Which Bible is the Word of God?

What the translation wars might be missing about Scripture

This past month, Randy Clark, founder of Global Awakening, released a thoughtful communication explaining why he no longer recommends The Passion Translation. Though gracious in tone, some of the reasons he gave opened a much larger question for me—not simply about TPT, but about the nature of Scripture, translation, and what we actually mean when we call the Bible the Word of God.

Randy points to Psalm 81:10 as a particularly striking example. Most translations say something like this: “Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it.”

The Passion renders the thought: “Open your mouth with a mighty decree… The words that you speak, so shall it be!”

Randy’s objection is straightforward: the Hebrew doesn’t say “mighty decree.” The translator has taken a theological idea about declarations and placed it directly into the poetry of the Psalm. I understand his observation here. If our question is simply, Which English wording most directly represents the Hebrew words on the page?—“mighty decree” isn’t there.

But oh boy… this opens up a much bigger conversation. And it takes us somewhere I don’t think we always expect.

Translation Is Already Interpretation

First, understand something… Every translation interprets.

Consider a familiar example. For years, the NIV famously rendered the Greek word sarx—literally “flesh”—as “sinful nature” in numerous passages. Neither the Greek word for “sin” nor the Greek word for “nature” appears in sarx. The translators believed that, in those contexts, “sinful nature” communicated what Paul meant by “flesh.”

That is interpretation.

And it is not an insignificant interpretation. “Sinful nature” carries an entire theological framework into the English text. Other translations simply retain “flesh,” leaving open the wider range of what Paul might mean by the term.

That doesn’t make the NIV a bad Bible. I have benefited enormously from the NIV. It means translation is never the mechanical replacement of Greek and Hebrew words with English ones.

There is a spectrum. Some translations stay closer to the linguistic form of the source text. Others attempt to communicate what the translators believe the source text means. Paraphrases move farther still.

Without a doubt, TPT moves farther along that interpretive spectrum than the NASB or ESV. And for that reason, I don’t study just from TPT.

But I don’t study just from the NIV either.

The question, then, cannot simply be: Does this translation interpret? They all do.

The questions are: How much does it interpret? Is it transparent about doing so? Is the interpretation defensible within the larger biblical witness?

And does it preserve the fundamental architecture of Scripture?

The Bible Itself Makes This More Complicated

This is where things get particularly interesting.

The New Testament writers regularly quote the Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures that we call the Septuagint. And sometimes that Greek translation differs considerably from the Hebrew text behind most modern Old Testaments.

Hebrews 10 gives us a remarkable example. Psalm 40:6 in Hebrew says essentially: “You have dug/opened ears for me.”

But the ancient Greek translation says: “A body you prepared for me.”

Those aren’t the same words. So when the writer of Hebrews quotes the Psalm, which one does he use? … The Greek.

“A body you prepared for me.”

More than that, the book of Hebrews proceeds to develop the thought around the very language supplied by the Greek translation:

“We have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.”

Apparently, the inspired New Testament writer was not troubled by a Greek rendering that moved beyond the literal meaning of the Hebrew image. He finds in that rendering language through which he illuminates Christ.

Then there is Psalm 68:18. This is a whole other level of interpretive conundrum.

The Hebrew speaks of God ascending and receiving gifts from humanity. The Septuagint likewise says he received gifts. But when Ephesians 4:8 cites the passage, it says:

“When he ascended on high… he gave gifts to men.”

Received becomes gave! And Paul immediately develops the passage around Christ giving apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers to his Body.

There are serious scholarly discussions about how Paul arrived at that reading, including possible connections to ancient Jewish interpretive traditions. But whatever explanation we choose, one thing is difficult to deny: The apostles’ relationship with the Old Testament was richer than simply reproducing its words as literally as possible.

They believed the Scriptures were alive with Christ.

This Doesn’t Mean “Anything Goes”

That does not mean we can make Scripture say whatever we want.

There is a profound difference between illuminating another dimension within the biblical witness and dismantling the architecture of that witness altogether.

Imagine Scripture as a great house. There are rooms to explore. Windows through which light enters differently. Floors we haven’t fully explored. There are poetic images capable of carrying more than one layer of meaning. But there are also load-bearing walls.

The identity of Jesus Christ. The revelation of the Father. The incarnation. The cross. Resurrection. The reconciliation of creation in Christ. The life of the Spirit.

Remove the load-bearing walls and eventually you have constructed another house.

This is why I don’t put TPT in the same category as translations deliberately shaped to deny foundational truths like the full deity of Christ. In fact, some of its interpretive expansions move in exactly the opposite direction. John 1:1–2, for instance, describes the Living Expression as “fully God” and eternally “face-to-face” with God.

On the other hand, Jehovah’s Witnesses famously render John 1:1 as “the Word was a god.” Joseph Smith’s revision takes another route, transforming John’s declaration that “the Word was God” into language saying that “the Son was of God.”

Those aren’t attempts to illuminate another dimension of beauty within John’s poetry. They alter something foundational to the Christian confession about who Jesus is. They start removing load-bearing walls.

God filling the mouth with “a mighty decree,” on the other hand, is an interpretive expansion of “open your mouth and I will fill it.” The language admittedly goes beyond the immediate Hebrew of Psalm 81, though the broader idea of a decree being established does appear elsewhere in Scripture—most explicitly in Job 22:28: “You will also decree a thing, and it will be established for you.”

So I understand the criticism. We should be able to distinguish between what the Hebrew of Psalm 81 actually says and the theological interpretation TPT has woven into it. But we are not talking about tearing down the house and constructing an entirely different one. We are debating what belongs in one of its rooms.

More importantly, it does not follow that every interpretive expansion represents a corruption of Scripture. If that becomes our standard, we may find ourselves having an uncomfortable conversation with the writer of Hebrews!

Let Scripture Be Bigger Than One Translation

Ironically, the translators of the King James Bible understood something about this. In their original preface, The Translators to the Reader, they approvingly cited Augustine’s observation that: “variety of translations is profitable for the finding out of the sense of the Scriptures.”

Read that again.

The translators of the “Authorized Version” believed that multiple translations help us discover the meaning of Scripture.

They consulted Hebrew, Greek, Syriac, and Latin sources, along with Spanish, French, Italian, and Dutch translations. They included alternate readings in their margins precisely because they recognized that sometimes the meaning wasn’t reducible to one unquestionable English rendering.

There is something beautifully humble about that, and I think we need more of it.

I don’t study from TPT alone. I wouldn’t recommend anyone else do so either. Put it beside the NASB. Put it beside the NIV. Put it beside the NRSV, ESV, NET, NKJV, or whatever translations help you see the text from different angles. Better still, learn to use the tools that let you look underneath all of them.

But don’t imagine that when you finally find the “right” English translation you have escaped interpretation. You haven’t. You have simply chosen someone else’s.

The Word Became Flesh, Not Paper

And this brings me to the real reason I’m writing this. This isn’t ultimately an article defending The Passion Translation. It is about something much deeper.

Five hundred years ago, Protestants rightly resisted the idea that the institutional Church or Pope possessed unquestionable authority over the conscience. Scripture became the great rallying cry of the Reformation.

But there is always a temptation to replace one unquestionable authority with another kind of unquestionable object—to trade what some have called the “Vatican Pope” for a “Paper Pope.”

And the irony is that Christians holding the same Bible then divide endlessly over what their final authority supposedly unquestionably says!

For example… I could probably find a hundred sincere followers of Jesus who would write letters criticizing Randy Clark’s ministry more severely than Randy has criticized TPT—and they would construct their arguments using the very translations he recommends!

The problem isn’t Scripture. It’s our assumption that possession of the text eliminates the need for interpretation, community, humility, and above all, the Holy Spirit.

There is only one perfect Word of God.

His name is Jesus Christ.

“In the beginning was the Word!”

The eternal Word didn’t become a book. It became flesh. And through the Spirit, this living Word is now being written upon human hearts.

In no way does this diminish Scripture. Rather, it helps us understand what Scripture is for.

“These are the very Scriptures that testify about me,” Jesus said.

The written Scriptures are an extraordinary, Spirit-breathed witness whose purpose is to reveal the Living Word.

So yes—study them carefully. Look into the Hebrew and Greek. Check out the work of scholars. Compare translations. Get to know Church history (from different traditions, though, because you’ll learn very different things).

But in the midst of all of that, come to Jesus. Because the destination of Scripture isn’t perfect information—but communion.

A Final Word

One final thought. I believe Randy Clark is an extraordinary gift to the Body of Christ. As I read his letter, though, I couldn’t help recalling the letters and warnings written by sincere Christian leaders about what was happening around Randy and the Vineyard in the 1990s.

Some of those people genuinely believed they were protecting the Church.

There is an old and unfortunate observation that one move of God often ends up resisting the next one.

I am not saying that’s what Randy is doing here. I’m saying the possibility should keep every one of us humble.

I want that humility for Randy, for those working on the Passion Translation—and certainly for myself! Because whatever God is doing in the days ahead, I don’t want my confidence in yesterday’s wineskin to keep me from recognizing today’s wine.

I want to stay in the River and remain teachable. I want to keep my heart open to grace. Pure, Christ-centered, Father-revealing, Spirit-filled grace.

And wherever a translation helps me see more clearly the face of Jesus Christ, I will receive the gift—without ever confusing the translation with the One to whom it points.

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