Did God really intend for man to be so fully dependent upon writings like we have in the Bible today in order to know Him? Some today say that the writers of Scripture never knew or understood that they were writing Scripture. They say the idea that we should be dependent upon ancient writings is something made up later. But what does the Bible itself show us? What intent shows up in the writings themselves? Further, if God did intend to communicate by writing, didn’t He anticipate the difficulty of transmitting the message accurately over thousands of years by simple hand-copying? Some today say so much copying and re-copying was done that even if the message was from God, the long years of copying rendered it useless. We will address each of these...

This morning we continue our series of messages called "God’s Word – the Bible." This is message number eight in the series. We’re presently looking at how the Bible Came to Us.

In the last lesson I told you that there are at least seven critical links in the chain of transmission of the message of the Bible from God to us. The seven links are 1) Revelation, 2) Inspiration, 3) Documentation, 4) Circulation, 5) Canonization, 6) Replication, and 7) Translation. I realize that’s a lot of words, but each one has a significant meaning if we are to understand where the Bible came from. I will do my best to explain them as we move along.

We covered revelation and inspiration last time. We’ll try to cover the next two in this lesson. To review quickly…

Revelation refers to God’s decision to reveal Himself to man. Since we cannot see God, He must take the initiative to explain Himself to us or we really cannot know Him. He has chosen to reveal Himself through the writings of the Bible.

Inspiration is the method God used to accurately transmit His message about Himself to man. He chose certain men called prophets and apostles and inspired them to accurately write His message. Their writing would be regarded as the word of God.

Documentation (which we’ll talk about today) refers to the actual writing of and dependence upon the original Scriptures. For the greater portion of man’s history, he has depended upon the written word to know the specifics about God.

Circulation has to do with the way the writings were utilized and disseminated among God’s people in ancient times and how they were viewed as Holy Scripture.

Did God really intend for man to be so fully dependent upon writings like we have in the Bible today in order to know Him? Some today say that the writers of Scripture never knew or understood that they were writing Scripture. They say the idea that we should be dependent upon ancient writings is something made up later. But what does the Bible itself show us? What intent shows up in the writings themselves? Further, if God did intend to communicate by writing, didn’t He anticipate the difficulty of transmitting the message accurately over thousands of years by simple hand-copying? Some today say so much copying and re-copying was done that even if the message was from God, the long years of copying rendered it useless. We will address each of these as we progress. First let’s consider…

Did God intend for ancient Israel to be dependent upon written Scriptures from her beginning until the coming of Christ? From the very beginning of Israel’s history as a nation, God’s people have looked to written documents as the Word of God. After Moses received the Law on Mt. Sinai, we read in Exodus 24:3-7: 3 Then Moses came and recounted to the people all the words of the Lord and all the ordinances… 4 And Moses wrote down all the words of the Lord….7 Then he took the book of the covenant and read it in the hearing of the people... and they said, "All that the Lord has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient!"

The words of the Lord that Moses received on Sinai were recounted, written down, read, and the documents were obeyed by Israel as the word of God.

Just before Moses died he gave instructions about how the written word he had received from God was to be used perpetually through Israel’s history. Speaking of the kings that would rule over them once they entered the Promised Land, Moses said in Deuteronomy 17:18-19: "Now it shall come about when he [each future king] sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself a copy of this law on a scroll in the presence of the Levitical priests. And it shall be with him, and he shall read it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the Lord his God, by carefully observing all the words of this law and these statutes…..

Did Moses envision a time when it would be necessary to copy His word so that it would be perpetuated into the future? According to these verses every king of Israel was to have his own copy so that He would obey the statutes of God’s law. The time of Israel’s kings stretched out over 450 years. That would necessitate a lot of copies. God must have figured that the people were capable of making accurate enough copies so as to preserve the integrity of His word or it would seem He would not have commanded their copying.

Moses announced to Israel that the reading of the written law should be done regularly as long as they lived in the Promised Land. Deuteronomy 31:9-13 say, 9 So Moses wrote this law and gave it to the priests, the sons of Levi who carried the ark of the covenant of the Lord, and to all the elders of Israel. 10 Then Moses commanded them, saying, "At the end of every seven years, at the time of the year of remission of debts, at the Feast of Booths, 11 when all Israel comes to appear before the Lord your God at the place which He will choose, you shall read this law in front of all Israel in their hearing. 12 Assemble the people, the men and the women and children and the alien who is in your town, in order that they may hear and learn and fear the Lord your God, and be careful to observe all the words of this law. 13 And their children, who have not known, will hear and learn to fear the Lord your God, as long as you live on the land which you are about to cross the Jordan to possess."

The writings of Moses were revered as the word of God by ancient Israel. Later additional writings of prophets besides those of Moses were added to these sacred scriptures of God’s people. There were books of history, books of poetry, and writings of the various prophets or spokesmen of God. Like the writings of Moses, these were gathered, copied, and circulated among the Jewish people and accepted as the authoritative Word of God. By the time of Christ copies of these writings were widely circulated and available through the system of the synagogues that dotted the land. The people relied on them as God’s standard of right and wrong.

Even the tiny, "blue collar" town of Nazareth had its own copies of the Scriptures. Remember when Jesus returned to Nazareth and visited the synagogue where he grew up? Luke 4:16-22 tells us that the synagogue official handed Jesus a copy of the scroll of Isaiah to read and Jesus used it to introduce Himself to them as Messiah. This reliance upon the written word of God was widespread and there were copies of it all over Israel.

Many times Jesus emphasized the importance of using the written Old Testament Scriptures. One of them was when the Lord told the story of the rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16. He spoke of the rich man, who was in Hades, begging Abraham to send someone to warn his brothers about this place of torment. Abraham responded with these words, as told by Jesus: "They have Moses and the Prophets. Let them hear them."(1) Of course "Moses and the Prophets" were all dead at the time Jesus spoke this, so obviously what He had in mind were the writings of Moses and the Prophets. Thus Jesus, in telling this story, acknowledged that the writings of Moses and the Prophets were sufficient to prevent people living under the Old Covenant from coming under the torment of Hades.

The Lord also mentioned the poetic literature of the Bible on the same level as the Law of Moses and the Prophets in Luke 24:44-45: "‘These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.’ Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures." Note here that the Lord referred to "the Psalms" as "Scripture" and put them on the same level as Moses and the Prophets.

And isn’t it interesting that never once did Jesus say or imply that the Old Testament Scriptures as they were available in His day were so full of errors and copyists’ mistakes that they were not sufficiently accurate to guide a person to Him. Yet portions these writings had been copied and copied for over 1400 years.

The reason I point this out to you is that some modern critics consider accurate transmission of ancient documents by hand-copying as virtually impossible – as though such failure of transmission were an obvious conclusion. Yet Jesus accepted the Scriptures written up to His day as accurate and sufficient though they had been copied over a long span of time. He used them and referred to them as the word of God. Somebody is wrong – either the critics or the Lord. I don’t think I need to tell you which one I trust.

Jesus relied on and quoted from the Old Testament Scriptures throughout His ministry. For instance, in Matthew 4 He quoted from the writings of Moses three times as Satan tried to bring Him down by temptation. Each time He accentuated his response to the devil by saying, "It is written…." If ever there were a time for Satan to make a claim that the Scripture was not accurate or sufficient in every way, this would have been it. "Oh Jesus, you can’t trust that Scripture! It has been copied so many times and is so full of mistakes that it doesn’t even resemble what it did in the day it was written." Yet Satan spoke no such word. Indeed, he was silenced by Jesus’ quoting the written Scripture. Even the devil knew that God is fully capable of transmitting an accurate message through time.

Jesus considered the written Scriptures to have authority even over the religious hierarchy of His day. On a number of occasions He rebuked their unacceptable behavior by quoting written Scripture.(2)

The apostles of Christ quoted extensively from the Old Testament Scriptures too, in far too many passages for me to cite here. They also spoke of the sufficiency of the written word as they had it in their day.

That God intended for His Old Testament people to be guided by the written Word of God throughout their history is abundantly clear. That there would be much copying and circulating it over 1400 years of Jewish history is inherent in its long and consistent use. That it was copied and circulated successfully without major corruption is seen in the fact that neither Christ nor the apostles ever wrote or said a word about it being inaccurate or lacking in any way. Instead they referred to it, quoted from it as authoritative, and appealed to it constantly.(3)

In a later message we will speak of the external evidence for accurate transmission of the Scriptures from them to us. For now we’re talking about its accuracy in the days of the ancient Jewish nation. If you have faith in Jesus Christ you can have faith in the Old Testament Scriptures that were transmitted accurately to those living in the days of Christ and that God intended His people to use them to guide their lives. Perhaps the greatest assurance of all from Jesus that we would have the Old Testament Scriptures available to us right down to today can be seen in His words in Matthew 5:18: "For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass away from the Law, until all is accomplished." Skeptics may argue that there is no way we can know what was originally written in the Old Testament due to years and years of copyists’ errors down to the time of Christ, but their words fly in the face of the words of Jesus Christ. If nothing else, this shows their true allegiance. Let’s move on now to:

The Old Testament people were very much dependent upon the written revelation of God. Did God intend that the church would also be dependent upon such writings?

Unlike the Old Testament Scriptures, we cannot appeal to the way Christ viewed the New Testament writings in retrospect because they were not written until after His death, burial, resurrection, and ascension. However we can examine the things He said while He was on earth about the future transmission of His word during the age of the New Covenant to find out what He intended. We can also look at the way the Apostles viewed their writings and whether they envisioned them to be perpetually binding on the church in their day and beyond.

That Jesus intended His written words to be present among His people from His earthly ministry right up until the end of earth’s time can be clearly seen in His words in Matthew 24:35 where He said, "Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words shall not pass away." Since Jesus is not on earth to speak to us directly today and will not be until the Second Coming, we must conclude that He intended that His words would be preserved in written form. If therefore, we do not have somewhere today accurate, written copies of the words of the Lord Jesus Christ - if they have somehow passed away or have become so corrupted that they no longer resemble what He originally spoke - then we may as well give up and go home. If Jesus predicted that His words would not pass away and they did pass away, then He is not who He claimed to be.

So what provision was made for the transmission of His words?

Of course we have the words of Jesus recorded in the four gospels – Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Matthew and John were apostles of Jesus, having actually been with him from the baptism of John until the day they saw Him ascend into heaven.(4) Mark and Luke, who were probably prophets, were traveling companions and associates of two other apostles of Jesus. Mark was the companion of Peter and Luke was the companion of Paul. With these four gospels still with us today we have part of the fulfillment of Jesus’ prediction that His words would not pass away.

But is all that Jesus intended to say recorded in the four gospels? No, there is more. The book of Revelation, written by the Apostle John, is also a part of the words of Christ. That book begins with this statement in Revelation 1:1-2: "The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show to His bond-servants…." Notice that this revelation from Jesus was to be shown "to His bond-servants." Thus it was intended by Christ to be circulated among all of followers of Christ.

So are the four gospels and the book of Revelation all of Christ’s words that He promised would not pass away? No, we aren’t finished yet.

On the night Jesus was betrayed He was in the upper room with His apostles. There, among other things, He said as John recorded in John 14:25-26: "These things I have spoken to you, while abiding with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you."

Here we find two things guaranteed to the apostles by Jesus. First He told them that the Holy Spirit would continue to teach them in Jesus’ absence and second, that the same Holy Spirit would bring to their remembrance all of His words. The one who says that the apostles couldn’t possibly have accurately written down the words of Christ either doesn’t know Jesus promised this supernatural help or he doesn’t believe it.

A little later in the same discourse Jesus repeated this same promise using different words. In John 16:12-14 we read: "I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He shall glorify Me; for He shall take of Mine, and shall disclose it to you."

On the night He was betrayed Jesus had many other things to teach his apostles, but they couldn’t handle them at that point. So He promised that He would continue to reveal His word to them through the Holy Spirit after He ascended back into heaven. "He shall take of Mine, and shall disclose it to you." Thus, additional teachings of Jesus were added to the gospels and Revelation through the writings of His apostles, inspired by the Holy Spirit. Therefore, as the apostles went forth from there, after the Holy Spirit came upon them on Pentecost, they continued to speak and write the words of Christ.

This is why, according to Acts 2:42, those in the early church "were continually devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching…."

This is why Peter said in 2 Peter 3:1-2: "... you should remember the words spoken beforehand by the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior spoken by your apostles." If one rejects the words of the apostles he or she rejects the words of the Lord.

But what about the Apostle Paul? He wasn’t one of the twelve in the upper room that Jesus said the Holy Spirit would guide into all truth. Were his words also considered the commandment of the Lord? Surely he thought so, as he wrote in 1 Corinthians 14:37-38: "If anyone thinks he is a prophet or spiritual, let him recognize that the things which I write to you are the Lord's commandment."

Did anyone else concur that Paul was to be a writer of the Lord’s words? Yes, both Peter and Jesus did. Peter wrote in 2 Peter 3:15-16, "… just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you, as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction." Peter referred to Paul’s writing on the same level as "the rest of the Scriptures." This shouldn’t surprise us. It is exactly what was predicted by Jesus through Ananias just before Paul was baptized.

You might remember that Jesus appeared to Saul of Tarsus (who was later to become Paul) on the road between Jerusalem and Damascus. After identifying Himself, the Lord told him in Acts 22:10: "Arise and go on into Damascus; and there you will be told of all that has been appointed for you to do." Once Saul was in the city Jesus appeared to a man named Ananias and told him to give Saul these words in Acts 22:14-15: "The God of our fathers has appointed you to know His will, and to see the Righteous One, and to hear an utterance from His mouth. For you will be a witness for Him to all men of what you have seen and heard." This prediction of Paul being a witness for Jesus is the same one the Lord spoke to the rest of the apostles in Acts 1:8: "You shall be my witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth." Paul would have the same authority and the same Holy Spirit to guide Him that the rest of the apostles had.

But were the spoken and written teachings of the apostles to be valid only for the first century church or were they intended to serve beyond that time down to our day? That the testimony of the apostles, including Paul, was to go on throughout the whole New Testament period and not be limited only to the first century church is seen in the words of Jesus to the twelve, "you shall be my witnesses… even to the remotest part of the earth." It is also seen in the words to of Jesus (through Ananias) to Paul, "you shall be a witness to all men." The words of the apostles didn’t go to the "remotest part of the earth" and "to all men" in their lifetime. In fact, these predictions have yet to be completely fulfilled. Thus their teachings contained in their writings, even after their deaths, were to be perpetual binding throughout the gospel age and not just during the first century. That means that this New Testament we carry with us which contains the writings of the apostles is the word of God for us and for all men until the end of the age. It isn’t just the word of God to the primitive church.

That’s why Paul wrote in Ephesians 2:20 that the church ("God’s household") was "built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone…." Today the church must continue to be built upon this same foundation and no other.

But are we really sure that the writings of the apostles were meant to be circulated beyond their original recipients and beyond their early time period? Yes we are sure. Paul concluded his letter to the Colossians with these words in Colossians 4:16: "And when this letter is read among you, have it also read in the church of the Laodiceans; and you, for your part read my letter that is coming from Laodicea." Obviously Paul’s letter was intended for more than its original recipients. Paul ended the First Thessalonians letter with these words in 1 Thessalonians 5:27: "I adjure you by the Lord to have this letter read to all the brethren." Paul began his first Corinthian letter with these words in 1 Corinthians 1:2: "to the church of God which is at Corinth… with all who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours…." That last phrase includes not only churches besides Corinth. It includes you and me, my friends.

Peter, as the time for his death approached, wrote these words in 2 Peter 1:12-15: "Therefore, I shall always be ready to remind you of these things, even though you already know them, and have been established in the truth which is present with you. And I consider it right, as long as I am in this earthly dwelling, to stir you up by way of reminder, knowing that the laying aside of my earthly dwelling is imminent, as also our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me. And I will also be diligent that at any time after my departure you may be able to call these things to mind."

How did Peter make arrangements so that they could call to mind his teachings after his death? He left a written record of his words for the benefit of the church that would go on after him.

God has always, since the writing of Moses, intended to provide an accurate written account of His word for people to read and study. This was His method in ancient times and it is His method today. He provided the Scriptures for ancient people who wished to seek Him and He has provided the same for us living today. This book, my friends, is the inspired word of God. We heed it to our great benefit or ignore it to our great peril. You should never allow anyone to lead you away from the truths of this book. I strongly encourage you to use it to prepare for the judgment and for eternity.

Footnotes: Please use your back button to return to your place.

1. Luke 16:29
2. As an example see Mark 7:5-9
3. Paul, for many years a Jewish Rabbi and later an apostle of Christ, was the writer of nearly half of the New Testament. He states in Romans 3:1-2 that the Jews were "entrusted with the oracles of God." Behind this would surely be Paul’s confidence that the Scriptures that the Jews had in his day were accurate enough to be called "the oracles of God." Had Paul and others living in his day had the attitude of the critics today, such a statement could not have been made. Paul would have had to say, "The Jews were entrusted with the oracles of God, but they lost it in transmission!"

Stephen, one of the first deacons of the church and doubtless a prophet through the laying on of the Apostles’ hands in Jerusalem as described in Acts 6, speaking before the Sanhedrin council just before they killed him, said in Acts 7:37-38: "Moses… received living oracles to pass on to you." His confidence in the written word is evident by his clear statement and further evident in that the assembled Sanhedrin did not object to his words regarding it.
4. Acts 1:22

Dave Redick is Minister of the Hwy 20 Church of Christ in Sweet Home, Oregon and Editor of The Preacher's Study. He may be reached at pstudysupport@comcast.net.

Copyright © 1996-2008 by The Preacher's Study. Permission is granted to subscribers to use this document in total or in sermon preparation in the context of the local congregation only. Publishing it in a book, on the Internet, or anyplace beyond the local congregation is prohibited.

All Scripture quotations and references are from the New American Standard Version unless otherwise stated.

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