What Bible Version do you use for personal Bible Study, for teaching, for preaching? Why?
As being young minister of the word and just starting to go deeper regarding the Word of God and how it should be interpreted I prefer to use the easy to understand version of the Bible – The New International Version. Since I became a Christian I never experienced to read any version of the Bible aside from the version that was really more preferred to be used by many Christian I have known, the NIV. I should admit that they have influenced me concerning my Bible preference. It really comes to me the literal meaning of the text clearly using that version. I understand what the passage means in literal principle and sometimes I see its deeper meaning beyond the history. Therefore, in my personal devotion, my teaching or even in my preaching I only used the New International Version. As of now, that’s the only version where I can understand the message of God and experienced His revelations. How can I preach the Gospel if I myself could not understood the message. May be the another factor why I using the New International Version is it uses English words that are easy to understand and will not bring me to a nose bleeding experience just to come out with the meaning of a certain word before the message will reveal. But at the present I starting to appreciate the other version of the Bible like the New Living translation because of its approach which is similar to New International Version, user friendly. I believe that versions like King James where considered as one of difficult to understand will give us more satisfactory understanding about God’s Word if we just learn to use it. Time will come sooner I will learn to appreciate completely the other versions of the Bible as my knowledge grows. It might help me a lot to improve my theology and to enhance my preaching ability in order for me to minister people effectively.
