Thought for the Day

We are driving on the left hand side of the road when I hear these amazing words on the radio..."In the beginning was the word."
It is a concept I sometimes take for granted in these days of IPhones and laptop computers, but 400 years ago a revolution took place with information technology, the release of the King James Bible. On the BBC radio program titled, "Thought for the Day", Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks stated it to be the "book that changed the world." Why? It was a time in history that brought great liberty to the common man who now had personal access to the word of God... a new beginning of God's word touching lives in English prose.
It may be hard for us to grasp the immensity of this anniversary with our freedoms today, but there was a time when those who brought reform and change( like William Tyndale) died for the cause. William was the first to translate considerable parts of the Bible into English for the general public. The politics of the day called his work heresy and he was imprisoned, tried and burned at the stake...but hope was not lost for Tyndale's life work or for those who hungered for the word of God...
The fifty-four independent scholars who created the King James Version of the Bible in 1611 drew significantly on Tyndale's translations. They used many of the phrases he coined such as:

• seek and you shall find

• knock and it shall be opened unto you

• lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil

• live and move and have our being

• fight the good fight

I am driving again on the right hand side of the road, grab a cup of coffee from Dino's and slip back into my regular routine. I turn on the 9 a.m. program of the BBC and can't help but think of the "Thought for the Day" we listened to while cruising the English countryside. I will go to work, write some articles and pull Bible Gateway up on my computer for quick reference checks. I wonder what John must have meant when he said in Revelations 1:7-8,

Behold, He is coming with clouds, and every eye will see Him, even they who pierced Him. And all the tribes of the earth will mourn because of Him. Even so, Amen. “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End,” says the Lord, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”

Information technology has accelerated since 400 years ago . The word of God is written "in the clouds" so to speak with internet access...but it is also written in the hearts of men. On this anniversary that cost so many so much, let us ponder this thought for the day...
"In the beginning was the word..."