I’m not sure where to begin on this one, but just couldn’t pass it up. This is the type of stuff we’re up against. Amazing Grace Baptist Church in Canton, North Carolina is holding their first annual Bible, Book, and Music Burning on Halloween Night. Because of their opinion that the KJV (King James Version) is the only reliable and authoritative translation, they will burn Bibles from all other translations. In addition, they’ll burn books by popular Christian authors like Billy Graham and Rick Warren. Today’s popular Christian music won’t escape the flames either. Click here to see the Associated Press video.
While I believe in being creative and out-of-the box in reaching a community with the life-changing message of Christ, we must carefully think through the future ramifications and potential perceptions of our proposed actions. We ought to be careful in distinguishing the difference between truth and preference. Truth is worth taking a stand for while an opinion is only worth expressing some of the time. This is yet another great lesson on how unbridled preference and opinion can divide.
The press loves to get a hold of a story like this and promote events that picture ignorance and division among Christians. While we all have preferences and opinions about translations, I really do think (have the opinion that) this is a rather extreme action by Amazing Grace Baptist Church. Maybe we need more education about the history of translation. Maybe there should be an enlightened conversation about our modern translations. Here’s a thought? What about the 6,909 distinct and living languages spoken around the globe? Can they only be taught from the KJV? What about the 2,197 language translations of at least a portion of Scripture, are all to be termed heresy?
I think there are bigger battles out there to get involved in personally. But, then again, that’s my opinion.
