1599 Geneva Bible: "A Warning to Leaders"

1 Corinthians 3:10 “According to the grace of God given to me, as a skillful master builder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon: (i) but let every man take heed how he buildeth upon it.”

i. Now Paul speaks to the teachers, who have succeeded him in the Church of Corinth, and to all that were after him as well as all that shall be Pastors of Congregations, seeing that they succeed in the work of the Apostles, which were the planters and chief builders. Therefore he warns them (and us) first, that they do not fool themselves into thinking that they can build the Church up in any way that pleases them, that is to say, they may not set forth anything in the Church, in substance or in kind of teaching, that is in any way different from the Apostles, which were the Church's first builders.



[The above quoted scripture and accompanying Troy-paraphrased notes are taken from the 1599 Geneva Bible. A version of this great Bible, with modern spelling, may be purchased from the following link]

1599 Geneva Bible: "Why so few take heed?"

[The below quoted scripture and accompanying Troy-aphrased notes are taken from the 1599 Geneva Bible. A version of this great Bible, with modern spelling, may be purchased from the following link]

1 Corinthians 2:14 “(i)But the (ii)natural man perceiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him, neither can he know them, because they are (iii)spiritually discerned”

i. Again Paul answers a possible objection by the reader: "How is it that so few men take heed of these things?" This is not to be marveled at says the Apostle, seeing as how men in their natural state are not endued with that sense, whereby spiritual things are understood (for that sense comes another way other than by birth) and therefore such men account spiritual wisdom as foolishness: and it is like if Paul were to say, "It should not surprise you that blind men can make no sense of colors, since they lack the light of their eyes, and therefore all light is to them as darkness."
ii. The natural man hath no more light of understanding than that which he brought with him from his mother's womb, as described in Jude 19.
iii. By gift of the Holy Ghost.

-For reference:
Jude 19 "*These are they that separate themselves from others, natural, having not the Spirit."

* It is the nature of Antichrists to separate themselves from the godly, because they are not governed by the spirit of God: vice versa it is the nature of Christians to build up one another through godly prayers both in faith and also in love until the mercy of Christ appears to their full salvation."

Troy's Bible Babblings, Part 2: "Why the Geneva Bible?"

With all the Previous stuff said, the first thing I want to do is answer a question you may have, my dearest Wormwood, is "With all the English bible translations out there with Modern Language and notes Why would you choose the Geneva bible?
Many years ago i bought a Large facsimile of the 1599 Geneva. I read it some but not often. I started carrying it to church because it gave me a chance to poke fun at some of the 1611 KJV folks who were a little negative on the newer translations that some of my friends used. I could now claim the 1611 AV folks used a more modern translation like the NIV and ESV when compared to my older 1599 Geneva. But it was a massive bible and impractical to carry around on a regular basis, plus the Chapter enumerations were in roman numerals and there were no headings on the top of the pages making flipping through the bible, (the psalms were a complete nightmare) and we do a lot of flipping around in our church very very difficult!

Then three things happened. First, I had grown very passionate about the puritans and reformers who turned out not to be the type people i had (like the rest of the culture) thought they were. They were very sweet, sensitive men who passionately loved the Lord, their families and their congregations. The reformers were the men who translated the text to English in the Geneva and supplied the numerous notes to the Geneva (including John Calvin himself). And many of the Puritans and Pilgrims used the Geneva bible. Second I found out that Tolle Lege Press was reprinting the 1599 Geneva Bible with modern spellings (although that never bothered me), typed text (vs. the hand scribbled notes in the facsimile) and the bible would be more compact and easier to carry around.
Finally i found the Geneva's translation of 1 Corinthians 1:27-28, which has since become my favorite verse in the Bible. It reads

"But God hath chosen the foolish things things of the world to confound the wise, and God hath chosen the weak things of the world, to confound the mighty things, And vile things which are despised, hath God chosen, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are."

My Love of this translation hinges on the word "vile." Context is important or else you loose the meaning of the verse. The previous verses describe how God has not chosen noblemen, and wise men, (by the worlds' standards), strong men or rich men. God has not chosen men of great importance in the world's eyes, which then leads to this verse. God has chosen the weak and the foolish and (my favorite word of all) the "vile" things of the world. I Love it because it gives me great hope! Other translations translate this word as "low" or "base." And those are perfectly valid words but if you knew my life, and if you knew my history, and my heart and my sins, the only proper word to describe me is the word "Vile!" And i rejoice in this because it is the vile that Christ came to save. His Blood is applied to Troy, Vilest of sinners, His blood saves me to the uttermost. Praise God!!
So these are the long winded reasons i have come to love the Geneva bible so. I still look at other translations in addition to the Geneva, of course, especially when I'm doing a bible study or sermon prep. But the Geneva is my Main stay in carrying around and in daily reading and i hope it always will be. I won't Lie, there are verses that it does do a poor job in translating, but there are many places where it does a far superior job translating than any other translation (ex Luke 1:3, by comparison the Geneva blows all other translation out of the water in the translation and accuracy on this verse). And it doesn't use the flowery poetic language like the King James does, thus making it a far far more understandable read than the King James is to modern readers, in my opinion (see this link for a quick compare of a couple verses).
Anyway, enough rambling already. Next post i should be getting to some good stuff.
your affectionate uncle,
Screwtape.

Troy's Bible Babblings, Part 1

Well I haven't blogged in over a year. I know this has been a crippling blow to the blogging community. I mostly used the blog to chronicle trips i would take for my friends but since i have joined facebook i can now status and post pics for my travel from there this became no longer necessary for me. I have no great need to blog my day to day life, for one reason it isn't so interesting that strangers would read it, and secondly the people who i want to know about my day to day life are the people who are already engaged in it. So what use can i make of this blog if any?
I have been greatly encouraged and blessed of late reading the blog of my Dear friend Jenny who is making notes on her bible study. So yes there is an area where i can do that too. But i have another idea that excites me greatly. I have a great passion for the Geneva Bible. specifically the 1599 Geneva Bible and the recent Reprint of it done by the Tolle Lege Press with modern English spelling of words and typesetting. I am reading the Murry Cheyenne's yearly reading plan and I was encouraged to pick one of the tracts of reading and read a commentary or a study bible notes as i read along that tract. So what better choice was there for me than my own 1599 Geneva bible. This way after 2 years i will have read the Geneva translation twice and every Reformed footnote in the that bible at least once. so far i have read the notes of Acts, Romans and the 1st part of 1 Corinthians. What a blessing. Many of the notes just refer you to a other passage, some reword the text to give you a clearer understanding but many many of the notes are paragraphs explaining the Reformers' own understanding of the text. And by and large the notes are powerful and have greatly enlightened me. That said the wording is distinctly 16th century and sometimes can be a little hard to get the first time you read it (even for a guy like me who loves puritan writing and reads it often). So I decided to post some of the passages of the Geneva and a Troy-er-phrased version of the notes on my blog to hopefully help and bless others. I hope this will be a blessing to the 2 people who might come to my blog and skim it. I think this will be more profitable for others than just my own ramblings which i will do from time to time but will keep that to a minimum and mostly focus on the Reformers.
I hope Both of you are looking forward to this ans much as I AM! (probably not) Any who, here goes.
Your affectionate uncle,
Screwtape

Pro-Life.

Greetings my beloved,
I wanted to explain to some out there who know me, why it is that I support Dr. Ron Paul for the presidency. Specifically I want to explain to my loved ones why I support his stance against the Iraq war (and even further action against Iran), even though that is a stance that seems to be counter so many professing Christians around us. Just because you or some Christian disagrees with Dr. Paul and myself does not make you a non-Christian or a bad person, I’m not laying this out to make anyone else feel bad. But I want to make it clear to everyone, what I believe and why. There are two big reasons I am against the war in Iraq, here they are.
I. I am Pro-life.
Now most people calling themselves protestant Christians call them selves pro-life. I am too. But to me, the sacredness of human life must extend beyond just the womb of a pregnant woman. I ,of course, agree that we must as a society and as Christians do all we can to protect all unborn human beings, but I believe we must also protect and have respect for life of all ages, genders, races. And this seriousness towards life must extend beyond our own borders as well to people of other countries and other religions too, even though they are false religions. These people have human souls and are valuable to God and that makes them valuable to me. Now in this country, we have laws, which are biblically based, for times when the state has a right to deprive a person of life or liberty. Crimes like murder and such must be met out with the punishment they are due. Likewise with foreign affairs, if we are attacked, our government bears a God given duty to protect their citizenry. On 9-11 our country was attacked by the Taliban (specifically we were attacked by Saudi Arabians and Egyptians under the protection of the Taliban), who were the recognized government of Afghanistan. We reciprocated and should have, Dr. Paul voted for the use of force in that country for the purposes of capturing Osama Bin Laden. Iraq, However, did not attack us. They did not have the ability to attack us. Even if they did have the ability to attack us, that still would not justify invading them. It is not the person owning a gun that the government should punish, but the man who has used his gun in threatening that country's citizens that should be punished.
Human life, including Iraqi life, is valuable. Before our government gives the order for one of our soldiers to shoot another human soul, we need to be dang certain of why he is doing it and it better be a good reason. Pre-emptive war is not justifiable. And this war in Iraq was not justifiable and our country has killed many more innocent women and children in Iraq than the terrorists (who were not affiliated with Iraq) did on 9-11.
One more thing, war is a terrible and has terrible psychological effects to the men who serve in them, ask any person, like my Grandpa, who served during war time. Even now the suicide rate is extremely high among our troops. I say again before we send our boys to kill and be killed be better have good reason for it. You can’t put a gun in some one’s face and make them love freedom, it just doesn’t work. I believe it is past time to bring our sons and daughters and neighbors home.
II. The government has no authority from God for preemptive war.
Last spring I took a course on the “doctrine of the church” taught by Dr. Sam Waldron. In one lesson he focused on the relationship between the government and the church. Basically here is the deal, all authority men have is a derived authority, that is it is an authority that comes from God. God has three spheres of delegated authority. The sphere of the family where God gives authority to the Husband to teach, train up and lead his family. There is the sphere of the state, where God has given the government the right to bear the sword and punish evil and keep civil order. Finally there is the sphere of the Church, whose elders govern the administration of Baptism, the Lord ’s Supper, and other things like church discipline. No one authority has the right to interfere with another’s God given areas. Neither the state not the Church can rightfully decide it is their duty to train up the family’s children. Both can provide institutions that the Parents can freely decide to use, but they can not be forced. The Church and the Family have no right to meet out justice; only the state has God’s authority to do that. But let us focus on the state for now.
The Text for State authority comes from Romans 13.:1-7.
Romans 13.:1-7 Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. 2 Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. 3 For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, 4 for he is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer. 5 Therefore one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God's wrath but also for the sake of conscience. 6 For because of this you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing. 7 Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed.
Now let us bear in mind that this letter was written to the Roman citizens not the Roman government. This is not a Charge for the Government to run across the globe avenging evil! This text is telling citizens to be submissive to their government because God has set them up as authorities over them. Certainly, a Government should and can go to war to defend it’s citizens from an invasion, but it is not ever given the authority to decide it doesn’t like another country’s policies and so invade it depose the rulers and then set up it’s own. This is equivalent to one father deciding he doesn’t like the way another father teaches his children so the first father goes and kills him and forcefully sets up an new father in that home. That is wrong, because God did not give the first father the right to do that. My Friend, Peter Lovassy, has a charge by God to train his children and spiritually aide his wife in her growth in Christ; he does not however have authority over the decisions that my friend Pat Hines makes with the training of his children. God has placed George Bush as President of the United States, he then has no authority to go into another nation killing both our troops and that country's people because he doesn't like the things that that country's government says.
To wield authority over another human soul, one must have a warrant from God. Our Government has no ground for exercising such authority over Iraq, Iran or North Korea.

These are my thoughts, maybe you don't agree, but I hope you van respect them.
God Bless you,
Hideous Rex

UPDATE: Here are some interesting figures about who supports Ron Paul. Our Military.

Ron Paul also received more total money from military contributors than all the Democratic candidates combined, or all the Republicans combined. Here are the totals in dollars for each candidate:

Ron Paul $392,721.00
Barack Obama $124,234.00
John S McCain $106,309.00
Hillary Clinton $75,258.00
Fred Thompson $58,373.00
Mike Huckabee $47,376.00
Mitt Romney $43,332.00
Rudolph Giuliani $23,430.00
Bill Richardson $21,175.00
John Edwards $20,711.00
Joseph Biden $10,940.00
Duncan Hunter $9,820.00
Thomas Gerald Tancredo $7,200.00
Samuel Dale Brownback $3,606.00
Dennis J Kucinich $2,952.00
Christopher J Dodd $1,098.00
Mike Gravel $970.00

Happy Reformation Day!!!

October 31, 1517

On this day in 1517, Martin Luther posted a proposal at the doors of a church in Wittenberg, Germany to debate the doctrine and practice of indulgences. This proposal is popularly known as the 95 Theses, which he nailed to the Castle Church doors. This was not an act of defiance or provocation as is sometimes thought. Since the Castle Church faced Wittenberg's main thoroughfare, the church door functioned as a public bulletin board and was therefore the logical place for posting important notices.

The Diet of Worms was a general assembly (a Diet) of the estates of the Holy Roman Empire that took place in Worms, a small town on the Rhine river located in what is now Germany

Martin Luther was summoned to renounce or reaffirm his views. When the matter came before the Diet, Counsellor Eck, asked Luther to plainly answer the question: "Would Luther reject his books and the errors they contain?" Luther replied:

"Unless I am convicted by Scripture and plain reason "I do not accept the authority of popes and councils, for they have contradicted each other, my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe." According to tradition, Luther is then said to have spoken these words: "Here I stand. I can do no other. God help me. Amen."

Over the next few days, private conferences were held to determine Luther's fate. Before a decision was reached, Luther left Worms. The Emperor issued the Edict of Worms on May 25, 1521, declaring Martin Luther an outlaw and a heretic and banning his literature.

The Reformationm Polka

Funny!