Question:
Thank you for taking my question. I am a pastoral student at a fundamentalist school, as a fundamentalist I believe in the old time faith. I want to defend the gospel handed down to me by my mentors and by the Lord and his apostles. Yet I have a question. I have heard a lot of opinions on KJV onlyism, what does the Bible say about the King James Version. Please do not think my question to be a loaded one, I merely want to know what the Bible says, and I want my faith and belief to be guided by that, thank you for your time.
Answer:
This is a subject which can get very deep in research, but I like your question. You want to know what the Bible says about the subject. A priest wrote and asked how we know that the Bible is the Word of God. This is part of what I told him:
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“Your second question was, “How do you establish its authority before you open it up and quote from it?” Herein lies the error of many people. If you have to first establish the authority of the Bible, then you have made MAN THE AUTHORITY. You are looking to man to tell you what is God’s Word and what is not. No one can establish the Bible’s authority but the One who gave it – God. You do not have to defend a lion – you just let it loose. You do not have to prove the Bible’s authority before you use it. You use it, and its authority will be seen in lives. “Is not my word like as a fire? saith the Lord; and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces?” (Jeremiah 23:29). You do not have to prove first whether the hammer will break the rock – you just pick it up and try it. Even so, God challenges people to do the same with His Word. “If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself” (John 7:17).
When Jesus came upon the scene, people immediately noticed something different between Him and the other religious leaders. “And it came to pass, when Jesus had ended these sayings, the people were astonished at his doctrine: For he taught them as ONE HAVING AUTHORITY, AND NOT AS THE SCRIBES” (Matthew 7:28,29). The scribes were always quoting other greatly respected Jewish leaders and teachers, but it did not have an impact upon the people. That is the difference between using the Word of God, and just quoting a man or a church.”
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You have asked exactly the right question. You did not ask for a man’s opinion of the different manuscripts, but you asked what the Bible says.
For people honestly searching for the truth, I take them to Psalm 12:6,7. “The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.”
God says that He not only “INSPIRED” His Word perfectly (He gave it perfectly, without error), “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works” (II Timothy 3:16,17), but God has also stated that He would “PRESERVE” it perfectly in Psalm 12:6,7 — notice that He said that He would do this “FROM THIS GENERATION FOR EVER.” God promised to preserve His Word as the purest silver for every generation. Do you believe that?
Now the question is, “What group of people really does believes that?” Many groups believe that God “inspired” His Word — that He gave it perfectly. But there is only one group that I know of who believes that we have a Bible that is perfectly preserved — those who stand for the King James Bible. They are the only group THAT BELIEVES WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS — THAT GOD WOULD PRESERVE HIS WORD PURE FOR EVERY GENERATION.
Ask any pastor who uses the NIV if he thinks that he has a perfectly preserved Bible without one error in his hands, and he will say, “No.” Ask any pastor who uses the New American Standard, or any other translation other than the King James Bible, and they will say, “No. No one has a perfect Bible without error.” You notice it in their preaching, too. They seldom preach “Thus saith the Lord,” but their messages are filled with, “The better word here would be ……”, “The best manuscripts here say ……..”, This would be better translated ……..” They are constantly “correcting” the Bible, instead of preaching what it says. They are just like the scribes and Pharisees who were always quoting what man said. That is why it was so refreshing to the people when Jesus came along. He spoke with authority.
Once you start throwing doubt upon the accurracy of the Bible from the pulpit, people are going to show it in the way that they live. If the Bible has mistakes in it, then any verse that they do not like can be ignored by saying, “It really does not mean that…”
For your further study, an excellent Web Site is http://wayoflife.org/~dcloud/fbns/versfbns.htm. You will find a wealth of information there, that will give you many days and weeks of rich study.