a reputable Bible, build the habit, rotate translations as you grow, and make the Word exciting for your kids. Be wary of corrupted "translations"—and above all, stay under the Bible's authority with joy.

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Transcript

[A]

Just because you wrestle with a desire to sin doesn't mean something's wrong. Actually, the fact that you're wrestling with it means something is right.

[B]

You are being renewed day by day. It's transforming your mind even when you don't feel like it is, because it's like one day you'll wake up and like, oh, I'm a different person.

[A]

What will keep you from understanding the Bible most is not the translation in your lap, but the posture in your heart. Let us kick this pig.

[B]

Let's do it.

[A]

Jana. Welcome to episode 59 of Live Free.

[B]

I'm happy to be here.

[A]

Hey, in the words of me and Carlos Cerazo, let's kick this pig.

[B]

All right, let's do it. Where did you get that from? As long as I've known you, you've.

[A]

Said that it's a rural Kentucky. Actually, we've had listeners say from Kentucky, say that it's not a Kentucky thing.

[B]

Well, maybe in Bowling Green, Kentucky.

[A]

I was gonna say where I grew up, my high school. We said, my friends said, let's kick this pig. Okay.

[B]

Yeah. I wonder. I don't know. I didn't know if it was from a movie or.

[A]

Nope. Okay. Nope. Okay, Jana. Let's talk about the Bible.

[B]

All right. I love it.

[A]

So this is going to be for live free listeners. Welcome to episode 59. We are going to talk all things really practical about the Bible. We're going to talk about what translations are best and what translations you should never, ever have in your house.

[B]

That's right.

[A]

Throw them away and burn them. And by the way, there are translations like that.

[B]

Are you going to burn one today?

[A]

Maybe. I've got. Listen, if they can't see it, I got one right here I would like to burn and I'm going to cover it so they won't know. Going to answer questions like, how do I study the Bible? How do I choose a Bible reading plan? What Bible reading plans are good? Which ones might we avoid? Which translation is best? How do I get, you know, all the things.

[B]

That's great.

[A]

So we're going to get like, super, super practical. It's going be fun.

[B]

Yeah, I'm looking forward to it.

[A]

Really fun. If you are part of Live Free Nation. By the way, man, I think we didn't you say isn't like 400 of these hats we sold now like that?

[B]

That's great.

[A]

Listen, man, we're pushing hats and I'm starting to see. It's funny. I'll get up to preach and I'll look Around the room, I'll be like, there's a live free hat. There's a live free hat. I want to meet that dude in the lobby.

[B]

That's awesome.

[A]

So, first of all, you can help us out by liking commenting, subscribing, sharing. If this is helpful to you, that helps us get word out. That'd be awesome. And then you can grab you a little live free hat at livefree Shop.

[B]

That sounds great. Are we going to give one away today?

[A]

Yeah, I think you should. Hey, well, you. You try that on. Let's see what you look like.

[B]

You know what? I've never tried one of these on. How many of the women wear these? That's what I want to know.

[A]

I think you look amazing.

[B]

You.

[A]

I think Jana looks amazing.

[B]

I think I need one.

[A]

That's your live free hat.

[B]

All right.

[A]

But we are going to get ones that.

[B]

After I put it on.

[A]

That's right, we are. Listen, man, we want to up the live free hat merch. Push. So how about this? I've just unilaterally decided we're giving away 10 live free hats. 10.

[B]

Okay. They were ready for that.

[A]

Sorry, Trinity. We're gonna give away 10 live free hats. So head over to YouTube, and if you'll do this, me and Jana are going on a date night right after this. Yeah, we were just talking about what restaurant we should go to. So do this. Drop in the comment. Your restaurant recommendation. Even if you live in some remote state or country, you can at least tell us what your favorite restaurant is. Yeah, maybe we visit, and then we'll pick 10 of them, and we'll give away 10 live free hats. Sound good?

[B]

Yep.

[A]

Okay, well, Jana, we are in week three at Lake Point of a series that we're just calling bootcamp Training for team Jesus.

[B]

Great way to start the year. It's been so good.

[A]

It has been really good. I've really, really liked it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Jana, we have a ton to get to today, and I want this to move quick. So, Jana, would you stand in for Carlos and say. And you can say, pastor Josh, what didn't make it into the sermon.

[B]

Okay. Pastor Josh, what didn't make it into the sermon.

[A]

By the way, actually, will you tell them? Because sometimes you call me Pastor Josh.

[B]

Yeah, I do.

[A]

When you're talking, if I'm talking about you. Actually, it's interesting. We didn't plan to talk about this. Yeah, tell the circumstances where you actually call me Pastor Josh and why you choose to do that.

[B]

Well, I mean, I think if people are asking me questions about what's going on with church or different things. And I. I'll just say, well, we're asking about you. I'll be like, well, Pastor Josh is. Or whatever. But it's just. I mean, you're my pastor, too, and so you're my husband, but you're also my pastor. So I want to make sure that I'm giving you that respect as my pastor as well. But I think you have something specific in mind that I.

[A]

Well, once upon a time, I noticed you doing it, and you told me that part of the reason was one, because I am your pastor and you want to respect that. But then you were also saying, like, man, I actually want to teach church members, so I need to model for them, like honoring their pastor.

[B]

Yeah, absolutely.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

You're good. You always remember me saying things more than I remember what I said, which can be dangerous.

[A]

That can be dangerous. Okay, let's keep this moving because we got a lot to get to. So, Janet, that's a great question. Let me tell you what didn't make it into the sermon.

[B]

Okay, Please.

[A]

So this week, obviously week three, we were talking about a disciple is a man or woman of prayer and the word, like Jesus, and taught Luke 4, the temptation of Jesus passage. There's a ton here. This is honestly one of the most important events in Jesus life. Three of. I think it's three of the synoptic gospels. Mat, Matthew, Mark, Luke, they all record this, and it's the spot where Jesus is. This is very interesting is immediately after the baptism and filling of the Spirit for Jesus. The Spirit then leads him out into the wilderness. And Jesus prays and fast for 40 days. Satan comes and gives him three temptations. I'm gonna talk about that here in a second. That's theologically significant. And then he moves forward after this moment into his ministry. So this is like the preparation thing. So let me say a few things. First of all, this passage underscores the reality for both Jesus and for us that we have a real enemy. It's not a fake enemy. It's not an enemy that's spiritual but not actual. We have a real enemy. The passage in Luke and some of the other narratives, they'll talk about our enemy and they'll give different names. The Bible calls him Satan. People make fun of me. I say it with a D. Satan.

[B]

I don't think I've ever noticed that.

[A]

Yeah, I don't know why I say it with a D. Satan.

[B]

Yeah, I've never noticed that.

[A]

I do. I say it with a D. Satan.

[B]

Is what Bowling Green thing.

[A]

Yeah, maybe it is, but it comes from the word Satan. It just means adversary, opponent. Also can be translated accuser.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

The book of Revelation calls Satan Satan.

[B]

Good job.

[A]

Thank you. The accuser of the brethren, because what he does is he wants to accuse us and remind us of our sin and try to convince us that we have condemnation. Another title the Bible uses for our enemy is the word devil. It comes from the Greek word diabolos. We obviously have an English word that comes from that. We'll say diabolical. And it means. Again, it means slanderer. It's just very interesting. Bible calls him Lucifer. Lucifer just means morning star. Because original. The Bible very frequently uses star imagery for angels. We talked about this on another pod, C.S. lewis. I don't know if you remember this. C.S. lewis and J.R.R. tolkien both thought that literally the stars are angels in one sense. It's very interesting. We talk about this on a different pod, so I won't go back into it. But Satan was obviously originally an angel that fell, and so calls him Lucifer, a morning star. And then Matthew 4 calls him the tempter. So kind of tells us what our enemy does. This is also interesting. It is interesting to note that the Holy Spirit leads or drives Jesus out to be tempt. And it specifically says to be tempted. Yes.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So this is really interesting. I didn't have time to go into this. The Bible actually makes it really clear that Satan. Satan. That Satan has to. People don't recognize this. He has to ask permission to tempt Christians.

[B]

Yes. Yeah. I mean, definitely reading. When you're reading the Book of Job, that's.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I mean, chapter. Pretty sure it's in chapter one.

[A]

You're correct.

[B]

That's right there.

[A]

Yeah. So there's. So there's three examples of this in the Bible that Satan actually has to request permission, it seems like, to tempt Christians. First of all, you have here in these passages, Luke 4, Matthew 4, where it says the spirit led him to be tempted. So it seems like God's control is even around the temptation. I'm going to read it. Job 1:12 says, the Lord said to Satan. So he requests. He essentially says, hey, this Job guy, when you're blessing him and everything's going well, of course he honors you, but if you take away all this great stuff, he's going to curse you and leave. And then this is really interesting. Job 1:12, the Lord said to Satan, very well, then everything he has is in your power, but on the man himself. Do not Lay a finger. So it's like the Bible is giving us a peek into the throne room of heaven. In some sense that we don't fully understand. Satan literally has to get permission. So Martin Luther called Satan a dog on a leash. I like it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And then in Luke 22, Jesus. Do you know where I'm going with this?

[B]

So, yeah, maybe I'm getting the wrong verse, but where he says, simon, Simon, I have given you to Satan so that he may sift you as wheat. But when you. It says something. But when you return to me, strengthen the brethren. And that was a totally different translation. But the reason I remember that is because I had a season in college where God was just doing a powerful work in me. And, like, honestly, I think it was just like, will you obey when it hurts? And then that I was reading that verse, and it was just like the Holy Spirit just, like, was like, this is what's happening to you right now, but you're gonna be okay. And whenever you like, whenever you get through what you're going through right now, like, I want you to use it as a testimony for, you know, for others. So, yes. Yeah, that was God. Used that powerfully in my own life.

[A]

I'm really impressed. I'm impressed you got that. Cause we didn't talk about this before the pod. Yeah, that's it. It's Luke 22:31, Holy Spirit.

[B]

And it's that together.

[A]

That's right. And that's why I wanted you on the podcast. We're doing all things Bible. Cause you are a Bible worm. You're a Bible now. I love the Bible in a good way. You love? Yep. Luke 22:31. Simon, Simon, Satan is asked to sift all of you. Sift you as wheat. And then Jesus says, but I have prayed for you.

[B]

That's right. That's the most important part.

[A]

Kind of a big deal. Yeah. Jesus says, I have prayed for you. And, man, this. You know, we could keep going on this. A lot of people wonder, like, what is Jesus doing right now? We've talked about before. First John 1 says that he is, in some sense, he's defending us before the Father, who we have an advocate before the Father. But then also, he is interceding for us. He is praying for the sons and daughters of God, that we would resist temptation.

[B]

And he knows what to pray for. So, like, we are in good hands.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So, yeah, there you go. Satan is under God's control. I didn't get that in the message. Also, just like, dude, this is just real practical. The temptation of Jesus. It shows us, this is really important, that especially for Christians with a more sensitive conscience, like Janet Howerton, like me, temptation to sin is not sin. And I do think sometimes Christians who, like, you know, it's like you're a normal person. So it's like Christians have this thing where there's sin in their sin.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Either in their lives or around them. And like, man, I know I shouldn't do this. I know God didn't want me to do this, but I kind of want to do this thing. And when they have that desire, it's like they'll feel guilty around having the desire. It's like, no, man, the thing about temptation is that it is tempting.

[B]

That's right. And then we are told to just resist. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.

[A]

That's right. Well, we know that temptation is not sin because literally, Hebrews 4:15 says about Jesus that he was tempted in every way as we are, but without sin. Okay. So I would just, like, you know, encourage everybody. Just because you wrestle with a desire to sin doesn't mean something's wrong. Actually, the fact that you're wrestling with it means something is right.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

If you didn't have the spirit of God living inside of you, there wouldn't even be a wrestle. So I thought that was interesting. That's good also. Very interesting. And I touched on this in a couple of the services. So the Bible actually gives us, like, a theology of temptation, and it tells us that there are three specific temptations that Satan is like, he's beatable because he's predictable. So first, the book of first John says this. It says, do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love the Father is not in them. This is. This verse 16 is what's really important for everything in the world. And then these three types, you and everybody else are going to experience three types of temptation. Lust of flesh, lust of the eyes, pride of life. Yeah. And so it's like. I think what people got to get is that. Is that it's just like. Well, let me define them. Like, lust of the flesh is the desire to feel. A lot of times people just think they hear lust of flesh. Thinks they think sex. No, no. It's like lust of the flesh is gluttony. Lust of the flesh is drunkenness. It's like any fleshy desire we have. Desire to feel. Lust of the eyes is desire to have. Like, I see that house. I see that car. You know, Covetousness. Yeah, covetousness. Yep. Lust of the eyes is desire to have. Pride of life is desire to be. So what's really interesting is this is where, like, you overlay the Bible on itself and it starts to make sense. First, John says that if you look at the three temptations that Satan throws Jesus in Luke 4, it's those exact same things. So he comes and he goes, hey, if. If you are the son of God, command these stones to become bread. He's like, yeah, you're hungry. So that's obviously lust of the flesh. And then he takes him up onto the high mountain, shows him all the kings from the kingdoms of the world, and he says, hey, if you'll bow down and worship me, I'll give you all these. That's obviously desire to have. Now, I'm going to talk about this in a second, and then we're going to talk all things Bible. How to get your kids to love the Bible, what does it look like in our family? All the things. But this is interesting, Jana, I'll ask you. Have you ever noticed that Satan tells Jesus, if you bow down and worship me, I can give you all the kings of the world? And Jesus does not correct him. In other words, Jesus doesn't say, actually, the kingdoms of the world are not yours to give. So it's sort of like implicitly acknowledges Satan at that time possessed ownership of the kingdoms of the world. I'm gonna talk about why that is in a second. It's called dominion theology. That is really interesting. And I wanna talk about that in a second.

[B]

Yeah, that's good. Yeah, you should.

[A]

Okay, I will. And then. So that's obviously. That's lust of the eyes. And then pride of life is. He goes, hey, if the son of God, he says, throw yourself off the top of the temple, I'm going to command the angels concerning you, and everybody's going to see how amazing you are. And that's pride of life. So here's the big idea that I think everybody needs to get. You know, I like to fish. It's kind of like. There's an old Puritan theologian, I think it was Thomas Brooks, that said that Satan temptation is like the. It's like bait on a hook. And basically he's like a fisherman that's only got three lures. Lust of flesh, lust, last, proud life. And kind of like just what? Just like when I'm fishing, if I go back to Bull, you know, bass pond behind the house, you know, it's like, I'll throw A lure. And then if they're not hitting that lure, well, then I'll just clip it off. And if I was throwing a soft bait Texas rig, a soft bait, and they're not hitting that, then I'll clip it off and I'll throw a top water frog and I hit that. Then I'll clip it off and I'll throw a crankbait or whatever it is. And I think what everybody needs to understand is Satan is exactly like that in your life. He's going to throw whichever one until he figures out what you'll hit on, and then he'll throw it. Once I find out the bass are hitting a soft bait, I'll throw that thing all day and he'll do the same thing for you. And so I think that one question I would encourage every Christian answer this question with a journal is ask yourself the question, if you were Satan, how would you take you out and have an actual answer to that question so that you know what to do? You got any thoughts there? You don't have to.

[B]

Oh, I think that's good advice. It's just like. I mean, he's. He's crafty and, like, you'll watch. He runs the same play every time because it works usually.

[A]

He'll keep going.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Now, obviously, Jesus resists the temptation. Three temptations and three times Jesus resists the temptation by saying, it is written. It is written. It is written. And so which connects to, obviously, Ephesians, chapter, chapter six, the armor of God. We've got one offensive weapon, the sword of the spirit, by which we extinguish, you know, the flaming errors, the evil one. So how do we overcome temptation by the word of God? So that's why we're going to deep dive here in a second on super practical questions about loving, reading, studying the word of God. And then we're going to rank translations, and I'm going to burn one of them.

[B]

All right.

[A]

It's going to be great.

[B]

Were we going to see that?

[A]

No, I'm not really going to. I want to, but I'm going to. Yeah. Now let me do the. Do you have something you're gonna say?

[B]

Just what I was gonna say. What I love about this is Jesus is our example in everything. Like, we want to be like him. And so he gives us examples of how, like, no matter what we come across in our lives, no matter the temptation that comes, we. We have the same ability to do just what Jesus did and, like, refute all of those flaming arrows with the word of God and So it's so important to hide that in our heart. So we have it to.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

To pour back out.

[A]

Well. And you are the master of that, which is why we wanted you on this episode. Okay, now can I answer the theology nerd question?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay. Let me do it.

[B]

I will allow it. Whoa. I listen.

[A]

Yes. Whoa. All right. It is a little weird when I walk into the kitchen and you're listening to Live Free. Yeah.

[B]

I'm like, man, that probably is weird. Like I. You know, having to listen to yourself a lot.

[A]

Yeah, it's weird. Okay, so here's the question. And this. So this passage is super interesting. This passage. It touches on. It's like a meta theme in the Bible. Nobody notices it and it runs all the way from Genesis to Revelation. So let me answer a super theology nerd interesting question. Jana Howerton. Why is it that when Satan tempts Jesus, he offers him all the kingdoms of the world? And instead of Jesus saying, because he says in Luke 4, I'm using the language, he says, for they have been delivered to me. Satan says, the kingdoms of the world have been delivered to me. And Jesus, who the Bible calls King of Kings and Lord of Lords, doesn't say, no, Satan, you're wrong. They belong to me. He does not say that. He seems to implicitly acknowledge that at that time, the kings of the world literally belong to Satan in some sense. So can I explain this?

[B]

Please do.

[A]

Okay, this is really interesting. So this is called dominion theology. Now I'm gonna read the passage. It says this in Luke 4, and the devil took him, Jesus up and showed all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time and said to him, to you. He says, I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. This is interesting. Jesus doesn't correct it. So Jesus doesn't correct him. Number two, the New Testament calls Satan, quote, the God of this world. Number three, the New Testament says, this world is lorded over by the Father of lies. So what the heck's going on? Now? This is gonna take me a second, so just, like, roll with me. And you have to listen to me talk a lot.

[B]

I like listening to you, so it's good.

[A]

You're sweet. All right, this has a. So you gotta back up to the book of Jeremiah. This has a crazy answer and it's going to take me a minute, so just roll here. All right, so the key to understanding this, I think, is if you go back to Jeremiah 32, there's a very interesting. And it's an odd passage about Jeremiah and a guy named Hanamel. Okay, so this is right before Israel goes into captivity in Babylon. Around that time, Israel's in captivity in Babylon. Now, I'm going to read the passage, and it's not gonna make any sense. And then I'm gonna make my way through it. And you'll be like, I can't believe that's in the Bible. Okay, so this is Jeremiah 32, starting at verse 6. Jeremiah said, the word of the Lord came to me. Behold, Hanamel, the son of Shallum. Your uncle will come to you and say, buy my field that is at Anathoth for the. And this is really important. The right of redemption by purchase is yours. Bookmark that. Then verse eight says, then Hanamel, my cousin, came to me in the court of the garden in accordance with the word of the Lord and said to me, buy my field at Anathoth. So basically, what God prophesied would happen is happening. Buy my field that's at Anathoth in the land of Benjamin for the right of inheritance. So this is really important. Bookmark this in your head. Live free nation. It's acknowledged. There's a right of redemption, and then there's a right of inheritance. This is. This is going to blow your mind. And redemption is yours. Buy it for yourself. Do you know where I'm going here? Never mind. Let me keep going. Then I knew that this was the word of the Lord. Now, verse nine. And I bought the field at Anathoth from Hanamel, my cousin, and weighed out the money to him, 17 shekels of silver. I signed the deed, sealed it, got witnesses, and weighed the money on scales. Verse 11. Then I took. Now this is really important. I took the sealed deed. It says of purchase, containing the terms and conditions and the open copy. So in ancient Israel culture, whenever you saw. I'll explain this in a second. There were two copies of a deed, a sealed deed and an open deed. And then verse 12. And I gave the deed of purchase to Baruch the son of Neriah of Mahasiah in the presence of Hannah Mel, my cousin. All right, so here's what's going on. And this. This ties together the whole Bible and takes you all the way to Revelation. And it explains what's going on in Luke 4. So what's going on here? Jeremiah, the prophet's dad, has probably died. One person. Bible study.

[B]

I like it.

[A]

So then the uncle buys the land, seemingly so the family has some money. All right. So now check this out. You've got two deeds. A sealed deed and open deed. Now, in ancient Israelite culture, there was an open deed to any piece of property so that you could sell it, and then you could write somebody's name on it if you sold it to them. So they write Hanamel's name on the open deed if you needed to sell the land for money. The sealed deed in ancient Israelite culture, it always stayed with the original family to prove that it belonged to their bloodline. So obviously, in ancient Israel, there was a lot of like, hey, man, God allotted the portions of the land to the 12 tribes. So the land was allotted. So a tribe or a family had that property, and it was assigned to their bloodline. So bookmark this in your head. Open deed you would give to somebody when they bought the property, but the original owner would keep the sealed deed to prove it was in their bloodline. Okay? Then you also have two rights. You've got an inheritance, the right of inheritance. So what that means is when the uncle would die, Jeremiah gets it back.

[B]

Okay?

[A]

So when the uncle dies, the ownership of the property reverts back to the original family so that it stays in the bloodline. And then you've got a right of redemption. If before the time when the purchaser dies, if somebody in the family wants to buy the land back, that's called the right of redemption. And it would require a quote, kinsman, redeemer. So this is, like, starts, oh, yeah, I see what's going on. A kinsman, redeemer. So somebody from the family. Why am I getting emotional right now? Somebody from the family that originally owned the property could pay a great price to redeem the property the family had lost and bring it back to the original family. Now, all the Bible nerds, all the bells are going off in your head, all right? So this passage, Jeremiah 32, has two meanings. It's got a historical meaning where essentially what God's saying is, hey, you're gonna be taken out of the land to go to Babylon. And he's promising, but this land is gonna belong to you again, it's worth buying property because I'm gonna restore you to the inheritance I originally gave you. You're coming back. So that's the historical meaning, but let's go a layer deeper for our super Bible nerds. All right? The Book of Hebrews says everything that was written in the Old Testament is for our instruction and that it was a type and a shadow of Christ. So Jeremiah 32 is a type and a shadow of Christ. All right, now check this out. This is where it gets nuts. All right? So when you talk about dominion of the earth, and we're asking the question, why in Luke 4 is Jesus tacitly acknowledging that Satan has dominion over the world and that it belongs to him, what the heck? Well, here's what the heck. God is the one who created the world. So dominion of this earth was originally our Father's and it stayed in his family, the Father, the Son and the Spirit. Okay? Then the book of Genesis says he creates Adam and Eve. Theologians will use the phrase that they were the vice regents of creation. And if you go back and read Genesis, it literally, he gives them what's called a dominion mandate. He gives them, the Bible says, dominion over the Earth, to work it and to keep it. So God has original dominion. He passes dominion of Earth to Adam and Eve when he passed it. Now, I'm coming back to this. You may like, what's he talking about? I'm coming back to this. He passes dominion to them, but God keeps the sealed deed because the world, it's good and all that is in it belongs to our Father. Now, Adam and Eve, they lost dominion. When they sinned and obeyed the serpent, they lost that dominion. And dominion was transferred from Adam and Eve, delegated dominion to Satan himself. This is why, by the way, in Matthew 4 and Luke 4, Satan can correctly say, all the kingdoms of this world have been delivered to me. And Jesus does not correct the statement. Now check this out. So what's going on here? So Jesus is the firstborn son of the family, of the original bloodline of the owner of everything in the world, okay? When Jesus comes on this earth, who is it that has. Listen, remember, there's a right of redemption and a right of inheritance. Who has the right of inheritance? That's Jesus.

[B]

Kinsman, redeemer, the kinsman, okay?

[A]

But he decides to exercise his right of redemption and buy back dominion of the world when he goes to the cross. And Jesus, when he goes to the cross, what he's doing is he's paying the right of redemption. He's paying the redemption price to purchase back the land, the property that was lost by our Father and bring back authority and dominion to the original family. Now this is. You go a layer deeper and this is where it gets nuts. If you go read Revelation chapter 5, everybody's gathered in Revelation 5. And then there's a scroll and it's a double sided scroll, okay? Now whenever there was a closed deed, okay, there's a sealed deed and an Open deed, a closed deed was a sealed scroll. And it was a double sided scroll inside and out in ancient Israelite culture. Double sided scroll. Then you get to Revelation 5 and this is nuts. Revelation 5 is like, there's this. All of heaven is gathered. And you remember what they're crying out. They're going, man, there's a sealed scroll and they're crying out, who is worthy to take the scroll and to break its seal? And then they say, you have redeemed us back to God. And whenever they're going, who's worthy to take the scroll and break its seal? And then everybody goes, the lamb who was slain is the only one that was found worthy. Oh, my God.

[B]

So good.

[A]

That's so good to open the scroll. And what's happening in Revelation chapter five is you're getting a vision behind the scenes in the spiritual realm, that the Kinsman Redeemer of dominion over all the world is stepping forward. He's saying, I am exercising my right of redemption to buy back what was lost. And he pays the redemption price as the Kinsman Redeemer with his own blood. And he purchases back dominion of heaven and earth. Which is why after Jesus is resurrected, it's only after Jesus is resurrected, he's resurrected. And then in Matthew 28, when he gives the great commission, he then says, for the first time now, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Why? Because the Kinsman Redeemer has now exercised his right of redemption. Dominion has been given back to him. Now I'll take it a layer deeper. When Jesus turns to the disciples, he says, I'm gonna give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven. Whatever you loose on earth will be bound in heaven. And then the New Testament says that Christians will, quote, reign with him. And what that is foreshadowing is, is that Jesus purchases back the dominion of all the earth. And then for the new sons and daughters of God, for Christians who have been adopted into his family, he goes, I'm now giving you dominion. And I want you to go make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything I've commanded to you. So listen, dude, you take the Bible, you pull on the thread and listen, you pull it all. Here, let me just recap it. And then you say, I want you to add any color you got. So what you got right here is, here's how the Bible works. Dominions was originally God's at creation. He gives it. He gives delegated dominion to Adam and Eve. They lose that dominion to Satan. Jesus breaks the back of the enemy. He, as a kinsman, redeemer, exercises his right of redemption at the cross, pays the price, buys back dominion over the earth, and then he now shares dominion and will end all of eternity with all of the sons and daughters of God who reign with him. That's amazing. That's amazing.

[B]

That's amazing. So that didn't make it in.

[A]

That didn't make it into the sermon.

[B]

Oh, see, that. That's why you need this podcast.

[A]

I know it is.

[B]

It is too good not to share.

[A]

It's amazing.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

All right, now. All right. Let's start talking about the Bible.

[B]

I'd love to.

[A]

So what Jesus does in this passage is three times he's tempted. He defeats the temptation of the enemy.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Three times, saying, it is written. It is written. It is written. And what the Bible says is that the Bible itself, that's our weapon to overcome the enemy and defeat temptation. So here's what we're going to do. We're about to rapid fire. Less rapid fire. We want to help listeners become men and women of the Word. And people got a ton of questions about how do I study the Bible? How do I read the Bible? What do I do when I get bored with the Bible? Yeah, translations, all the things. Let's rapid fire these things and answer some super practical questions. So I think people submitted, like, I think between a few different platforms, it was like, 800 different questions.

[B]

Oh, my goodness.

[A]

And we boiled them down.

[B]

That's a lot.

[A]

So let's do this. I'm going to rapid fire you some of these questions, and then let's talk about this. And then we're going to rank. We're going to rank Bible translations, and it's going to be awesome.

[B]

All right.

[A]

Okay. So, Jana, let's begin right here. Question number one. Okay. I've never been a regular Bible reader before. Somebody says, what tips do you have for building this habit?

[B]

Yeah. So I think the first thing that I would tell you is, like, don't wait. Like, don't. Like, I hear so many people, they talk about, like, oh, I'm just in a really busy season, or, like, I have this going on. I have young kids, or, you know, I'm taking care of aging parents or I'm starting a new job. Like, just don't wait. Don't wait for tomorrow, because you know what you're gonna have, like, the next season is gonna Be just as busy as this season. So first, I would tell you, don't wait. Like, start now. And, like, I just. It makes me think about Matthew 6:33. So Jesus tells us to seek first the kingdom, and then everything else will be added to us. So that's, like, for me, that's just kind of been. I'm not telling you you have to do your time in the Word, like, first thing in the morning. Because I think some people, they need to do it at a different time. But it's just. I've always thought of it as first fruits. I want to give God my best in my first fruits. And so I want to get up, and I want to meet with him in the morning. And so, like, practically speaking, it's just like, kind of you. You set your intention, and then you do it.

[A]

So.

[B]

So that may mean going to bed earlier so you can wake up to be able to be in the Word and to be awake and all of that. So I would just say, like, start there, set the intention, and something that I pray. Cause Josh knows this. I really don't like to wake up. I don't. I mean, I want to wake up. I just. You know, I just.

[A]

Now I'm gonna defend you really quick because you like to sleep. But, like, no joke, you might be the hardest working person I've ever met. And that alarm clock is going off early every day so that you've got time in the Word before the kids get up.

[B]

Yes, yes. So one thing I've done, and this is. I mean, God just. He always blows my mind. Just. He's so kind and so generous. But, like, I will know, like, okay, if I'm going to bed a little later than I should, and I'm gonna have a hard time, I'm. God, please, please make me get up. Wake me up tomorrow so I can meet with you. And he answers that prayer every time. And sometimes I'm a little disobedient and I might sleep a little bit longer, but he always. He always answers that prayer. So if that is something that you need to use to help you, that is just something. I don't even know where that came from. I just started doing that, I think, whenever I was a new believer. And God just kept answering it, and I just keep praying it. So. So. And then, you know, praying for the ability to focus first thing in the morning. But, like, one thing I want to say is, like, if reading the Bible's new to you, like, start small so.

[A]

You don't strongly agree.

[B]

Have to be Reading the full like five chapters a day. If you're trying to read through the Bible in a year, start small and don't despise small beginnings. Like, it's just God's going to continue to grow you and you are going to be just so shocked at how much you learn about him and how much more you fall in love with him and love scriptures just by starting small. So anything, anytime you start a new habit, like starting small is going to keep you moving forward with that. So like what we tell people, and Felicity, our 11 year old, she's like, where do I start and how much do I read? And we're like, well, you know, with you, while you're developing like a new daily habit on your own, just start with one chapter a day. And so like start there. And then I would also tell you like the first thing in the morning, don't, when you wake up, don't check social media, don't open your phone, don't do anything else before you get time in God's word, because that is just a way to sidetrack you. Or you start reading those emails or checking your text messages and you're just kind of sidelined, side. Sidetracked. So, so I would just, for me, it's a do it first sort of thing. I want my day, my time with the Lord first. And then another thing that I've learned over the years, especially like if you're someone, you just, I don't know how to phrase this, but like, I don't know if you, you're just like, oh, no, I, I can't, I can't miss a chapter, I can't miss a day. And then you miss one. And then, oh, what happens? Like then the next day you miss a day and then before you know it, you're just like, I don't know.

[A]

You'Re like, oh, I can't, I don't.

[B]

Even know where to start.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

Yeah. So what I would tell you, yeah, it is just go back to your reading plan if you have one. And we're gonna talk about that here in a minute.

[A]

Yeah, that's right.

[B]

And then just go to the day that you would be on and start there and then just keep moving forward because then you're never, you may have missed a few chapters, but it's better than just feeling like, well, I can't go back to it, dude.

[A]

Can I, can I say something about, about being a mom and then something that I think moms especially struggle with.

[B]

Yeah, yeah.

[A]

So, so you Hear you in the lobby. Sometimes we'll get this like, oh, man, I want to get in the word, but my. My kids. I can't do it. My kids are up. And. And so I'll say something that's got a bit of an edge to it, and then let me just kind of. We can talk about it. Yeah. We made a decision. And by the way, we are not perfect parents. My gosh, are you crazy? That's. We're failing forward. We made a decision early on that our kids were going to revolve around our lives. Our lives were not going to revolve around our kids. We actually. If you. If you build your entire life revolving around what your kids want and what your kids naturally do, it's actually bad discipleship because you're teaching them. You're the most important thing in the world.

[B]

You are God.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

You know, that's what you're like the little flu. What's your teaching room?

[A]

So, honestly, like, we. With all three of our kids, we were big on sleep schedules.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

We established firm. And I'm gonna say everybody's gotta do this. I'm saying this is what worked for us. We established a firm schedule. We disciplined our kids not to break that schedule. And part of that. Well, give me just a second and I'll get there. And then part of that was, like, all three of our kids, from very early age, they knew you can't come out of your room before 8am and very frankly, the reason for that was, I tell you all the time, actually, what's the number one thing?

[B]

You've got to put the oxygen mask on first. Yes.

[A]

That's like number one thing.

[B]

And sometimes you need to be reminded of that.

[A]

Let me explain that real quick because, Jana, your work ethic is insane. You're kind and like, you know, homemakers. That is a full time and a half job. Like, to. To run. To run an elite home is a full time and a half job. So you'll kind of work yourself into a, you know, not a. What's the right way? You kind of run yourself down. Just work, work, work, work. And what I'll say is, hey, babe, you got to get that oxygen mask on. Oxygen mask. I go on mama first. Because if mama's not good.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You're setting the tone, temperature, and vibe of the house. And if you're stressed out and you're worn down and you're frustrated, you're angry, guess what the house gonna feel like. And so what we've learned is we have to, like, sleep schedule. How do the kids work? We have to teach you and discipline you as kids so that your schedule allows us to get our time in the Word with our Father first so that we can walk out, you know, with refreshed spirits to share.

[B]

That's right. Cause you have to have something to pour out. Like, you're not going to just naturally have that. You need to be getting into the Word and not just getting in the Word, letting it get into you so you have something to pour out and be able to love like Jesus the rest of the day.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Let me go to the. Let me say one last thing. Go to the next question. I'll emphasize what you said and I. Listen, man, this is. I'm going to confess some sin. I've fallen in a bad habit on this. But don't go digital before you get biblical. Yeah, that's like, been a rule for me, and then I've been breaking that rule lately. But don't go digital before you get biblical. When. When Jesus in one of the parables says Satan tries to steal the seed. Honestly, man, he doesn't. He steals it. With this. You start checking notifications and social media and everything. And yeah, so I would say that give God the first. Choose a time, choose a place, choose a plan, and work it.

[B]

Can I add, like, there are two other things that I wanted to add to that. So one of them, because I don't know if it was that question or another one, was saying I get distracted, my mind wanders. So if you're in that situation, just have a piece of paper next to you. And so it's like, if you're thinking about your to do list, write it down. And then that way you're not going to forget and you get back to reading. And if something else, write it down and get back to it.

[A]

That's a great hack. So I'll do that. I keep a pen. And by the way, don't. I've learned this by failing. Don't keep your phone next to you. And it's like, oh, if I think of something, I'll put it in my to do list. My phone? No, no, because you're going to open your phone, you're going to see notifications, and then you're gone. So I keep my journal next to me, and then I do it in the back page. If something pops in my head, I write it down there on a physical thing.

[B]

Yeah, that's great. That's so helpful.

[A]

Okay, question number two.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Janice Somebody asked, okay, Bible reading plan.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

When I'm picking a Bible reading plan, which one should I do? Which ones are good? Which ones? Where do I start?

[B]

And I mean starting with that is just like pick the one you'll actually do. Don't, don't pick one that is 20 chapters in every day. You know, something like that. Pick the one that you will do. So like honestly on, do we have a picture?

[A]

Yeah, let me show it real quick. So I'll jump in. So I really want to highlight. People will often ask us in the lobby, what's the best Bible reading plan? And we have a go to response is we say that Bible reading plans are like diets. What's the best diet? The one you'll do. What's the best Bible reading plan? The one you'll do.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

So a bite size Bible reading plan that you'll do is better than like a Bible scholar reading plan that you're going to do for two days, get worn out and not do. So here's what we've done at Lake Pointe is On the new LakePoint app, I'm going to show people how to do this. We are all in on getting people into the word of God. So here's what this is, is one chapter per day. And now in the Lake Point app, we load a one chapter Bible reading plan per day that aligns with the sermon that was preached that week. So we're trying to stack it so that you can listen to the sermon, you can listen to the Deeper Drive live free podcast. And then one chapter per day, there's a chapter of the Bible that relates to what I just preached. And that way it's like, man, we're just driving it down. So I want to show people where this is. By the way, what's the action step for them to get the LakePoint app? Text app? Yeah, you can text the Word app to the number 20411. You can get the LakePoint app. And then in the LakePoint app are all the sermons, all the live free podcasts, and all the corresponding disciple guides and Bible reading plans. So check this out. If you open the LakePoint app, this is what you're going to see. Now don't change it yet. Trinity. You'll see at the very bottom, bottom, middle, that icon that says daily. If you click on daily, this is what you're going to see. Go to the next one. You're going to see this thing. And this is all the spiritual rhythms to help you grow as a disciple. Now you see right There where it says read today's scripture and use the prompts to observe, apply it to your life and pray. If you click on that, click that real quick. Trinity. If you click on that, that's going to take you to that day's one chapter that relates to the sermon that was preached. And it's just one chapter.

[B]

That's great.

[A]

So it's one chapter per day. So for instance, I just finished preaching on baptism in water and the Spirit. Romans 6 is largely a theology of baptism. So our Bible teaching team at Lake Point, they intentionally chose that because like, oh man, he just preached on that. Let me go a layer deeper. So it's right there. Literally every single day there's one chapter waiting on you to take you deeper into the Word. And you can do that.

[B]

I love that. And I think that's a great place to get started. It's one chapter a day. And then your hunger and appetite for the Word is going to grow and grow and grow and then before you know it, you'll be reading through the Bible in a year.

[A]

Okay, I'm gonna say a couple things on Bible reading plans. Is that good?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So there are. If you're not. If you wanna. That's a chapter per day if somebody wants to like up their game.

[B]

Right.

[A]

There's two that I would recommend that I've done. There's a. It's called The Robert Murray McShane Bible Reading Plan. I did that for years and years. He was a. I think he was a. I think he was Scottish.

[B]

I'm not sure.

[A]

I don't think so. Well, he put together a Bible reading plan for his congregants and it's amazing. And It's a. The one year Robert Murray McShane Bible reading plan usually comes out to about five chapters a day.

[B]

I think so. Yeah.

[A]

I usually do the Robert Murray McShane Bible Reading Plan in two years. But there's that one. The thing that I like about The Robert Murray McShane Reading Plan is every single day there's Old Testament and New Testament. And I think he constructed it this way on purpose. He will stack like you'll read the Old Testament passage. And then I think he intentionally did some things to align New Testament passages that shed light on the Old Testament passage from the same day. So that Bible reading plan is more theological. Whereas the other Bible reading plan that you and me have both done, that's Tara Leigh Cobble's Bible recap. That one's not as much. The sequence of the chapters aren't Aligned theological. They're aligned chronological. So let me explain something for people who are new to the Bible. By the way, shout out Tara Leigh Cobble. Tara Lee is a friend of ours. We've been texting lately, and we're big fans of Tara Lee. But dadgum it, we can't. We've only beat her on the dadgum religion and spirituality podcast rankings once. Really only one with tremendous. She's tough to beat.

[B]

It's great.

[A]

She's tough to be. The Bible Recap is a chronological Bible reading plan. So a lot of people don't know this. They're new to the Bible. The way that your normal Bible. Oh, shoot. Sorry, guys. The way that your normal Bible is arranged, it's not arranged by timeline, it's arranged by literary genre. So you start in the Old Testament and Genesis. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1st and 2nd Samuel, 1 and 2 kings, 1st and 2nd Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther. Yeah, up to Esther. So Genesis through Esther are the literary genre of history. Then you get Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon. Those are the literary genre. That's the wisdom literature. Then you get Isaiah, Jeremiah. Lamentations is a cheat because Jeremiah wrote Lamentations also. But Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, those are the major prophets. And then all the rest of them, Hosea, Jolamis, Obadiah, all the way through Malachi. Those are the minor prophets. So when you're opening your Bible, if you just start reading and you think you're reading things in order, you're not. They're arranged by literary genre, not timeline. What I like about the Bible Recap is it's a chronological reading plan. So what she does is you'll be reading in second, let's say, let's say first or second Samuel, and you're reading about David. And then I like it because you'll read a couple chapters about what happened, and then she'll, on that day, put the psalm in the Bible reading plan that corresponds that David wrote about the events you just read. And it's. Honestly, I had never done a chronological reading plan before two years ago, and I really liked it. So what I would say is just you can either do a more theologically structured Bible reading plan, like Robert Murray McShane, or you can do a chronologically oriented Bible reading plan like Bible Recap, which you can find on the Bible app youversion, Bible applied. And those are good, too. Any other thoughts here?

[B]

Yeah, I mean, they're. You can just search for just Bible reading plans, because they're just. There's so many more. Because there you can do an Old Testament chapter, a New Testament chapter with psalms and proverbs. Like, there's just all kinds of. Just different mixtures with different names, but chronological. I started. Actually, I started doing that before Bible recap came out. I would just be. What I would do is at the beginning of the year, print out my chronological reading. And it really was just like I could read and see new things in scripture that I never saw before because I was like, oh, that Whenever you're talking about psalms going between different chapters, because that scripture, the. Be still and know that I am God. Okay. You think when you read that, it's just kind of like, well, that's a sweet scripture. But no, they were in the middle of war and they're being told this, and it's how just to wait upon the Lord. And it just like opens your. Your eyes and your mind to new things, to understanding what they were exactly going through in that moment when that was written.

[A]

But what's interesting is you wouldn't know that unless you were doing a chronological Bible reading plan and somebody told you.

[B]

Exactly. Well. Well, yeah, you're reading it, and as you're reading it, you're seeing it.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

Is what I'm.

[A]

Yeah, you also get. Here's another place where chronological comes in handy. Cause I just finished this part. You'll be reading Acts. This is where another one's super helpful. You'll be reading Acts, and you'll read. And then you're going through Acts. And then she'll interject, oh, this is when he wrote Colossians. So you'll read through that part of Acts, and then you'll go read Colossians. And all of a sudden things are firing in your head because you're like, oh, that's why he said that this was just happening in Acts. And that's what just happened to him. And that's why he wrote this in Colossians. And it just kind of comes off the page. But here's the big idea is which one's the best Bible reading plan? The one you'll do. Now, Jana, this is a question we've gotten a lot. Here's another question somebody asked. They asked the question, do you and Josh study the Bible together? And I think people's. Our response to this might suppress people. So, Jana, let me ask you, do you and Josh study the Bible together?

[B]

No.

[A]

Nope.

[B]

We don't.

[A]

We don't.

[B]

But here's what we do. Okay. We will. I will tell you what we do. So, like, before bed. So we'll either pray together or Charles Spurgeon has this devotional. It's mornings and evenings and just morning and evening.

[A]

If somebody searches it.

[B]

Morning and evening. Okay, go ahead.

[A]

Well, can you guys make sure this right here is in the. The study guide. Yep. The show notes. That's great.

[B]

So, and then we'll read, like, just whatever that day, whatever, you know, the day is. Then we'll read the morning or the evening devotional for that and maybe pray and head to bed. But we do have a rule about that. I never bring it up. I never ask Josh to do it. And then actually. And then I'm always very enthusiastic if he says, this is what we're doing. So he never feels badgered. And because he never feels badgered, he does it more often. So. Hear that, ladies like that. You know, whenever you're not badgering, then it, you know, it's encouraging to do it more often, I think.

[A]

Before you say anything else, let me like, to husbands and wives, let me talk about why we do it this way. So a lot of times, overly spiritual but underly mature women, the thing you'll hear is like, oh, my husband is just not a spiritual leader. He's not a spiritual leader. And they're, like, expecting, like, their husband to sit down and do a big family devotion and, you know, sing some hymns and everything. It's just like this. A, that might not be sustainable. B, it might feel ridiculous. It just might not fit. So the reason. So let me just help our guys out and talk about this real quick. This is so easy. If you're a dude. That's like, man, I want to start leading my family spiritually. I'm not going to do a Bible study with my family. I'm learning Bible myself. The Charles Spurgeon morning and evening. Those devotions, they're literally. How long do you think it takes me to read one?

[B]

Less than five minutes. I mean, three minutes.

[A]

It's like right before we go to bed, I'll just be like, hey, babe, do one. I'll open it up. It literally takes three minutes to read one. And what it does is it makes sure that we both. We fall asleep with the promises of God fresh on our hearts. And if you're a dude, and it's like, dude, I don't know my Bible that well. And my wife's more spiritual than me. She knows her Bible. You can open a Kindle app and read a three minute Devotional. It's fine. Now, the reason that our. That our rule is. And you came up with a rule that you never asked for it is if the wife is pressuring or badgering the husband to do it because she thinks she's trying to get him to spiritually lead, that's literally the exact opposite thing that's happening. You're emasculating him. And actually, you're the one that's trying to take leadership, you know, and the Bible says that a nagging wife is like waterboarding torture. And so don't do that.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, it goes better. It goes better. But there are. I mean, do you have anything else for that part? Because I was gonna say there are other ways that you lead our family and go for it. Okay, So I don't really know what question this falls under, but just things that we've done to help our kids, like, love the word.

[A]

Oh, hang on, we're coming back to that.

[B]

Come back to that.

[A]

Okay, yeah, we're coming back to that. So I would say if on this one, if you're a family, that's like, okay, you know, me and my wife, we want to grow together in this. I'd say do this. Do the thing where it's like, first of all, going to bed at the same time is a marriage cheat code in like seven different ways. I recommend it strongly. But then two, I recommend this. Just do the thing where it's like right before bed or you fall asleep, grab her hand. And then I recommend one of these three because they're short. I don't want to. Very frankly, I'm a normal guy. I don't want to read you a 17 minute devotion before bed. You know, I want a quick Charles Spurgeon morning and evening. There's an old one called Note to Self by Joe Thorne.

[B]

That one was so good. We've done that like, a couple different times.

[A]

And then, I'll be honest, a lot of people like this one. It's not my thing, but I'm just going to say it because a lot of people do like it. Oswald Chambers. My utmost for his highest. It's not my thing. I don't know why. It's never really resonated with me. A lot of people love it. But one of those three.

[B]

Yeah, that's great.

[A]

All right, let me do the next one. Another question that people asked is, what do you do when Bible reading gets boring? You feel like you're stuck in a rut, you're in a dry season, and you're not Getting anything out of it.

[B]

Yeah. Well, one, I want to encourage you because you, when you continue on, when you're in that season, and sometimes those wilderness seasons last longer than you want them to, to be honest. But you are planting seeds of faithfulness. The Lord just like put that into my heart one day. That like whenever you're continuing to do it and it's, it is a wilderness season, you're, that's what you're doing. You're planting seeds of faithfulness and you are going to reap a harvest. So you just, you don't grow weary, you just keep going. But if you're in that season, there, there are three things that I. One, change it up. So if, hey, if what you're doing is not working, change it up. So sometimes what I'll do, I will take a break from reading through the Bible in a year and I will focus on just studying certain books of the Bible. And that has been so fruitful. I really love it. I will grab out a commentary and kind of study slowly along with it.

[A]

How long did you do Isaiah?

[B]

Oh, it took me like I don't month. I did it really slow, but I'm thinking, I don't know if it was somewhere between three to six months.

[A]

That's what I thought.

[B]

And then I moved on to Jeremiah and studied through that afterwards and I loved it. I mean, I love the book of Isaiah so much.

[A]

You know what they call, they call Isaiah the Romans of the Old Testament.

[B]

Oh, no, I didn't know that.

[A]

Yeah, but it's because it's like essentially virtually every major doctrine is in it. Yeah. Gets hit in the book of Isaiah.

[B]

It's just so good. Every time I read it, it just penetrates my heart so deep. I love it. So that's what I would do. Just change it up somehow or try a different reading plan or you know, add something different in. I know you do some, some different things when you're.

[A]

So what I would say on this, first of all, like, dude, if you're like, man, some people start reading the Bible and then either it's boring, their NSC's not getting anything out of it and they think something's wrong with them. Nothing's wrong with you. You're human. It's like this side of glory that's going to happen to us. So a couple things I would say is, number one, consistency always beats intensity. It's just like lifting weights and exercising. Like, hey, which one's better? You? Once every three weeks, getting in there and like doing a two hour insane workout or you doing a 40 minute workout five days a week. Which one's gonna be better? 40 minute workout, five days a week. Over time. Consistency always beats into intensity. So what I would say to that person is there's more happening in your soul than you think that there is just from you being in it day by day. Yes, I'd say that you're gonna say something.

[B]

Well, there's something to that because it is. You are being renewed day by day. And so it's transforming your mind even when you don't feel like it is. Because it's like one day you'll wake up and like, oh, I'm a different person.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

I didn't respond to that the way I used to or I, I don't even want to do that. You know, like just, you're just different. You're new. God's making you new.

[A]

The other thing I would say, I'm gonna say two other things. If it's like your mind's wandering, you're getting bored, read with a pen in your hand. So, like, this helps me. I never, you know, I wish you probably can't see it, but like, you know, I'm never reading. Yeah, you can't see it. I'm never reading without just constantly, every page, you know, a pen in my hand. And that kind of keeps my brain attached to what's happening. And I'm writing in my margin sometimes I'm writing prayers, I'm always writing, oh, I notice this, that kind of thing. And then the other thing I'd say is change of place, change of pace, change of perspective.

[B]

That's good.

[A]

So there's a ton of different ways to interact with the Bible. You alluded to this. You can read the Bible, you can study the Bible, you can memorize the Bible, you can meditate on the Bible, you can pray the Bible, you can sing the Bible, you can teach the Bible. All three. Sorry, all six of those or seven of those. Those are all ways to get the Word into your soul. So what I'll do, and I'd like to hear how you approach this because you do some things here. If I'm like stuck in a Bible reading plan, I'm like, man, this is honestly, she's not doing it for me. I'll just switch which way I'm interacting with the Word. It's like, you know, in the warm months, a lot of mornings, I'm going to go out and what am I going to do?

[B]

You're going to have some Scripture with you and be meditating, memorizing it and walking.

[A]

That's right. When the warm months, I'm going to go out and take a walk.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And a lot of times that's where like I'll choose six verses and memorize them over the course of a week.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And I'll just take my 30 minute walk and I'm quoting it out loud to myself and just working on memorizing it. And then every time I hop in the car, I'm working on the verses. A lot of times my iPhone lock screen is whatever passage I'm trying to memorize. That's good. I'll meditate on the word. Sometimes I'm singing it you same thing when you get in a rut. Okay. I'm gonna sweat. Instead of reading it, I'm gonna study it. I'm gonna pick one book and deep dive it. But I would say if you get stuck, just switch it up.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Anything else there?

[B]

No shame there. Okay. Two other things that I would hit on because, you know, everybody's in a different situation place. But I always pray when I'm in that place, like, lord, restore me to the joy of my salvation and just asking for that heart to hunger and thirst after him. So I pray about that. And then also it's like I'm just asking myself, do I have any unconfessed sin that I need to confess to the Lord repent of to make sure that I'm not hindering being able to hear him. So. So I do that as well.

[A]

Amen. Golly. I'm trying to decide whether or not I should talk about how to do the different ways to interact with the Bible.

[B]

Like going through each one of those or.

[A]

Yeah, let me not do that. There's a lot there. Okay. All right, let's go to the next one. Another one that a lot of people asked is how do you study the Bible? So, okay, man, you know, you know, they just heard you talk about, you chose to deep dive Isaiah and Jeremiah. A lot of people asking the question, man, I hear, man, when Josh is teaching, he gets things out of there I never would have noticed. And that, that, that's amazing. How do you guys get that stuff? How do you study the Bible? So, thoughts?

[B]

Yeah, I'd love to hear honestly, what, what you do and how you, you get so many details. And I'm like, oh, I wish I knew, I knew that. But yeah, for me, as far as studying goes also, I, I do keep an ESV study Bible with me. And so it's like, okay, when I'm reading and I'm like, oh, I don't. Really, I don't. That's a little unclear to me. I will open that study Bible to try to see what the, the commentary says inside of that to help or, you know, if I'm, like I said, deeper diving into certain books of the Bible, I'll have a commentary that I'm just studying along with it. But you have to remember, commentary is it's not God breathed.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

It's written by fallible men who, or, or maybe there are women who write them too. I'm not sure. But it's possible they've made a mistake or a misinterpretation or something. So just keep that in mind and allow the Holy Spirit to speak to you.

[A]

Yes. So, okay, how do you study the Bible? First of all, for me personally, this has been probably the best way to interact with the Bible for me. And it is a bit of a cheat code. But because like I'm a, you know, I'm a professional Christian, like they, that I get paid to study the Bible. A few things here. One, one, I think step one is putting you and your family under good Bible teaching and preaching. So what church you choose, I'm talking to the dads and the husbands in particular because God has chosen you to lead your family. You picking a Bible preaching church that loves the Word, teaches the Word and gets into the Word and helps you get into the Word is a stinking big deal. So number one, put yourself under good Bible teaching and then soak yourself in it. Number two, I'll just shoot you really straight. How do you study the Bible? That's why we do live free every single week. What we're trying to do is this is Bible study. We're trying to, for an hour and a half, we're trying to, to take you deep into the word Bible study. Let me say a few things that I've learned have been helpful to me.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And some people. So first of all, good commentary, having a good commentary, if you want one that's like just generally it's a win either. The John MacArthur whole Bibles, he's got a whole Bible commentary. It's great. You can get on Kindle that way you're not carrying around like a, a tome is fantastic. And then he's got a commentary I think for every single book of the Bible. So there's, listen, there's great commentaries on all the books. But if you want like, you know, it's going to Be good. It's solid. The MacArthur commentary is great. Jan already mentioned this. A good study Bible is great. I'm going to talk about this in a second. My favorite study Bible is the ESV study Bible. So you can grab one of those. Another thing I would say that a lot of people miss, pay attention to the footnotes in your Bible. So if you're like you're studying footnotes are when you see that little number or you see a little letter, the letters, the way that Bibles are printed and published, especially the ones that have letters, they're called cross reference footnotes. When you see the letters, what the scholars who helped put that translation together are doing is those letters are pointing you to other passages that are connected to that passage. So honestly, a lot of people, when they'll hear me, just like I did in this podcast, the Dominion Theology thing, Satan said kingdoms of this world. A lot of times you'll see a little letter right there and it'll point you to the passage where this says that he's the God of this world or that this whole world is Lord by the Father alive. And it'll help you make mental connections you wouldn't have otherwise made.

[B]

That's great.

[A]

Let me say a couple other quick things here. This one some people may disagree with. I'm just telling you how it's working for me. Honestly, when I'm reading a passage, especially in the Old Testament or historical passages, I will get out. I'm using Grok Heavy right now. I'm a GROK subscriber. That's AI. And what I'll do is I'll put in the prompt, think like a conservative evangelical Bible scholar, and then I'll ask it questions about the passage. So if it says, for instance, that I'm in, you know, let's say I'm in first and Second Samuel, and it says, David went from here to here. A lot of times I'm just curious. I'm like, oh, I wonder how far that was. And I'll literally just ask, grotesque how, you know, think like a conservative evangelical Bible scholar. How far is it from this city to this city? Now what I've learned is you got to double check it.

[B]

I was going to ask about that.

[A]

Yeah, you got to double check it. It's getting good enough where it's almost always right, but you got to double check it. And I don't trust the future of where that stuff is going yet. So just watch out. But you can ask questions like I did. I got curious before this podcast and I asked it the question, think like a conservative evangelical Bible scholar. Why did Satan say that he could deliver Jesus? All the kings of the world. And it got the answer right.

[B]

Okay, well, that's good.

[A]

So you can do that, but double check it. A couple other things I would say is a good Bible study method is the SOAP method.

[B]

I hadn't heard of that until you told me about it.

[A]

This is what Jeff Carlisle, my youth pastor, taught me growing up. He's the guy that set us up on a blind date. Shout out, Jeff. Marybeth.

[B]

So thankful.

[A]

The SOAP method is soap. It's an acronym. Scripture Observation Application. Prayer soap. S O, A P. So a scripture. You just pick a short Bible passage and basically you just like. What they say is write it out in your own hand, take a bunch of notes, ask questions. Like, you know, just look at it. So get some Scripture in front of you. Observation is when you just start asking questions. Who, what, when, where, why? How?

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And you just. And then with a pen in your hand, you just start making observations about the passage. Application is. Then you move to like, okay, God, what are you saying to me to do? Think, feel, obey. And then you get to, I need to apply the Word. Be ye doers of the word and not hears only. And then finally you end with prayer. All right, God, you've showed me this, man. Lord, I'm praying this into my life today. I'm praying this over my kids today. You know, that kind of thing. S O A P. Last thing I would say here is, and let me show this. I'm talking to everybody. But I especially want to talk to the dads. I've done this one other time before. There's a few books that I'd just be like, have every Christian family ought to have one of these in the house. Get you one of these guys. That's Systematic Theology by Wayne Grudem. This is not the type of book. I mean, this thing's like 1600 pages, 1400 pages. That's not the type of book you're going to sit down and read, like just cover to cover, chapter by chapter. I did that when I was in seminary. But that's the type of book who. Like when you got a question about the Holy Spirit or salvation or hell, it's nice to have this because you can open up to the little table of contents and the glossary in the back and it'll point you to that chapter. And then you can go read a section from. Wayne Grudem is a very solid Bible scholar. Okay, now I get it. And then when your kids ask you questions, hey, dad, it's okay to say, I don't know, but I'm gonna get you the answer, and then you go grab it. So I recommend having one of those.

[B]

That's good.

[A]

There's two other things that have just been helpful for. And how does the whole Bible fit together? There is an. And if you guys can find this link and put in the show notes, too, there's an old lecture series. Now, this is, like, super Bible nerd right here. There's an old lecture series called Preaching Christ in a Postmodern World. And I will say it's designed for preachers, but it, like, anybody can read it. And if you're going, man, I want to see how the Old Testament and the New Testament fit together and all those connections that Josh is always making and kind of blow your mind. It's by Tim Keller and Edmund Clowney.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

And it's a lecture series. Stick it in your car. And I'm just telling you, you're gonna walk out the other end going, like, dang, like, I get my Bible a lot more than I did now.

[B]

That's great.

[A]

The other one that I recommend is there was a book called. There is a book called Epic of Eden by Sandra Richter. Okay, that's another one that, like, after I read it, the Bible made way more sense to me. So we'll have the links to all those in the show notes, but there you go. And then I'm going to show this real quick. Will you show my iPad thing here? So this is another one. Like, if you get stuck and you're like, your mind's drifting, you start getting bored. So this is an app called Notability that I use my iPad. And it's just little. It's an apple pen that they made, or pencil, I think. And I'll just. I'll screenshot a passage, stick it in notability. And that probably. I've probably spent 45 minutes with those, I don't know, eight verses. And it's just. I'm making all these observations. I'm writing notes, I'm writing prayers. There's things. But just keep a pen in your hand and you're going to notice stuff gets into your soul.

[B]

That's great.

[A]

Yeah. Jana, let's keep this moving, okay? And then I gotta. I want to rank these Bible translations.

[C]

Well, hey, Lyford Nation, let me share something exciting with you. We want to invite you to the most important night of the year for our church. That is our night of Prayer and worship. This is a night where we come believing that God still heals, he still restores, and he still moves. And so on January 21, from 7 to 8:30pm that's central standard Time, we'll gather to worship and pray with faith for miracles, for breakthrough, for the next generation and for the one more God is still reaching. And so this is a night to bring your need, your burden, your unanswered prayer, and trust God to do what only he can do. We are believing as a church for chains to break, for hearts to be renewed and lives to be changed in the presence of God. And so to hear more about this event, text the word event to 20411. Or you can visit Lakepoint Church event and select night of prayer and Worship. If you are in the DFW area, or maybe you live in a different state or city and you're willing to drive or fly and come visit, join us in person at any of our seven campuses. Or you can also worship with us by joining church online via YouTube, Facebook, or Lakepoint Live here. Come expecting, come hungry, come believing. Mark your calendar January 21st and be a part of what God wants to do.

[A]

Last question here, Jana. A lot of people are asking, how can we help our kids learn to love the Bible?

[B]

I think, you know, it's just like Jesus is our model. Like, we want to be a model for our kids. So when they see parents who are in love with the Word and they love the Lord and they've been transformed so much by his grace, that's contagious. So when they see that in you, they're gonna. They're gonna want what you have. And so just some of the stuff that. That we do. So we do nightly Bible readings. So we use. Actually. Okay, we have one. So we use. Because of Hudson, we use the action Bible.

[A]

Heads up. If you got little kids, you want one of these? So what I would say is from maybe ages zero to, like, I'd say, like, I don't know, eight or nine.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

This is awesome. Because this action Bible, you're gonna know. It's like, it puts it in comic books and then. Yeah.

[B]

So Josh does different voices for the. The different. I don't want to call them characters because they're people, but, you know, just the different people in scripture and it's really funny and the kids have so much fun.

[A]

What voices have I done?

[B]

What we call them?

[A]

Yeah, you can sing, right?

[B]

I don't know if I want to.

[A]

Come on. That's what makes the podcast Fun. What do we call them? You want me to say it?

[B]

Yeah, you can say it. Yeah, you can say it. And then. Yeah.

[A]

So like, for instance, yeah, we did Jezebel the other night.

[B]

So Jezebel, she has a specific voice that we've given her. And you want me to say what? We call it. We call it a ditwit voice.

[A]

We call it a ditwit voice. We want to train our daughters not to be ditwits. What's a ditwit? A ditwit is a ditzy nitwit. And it's like, I don't want to raise idiot daughters that act like idiots. So, like, I'll do Jezebel and be like, oh, my God. Literally, it's like, I'll do the voice. Or then like, jesus, I'll do, like a John Wayne voice. Or like, if there's like. If there's like, a king, I'll do like, a British.

[B]

Yeah, and then you had some, like, bro voices.

[A]

Like, I did that for the other night. We did Jonah. Yeah, bruh.

[B]

For the sailors, dude. That was not Jonah's voice, though.

[A]

Who was it? Whose voice was that?

[B]

No, you gave that to the. Like, to the sailors.

[A]

Yeah, to the sailors. To the sailors, bruh. But so here's the big idea. And, like, as a dad, it's like, this is funny, but, like, let me. There's a method to the madness. As a dad, what you want to do when your kids are young is anytime your kids are interacting with a Bible, it needs to be fun.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So I really want to highlight this.

[B]

And we have, well, teenager and almost teenage. Another teenage daughter. And they are still part of this.

[A]

They love us.

[B]

They love it. We all love this time together.

[A]

We all cuddle up in Hudson's room right before bed. And I always tell them, you know, I always say, do you guys want me to do the voices? Yeah, I know the boys, dad. And then, like, for instance, when we're doing ditwits, like, I'll ask Elian and Felicity, what did ditwits say? And they were like, they say literally a lot. They say literally they love Taylor Swift. And so I'll toss that in there. Yeah, it's great. But seriously, here's the big idea. I want when my kids interact with the word of God, I want it to be fun so that from the time that they first crack open the word of God, they're thinking there is joy around this book. That's the big idea.

[B]

Yeah. It's so Good.

[A]

All right, so you already hit. So first of all, modeling it.

[B]

Yeah, Modeling. Nightly Bible reading.

[A]

Wait, wait, I want to say something on the modeling.

[B]

Oh, okay. Yeah.

[A]

Like, Jana is the best at this. You know, we build our family schedule around mama getting her oxygen mask on. Mama gets time in the Word and prayer before the kids get up. So you have a refreshed spirit to pour out with every single one of our kids and our dog. They all know if you want to find mom in the morning, we know exactly where she's going to be. She's going to be in the little sun room. She's going to have a Bible on her lap, and they all know exactly where she's going to be. And so all of our kids grow up knowing mom's in the Word every day. And they walk out and they see me in the Word, I'm usually done. Sometimes I'm done by the time I get up, but that's it.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Other things here that you'd say, yeah.

[B]

So there's actually a lot, but I'll try to go fast. But memorization. So part of our. The way we school our kids, that's just part of our natural flow with our school model is we always have. And it's not just a verse here and there. Like, our kids are through our school, they are memorizing large passages of scripture. And that's been so fruitful and good. And they memorize way faster than me. I wish to have a young brain. Oh, my goodness, they can. Hudson's just memorizing like that. But what I wanted to say about memorization is when Hudson was, like, two or three, Josh started just as a blessing before bed, saying Psalm 1 over him every night. And within a matter of weeks, Hudson already had it memorized.

[A]

I bet it didn't even take him two weeks.

[B]

So, like, yeah, getting your kids to memorize Scripture, especially whenever they're really young, it's so much easier.

[A]

Let me give a hack on this. So, like, with Hudson, I'll crawl in bed with him. And the first few days, I would say it. But then here's what I do. And this is a little hack for if you got real young kids, once you've said it a little bit, do the switch to where you give them a prompt and make them finish the sentence. So, like Hudson, what we do every night is I'll put him to bed and I'll look at him and I'll say, do not. And I'll just look at him, and he knows, do not walk in the Counsel of the wicked. And then I'll say, nor. And he'll say, stand in the way of sinners. And I'll say, nor. Sit in the seat. And he'll say, sit in the seat of mockers, but delight. And he'll say, delight yourself in the law of the Lord. And. And he'll say, meditate on it day and night. And then all of a sudden. So here's what that does. Kids have attention spans like squirrels. So what you gotta do as a dad of a young kid is the little prompt. It forces their brain to stay engaged. And they feel proud. They start to feel proud really fast. And then, like for all the kids, parents that are listening, think about this. In two weeks, all of a sudden, my six year old has an entire chapter of the Bible memorized. And why is that important? I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. Yeah, I remember to this day, I remember verses that my mom was helping me memorize as a little kid. Like me and my brother would get in a fight, and while we're still ticks, mom would quote that proverb. A soft answer turns away wrath. But grievous words. What Josh. Shout out Mom. What Josh? Stir up anger. And you know, she's teaching me these things.

[B]

She remembered it.

[A]

I remember. I remember.

[B]

That's good. That's good.

[A]

What else you got?

[B]

Okay, so one thing that we do, we sing the Doxology before dinner, like almost every night.

[A]

So that's it. We don't. And I'm not saying you gotta do this.

[B]

No, that's just something we do well.

[A]

Yeah. So in our family, if people don't know what that is, a lot of people, they pray before a meal. Next week, a lot of the podcast is gonna be on how to pray. A lot of people, they don't realize that when we sing worship songs, that's prayer. We're singing it to God. So in our family, what we do, Jana finishes cooking, and then we all gather in the kitchen. And two things. Every kid knows. I want you to finish this. Every kid knows you're not allowed to take a bite.

[B]

Until when mom sits down.

[A]

Until mom sits down, nobody's allowed to take a bite because Mom's the queen of the house and we honor mom in this house. So no, Hudson, you can't eat until mom sits down. And the reason for that is you're so busy helping everybody else that you would get to the table and they've already been eating for eight minutes. And I hate that thing. And they're done, and they're done, and then they want to. No, no, no. This is really important. Listen, listen, listen. This is really important. The table is for leading, not just feeding. The dinner table is for leading your family, not just feeding your family. So while we're talking about this, how do I get my kids to love the Bible? Deuteronomy 6 says the way that a parent go read Deuteronomy 6. Deuteronomy 6 says the way that godly parents install the Bible into their kids is not through family devotions. That's not what it says. It says talk about it. When you walk along the way, when you rise, when you lie down, everywhere you go, you're talking about the Bible. So at dinner, a lot of times, we're going around. We're going. Okay. Eliana, how was your day? Felicia, how was your day? Hudson, what was your day? Tell us your high and your low, and then they'll tell us what happened at school. And this person got in a fight with this person, and, you know, I'm dealing with a couple ditwits and, you know, whatever. And that's a joke. But then what we'll do is we'll pause and we'll go, oh, hey, buddy, what's the Bible say about that? And then we'll talk about it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And what we're doing is. But anyway, what we do. So nobody's allowed to eat a bite until mommy sits down. And I enforce that. Mommy doesn't enforce that. Dad enforces that. So I'm reinforcing family structure. I'm the head of the home. Home. And me, as the head of the home, I'm making sure that the associate pastor of the home. Mommy. That the congregants respect the associate pastor. That's my job. But the other thing is a lot of people pray before meals. What we do is we just sing the doxology.

[B]

Praise God from whom all blessings we pray too. But yeah, just depends on the night. And we switch it up. Yeah, we switch it up. And usually when. And we ask Hudson to lead in prayer or whatever. He'll pick. Can I just. Can I sing the Doctor?

[A]

Can I sing the Doctor? But we all sing.

[B]

Yeah, we do.

[A]

All right, keep going. Anything else on how to get your kids to love the Bible?

[B]

Okay, so there are several other things that we do. But so as our kids age, we get them a new Bible that they're interested in.

[A]

This is big.

[B]

And they're. I mean, honestly, they would. Would get a new one all the time if we'd let them because they just. They get so excited about it, and so.

[A]

And they get excited because we make it a big deal.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

It's like, hey, we're gonna get you a Bible. We're gonna get you any Bible you want. I've been looking and, oh, I found that. You'll. I found this real pretty one, Felicity, that has room for you to take notes. And I'm gonna buy you six colored pens.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And you make it a big deal.

[B]

Yeah. Yes. And then they take. What I love the most is our kids are note takers. Like, and I take notes during sermons. I like to write my notes. Sometimes I forget my notebook and have to put it in my phone, but I love to take notes. And what I've seen is our daughters do the same. And then Hudson, when he sat in with us at Christmas, he took notes on a sermon. He took notes. It was amazing. I didn't ask him to do that, but he did. And so it was really cool to see that happen. So we have big note takers. So it's just getting them Bibles that they're really excited about. And they love having room in the margins to take more notes, so they do that. And the pins. They're very into the pins.

[A]

They're big into pins.

[B]

We want to steward their heroes, so.

[A]

Oh, this is huge.

[B]

We've done a lot of this in the past is. I love biographies myself. So we love to read about missionaries or just. Just different. Just men and women of God. And so we read about them, we discuss them, because we want them to have heroes who know and love Jesus. So we read that all the time. Let's see.

[A]

Oh, let me say something right here. Okay, so like with your kids, and this ties into getting your kids to love the word. Your kids will imitate whoever they idolize. So this is really important. They're gonna imitate whoever they idolize. So especially when your kids are young, you need to work hard to make sure that they have the right heroes, is what you're saying. So some things that we've done, very frankly. And again, I get crushed every time I say this. I do not want my 11 year old having Taylor Swift as a hero. I do not want her having some girl that dances on stage and looks real shady, is singing about same sex relationships, and is just seemingly a Jezebel, super worldly person. If that's my daughter's hero. You imitate who you idolize. So what Jana started doing really, really, really young is she would find little fun biographies Appropriate for kids. We're gonna get some of those in the show notes. Jana's gonna give some ideas afterwards. We're gonna put those in the show notes. How do they get the show notes? Oh, it's in the app. Yeah, it's in the app. So go in the app and you'll get it. And then we're reading stories about men and missionary men and women of the Word. Here's the other thing. Listen really close, parents. If you want your kids to grow up hating the Bible and hating the Lord, walking away from the Lord and hating church, here's all you got to do in the car ride home and at home, nitpick and criticize your pastor in your church. Now, you may hear that. You may be like, he's just being self serving because he's a pastor. No, I'm raising children. And guess who me and guess what me and Janet don't do? We don't like. We revere and talk with reverence about faithful Bible teachers in our home. And what we're doing is we're teaching them to idol. And I'm using the word idolize loosely. I don't mean literally worship people as idols were training their heroes because people imitate who they idolize.

[B]

Yeah. And I mean, we just. We do the same with the church in general. We go home and we talk about how great the people of God are and how he's using them, how generous they are, how loving and kind. And, hey, listen to what is happening in this person's life and how God is transforming and moving. And so we just. We're always looking for ways to talk about the blessing of the church.

[A]

That's right. Yeah. Anything else there?

[B]

Well, now Eliana is. I mean, we have three and a half years before Eliana moves on to college, which is crazy. Crazy. But now that she's getting older, it's like, I'm just trying to spend time going through some book that she. She has her own time in the Word. She's. She's really diligent in. In getting that time with. With the Lord first thing in the morning. But I'm reading just a book. And then once we finish a book, then we'll read another one just to help her grow spiritually and to really make sure she is ready to grow into the woman of God that he's created her to be.

[A]

That's exactly right. What's that book y' all are reading right now?

[B]

Oh, goodness.

[A]

No Time to be dumb.

[B]

No Time to be dumb.

[A]

By who?

[B]

Rachel Jankovich?

[A]

That's right. Shout out Wilson family.

[B]

Yes. Yeah, so we're reading that together right now, so.

[A]

Okay. Jana, should we rank some Bible translations? Let's do it. Okay, here's what we're going to do to finish this out, because this is like one of the most common questions we get. What's the best Bible translation? I'm going to be. There'll be a couple moments where I'm a little savage in the next few minutes. What's the worst Bible translation? Which one should I read? All the things. So I'm going to have you hand me a couple here in a second.

[B]

Can I share a story really quick? Because this was just so great. So this past. No, actually it was two. Two weeks ago. A lady named Letitia came up to me and she was so excited. She just bought a new Bible and she's starting a new Bible reading for the year. So it was at the beginning of the year and she just asked me to pray over her and as God would, you know, speak to her throughout the year. And I just. I loved that so much. Just the hunger and desire for God's word. It was just such a blessing to me.

[A]

I just wanted to share that rag on this. Our bookstore just told me that last week, two. Almost 200 people came to the bookstore to buy their first Bible.

[B]

That's awesome.

[A]

I know. I love it so much.

[B]

That's awesome.

[A]

All right, so here we go. We're going to rank some Bible translations. Don't hand me anything yet. Okay, so what we're going to do is I'm going to stack them. Let me get this out of here. I'm going to stack them right here.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

And I'm going to stack them. I'm going to do my own kind of worst to best, you know, we're gonna do it like this. So let me begin with worst.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I might. If I had a match, I'd burn this thing right now. So a few things that are worst. The very, very worst, they're hot garbage. If they're in your home, you should literally burn them or something else are things like the New World translation that is from the Jehovah's Witness deal. All this stuff, quote unquote translations like that, they take out the parts that refer to Jesus as God because it is a cult. They think he's the angel Archangel Michael and that he was a created being. If you get a quote unquote Bible like that, it has literally been corrupted by Satan himself. To demean Jesus and talk about Jesus, they went in and they changed all the Bible verses that refer to Jesus as God. So for instance, if you go read John 1:1, it said in the actual Bible it says in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God and it says Jesus is, is the Word. They literally changed it to in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was a God. Oh, and so like hot garbage. All the things, other garbage translations. So get that out of your home. Other garbage translations are things like this, the Book of Mormon, or in fact, I hate it, we're going to throw in the trash whatever it is, the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith's translation, the Doctrine and Covenants, the Pearl of Great Price, all those hot garbage, literally influenced and affected by the demonic and by Satan. And I'll just say this. If a white guy from the Midwest that was a horse thief, had multiple wives, thinks the Garden of Eden was in Missouri, and he thinks that Jesus will return in Missouri, Missouri writes a Bible, it's probably really crappy. So all those, they're at the very bottom. They're so low I won't even get them. Keep them on the table. They're awful. I would also add quote unquote translations like the New Revised Standard Version. It's like literally a woke Bible translation that we're going to do gender neutral pronouns and remove stuff about God being father and da da da da. Super ridiculous, awful.

[B]

We don't even have a copy.

[A]

We don't even have a copy up here. I refuse to have one. Or the Queen James Version. A few years ago, somebody put together a translation to, quote, prevent homophobic misinterpretation. Eh, wrong, Terrible, literally sacrilegious. Revelation 22. Jesus literally says, I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this scroll. If anyone adds to them, the plagues described in this scroll will fall on their head. If anyone takes away words from the scroll of this prophecy, God will take away that person and any share in the tree of life and in the Holy city which are described in this scroll. So anyway, like, it's a stinking big deal for you to tamper with the Word of God. All those are things that cults and apostate people have done to corrupt the Word of God. They're not translations, they're corruptions. They're authentic. Those go at the very bottom.

[B]

Stay away from.

[A]

All right, now let me talk real quick about different types, not quite yet about different types of translations. And then I'll have you start handing Me these. In Bible translations, there's a few different types. There are word for word translations that just obviously they take. Actually, I'll explain this here in a second. There's word for word translations, there's thought for thought translations, there's what are called paraphrases, and then there are things that are even below paraphrases. They're just corruptions of the word. So here's what this is. Word for word translations, they're based on what's called a belief that Christians have verbal plenary inerrancy. It's a big theological phrase. Verbal refers to the words of the Bible. Plenary means complete or all, and inerrancy means without error. So theologians will talk about verbal plenary inerrancy or verbal plenary inspiration. And what they're saying is that all of the actual words that God chose are inerrant and inspired by God. Okay, so every single this is important. It's not just every thought. The Bible contains this inspired. It's the literal words that God chose, he chose with an intentionality. And the word for word translations, they just take the Greek word, the Hebrew word, or the Aramaic word, and give you the corresponding English word. Then there's thought for thought translations. Theologians will sometimes call these dynamic equivalence translations. These aren't just the words, they'll take the intent of the word of the phrase. So for instance, some people will sometimes say, hey Josh, do you take the Bible literally? And then if you say yes, then like Reddit atheists will be like, uh huh. So you think the stars literally dance for joy? I'll do a ditwa. You think the stars literally dance for joy? Oh my gosh. So the answer is no, we don't take the Bible literally. We take the Bible literarily. We ask the question, what literary genre is this book of the Bible written in? And then we interpret it according to literary genre. Okay, so like for instance, when the Bible's using poetic language and talking about the stars dancing for joy, it doesn't mean the stars literally dance for joy. It's a thought that's expressing something. So thought for thought translations, they'll take the thought that this phrase intended and they'll convey the corresponding English thought. A good example of this is whenever you see the phrase in the Old Testament that gets translated, God is slow to anger. The Hebrew phrase there is that he is long of nose. That's like literally what the words say in Hebrew. He's long of nose. Why? Because in ancient Hebrew, long of nose was like an Idiom to express that somebody was very patient. So what the thought for thought translations do is they'll take a, you know, a thought or a phrase and try to do their best to give the English Gotcha a paraphrase. Are some translations. I'm gonna get to this here in a second. Like the Passion translation, the message, the New Living translation is a little bit of a paraphrase. And these are ones, they don't pretend to be word for word. They're just trying to generally paraphrase what somebody's going for in a certain section of the Bible. So here's what I'll do before I get into these translations and rapid fire through them. Here, here's my encouragement. Pick a really good word for word translation. And then when you're reading like New Testament epistles, the book of Romans, stuff like that, that's where you really want a good word for word translation. And then, I'll be honest, I think it's good to sometimes have a more thought for thought or even sometimes a paraphrase for things like Old Testament prophecy or a lot of the books that have lots of poetry or sometimes even like apocalyptic. Another literary genre is apocalyptic literature. It's a highly poetic language. If you get a good thought for thought, it does a better job of helping you understand what the heck are they talking about right here?

[B]

Yeah, that makes sense.

[A]

So you can do that. So Trinity, will you throw up that. Throw up that little graphic there? So what this is, is you're going to see on the left are readability scores, and on the right are literal scores. And so basically, here's how it kind of works is some translations, they're extremely literal. They take just the exact closest English word for whatever word is being translated and stick it in there. And they have really high literal. But then they're not as readable because it's kind of wooden language. And I don't understand what that idiom meant. And then some translations, they're really readable, but they're not quite as literal. So you'll readability and literality, whatever it is, it'll kind of go like this, inversely proportionate. So as I run through these really fast and we rank these Bible translations, that's what's going on here. So you know what? Let's start. Where's the nasb? Where's our nasb? Let's start with the nasb. Got it for me. All right, so we're going to start with nasb. This is NASB right here. There it is. This right Here, NASB is an older translation. It's kind of interesting. This was commissioned by the. What's called the lockman foundation in 1971. Here's why this is really important, actually. This sets up what we're going to talk about in a few here. A few of the Bible translations, they're owned by different copyrights. So somebody commissioned them. And then the copyright to the translation is owned by like a publishing house or a foundation. This one is owned by the Lockman Foundation. Here's why that actually becomes kind of important. The NASB is a pretty good. It's a word for word translation in a lot of like high church, Presbyterian, Reformed, high expository preaching churches. They like the nasb. It's a good translation. What's really interesting is it didn't get a lot of wide distribution. And this is a really interesting fact because the copyright is owned by the Lachman foundation and they charge a higher royalty rate than I think any other translation. Yeah. So here's what's really interesting. A lot of people like, why is it a good translation but it doesn't get used a lot? Well, here's why. Because if a Bible study publisher wants to use the nasb, it costs them way more than if they use another translation. And so this one actually doesn't get as wide distribution as you would think it would, given the fact that it's a pretty darn good translation.

[B]

I had wondered why, because. Well, I don't want to spoil what your next one probably is, but.

[A]

No, what. What are you.

[B]

I'd wondered why ESV is used more than an nasb.

[A]

That is one of the main reasons why. It's just more expensive. So this is really interesting. We all want to be Bible nerds. This is why when you go into hotels and you open that little drawer, it's always a kjv. Do you know why that is? Because KJV is free. There's no royalty charge on kjv. So it's just. It's cheaper, free and that kind of thing. So this one nas more popular among older expository Bible teachers. This is a very good word for word translation. So even though it's the first one, it's at the bottom and it's at the top. I think that's a good translation. So we're gonna do that.

[B]

That's good.

[A]

Let's do. Give me another one. You pick, Jana.

[B]

Okay, well, we'll do.

[A]

What do we got there?

[B]

The nkjv.

[A]

Ooh, nkjv. So actually, can you give me Find The KJV also, we're gonna do both of these at the same time. So we got NKJV and then we're going to do kjv. I'm going to talk about both of these at the same time because they're obviously related. So let me talk about the KJV first. So King James Version, obviously you got right here lots of these and thous. So King James, first of all, let me just get this out there. King James Version was completed in 1611. It was either completed or commissioned in 1611 by King James. Heads up, King James was probably homosexual. So there's lots of stuff in history about he probably, you know, was into dudes, not. So he was reading it, but not applying it and obeying it. So you got that little interesting tidbit about the King James. King James is like in between a word for word and a thought for thought. King James literally, he commissioned this to solve disputes that were arising. Have you heard this before? Solve disputes that were rising in England. And there was these hot debates between the Puritans and the Church of England and they were getting ticked at each other over Bible translations. He was like, everybody, stop fighting. You go into your corner. You go into your corner. We're going to create a translation that everybody in England agrees on. He commissions it, and the KJV comes out in 1611. Now every now and then, heads up, you will run in to these King James only people. They're stinking weird. I'm just telling you, like, these King James only people are weird. Some of them literally believe that this was providentially preserved as the perfect Bible translation in English. A lot of these people, they're in like independent fundamentalist Baptist churches with like seven people in them. The earth is flat, the world is governed by lizard people, and they're all dressing like Amish people and they churn their own bones. Butter. That's the. These are the people who are the King James only people. They're weird. They are.

[C]

You're weird.

[A]

And none of them are ever going to listen to this podcast because they don't use YouTube and I'm safe. So here's the problem with the King James Version. It's a decent translation, but here's the problem. It was commissioned in 1611. Now this is like a super, super nerdy thing. All the Bible translations, they draw on two different groups of original manuscripts. The Bible was originally written in three languages. Greek, Hebrew, and sections in Arab, Aramaic. Okay? There's two groups of source texts that archaeologists dug up these ancient you know, fragments of the manuscripts. There's two groups. There's the, it's called the Textus Receptus. Those come from medieval copies of Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic. You know, things medieval copies that are from the 1100s through the 1500s. So these are late, quote unquote, original manuscripts of Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic. But then there's a second group of manuscripts called the critical. It's called the critical texts. They come from far older manuscripts. So here's the problem with the KJV. Since 1611, archaeologists have dug up way earlier manuscripts to within like 50, 60 years of when the original, what are called Bible scholars call them the autographs. Like the actual paper that the Apostle Paul wrote Philippians on or whatever that's called the autograph. Well, what we want is we want the manuscripts that are the closest to the autographs so that we know, man, I'm getting the thing that is as close as possible, you know, to the original manuscripts. The problem with the KJV is it's based on the textus receptive group of manuscripts that are really, really late manuscripts. We have way better manuscripts now that are closer. So that's why it's a decent translation, but it's based on much later manuscripts. Not as good. The other problem that you get with the kjv, again, it's lots of these and thou's and thines and all the things. You got to watch out for this. If your grandma handed you down a kjv, it's written in Elizabethan English. They did that in their minds. They were trying to preserve the dignity of the word of God. Here's my response to that. When the Bible was written, the New Testament was written, there were two forms of Greek. There was what was called classical Greek that like the dignitaries in Greece and Rome spoke and there was what was called Koine Greek that was like normal blue collar dudes that swung hammers and hung drywall. They spoke Kornate Koine Greek Greek. I do not think it is a coincidence that God chose to inspire the New Testament text in Koine street level Greek. So God did not choose to inspire the Bible in the very high dignified classical Greek. He inspired it in Koine Greek. Charles Spurgeon called it Plow. He called street level English. He called it Plowman's English. So I actually think it's a mistake to to translate the Bible in this very elevated, lofty language that normal dudes who swing hammers and ladies that are at home cooking whatever y' all cook. So I think That's a mistake. So here's what you get in the kjv. If you're ever like on a, you have a Reddit atheist and here's what he'll say to you. He'll be like, the Bible literally says there's unicorns. Where they get that is from the KJV translation. Because in Elizabethan English they called a wild ox a unicorn. So this is like just one example. In Elizabethan English, they did it. They're not literally referring to a magical fairy creature. In Elizabethan English, that's what they would call a wild ox. So then they translated it into the kjv and you got a dagum unicorn in your kjv and you're like, what the heck is going on? That's Elizabethan English. I got like five other example is this. So anyway, those are the problems of the kjv, okay? And the NKJV is very, very, it's, it's similar. Here's. So in the end, so I'm going to put the kjv, I'm going to put under the nasb. I'm going to put NASB over kjv. Now here's the deal on the nkjv. NKJV is published by Thomas Nelson. You got to watch out for this. A lot of, lot of Christians have no idea this happens. What'll happen a lot of times is a publisher that was originally a Christian publisher. They'll get bought out by some conglomerate that's not a Christian publishing company. Then they'll keep the subsidiary that was a Christian publisher, but it's under the leadership of this non Christian organization. So then here's what you got now. Now you have non Christians who are in charge of Christian Bible translations, okay? NKJV is published by Thomas Nelson. And so you gotta watch out for this. Now here's the problem with the NKJV is it's updated language again. It's kind of a more. It's in between word for word and thought for thought. It's updated language from the kjv. The problem is it's still based on those later manuscripts, the Textus Receptus. And we have better, more accurate manuscripts now. So this is not my favorite Pentecostal. People tend to love the NKJV for some reason. I think Jack Hayford used it a long time ago and wrote a study Bible that popularized it among Pentecostals. It's a decent translation. It's not terrible. I'm going to put it in between the NASB and the kjv. All right, let's do another one. What's the next one?

[B]

The niv.

[A]

Ooh, the nib. Okay, the niv or what? What some of my reformed friends will call the nearly inspired version the NIV. Okay, so NIV. So there's a lot about the NIV. The NIV. I think ever since the NIV was originally commissioned and published in 1978, I think since 1978, it has remained by far the best selling Bible translation. So I'll just, just throw my cards on the table at Lake Point. My default translation to preach out of is the niv. Not because I think it's the best translation, but because I think it is a very good translation. And it's the one that normal I call them, drink a beer. Watch, watch a game lost, guys. It's the translation that that dude is most likely to have a dusty copy of on his shelf. So I'm just like, I want that guy to walk into Lake Point and be like, yeah, dude, I get that's what my Bible says. So that's why it's my default mode. The NIV is really interesting. It's undergone at least four revisions. A lot of people don't know this. English Bible translations, they'll go through different revisions. Where, for instance, they published this first in 1978, then they received a bunch of feedback from people, and then scholars would chime in and go, hey, actually, don't translate it like this, translate it like this. They updated it. What really bothers me is the. I think the best translation version of the NIV was the 1984 version. And that's what I memorized like huge chapters of the Bible in when I was in college. And then they switched it on me. And you can't even find a 1984 NIV anymore. But what the NIV is, it's in between a word for word and a thought for thought. So in the niv, they're trying to walk the line between like, let me give you the actual words God chose. But then whenever it gets to a phrase that's a little confusing, they'll do their best to like, hey, let's give you a phrase that you're gonna understand. Here's what I like about the niv. And actually, so far, I'm gonna put it on the very top of the ones. Okay, here's what I like. In almost all NIV versions, if they insert a thought for thought translation that's not as literal, they'll put a footnote in there. And at the bottom of your Bible, they'll tell you, here's the actual word for word thing.

[B]

Oh, that's good.

[A]

So you kind of get, you kind of get both. I really like it. Here's one tiny. Watch out. I will give on the NIV. The most recent revision of the NIV happened, I think in 2011, and they inserted gender neutral language in places where the Bible had been using masculine language that to them felt patriarchal. So not in every place, and I'm going to talk about this here in a second. There are some quote unquote translations of the Bible where they're actually not doing translation, they're doing interpretation and tricking you into thinking that the interpretation is translation. The NIV doesn't do that as much, but you do get where they changed like he, him, his or it said man or men. Or let's say the original translation, the Greek word was let's say adelphoi, which means brothers. And they'll insert brothers and sisters because for instance, in Greek it's kind of hard to explain. The Greek plural adelphoi, which means brothers, can refer to groups of people that are both masculine and feminine. So if there's a big crowd of men and women in Greek, they'll say adelphoi. I hope I'm getting that right. Adelphoi. And it means the literal translation would be brothers, but because it can refer to both a group of both dudes and women, they'll say brothers and sisters. So I don't love that because I just personally I like real clear word for word. So anyway, but I'm going to put that at the top so far with that one little cap. Okay, all right, what am I doing next?

[B]

The nlt.

[A]

Ooh, nlt. Okay, so nlt. Here we go. Nlt. NLT is published by Tyndall. I'm going to brag on Tyndall really quick as a Bible publisher. So I said earlier, there are some Bible publishers that get acquired by non Christian organizations. And then just in general, probably not a great idea to have non Christians that are in charge of Christian Bible translations. What Tyndall has done, if I understand this correctly, is it was a Bible loving Christian family that started this publisher. They put the publishing company in a family trust which means it cannot be bought out by non Christian organizations.

[B]

Oh, that's great.

[A]

So what that does is it keeps everything inside of a Christian family. I'll be really honest, I like the NLT a lot as like just a daily Bible reading translation. So if I get here's I would encourage people to do this. When you're doing Bible reading plans, don't do the same translation every year. Rotate among good Bible translations like do NIV one year, NLT one year, ESV one year and you're going to notice different things. Two years ago I rotated and I did like the whole year in NLT and I loved it.

[B]

I didn't know you did that.

[A]

I did. The NLT is in between a word for word and a thought for thought. It leans towards thought for thought, but it's super, super readable. So like what I would say is if you're somebody and you're a Christian, you're buying a Bible for somebody that's a brand new Christian. Or like you're buying a Bible for your One more and they're not a Christian. I'm actually going to go ahead on record and say I actually kind of recommend the annual thing because it's the most dang readable version that's like. That still does a really good job of accurate translation.

[B]

So sorry, do you have more to say about that?

[A]

Go ahead and then I can finish.

[B]

Well, one of our questions, I was trying to find it. Someone had asked if the NLT is woke because someone told them that. How true is this? Cause they love it.

[A]

They said the NLT was woke there maybe. I bet you what they're talking about is, for instance, whenever it would have been brothers, they'll say brothers and sister. I don't think. Now there are some translations like the super and I use this word on purpose. The kind of gay Queen James version, like that one actually is woke, where it's like trying to inject queer theory and gender ideology into the translation. To my knowledge, I don't think the NLT does this, but I would need to go and check.

[B]

Dig more. Okay.

[A]

I would need to go and check to double check. Here's where the NLT is really good. And let me circle back to something I said earlier. When you get into those confusing passages in Old Testament prophecy or Old Testament poetry and you're like, bro, I don't got a clue what's going on. NLT is actually really good. It does a good job on thought for thought translation and you know, it just kind of helps you through some of those, those hard passages. So what I'm going to do, I'm going to put nlt. Ah man. Here's what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna cheat. I'm gonna put it right alongside the nasb. This one's more literal. This one's more readable. I'm gonna keep Niv right above it. Okay. All right, what's next?

[B]

Can you reach it?

[A]

There you go. You pick one out, and I'll go at it.

[B]

We'll just do the one on top. Oh, the message.

[A]

Ooh, the message. All right, here. So this one's. The message is really interesting. So we said earlier, there's three types. There's word for word, thought for thought, and there's a paraphrase. This is really important. The message is not a translation of the Bible. The message is one guy's paraphrase of the Bible. So Originally published in 2002, it was the life work of a dude named Eugene Peterson. By the way, if you ever want to see something absolutely hysterical, miracle Bono of U2 fame. When he started kind of getting into the Bible, he was reading the message, and it kind of gripped him. And he's. At that time, he was like, the most famous dude in the whole world. And he was like, I want to meet this guy, Eugene Peterson. So he had his people reach out to Eugene Peterson, and they were like, eugene, Bono wants to meet you. And he was like, who's Bono? He had no idea. So then you can go watch this documentary. It's hilarious. They bring. I think they bring Eugene Peterson to a bona. To a U2 concert. And you can tell, he's like, where am I? This is ridiculous. Like, he hates it. And they formed this funny little friendship. So anyway, that's cool. Yeah. Now, here's what I would say. I'm gonna give. I don't hate this. It's not my favorite. And here's why I'm gonna say this. I will sometimes use the message when I'm personally reading Old Testament poetry or prophecy, because that was Eugene's Peterson's specialty. Here's what I don't love about it. It was written by one guy. It's far better to have a team of translators. Here's why. Because again, the Bible's written in three languages. Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic. Well, people, like, scholars are going to have one area of focus that's like. That's their center. Bullseye.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And, you know, it's hard to. You're not going to be a master of all three.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And you're going to have Bible scholars that are like, dude, they're great at poetry. They're great at New Testament epistles, They're great at apocalyptic literature. So when you get a team of experts around, you kind of get the best thought from a bunch of different People, this is just written by one dude.

[B]

Now this may, I may be remembering this wrong, so correct me please. But wasn't like when he was writing that wasn't it because he had a family member who was having a hard time understanding the Bible and he wanted.

[A]

If I understand that's correct, he originally started the work because he, he did. I think he had a, I think he had a family member. Yeah, it wasn't one of his kids, it was somebody else. And he was like, I want to help him understand. Which is awesome. That's stinking amazing. Here's the other thing about the message. To give you a heads up, the chapters and verses aren't the same. Here's. So let me do. Here's another thing about your Bible. You need to know the chapters and verses were not put there by God. You know, a lot of people don't know that. They're like, where did that. The numbers and the note 1 numbers come from. The chapters were added in the 1300s and the verses were added in the 1500s. The first Bible that ever had them was a very famous Bible called the Geneva Bible that came out in 15C. Here's one thing that's really sad for me to report, but it just gives you something to have your head on a swivel when you're reading something like the message. Tragically, Eugene Peterson at the end of his life came out in support of same sex marriage. And then he, he kind of, he did. And then he kind of walked it back halfway. But here's the reason I say that. I'm not saying that to like dump on somebody's legacy. What I am saying is it is really important that Bible translators have biblical convictions because translators are not just always doing translation, they're also doing a little interpretation. And I would say this. If you're trying to test a Bible translation, you need to watch how do they handle the most controversial passages, especially about gender, marriage and sexuality.

[B]

That's good.

[A]

So on this one, it's super readable. Super readable. But it's, it's not, it's not a, an awesome translation. I'm going to put it just right above our old kjv, but down here, what's next?

[B]

Okay, I, I have never even heard of this, but the passion translation.

[A]

Passion translation. I read this a little bit in college. So here's where there's passion translation. First of all, they do make passion translations that are not for chicks.

[B]

Let me just say that I didn't know.

[A]

So first of all, it needs to Be really clear. This is not connected to the Passion conference and has nothing to do with Louie Giglio and all of our friends over there. A lot of people think that it is.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So this has nothing to do with that conference. Now, here's one thing I would say. This says Passion, and it literally says on the front, translation. This is not a translation. This should say paraphrase. So again, this is interpret. So here's how you need to think about a paraphrase. If it's a Bible paraphrase, it's not really a Bible. It's more like a commentary. Here's what I really, really don't like about this. I'm going to go ahead and tip my hat. This is going to go at the bottom here in a second. This was written by one dude, his name was Brian Simmons, and it was commissioned, if I understand this correctly. They literally wanted him to put some of his theology, especially around the Holy Spirit, into this paraphrase of the Bible. So some people have pointed out, and this one may be a little different, but at least the original Passion translation was almost 50% longer than the actual Bible.

[B]

Wow.

[A]

Why? Because the dude that wrote this, Brian Simmons, he was inserting a bunch of his own thoughts into the paraphrase. Not. Not awesome. So, for instance, I'll just give you an example. Paraphrase. So Psalm 23:1 in, you know, 1984, NIV says, the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want the Passion Paraphrase says, the Lord is my best friend and my shepherd, and I will always have more than enough. Just sort of flowery. So anyway, way not a huge fan. We're gonna put this guy so far at the very bottom. Okay, we got two more. Let's do these real quick here.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Christian Standard Bible, the old csb. All right. Am I blocking? This is starting to block me, isn't it? There we go. The old csb. So this is. This was a. This is. This is an iteration of what was originally the hcsb, if I understand it correctly, the Holman Christian Standard Bible. This is published by. Now, here's what this is. This Bible came from our Baptist friends, so Holman is a Baptist publishing entity. I may get some things wrong here, but I need to make sure I got this right. So the csb, it blends word for word and thought for thought. And honestly, it does a pretty good job if I was gonna give one. Watch out on the csb is whenever you have a translation of the Bible that is commissioned by a denomination, what you got to watch out for is the interpreters will sometimes they know that they need to sort of stay within the doctrinal guidelines of the denomination. So if you get to a passage that has something to do with the doctrine of that denomination and the interpretation options are like a jump ball, they'll always default to whatever is the translation that affirms the doctrine of the denomination. And some people would say the CSB can sometimes kind of do that. So good translation, very readable. I actually like the csb. Like I do like it. Okay, so I think where I would put this guy, you know, it's hard to do this. I'm gonna put it right underneath our friends right here and we'll do, we'll do that guy right there. And then let's do our last one, Jan. And we saved last not least the esv. The esv. Now the ESV is that camera. We still get on it. Okay, the esv. I'm a big, big, big fan. So let me just tip my hat. The ESV is what I use in my personal Bible reading. So like this, this is my ESV. I've had it for 20 years. That's what I personally use. Now this is the ESV study Bible. I mentioned earlier that, I mentioned earlier study Bibles. Let me say a couple quick things about study Bibles that you need to know. So if you didn't know this, I recommend especially for newer Christians, everybody, you need to have a good study Bible in your house. Here's why I'm going to show this and we'll over there. So what you're going to see is up here is Bible. Down here is a little commentary by good Bible scholars explaining frequently asked questions about what you're reading up here. Now I'm going to give another example and it just. So I happen to open to a good page for this. What you'll also see in study Bibles is you'll get this little content down here and like this thing, they'll give little theological treatises or they'll give little pages on context and setting of books that are really helpful. So like right here I'm in Nahum and it has a chart, afflictions of Assyria against Israel. It gives a list of what king was going on here, what years they reigned, what was the affliction that they did on the people of Israel. And here's the significance biblically of those things. That kind of stuff honestly is super helpful if you're like, dude, I don't know my Bible. I'm trying to figure stuff out that stuff is. It is. It's really, really helpful. Okay, now, but here's what you got to remember is whenever you see that, you have to emotionally calibrate in your head. Really clear. This stuff is inspired by God.

[B]

Right?

[A]

That stuff is not inspired by God. There are errors in what's down here. There ain't no error in what is up here. Okay? So you do need to get that in your head. The two study Bibles that I have personally had that I liked the Most were the MacArthur Study Bible and that ESV Study Bible. That ESV Study Bible is the one that we keep in our house, I keep up in my office. ESV is a word for word translation. It's a really good word for word translation. It was commissioned by crossway. In general. In general, there's some things, you know, hit or miss, but in general, I like a lot of stuff that comes out of crossway. Here's the other thing I like about this. It's what I like. But here's also a Watch out. Some of this generation's best Bible scholars gave influence into the esv. So these are dudes, like Bible nerds are going to know these names. These are dudes like J.I. packer, Wayne Grudem, who we mentioned earlier, helped with ESV. Vern Poythres, Daryl Bach. These guys are studs. Now, I will give one little caveat here. And this is a theology nerd thing that, you know, if you understand it, great. If you don't, that's fine. One little watch out. I'll give. Is either all or almost all of the guys who spoke into this translation. They were. They're reformed. Theologically, they're reformed. So, you know, sometimes that can end up affecting the translation a little bit. I'm not saying that it did. I'm just saying that's kind of a watch out. Okay, here's where the ESV is really good. I think it's really, really good. New Testament, New Testament epistles, all the things. It's just great blend of word for word, thought for thought, and it's very readable. Personally, I'll be honest. Sometimes it can get a little woody in the Old Testament, in poetry and in some of the prophecy. That's when I'll switch over to, like, nlt. And I will occasionally go, I didn't understand that at all. What did the message say? Things like that.

[B]

That's good.

[A]

Were you going to say something? I thought you were going to say something. All right, so as will probably surprise nobody. I'm Going to put that one at the top because that's the one where our stack's getting high. That's the one that I actually personally read in my own personal Bible. Time. So let me just finish by asking this question. People who are asking, what's the best Bible? I want to answer in the same way that we answered earlier. Bibles are like diets. Which one's the best one, the one you'll do? Which translation of the Bible is the best one, the one you'll read. And what I would say to people is what will keep you from understanding the Bible most is not the translation in your life lap, but the posture in your heart. You got to walk in when you open your Bible, knowing man, either the Bible stands in authority over my beliefs or my beliefs stand in authority over the Bible. I got to make sure the Bible stands in authority over my beliefs. The Holy Spirit is going to read the Word with you and highlight things to you. So open your Bible, pray and ask the Holy Spirit, please speak to me. Please help me. And what you're going to notice. Here's what you're going to notice. One, it's going to change you. But two, that is why you can read a verse you've read a thousand times before and see something you've never seen before. Why? Because the Holy Spirit is showing you something he's never shown you before. Let's get into the Bible.

[B]

So good.

[A]

All right. Jana, will you pray for our future Bible nerds?

[B]

I would love to. Father, thank you just so much for your Word. Thank you for giving it to us. Just as a way for us to know you and love you deeper, to show us your character and just to help us to. To just walk like Jesus did. Father, I just pray that you will give each of us hearts that desire to know you more. Desire your Word. I pray that we will hunger and thirst after your word and your. Your righteousness, Lord. Father. So I just pray that you'll just transform us and to make us more like Jesus. And I know you do this through, through. Through us being in your word, Father. So I just pray that you will give us hearts that desire you. And I just pray that all of us will walk around looking a whole lot more like Jesus because of it. And it's in Jesus name we pray. Amen.

[A]

Amen.