Students of Theology quoting Scripture must be certain of their sources.

For instance, Christopher Cocksworth in his book, Holy, Holy, Holy: Worshiping the Trinitarian God (reprinted 2004) looks at the Trinity through the lens of worship. (p. 8). He quotes Scriptures that support his thesis about triune worship, although at times not very discriminately.

His source is the New International Version. In his comment on Acts 13:2 Cocksworth wrote:” Luke describes the prophets at Antioch worshiping and fasting” after he quoted the following passage:

“While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’”

Interestingly, the NKJV renders this verse: “As they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Now separate to Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’” Now the critical question is: Which is authentic, worshiping or ministering? The verb is leitourgeo which Thayer in his Greek-English Lexicon defines as: “to do service, as priests doing sacred rites, or persons doing prayer, or helping others.”

There are only three verses in the NT that use leitourgeo. I quote each one from the NIV to illustrate how indiscriminate this version can be:

• Acts: 13:2 “2 While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’”
• Rom, 15:27: “For if the Gentiles have shared in the Jews’ spiritual blessings, they owe it to the Jews to share with them their material blessings.”
• Heb. 10:11: “Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.”

The reason why access to authentic information is critical is that the first foundation that must be laid in teaching trinity based worship is the accuracy and consistency of the Bible resources used in the study.