Book Review: KJV Minister’s Bible
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When Thomas Nelson offered to send me a copy of the KJV Minister’s Bible for review, I jumped at the chance thinking how nice it would be to pass it along to a young man recently called to preach. So I review this particular book not as someone accustomed to the pulpit but as a shopper for such a man.
The Bible comes packaged in an attractive black box with gold lettering. However, upon opening the box the book itself is very unassuming. It has no indication on the cover that it is designed for a minister and the spine shows only “Holy Bible” and the publisher’s symbol. The copy I received was the trademarked Leathersoft and it feels absolutely sumptuous. There is a very simple presentation page, an index then on just the fifth page is the dedication from the translators to King James. I think this simplicity is great because you aren’t carrying around a lot of extra pages – and therefore weight – used only to explain the content of the bible.
The text is printed in Thomas Nelson’s KJV Typeface which was specifically designed for these Bibles. There is nothing but the scripture, no pronunciation guides, no cross-references and not a word of commentary. As I said before, that seems good from a streamlining perspective and I imagine it is designed with the intent that the man of God would be studying with other books at hand and then carrying only this to deliver his message. As for readability, it maybe seems a little bit small and compressed to me.
There are three ribbon markers which would be very helpful when setting up to turn to different references. It had lay-flat binding which delivers as promised once you’ve turned about 100 pages into the book.
Between the Old and New Testaments you’ll find the minister’s portion of this Bible. There you’ll find nearly 200 pages of resource material for weddings, funerals, dedications, communion services, baptisms and worship. While perhaps a seasoned minister would scoff at the material, I can certainly see that it would help to guide a novice. Even as a layperson, there are verses to share with the sick and dying and witnessing guidance that I would find very useful.
This Bible ends as quickly as it began with only five pages of end-material. Included in those are reading plans for “30 days with Jesus” and reading the Bible through in a year – both which I found very useful.
I cannot argue with a straightforward presentation of God’s word and therefore this KJV Minister’s Bible gets 5 stars!
As I mentioned in the beginning, Thomas Nelson did provide a copy of this bible for review purposes.