Coffee and the KJV, ESV, or NIV

For my first blog with blogger, I thought I'd comment on the cool coffeepot that one of our church members brought by for the pastor's office. It's awesome. It has a blue backlit display, auto timer, auto shutoff and chrome accents! :-) What's better than that, it was gifted to the church by a great church member who, along with her husband and children are a great asset in themselves to our church. It caused me to think, because of the way that I think, about what's the absolute best Bible version. Like coffeemakers, that depends on what you like. One of the interns at our church, though only 18 years old, loves the King James version. My personal favorite is the ESV. Church use now has commonly shifted to the NIV. Which one is best? Let me ask you, how do you like your messages from the Lord? Do you like them with a British accent? that causes you to look behind the 1611 word usage to find the original meaning? Then you should use the KJV. Or do you like to open up Scripture and get the concept of the author's original intended meaning quickly? The NIV is for you. IF however, you want a strict verse by verse translation of the earliest and best manuscripts the Biblical authors wrote, you might just want to look at the ESV. I had an ugly white coffee pot in the office that didn't have an autoshutoff and I risked setting the church on fire everytime I turned it on. It still made coffee. Now that I have the high speed coffee maker, I have virtually eliminated the risk of burning the church down due to coffee consumption. It makes coffee too. I can assure you of this: I will drink more coffee because it's cool. Has your Bible study been suffering lately? Maybe it's time for a fresh look at the word of God. It might just communicate something you've never seen before.