Is it Possible to Free a Believer's Conscience from Bondage to the One English Translation? (My Thoughts)

Is it Possible to Free a Believer's Conscience from Bondage to a One English Translation Position? (My Thoughts Only)

What actual ingredients would be necessary to free a person's conscience from believing only one English translation is appropriate?  Or to believe God has only preserved his word (providentially) in one English translation (or for that matter in only one Greek text)?  What steps are needed to help members of a local church to reach this ability?  This assumes that this position is even necessary or desirable.  Please remember this implies two things: one, they are not currently violating their conscience in using a different English translation; and two, the conscience can be taught, shaped, and re-calibrated via the scriptures.  

First, it begins with local church leadership.  The one pastor or lay-elders (whatever the polity), need to be involved proactively.  If your preaching displays that the text doesn't matter then don't expect the congregation to think otherwise.  If you actually preach and teach as though the text or underlying Hebrew and/or Greek matter, then perhaps your congregation will be more on board (but this is no guarantee).  Does the leadership actually teach the people?  Do they just throw a book at them to read?  Worst case scenario, the pastor wants to push ahead faster than the congregation.  Don't fall backwards if there is a church split (pushing too fast).  If people don't want to follow where you (alone) want to go, maybe you should slow down or rethink that particular route.  It would be much better to take things slower than to speed up and hit a wall.

Second, it begins with believers who desire to know the historic truth on the Bible translation position.  If they are content not knowing and remaining in that condition, it makes things very hard.  However, if the congregation is actually taught (through painstaking time and effort) to read and study the scriptures for themselves, this does present a better working environment.  It must be said that church attendance is not always a guarantee of Christian maturity (but you just got to wonder when some people never show up Sunday evening or Wednesday night).

Third, our standard for determining truth is not subjective experience.  It is the scriptures alone.  In God's providence certain English translations have been especially used of God in Christian circles.  From a sales perspective, certain translations have far outsold the others?  Some have even taken on their own distinct theological flavor (especially depending on who endorses them).    Remember not to confuse the theology or life-styles choices (evangelism, convictions, etc...) of the individual with the actual objective teachings of scripture.

Again these are just thoughts I have collected and experienced having lived in six different states within a multitude of different churches.  This also comes with graduate level seminary degrees from two different seminaries within fundamental Christian circles.  And yes there will always be overlapping agreements and alternative disagreements between schools.  Again I say this only because I've seen it really work well and I also have seen it turn our very ugly.  I've seen where people will not study, learn and grow.  I've also seen the reverse where people do grow and mature in their understanding of the historical position on the translation issue.  Just to be fair, even mature Christians will disagree on this issue.

As always, comments encouraged.

Voices from history on the Translation issue, 

(1910) "Inspiration is affirmed, of course, only of the original documents, now no longer extant.  Many mistakes may have been made by copyists, and some interpolations by officious scribes and translators are fallible.  It is the part of reverent criticism to seek, by careful examination and comparison of all existing documents, to detect errors and restore as far as possible the Scriptures in their original purity" (A. T. Pierson, Knowing the Scriptures, p. 21; Taken from Trusted Voices on Translations, Mount Calvary Baptist Church, Greenville, SC).

(1910) "One evening he remarked that no one claimed verbal inspiration for the English Bible-although that was remarkably accurate-but only for the text of the original writings.  "Then," exclaimed a gentleman rising in the front seat, "if we cannot read the original we might as well have no inspired Bible at all."  "Well," replied the lecturer quickly, "my daughter, who is a missionary in Japan, recently sent me a photography of her child whom I have never seen.  No doubt it is not a perfect likeness.  Do you suppose that I said, as I looked upon it, that is not the original and therefore I might as well have no grandchildren at all?" (Arthur T. Pierson: A Biography; By Delaven Leonard Pierson, p. 284; borrowed from Trusted Voices on Translations, Mount Calvary Baptist, Greenville, SC).