That Flattened the Gospel

Jesus. Christ. Lord. Church. What each word replaced, what the replacement cost,
and what is recovered when the original is restored.

Part 1 of 5

There is a conversation happening beneath the surface of every English Bible ever printed. It is the conversation between what the words on the page say and what the words they replaced were declaring. Most readers of the English Bible have never heard this conversation because the translations that produced the English text were so thorough, so consistent, and so early in the history of the tradition...    see more >>

…Covered Yeshua

YHWH saves. The divine name embedded in the name of the Son, present before the foundation of the world, confirmed in thirty-three years, eternal beyond them. Jesus confined him to a lifetime. Yeshua carries him through eternity.

Part 2 of 5

There are two names. They designate the same person. But they do not carry the same one. One of them is a declaration that reaches from before the foundation of the world through thirty-three years of human history and out the other side into eternity. The other is a label that begins at a birth and ends at a resurrection. The difference between a declaration that spans eternity and a label that...    see more >>

…Covered Mashiach

A covenantal title became a surname. A surname points to a person. A covenantal title points to the entire story of what YHWH was doing from the beginning.

Part 3 of 5

Ask most English speakers what Christ means and they will pause. Some will say it means anointed. Most will simply say it is part of his name, Jesus Christ, a first name and a last name, two syllables following two others, the complete designation of the one the gospel proclaims. The pause itself is the evidence of what was lost. Christ has become so thoroughly a surname that the title it once...    see more >>

…Covered YHWH

Six thousand eight hundred and twenty-eight times in the Old Testament. Continued into the New Testament. Thomas saw the nail marks and recognized the name. The tradition covered the recognition with a title.

Part 4 of 5

Lord is the most consequential of the four translation choices in this series because it is doing double duty, covering YHWH six thousand eight hundred and twenty-eight times in the Old Testament, and then continuing into the New Testament where it covers the recognition of YHWH in the body of the risen Son. Every other translation in this series removed a declaration from the name or title of...    see more >>

…Covered Ekklesia

The called-out assembly of all flesh, constituted by the cross, without walls, without exclusion mechanisms, without a statement of faith that qualifies or disqualifies, became a building with a door that could be closed.

Part 5 of 5

The first four documents in this series examined translation choices that covered declarations about the one the gospel proclaims, his name, his covenantal title, his Father’s name. This fifth document examines a translation choice that covered the nature of the body his cross constituted. Not who he is. What his work produced. And what the tradition built in its place.

The body constituted...    see more >>