Sermon Notes: How We Got The Bible

#THERE ARE ANSWERS: HOW WE GOT THE BIBLE

[Hebrews 1:1-4](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Hebrews+1%3A1-4&version=ESV)

v.3-4 — The glory, majesty, uniqueness, supremacy and sufficiency of Jesus
v.1 — God speaks: through the Prophets
v.2 — God speaks: through the Son
2 Peter 3:2 — God speaks: through the Apostles

**The Apostles**
• Disciples of Jesus (Mark 3:13-14)
• Eyewitnesses of the life, teaching, death and resurrection of Jesus (2 Peter 1:16; 1 John 1:1-4; Luke 24:46-48; Acts 10:40-43)

***This Week: The Canon of Scripture
Next Week: Inspiration, Inerrancy, and Authority of Scripture***

**I. Old Testament Canon**

a. The Scripture bears witness to the historical development of the Canon.
• Exodus 31:18
• Deuteronomy 31:24-26
• Joshua 24:26
• 1 Samuel 10:25
• 1 Chronicles 29:29
• 2 Chronicles 26:22
• Jeremiah 30:2

b. The Canon grew from the time of Moses to the time of Artaxerxes (approximately 435 B.C.)

c. But what about the Apocrypha?

**II. New Testament Canon**

a. Content
• Story of Jesus — Gospels
• Story of the Church — Acts
• Letters of Paul, Peter, John, James, Jude, Hebrews
• Culmination of History and the Restoration of all things — Revelation

b. Canonicity
• Divine Qualities
• Corporate Reception
• Authoritative Authors

c. Self-Attestation
• 1 Corinthians 14:37
• 2 Peter 3:16
• 1 Timothy 5:18

**III. Common Objections**

The Bible has been copied and edited and therefore we do not have today what they wrote back then.
• Reverence for the Scriptures (cf. Deut.4:2 & Rev. 22:18-19)
• Vast number of manuscripts [5600 copies - Caesar (10 copies) or Tacitus (20 copies) by comparison are universally accepted as accurate]
• Accuracy of copies at 99.5%
Aren’t there books that were omitted from the New Testament?
• No other 1st Century books except 1 Clement (AD95)
• Therefore no eyewitness accounts
• Gospel of Thomas
Isn’t the Bible full of contradictions?

**Conclusion**

The Bible is the world’s highest selling book of all times with five billion copies sold. It has been translated into 2000 languages.
This collection of 66 books was written by 40 authors, in three languages, on three continents over a span of 1500 years. Yet it’s beauty and power are displayed in one unified story of Redemption from Creation to New Creation.

Throughout the centuries beginning from Jesus’ time Christians have believed that the Bible is God’s Word and the oldest known Christian Creed affirms that:

For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received:
that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures,
that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures,
and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.
1 Corinthians 15:3-5