Scripture Engagement

We have a lot of teaching in our churches these days about how we are accepted. That's great. In Bible translation we used to talk about accurate, clear and natural translations. More recently we have started adding a fourth criteria for a good translation: acceptable . What does that mean? It means a translation that is acceptable to the audience it was intended for. Now that raises a lot of questions - what if we have two audiences, a primary and a secondary audience? How do we work out what these audiences are like? What does that mean in practice? Let's take each in turn: Primary and secondary audiences are important to define. The primary audience is the main audience you're translating for. The secondary is one that might have some influence. For instance if you are working in an area where most people are Muslims, you might have the majority Muslims as your primary audience, and believers in Isa al Masih (Jesus the Messiah) who gather in small groups as you...

Many people in the world have an oral communication preference. The good thing is that the Word is alive . It’s living and active . 'For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.'   Heb 4:12-13 It was originally communicated orally: God spoke the world into being. Gen 1:2-3 Wisdom is personified as a woman ( hokmah is fem.) calling out from the heights. Pro 9:3 Wisdom - often in short, pithy proverbs. Useful for teaching whom? Your children. E.g. 19:20 The prophets spoke God’s word (in oral form) Amo 1:1-2 . It was a vision, written down. Jesus is God’s word in human form Jhn 1:14 making his home among us. Also alive. He communicated orally. What he said in the form of parables (stories) and teaching was recorded in writing. This means that when we focus on oral storying we are doing something very biblical, ...