Nick Norelli and Kevin Sam have both tagged me with a Bible meme. I wasn’t sure what to do about, and that is why I have delayed my response. But I will try to answer it in part, as I celebrate my 400th blog post (well, not quite, because WordPress counts some drafts which were never completed).

1. What translation of the Bible do you like best?

TNIV. It’s not ideal, but for my purposes it is the best single general purpose Bible. For 25 years before TNIV came out I used and liked NIV, but TNIV is a real improvement on NIV in the areas where it was weak: misleading gender language and reading the New Testament into the Old.

2. Old or New Testament?

What a choice? I am a New Testament believer, but in some ways I prefer the Old Testament.

3. Favorite Book of the Bible?

Difficult to say. If I have just one choice I will go for Isaiah.

4. Favorite Chapter?

Even more difficult, and especially because chapter divisions so often don’t match the boundaries of passages. In the Psalms they do, so I can safely go for Psalm 23.

5. Favorite Verse? (feel free to explain yourself if you have to)

John 3:16. This may sound hackneyed, but my reasons are implicit in my recent post on this verse.

6. Bible character you think you’re most like?

Again, I don’t really know. I would like to be most like Jesus. But sometimes I feel more like one of his very fallible disciples; perhaps someone else would like to suggest which of them.

7. One thing from the Bible that confuses you?

“And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.” (Matt. 11:12) I’ve heard this verse preached on and exegeted countless times and it has never made sense.

This was Nick’s answer to this question, and I can’t improve on it, except to put the quote in a modern version which is just as unclear.

8. Moses or Paul?

Definitely Paul.

9. A teaching from the Bible that you struggle with or don’t get?

Despite my attempt at confident answers to the comments on my previous post, the status and fate of Christians who continue in sin.

10. Coolest name in the Bible?

Zerubbabel.

Now tag five people.

Well, I can’t resist winding up John Hobbins again by tagging him. I don’t think Lingamish has done this one either, so I will pay him back for tagging me with The Room With A View, a meme which he seems to have invented as a way to show off how nice a life he is living in Africa. I would love to see Wayne Leman‘s answers if he can be tempted to join in here. Paul Trathen was so excited to be tagged the last time (when he tagged me, but for a meme I had already done) that I will tag him again. Finally, I will encourage Alastair Roberts to keep up the blogging he has recently returned to by tagging him as well.

PS For some reason this came up as post 402. The only reason I can think of for WordPress skipping 400 and 401 is that last night I upgraded to the latest version.