Last week my wife was in the middle of her bible study and there was a question in the study that she suggested I might use to start a conversation with the men in our meeting that week. I am always looking for ways to get the men talking and discussing and she is good at giving me interesting tidbits. The question was on Heb 12:58 and was stated like this:
“In what ways can we show our gratitude and make our worship acceptable to God?”
The question struck me a little funny. There was something about it that didn’t sound right. Naturally, I opened my bible to correct my thinking. I read the following:
Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. Heb 12:28 NKJV
I noticed that the word gratitude was not in the passage. When I read the context it was about Jesus skaking things from Heaven. So I looked at the bible study a little closer and noticed they were using the ESV in some of the quotes listed. So I opened my phone and looked up the passage in the ESV. Something very different was rendered there:
Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, Heb 12:28 ESV
The first reference I looked up was the word being translated grace in the King James but grateful in the ESV. The Greek word turns out to be the same in the TR (manuscript behind the KJV and the NU (modern manuscript behind the ESV): charis This word is translated as Grace 130 times in the KJV. Its main meaning when looked up is “grace”. (see below)
-
grace
-
that which affords joy, pleasure, delight, sweetness, charm, loveliness: grace of speech
-
-
good will, loving-kindness, favour
-
of the merciful kindness by which God, exerting his holy influence upon souls, turns them to Christ, keeps, strengthens, increases them in Christian faith, knowledge, affection, and kindles them to the exercise of the Christian virtues
-
-
what is due to grace
-
the spiritual condition of one governed by the power of divine grace
-
the token or proof of grace, benefit
-
a gift of grace
-
benefit, bounty
-
-
-
thanks, (for benefits, services, favours), recompense, reward
We do notice that the last meaning listed is that of thanks. The scholars have said that it mostly by context that the alternative english word “thank” is used. So let us look at those places where the word is translated “thank”, I have listed all 11 below. Notice how context would not allow the word grace to be used in any of these instances:
[Luk 17:9 ] “Does he thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded him? I think not.
[Rom 6:17 ] But God be thanked that though you were slaves of sin, yet you obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered.
[1Co 1:4 ] I thank my God always concerning you for the grace of God which was given to you by Christ Jesus,
[1Co 10:30 ] But if I partake with thanks, why am I evil spoken of for the food over which I give thanks?
[1Co 15:57 ] But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
[2Co 2:14 ] Now thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us diffuses the fragrance of His knowledge in every place.
[2Co 4:15 ] For all things are for your sakes, that grace, having spread through the many, may cause thanksgiving to abound to the glory of God.
[2Co 8:16 ] But thanks be to God who puts the same earnest care for you into the heart of Titus.
[2Co 9:15 ] Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift!
[1Ti 1:12 ] And I thank Christ Jesus our Lord who has enabled me, because He counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry,
[2Ti 1:3 ] I thank God, whom I serve with a pure conscience, as my forefathers did, as without ceasing I remember you in my prayers night and day,
So the contextual reason to render the word as “thank” or “grace” in Heb 12:28 depends on the supporting phrase, which is one word in Greek: “echo” I have verified that the same word is in the TR and the NU. The KJV renders it as”let us have” and the ESV has rendered it as “let us show”. The word is translated as a form of have 613 times and is translated as a form of show ZERO times in the KJV and exactly ONCE in the ESV. The meaning of the word does not allow it to be translated as “show”.
-
to have, i.e. to hold
-
to have (hold) in the hand, in the sense of wearing, to have (hold) possession of the mind (refers to alarm, agitating emotions, etc.), to hold fast keep, to have or comprise or involve, to regard or consider or hold as
-
-
to have i.e. own, possess
-
external things such as pertain to property or riches or furniture or utensils or goods or food etc.
-
used of those joined to any one by the bonds of natural blood or marriage or friendship or duty or law etc, of attendance or companionship
-
-
to hold one’s self or find one’s self so and so, to be in such or such a condition
-
to hold one’s self to a thing, to lay hold of a thing, to adhere or cling to
-
to be closely joined to a person or a thing
-
I am admittedly no Greek expert by any measure but I do know that the scholars involved in the Authorized Version were more than experts in the Greek language and I trust that they knew “let us show” which would be an action with imperative as something we are to produce verses “let us have” in the sense of putting on, holding, wearing, trusting in that which is given to us… namely GRACE.
It is only the grace of God that enables us to worship God in a right manner: nature cannot come up to it; it can produce neither that precious faith nor that holy fear that is necessary to acceptable worship. – Matthew Henry
While it is certainly not unbiblical or wrong to be grateful, the Preserved Word of God indeed instructs us to be grateful (1 Thes 5:18). It is simply not the lesson of this verse or the larger teaching offered in chapter 12 of Hebrews.
NOTE: Many of the other modern Bibles render the phrase as “let us be”. The same arguments apply and are relevant to those translations.
by 