We give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you, Colossians 1:3.
One of the unique strengths of the King James Bible is that it is careful to depict each person in the Godhead in their own individual right. Within the very first week of me becoming a naive King James Bible believer (back in 1978), a graduate of Prairie Bible Institute told me two things. First, she let me know that Prairie was the "Bob Jones University of Canada". Next, she told me that Colossians 1:3 was proof that the King James Bible erred. She pointed out that it made a distinction between God and the Father as if they were two different entities.
I thought about that through the night and in the morning I understood. God is the description of the Christian deity and he is made up of three distinct persons. One of them is the Father who just like Jesus Christ can and does step outside of his identity within the Godhead to manifest himself as a distinct person known as the Father. I also understood that the new versions obscured that fact.
It was not just the person of Jesus Christ who was under attack in the New Versions, the Father himself was under attack. My proud bible school graduate would have nodded with approval at the ESV in Colossians 1:3; We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you. The ESV carefully preserves the pagan concept of God in which God the creator is the Father and any idea that there is more than one person who can speak as God in unthinkable. The idea that within the Godhead are three distinct persons; each one capable of manifesting himself outside of his role in making up the God head, is obscured.
The new versions are consistent. James said, Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this,1:27. The NIV smoothly blends the Father back into the Godhead as a smooth homogenous paste; Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this. This isn't accidental. This is a direct on attack to obscure the Father as a person.
The pattern continues. Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, Ephesians 5:20. It is very clear from reading this verse that Paul is giving thanks to God, and he is drawing the Father out specifically to thank him also. The NIV says; always giving thanks to God the Father for everything. The ESV agrees, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father.
In the antichrist's never ending attack on Jesus who is the Christ, the Father must be neutralized. All things are delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him, Matthew 11:27. The Father and Jesus Christ mutually bear witness of each other. In order to hate Jesus Christ and to downplay him as the new versions do, it is necessary to keep the Father's identity as low key as possible.
What better way could there be to obscure the Father than to just deny that he is a real person within the Godhead and instead just call God as a whole the Father? Wake up. The Father is a real person. To the world, the concept of God is the farthest that they will ever look for the Father. To the King James Bible believing Christian, the Father is a person within the Godhead who loved us enough to send Jesus Christ.
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