[This is one in a series of devotional reflections prepared for Horley Baptist Church during June 2021]
The story is told of two brothers visiting their grandparents’ house. The first said “I’m hungry! Let’s eat, grandma.” The second said “I’m hungry! Let’s eat grandma.” Did you notice the difference? The fate of grandma rests on a simple point of punctuation – the comma.
In 2003 Lynne Truss, the British radio personality, gained a certain degree of fame, and notoriety, when she published a book[1] deploring the declining standards of punctuation in written English. Punctuation is an unlikely choice of subject for a best-seller but subsequent sales far exceeded the author’s expectations.
It seems that punctuation can be a surprisingly emotive topic. We have all seen the grocers’ apostrophe (potato’s, tomato’s, etc) but the debate becomes more heated when joined by those whose use of ‘English’ is within the context of a foreign culture. As Henry Higgins declares in ‘My Fair Lady’: “There even are places where English completely disappears – in America they haven’t used it for years!”
Some time ago, I had an in-office discussion with a colleague about the punctuation of Luke 23 v43 which, in the NIV, is rendered as:
Jesus answered him, ‘Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.’
His argument was that the comma should be placed after the ‘today’. This simple typographical adjustment is enough to change the whole meaning of the passage; it removes the immediacy of heaven for a dying believer and delays it to some unspecified time in the future. This places it at odds with the apostle Paul who, in writing to the Corinthians, argues that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.
The Westminster Shorter Catechism of 1647[2] is often regarded as setting out the common basics of Protestant Christian beliefs. In Article 37 it states:
“The souls of believers are at their death made perfect in holiness, and do immediately pass into glory; and their bodies, being still united to Christ, do rest in their graves till the resurrection.”
I suspect that the immediacy of heaven is the common belief of most of those who will read these notes. We can draw great comfort from this promise, both for ourselves and for those who are about to leave the stage. But we do not have to wait for such circumstances in order to receive encouragement. Elsewhere in his letters to the Corinthians Paul wrote:
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. [2 Corinthians 1 v3-4 NIVUK]
[1] ‘Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation’, Lynne Truss, ISBN 978-1-86197-612-3.
[2] The Westminster Shorter Catechism (1647)
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Contributed by Steve Humphreys; © the Author
Really, good, article, Steve. Thought I would cover all bases
Fascinating Steve – that punctuation can change the whole meaning. It was the correcting of a poor Biblical translation, that finally enabled me to give myself unequivocally to Jesus. I had always struggled with Jesus’ dying words – ‘ It is finished.’ But when I was told that what he actually said was – ‘ It is accomplished/ complete.’ It made complete sense to me and as they say – it blew my mind ! That was end of my questioning and the beginning of the beautiful journey.
Thanks for your devotional reflections Steve. I always enjoyed them when we were in John Bowden’s house group.
God bless you and your’ loved ones.
Jan Magdinier
Thanks, Jan. They were indeed good times, with the discussions often continuing for several hours afterwards.