I usually try to keep blog posts suitably vague when I’m being negative however I make no apologies for this one being explicit on it’s topic!

Tonight I went to the Tabanacle in Great Yarmouth/Cobolm for their youth group, I learnt a lot about God in this group throughout my late teens however since the leader changed and the older young people (i.e. 16 plus) have separated and meet at Park Baptist Church (led by a couple of good friends of mine) and the younger meet at this church led by one of their elders (or to use a Ben phrase the pastor’s ‘whipping boy’). Tonight however was a one-off joint ‘it’s not really an Easter event because the Tabanacle don’t celebrate Easter’ event (much to my amusement hot cross buns were bought by friends of mine!). This youth group has never been a conventional youth group, in fact it’s always been like a church service consisting of a chunk of worship, some form of response and a talk followed by tuck and although I’ve never figured out why it works it does.

However this evening the Tabanacle Pastor’s Whipping Boy stepped up to share (following a cracking talk from Eric who used to lead it and was back for one night) and proceeded to indoctrinate everyone. Using a leaflet put together by the Pastor of this church he proceeded to tell everyone that the king James Bible was the only bible that is actually the word of God, describing other translations such as the NIV as the works of Satan.

Jo being very clever and currently in the middle of a degree in this kinda stuff (alongside English Lit) proceeded to pull this apart his claim that ‘if you want the pure, unadulterated word of God it’s the King James Version’ (direct quote) with a variety of interesting geeky facts including actually looking at the reasons the KJV was originally translated, by who, their motives and the political stances built into it and by the time this man finished his 20 minute spiel of complete poo amost every adult in the room promtly asked him deep questions that totally disproved him.

Now I don’t have a problem with him airing a view that one particular translation is right and the others are wrong…that’s his choice but by backing it up with out-of-context bible verses is wrong but more importantly telling a group of young people this is insane. Young people struggle to read bibles as it is and telling them that their youth bible or NIV is the work of Satan won’t help them (surprising I know!) and more to the point telling them to throw that away and buy a king James is enough to put them off reading their bible for life.

So that this blog post is fair I have took photos of the leaflet and includes it below as a download, feel free to download it and be amazed and some of the complete poo that some people have the ability to talk and scarily believe that young people should be aware of.

The bottom line is that all translations of the bible have their faults, they were all written by people with certain view points, translated into a language that is no where near as varied as theirs (i.e. the Greeks have 7 words for love) and have probably lost some meanings in translation through changes in language and time however God speaks to people through the bible whatever translation, it’s powerful and has the power to change lives, mend broken hearts and bring people into a relationship with their creator so I’m sorry Tabanacle I’m keeping my NIV, burning your leaflet and getting on with my life safe in the knowledge that I serve a God who is bigger than bible translations and who I don’t believe gives two hoots which translation people read as long as they read it to grow in Him.

Download The Leaflet: Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3

If you are as outraged by the leaflet as everyone I know who was there this evening then feel free to write a comment on this blog or write to the church themselves: Les Potter, The Upper Room Trust, P.O.Box 130, Gt. Yarmouth, Norfolk, NR31 8TH