For to me, living means living for Christ, and dying is even better.
Philippians 1:21 (New Living Translation)
God’s Word never changes, but each translation, from the original Hebrew and Greek, gives us some new insights. I don’t mean that my go-to Bible is full of errors. What I mean is that God’s Word is alive. We can read the same verse ten times, and ten times we will learn a little more. Modern translations help us glean even more from the Scriptures.
When I read today’s “Verse of the Day” on Biblegateway.com, I had one of those “oh” moments. It wasn’t that I didn’t understand what the Apostle Paul had written – “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” But reading the phrase, “dying is even better,” drove home Paul’s statement. And that the value of reading the same verses in several translations. In reference to this verse, I’ve often said that Jesus will judge us on is what we did with the time He gave us and not how long we managed to live.
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