I often hear pastors and seminary professors bemoaning the widespread biblical illiteracy within the church today. I don’t think it’s the problem.

Is it true? Are people more ignorant of the Bible than they were 10, 20, 50, 100 years ago? Of course. There’s no denying it. Studies, surveys, and tests have proven it. For example, when I entered Seminary, they gave us an entrance exam on our knowledge of biblical and theological ideas, and then, as we neared graduation, they gave it to us again to see if we learned anything. Most of us did improve, of course, but the professor who proctored our exam said that over the years, the test has not changed, but the scores have steadily decreased. Both incoming and graduating seminary students know less than similar students from previous generations.

And this isn’t just a problem with seminary students. It’s true in almost all churches.

So why do I believe it’s not a problem? Here’s why:

What has ever-increasing Biblical knowledge ever done for the church? The main thing isn’t how much you know, it’s what you do with what you know. And I think that we live in a generation that looks at the scholars of our own day and the past and says, “Well, that’s great that they could recite the Bible backwards, but what did they do with that knowledge except for write a bunch of books and preach a bunch of sermons? Nothing? Well, then I guess I don’t need that knowledge.”

The problem facing modern Christianity is not biblical illiteracy, but biblical apathy. People don’t care what they don’t know unless they can see a direct link between learning something and using what they learn to love and serve others.

Just take a look at how many companies today are using “community service” benefits to attract young employees. That’s right. Companies used to offer health benefits, 401(k)s, and career advancement opportunities. But new and upcoming employees are asking, “Are you going to give me time to take what I am learning in this business and use it to help people in Africa? If not, I’ll look elsewhere.”

That’s the way the church needs to use biblical knowledge. We must show the direct link between learning something from the Bible and using what we learn to help others in need. If no such direct link can be made, then we should not complain when people don’t want to learn it.

So do you want to increase Biblical literacy? Then show how knowing the Bible will help transform lives, our communities, and the world. And this doesn’t mean more time given to application in the sermon. It means actually taking people out into the world to put the Word into practice.

Agree? Disagree? Let me know!

Put Service Back in the Church Service

By Jeremy Myers

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In a previous post about cancelling your church service, one person commented that there were six other days for serving the community, and we should leave the Sunday church service alone.

I understand this concern, but the sad reality is that Christians do not use those six other days to love and serve their community. And another sermon series is not going to change this. Church leaders need to proactively show their members how to serve and who to love in the community, not just preach and teach about it.

Could this be done on Tuesday night instead of Sunday morning? Sure. But as we all know from decades of experience, less than 10% of the church will show up for a Tuesday night community service project. So once again, to get people out of the pews and into the community, the best time to do this may be on Sunday morning. Doing so is not really cancelling the church service; it’s putting service back in the “church service.”

Let’s look at this from the spiritual perspective. I’m fairly convinced that Satan doesn’t care too much if Christians have faithful church attendance. The more services we have, and the longer they are, the more delighted he is. Of course, he is just as happy if Christians don t get together with other believers at all, and just sit at home watching television.

And if that is the way Satan feels, God feels just about the opposite.

Just as God did not call us out of the world so we could sit at home watching television, He also did not call us out of the world so we could sit in a pew at church watching a sermon. The one thing God wants is the one thing Satan doesn’t: followers of Jesus who actually follow Jesus into the world.

So the reason for cancelling church services is not to just give people a break from church. It is to get followers of Jesus off the warm, padded pews in church, and out onto the cold, hard, concrete of the world where the people are.

How? Well, there is no one right way to do this. We have the freedom to be as creative and flexible as we want.

Maybe a good way to begin this is to have a regularly scheduled Sunday service where a service event is planned and announced in advance. Churches are notorious for having special Sunday events to get people to come to church. We have special speakers, choirs, and concerts. We schedule “Friend Day” and “Back to Church Sunday.” I recently saw one church in my area inviting people to attend “Orphan Sunday.”

I’m not fond of such special Sundays, but maybe if we can avoid the gimmicks one or two Sundays a month could be planned where the church does not try to get people into the pews, but out of them. You could call it “Back to Work Sunday.” This might show people that the point of church is not to come to church, but for the church to go to the world.

If Christians are really concerned about orphans, rather than have a Sunday where we talk about orphans, we could have a Sunday where we go play with children in an actual orphanage, go participate in a fundraiser for adoptions, or host a family-fun day in the park for foster parents and their children.

If the leadership of a church was serious about reaching the people who don t come to church on Sunday, maybe a good strategy would be to find the places where these people already are on Sunday morning, and go join them rather than ask them to join us. Yes, you might end up tailgating at the football coliseum, fishing at the bass lake, or hiking mountain trails.

One church I am talking with, Mercer Island Covenant Church, cancelled their church service last March to either run or volunteer in the annual Rotary Club’s Half Marathon Run. They got a lot of positive feedback from the church members and the community, and met several community leaders in the process. They plan on doing the same thing again this year. That’s what I’m talking about!

I believe that if we genuinely participated in some of these things during the hours we were usually in church, more relationship building would take place in one month than often happens in an entire year of church services.

Do you know of any other churches that participate in community service or activities on Sunday morning? I would love to hear about them in the comment section below.

Real Beauty

By Jeremy Myers

2 Comments

Women today are inundated with images of beauty that they are expected to live up to. I have three daughters, and I wonder every day what pressures they will face as they grow up to look a certain way, have certain hair, or be a certain weight. I try to tell them that they are perfect and loved just as they are, but sometimes I feel like it’s my voice against the world. And it doesn’t help that most of what is shown on television and in magazines is doctored, not just surgically and with hours of make-up, but with Photoshop and other image editing programs.

To see what I mean, check out these links:

A post from over three years ago about the Dove Evolution Commercials.

Unattainable Beauty

Generation Diva

Finally, here’s a video which Jonathan Brink posted last week by P!nk called “Perfect” about the message we need to be telling all our girls.

Church Cancelled Today

By Jeremy Myers

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I have previously suggested that one of the best things a pastor could do for their church is cancel all church services. The reason would not be to shut the church down, but liberate the church to actually be the church in the community. People are so busy attending church, they don’t have time to be the church. So cancelling the services would free up their time.

But it is easy to predict what would happen if your church did this. Most of the members would go down the street to another church. And then the pastor would get fired by the few who remained.

So before canceling everything all at once, some small steps toward freedom might be necessary. For example, a church could cancel one Sunday service per month. And initially, to really surrender control and give the people freedom, nothing should be scheduled to replace the canceled service. On these Sundays, the people are simply given permission to not attend church. The pastor could tell the people that they are being given the Sunday off. They can sleep in, go golfing, or have an enjoyable morning with their family.

When that Sunday comes, the church doors should remain locked and a sign can be posted which says, “Church service cancelled today. Enjoy your day and see you next week!” Later, if the leaders feel they must plan something for the people do, they must first ask themselves if they are having control issues.

Then, once they are assured they are not, they should take a deep breath, and schedule something unchurchy. Tell the people that there are no requirements, but if they want to join you at the beach next Sunday, they are welcome. Or fishing on the lake. Or watching football. Or whatever. Just don t do anything with the Bible, singing, sermons, and prayer. Whatever you do, don t take attendance or an offering.

Cancelling a church service, of course, is done with purpose. It is to show the people that attending church is not what church is really about. Cancelling a service or two per month provides the church the opportunity to put the service back in church service. I’ll post about this later.

What do you think? Is this doable? What would happen if your church tried something like this?

Human Trafficking Prostitution Ring Busted

By Jeremy Myers

2 Comments

My wife and I are slowly trying to learn how to help girls enslaved in human trafficking as sex slaves. So occasionally, I will post updates about what we are learning. Martin Scott over at the Perspectives blog alerted me to the following news:

Sex-Slave Ring Busted in Mallorca, Canary Islands, and Madrid

Here is a quote from the article (This is a Google translation from Spanish, so forgive the oddities):

The organization captured a good-looking young Nigerian and scarce resources to those subjected to a “voodoo ritual” in their country of origin, which were committed to an oath to repay a debt of between 30,000 and 70,000 euros.

Were transferred by boat to Spain via Morocco or in plane clandestinely and with false documents, under the promise that the organization would seek a job to start a new life in Europe and not knowing that his fate was to be exercised prostitution.

Once in Spain, women living in captivity and were forced into prostitution under threats of black magic rituals, as well as by physical violence, rape and death threats to the girls themselves and their families in Nigeria. Several were forced to abort.

And remember, this isn’t just a problem in Spain or Africa. It’s happening right here in the United States. It’s going on in your town.

To learn more about Human Trafficking and sex slavery, check out some of these posts:

Human Trafficking Posts

Book Review: The Irresistible Revolution

By Jeremy Myers

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Other than posting a short blurb on my 4000 books post, I usually do not review books unless they were given to me as review copies. But The Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne deserves a blog post. I’m not sure yet if it will gain a place on my Burning Books list, but time will tell.

No matter what you believe about the role of Christians in society and culture, especially in regard to social issues like hunger, poverty, and war, Shane’s book will challenge you to think and act differently. It is the story of how he and some friends entered into one of the worst areas of Philadelphia to live out the love of Jesus among the people who were there. Shane gives plenty of examples about the things they have done and the lessons they have learned along the way.

For example, their community developed a statement of beliefs to show people that they were not a cult, but they also developed a statement of practices to show they were not just believers (p. 125). I would love to see this sort of thing adopted in churches everywhere. We have doctrinal statements, but how many of us have practical statements? If what you believe isn’t leading you to do something for others, what good is it? (That sounds a lot like James 2.) And of course, their community in Philly didn’t just write a statement of practices, they actually practice them. That’s important too.

Here are some of the other ideas that challenged me:

The greatest tragedy in the church today is not that rich Christians do not care about the poor but that rich Christians do not know the poor (p. 113, 127, 157).
We don’t need more churches. What we need is a church (p. 145).
We lose our children to the culture of drugs and materialism, violence and war, not because we did not entertain them, but because we did not challenge them to actually live the gospel in difficult and heroic ways (p. 226).
If we believe terrorists are beyond redemption, we should rip out half our New Testament, since it was written by a converted terrorist who became an extremist for grace (p. 272).
Violence is for those who have lost their imagination (p. 279).
We should no longer talk about “issues” and “needs.” We need to talk about and get to know people. For example, it’s easy to talk about “ending world hunger,” but such theoretical discussions cease when we discover that Jim lost his job and doesn’t have any money to put food on the table for his wife and three kids. Stop talking about issues and needs, and get out there and find someone who is dealing with such things, and then help them (p. 292).
Bigger is not better. We do not need million-dollar mansions for God to accomplish His will for the world. In fact, those megabuildings might only get in the way (p. 322ff). We need to grow smaller and smaller until we take over the world (p. 340).

Not everyone is going to agree with Shane, his beliefs, or his practices. There were several things he said and did in the book that made me quite uncomfortable. Like the time they went and threw $10,000 worth of coins onto the sidewalks of Wall Street to make a point about greed (pp. 188-189). I’m still not sure what was accomplished, and it seemed a somewhat wasteful way of using $10,000.

I highly recommend this book. And I, for one, am going to do more than just read it. I am going to start trying to live the Kingdom of God ideas it contains. Read this book. Let Shane challenge you to change.

Book Review: SoulPrint

By Jeremy Myers

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I’ve read Mark Batterson‘s other two books, In a Pit With a Lion on a Snowy Day, and Wild Goose Chase, and I think both were better than Soulprint. It might just be that I’m a little tired of hearing about how to discover my divine destiny. It seems that ever since Rick Warren published The Purpose Driven Life, every pastor out there is preaching sermons and every Christian author is writing books about discovering who God made you to be and how to live accordingly.

It’s not that I disagree. I believe that each one of us is uniquely created by God to fulfill some purpose within His plan for the world. We are not to copy someone else, but are to learn who God made us to be and how we can live our lives within His Kingdom. Mark Batterson did a good job explaining this concept. And I really appreciated his explanation that there are different seasons in life, and we must be content with the season we are in (p. 25).

The strength of Soulprint is that each chapter is based on an event from the life of David. I like it when books do this, because even if I get bored with the book, I still feel like I’m learning something about Scripture. But other than this, I just couldn’t get into the book. It didn’t help that it is another book written by a popular and powerful megachurch pastor. I really struggle with most of these books since it seems that once the authors get to where they are, they forget the struggles and pain that all of us “lesser” people are dealing with. Most of the stories and illustrations in such books deal with how to handle crowds of adoring fans, multi-million dollar budgets, and rich CEOs who try to push your church around. That just doesn’t connect with where most of us are at.

So if you have never read any “find your divine destiny” books, you could start with this one. Otherwise, I recommend you just move on to actually living out who God has made you to be.

Please Rank this review:

FTC Disclaimer: I was given a free review copy of this book by Multnomah Press.

Church Planter Disconnect

By Jeremy Myers

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I took a short survey at Church Planter Profiles yesterday. All I really wanted was the chance to win a $50 Amazon gift card, but I found the survey amusing. They did not seem to recognize that house churches are churches too. The survey was about buildings, budget, staff, and how quickly you reached 200 people.

Clearly, what they actually wanted is not “Church Planter Profiles” but “Megachurch Planter Profiles.” Apparently, that is the only way to properly do church.

I even found their homepage picture a little sad:

So apparently, God can only use you to plant a church if you fit this “unique combination of personality, gifting, ability, experience, and drive.” Otherwise, God can’t use you.

Well, I’m not one of them, but I’m still ready. How about it, God?

Free Greek and Hebrew Fonts

By Jeremy Myers

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In case you want or need them, here is a link for free Greek and Hebrew fonts.

http://www.bibleworks.com/fonts.html (Download and unpack the zip file on this page, then follow the instructions to install.)

Here are the keyboard layouts:

Contents of BibleWorks 8

By Jeremy Myers

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I am so impressed with all the reference tools in BibleWorks 8. And not just the quantity, but the type of resources. There are Greek and Hebrew tools in BibleWorks you will not find anywhere else. Fantastic original language resources and background material.

Take, for example, the Salkinson-Ginsburg Hebrew New Testament. Yes, it is the New Testament, but in Hebrew. Many people believe that much of the original stories behind the New Testament text (and maybe parts of the text itself — such as the Gospel of Matthew) was originally in Hebrew, not Greek. So while you were hear lots of people talk about the importance of studying the Greek New Testament, there are huge advantages to studying the Hebrew New Testament as well. It was, after all, written primarily by Jews and for Jews. Studying the Salkinson-Ginsburg Hebrew New Testament was one of the things that helped me come to my conclusions on the recent paper I posted on Luke 6:1.

Anyway, I’m not aware of any other Bible Study software package that has this quantity and quality of original language resources. Below is the entire list of study resources in Bible Works 8. It is quite long, so I have included some hotlinks for you to jump to sections that interest you.

Shortcut to Sections:
Original Languages – Hebrew/Aramaic/Syriac
Original Languages – Greek
Bible Versions – English
Bible Versions – Other (they even have Swahili…)
Lexical-Grammatical Reference Works (Look at this list!…)
Other Reference Works (…this list too!)

Original Language Texts

Hebrew/Aramaic/Syriac

1905 British and Foreign Bible Society Peshitto edition
The Aramaic New Testament (Peshitta), with the Etheridge (1849), Lewis (1896), Murdock (1851), Norton (1881), and Magiera (2005) English translations
Leningrad Codex Hebrew Bible, with full accenting & full vowel pointing
Leningrad Codex Hebrew Bible, transliterated
Delitzsch Hebrew NT
Groves-Wheeler Westminster Hebrew Old Testament Morphology database,version 4.10
Hebrew Accent Extensions to Groves-Wheeler Westminster Hebrew Old Testament Morphology database
Old Syriac Sinaiticus manuscript
Old Syriac Curetonian manuscript
Peshitta, with Syriac and Hebrew letters
Salkinson-Ginsburg Hebrew New Testament
The Targumim, parsed, lemmatized and tied to entries in the Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon. Also included:
- FragTargums with morphology, TgSheniSuppEsther with morphology, TgTosefProphets with morphology
- Psalms Targum (English)
- Rodkinson Babylonian Talmud and Mishnah
  (English)
- Targum Cairo Geniza with morphology
- Targum Jerusalem on the Pentateuch (English) (Etheridge)
- Targum Neofiti with morphology
- Targum NeofMarginalia with morphology
- Targum Onkelos on the Pentateuch (English) (Etheridge)
- Targum Pseudo Jonathan on the Pentateuch (Etheridge)
- Targum PseudoJonathan with morphology
- Targumim (Mostly Onkelos and Jonathan) with morphology (updated 2005)

Greek*

Aletti/Gieniusz/Bushell Morphologically Analyzed Greek New Testament
Aletti/Gieniusz/Bushell/CATSS Morphologically Analyzed Septuagint
Apostolic Fathers English translation
Apostolic Fathers (Greek with Morphological tags by Gieniusz/Bushell)
Apostolic Fathers Latin
Brenton’s Septuagint English Translation, including Deutero-canonical section
Complete Works of Flavius Josephus, parsed and lemmatized, with the 1828 Whiston English translation and Latin sections
Friberg’s 1999 Morphologically Analyzed Greek New Testament
Nestle-Aland 27th Edition/UBS Fourth Edition Greek New Testament
OT Pseudepigrapha in Greek, morphologically tagged, with English translation
Rahlfs’ Septuagint, with Apocrypha & variants
Robinson-Pierpont Greek New Testament (Byzantine Textform 2005) with Morphological Analysis
Scrivener’s Greek New Testament (Textus Receptus), with Morphological Analysis
Stephanus Greek New Testament (Textus Receptus), with Morphological Analysis
Tischendorf Greek New Testament, with Critical Apparatus
Von Soden Greek New Testament
Westcott and Hort Greek New Testament (proofed & corrected), with Morphological Analysis
Works of Philo (Greek Text & Morphology with English translation)

* Modern Greek versions in separate section below

Bible Versions

English

American Standard Version, 1901
Bible in Basic English, 1949/64
Bishop’s Bible, 1595
Brenton’s Septuagint English Translation, without Deutero-canonical section
Complete Jewish Bible, 1998
Darby Bible (1884/1890)
Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition
English Revised Version, 1881/1885
English Standard Version, 2007 update
Geneva Bible, 1599
GOD’S WORD® Translation, 1995
Holman Christian Standard Bible, 2004
Hone English NT Apocrypha
Jewish Publication Society Tanakh, 1917
Jewish Publication Society Tanakh, 1985
King James Apocrypha, 1611
King James, 1611, with Strong’s Codes and Geneva Bible notes
King James, 1611/1769, with Strong’s Codes
MacDonald Idiomatic Translation Bible
NET Bible with notes and maps
New American Bible
New American Standard Bible, 1977, with Codes
New American Standard Bible, 1995, with Codes
New International Reader’s Version
New International Version (UK)
New International Version (US), 1984, with cross references and footnotes
New Jerusalem Bible
New King James Version (1982) Version, with Strong’s Codes
New Living Translation, 2nd edition, 2005
New Revised Standard Version with Apocrypha, 1989
New Testament Peshitta Translation, Etheridge, 1849
New Testament Peshitta Translation, James Murdock, 1851
New Testament Peshitta Translation, Lewis, 1896
New Testament Peshitta Translation, Norton, 1881
New Testament Peshitta Translation, Magiera, 2005
Revised Standard Version with Apocrypha, 1952
Today’s NIV
Tyndale New Testament, 1534
Von Soden Greek New Testament
Webster Bible, 1833
Revised Webster Update, 1995, with Codes
Young’s Literal Translation, 1862/1898

Latin

Nova Vulgata
Latin Vulgate (Weber Edition)
Latin Vulgate (Nova Vulgata)
Latin Vulgate (Vulgata Clementina 1598 with Glossa Ordinaria notes)
Latin sections from Works of Flavius Josephus
Online Bible Vulgate Mapped to KJV

Afrikaans

Bible Afrikaans, 1953
Afrikaans, 1983

Albanian

Albanian (1994)

Arabic

Van Dyke Arabic Bible

Bulgarian

Bulgarian Protestant Version, 1940/1995/2005
Bulgarian Bible, 1938
Constantinople (Tzarigrad) Bible, 1871

Catalan

Catalan BCI Version

Chinese

Chinese Union Bible, Big5
Chinese Union Bible, Simplified
Chinese New Version, Big5
Chinese New Version, Simplified

Croatian

Croatian Bible

Cyrillic

Russian Synodal Text of the Bible with Codes

Czech

Bible, 21st Century Translation (B21), 2009 (added after initial release)
Bible Kralicka, 1613
Cesky Ekumenicky preklad, 1985
Preklad KMS, 1994
Nova Bible Kralicka, 1998
Slovo na cestu, 2000

Danish

De Hellige Skrifter, 1931
Wierød Danish New Testament,1997

Dutch

Leidse Vertaling, 1912/1994
Lutherse Vertaling, 1750/1933/1994
The Netherlands Bible Society, 1951
Statenvertaling, 1637, with Codes
Willibrordvertaling Version, 1978
Willibrordvertaling Version, 1995

Finnish

Raamattu, 1933/1938 käännös

French

Bible en français courant, 1997
Jerusalem Bible
Haitian Creole Bible
Louis Segond, 1910, with Strong’s Codes
Nouvelle Édition Genève, 1979, with Codes
Traduction Œcuménique de la Bible, 1988
Version Darby, 1885

German

Einheitsübersetzung-KBA, 1980
Elberfelder, Revised, 1993
Elberfelder, Unrevised, 1905 (Darby)
Herder Translation (Revised Version 2005)
Lutherbibel, 1545
LutherBibel, 1912, with Strong’s Codes
Münchener New Testament, 1998, with Codes
Schlachter Bible, 1951
Schlachter Bible, 2000
Zuercher Bibel, 2nd edition, 2008

Greek (modern)

Greek Orthodox Church NT
Metaglottisis Greek New Testament, 2004
Modern Greek Bible

Hungarian

Károli, 1993

Indonesian

Bahasa Indonesia Sehari-hari
Terjemahan Baru, 2nd edition, 1974/1997

Italian

San Paolo Edizione, 1995
La Nuova Diodati, 1991
La Sacra Biblia Nuova Riveduta, 1994

Japanese

Shinkaiyaku Version
Kogoyaku Version (added after initial release)

Korean

Korean Revised Version

Lithuanian

Lithuanian Bible

Macedonian

Macedonian Bible

Norwegian

1930 Bokmål
1938 Nynorsk
Norsk Bibel Konkordant, 1988
Norsk Bibel Nynorsk, 1994

Polish

Biblia Gdanska, 1632
Biblia Tysiaclecia. Wydanie 4., 1965/84
Uwspółcześniona Biblia Gdańska (NT), 2009 (added after official release)

Portuguese

Almeida Revista e Atualizada, 1993
Almeida Revista e Corrigida, 1969
Almeida Biblia, 1994
Corrigida Fiel, 1753/1995
Modern Language Translation, 2005

Romanian

Cornilescu Bible

Russia

Orthodox Russian Synodal Translation
Contemporary Russian version, New Testament

Slovak

Sväté Písmo, 1995

Spanish

Castilian La Biblia (Herder)
La Biblia de Las Americas, NASB, 1986
La Biblia de Nuestro Pueblo (added after official release)
La Biblia del Peregrino (added after official release)
Nueva Biblia de los Hispanos
Nueva Versión Internacional
Reina-Valera, 1909
Reina-Valera Actualizada, 1989
Reina-Valera Gómez
Reina-Valera Revised, 1960
Reina-Valera Update, 1995

Swahili

New Testament

Swedish

Svenska 1917
Svenska Folkbibeln, 1998
Bibel 82
Bibel 2000

Thai

Thai King James Version

Turkish

Turkish Bible, 2002

Ukrainian

Ukrainian

Vietnamese

Vietnamese

Lexical-Grammatical References

A Concise Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament: Based on the Lexical Work of Ludwig Koehler and Walter Baumgartner (Holladay)
Beginner’s Grammar of the Greek New Testament (Davis)
Brown-Driver-Briggs-Gesenius Hebrew-English Lexicon, 1905, unabridged
Brown-Driver-Briggs-Gesenius Hebrew-English/Hebrew-French/Hebrew-Russian Lexicons (Strong’s), abridged
CATSS/Tov Hebrew-Greek Parallel Aligned Text
Friberg’s Analytical Lexicon of the Greek New Testament, Complete 2000 edition
Gesenius’ Hebrew Grammar
A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew, Revised (Joüon-Muraoka) (no unlock needed)
Grammar of Septuagint Greek (Conybeare & Stock)
A Grammar of the Greek New Testament in the Light of Historical Research, 3rd edition (Robertson)
Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic paradigm charts with sounds (revised)
Greek Enchiridion: A Concise Handbook of Grammar and Exegesis (MacDonald)
Greek Grammar beyond the Basics: An Exegetical Syntax of the New Testament (Wallace) (no unlock needed)
Greek New Testament Diagrams (Leedy), complete
A Greek-English Lexicon of the Septuagint, Volumes 1 & 2 (Lust, Eynikel, Hauspie, Chamberlain)
Syntactic and Thematic Greek Transcription of the NT (MacDonald)
An Introduction to Biblical Hebrew Syntax (Waltke & O’Connor) (no unlock needed)
Introductory Lessons in Aramaic (Eric D. Reymond)
Liddell-Scott Greek Lexicon, abridged
Louw-Nida Greek New Testament Lexicon based on Semantic Domains, Second Edition
Moods and Tenses of New Testament Greek (Burton)
The Shorter Lexicon of the Greek New Testament, Revised Edition (Gingrich/Danker)
The Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (Harris, Archer & Waltke)
Thayer Greek Lexicon, abridged
Thayer Greek Lexicon, unabridged
The Vocabulary of the Greek New Testament Module (J.H. Moulton and G. Milligan) (no unlock needed) (added after initial release)
Wigram’s Tense, Voice, Mood codes for some English, German, Dutch, French and Russian Bibles

Reference Works

1689 London Baptist Confession (added after initial release)
Belgic Confession (added after initial release)
Biographical Bible (distinguishes Bible people with same names)
Canons of Dort (added after initial release)
Charles, Old Testament Pseudepigrapha English translation
Early Church Fathers
Easton’s Bible Dictionary
Fausset Bible Dictionary
Greek NT Vocabulary Sound Files (Schwandt)
Hebrew Vocabulary Sound Files (Verbruggen)
Heidelberg Catechism (added after initial release)
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (1915)
James, New Testament Apocrypha English translation
Matthew Henry’s Commentary
Metzger’s Bible Outline
Nave’s Topical Index
New Chain Reference Bible (1934) topics (Thompson)
New Topical Text Book (Torrey)
Old Testament Quotations in the New Testament (Archer & Chirichigno)
Synopsis of the Gospels
Timelines: Biblical, Church, and Secular History
TEXTKRITIK des Neuen Testaments (Gregory)
Treasury of Scriptural Knowledge
Westminster Confessional Standards (CHM version) (added after initial release)

Human Trafficking Posts

Original Language Texts

Hebrew/Aramaic/Syriac

Greek*

Bible Versions

English

Latin

Afrikaans

Albanian

Arabic

Bulgarian

Catalan

Chinese

Croatian

Cyrillic

Czech

Danish

Dutch

Finnish

French

German

Greek (modern)

Hungarian

Indonesian

Italian

Japanese

Korean

Lithuanian

Macedonian

Norwegian

Polish

Portuguese

Romanian

Russia

Slovak

Spanish

Swahili

Swedish

Thai

Turkish

Ukrainian

Vietnamese

Lexical-Grammatical References

Reference Works

FTC Disclaimer: I was asked to review BibleWorks 8 in exchange for a review copy.

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