Canonicity of the New Testament

Context of God’s Word

https://www.lifeway.com/en/articles/bible-study-establishing-new-testament-canon

2 Peter 1:21 ESV

21 For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

We received the books of both the Old and New Testament as men of God were spoken to by God’s Spirit. God breathed out every Word of the Bible to these Prophets and Apostles.

God did so using their own personality, writing style and vocabulary. We see differences in vocabulary and writing style in the books of the Bible.

Did you know that there were other books who some thought should be in the New Testament?

1 & 2 Clement, Shepherd of Hermas, Epistle of Barnabas ....

How do we know that books in our New Testament are the books we are supposed to have?

How did we get the 27 books of the New Testament?

Through much prayer God gave His church great wisdom in distinguishing the books that were from Him from others that were not.

It starts and ends with The Canon of Scripture.

What is the canon?

A Canon is “the official grouping” it applies to literature, music, law, philosophy.

A canon is grouping of literary texts that make up the “The Classics”.

Dante, Shakespeare, Plato are a few authors that make up the classics.

There is a Star Wars Canon - There are many Star Wars story lines and characters that branch off the original story line. So, there is a group of books that are considered Star Wars Canon.

The most important canon (grouping of texts) is the texts of the Biblical Canon.

What is the Canon of scripture? Tonight the Canon of the New Testament.

The Canon of scripture are the books of the Bible that have been determined to on to be from God.

The word Canon comes from the greek meaning measuring stick.

The Canon of Scripture is made up of the books of the Bible that meet God’s Standard of being part of the Bible.

Why do we need a Canon? What’s the point?

-While the Apostle’s were alive there wasn’t a need for a Canon.

-The Apostles were the final authority on matters of doctrine and spiritual life.

-Questions the churches had could be answered. The teachings of the Apostle’s were clear.

Rise of Heresies - The influence of greek philosophy and religion had a serious negative effect on the teachings of the Church. Lies started to slip into the church.

-2 things you will notice in many of Paul’s letters:

A. Paul talking about how he is an Apostle and how Christ appointed Him.

-False teachers would cast doubt on Paul’s teaching and authority as an Apostle.

B. Warnings about false teaching are all over the New Testament Books in general and in Paul’s letters as well.

Today, we have many who deviate from the scriptures.

Roman Persecution -

You had less and less people who either lived during Jesus day or were one generation away from the first generation of Christians. The potential of loosing New Testament teachings was getting higher.

Christians caught with copies of this new teaching that claimed Jesus as King would be imprisioned or killed. Of course the Apostles letters would also be destroyed.

-This is one reason why letters sent to churches from the Apostles were copied before they were sent to someone else. You never knew when the original would be found in transit and destroyed.

Apostles Dying - All Apostles except John died of persecution. We think John died not of persecution, but in persecution, of natural causes on the penal island Patmos.

-Those who were keeping the teachings of the church were dying off.

-Without something written down the teachings of God would slide over the generations.

Summary - A canon of Spiritual New Covenant truth was needed. Before the church realized they needed it, God already had planned for the New Testament.

How was the New Testament Canon Formed?

The letters of the Apostles and other letters were copied and past around.

1 & 2 Clement, Shepherd of Hermas, Epistle of Barnabas ....

By about 130 AD there were many different letters that had been surfaced claiming to be from an Apostle.

Problem - There were forgeries in the mix. These forgeries were not given from God and had false teaching.

The Epistle of Paul & Gospel of Thomas were forgeries.

If you collect all the scrolls submitted to be in the scriptures, these would include what we have today and plenty others.

Imagine a funnel.

The early church leaders over several hundred years began to funnel down, cull down, the books of the New Testament.

Irenaeus (202 AD), Origen (300’s) add to the funneling down what is in and what is out.

By the middle of the 2nd century most of the major New Testament writings were accepted.

Council of Nicaea met in 325 and made progress.

In 367 AD, Athanasius Bishop of Alexandria gave a list in his Easter letter and called his list of New Testament books the Canon. He was the first to use the word Canon for his list.

His list was the final list.

Several councils met afterward and confirmed Athanasius Canon: Trent, Hippo, 2 councils of Carthage.

The Carthian councils took place under St. Augustine who considered the Canon of Scripture closed - finalized.

During the time surrounding the Protestant Reformation protestant groups met to finalize the New Testament.

In the end you have agreement on what the New Testament books are.

We have a closed canon.

This keeps false teachers from adding to the books and leading God’s people astray.

Important Point - Remember the Canon of scripture is Church Fathers or Councils declaring something is God’s Word.

The Canon of Scripture is discovering what God has given as His word.

What were the Canonical criteria?

What were some of the questions the early church was asking to discover what books were from God and which were not.

Was the book written by an Apostle?

-3 exceptions, Luke who interviewed Apostles for the books of Luke and Acts.

-Hebrews, Reads like it is from an Apostle. Many different theories on who wrote it. My personal favorites are Paul speaking with John writing what Paul said.

-Paul’s eyesight appears to have weakened in his age.

-Apollos, well known Christ follower in the New Testament. But we really don’t know.

Was the Book Written by an Apostle?

Was the book recognized by the churches and in use.

Books were received, copied, passed around to others.

Was the book written in the first century?

Does the book line up with & agree with other known scripture?

Does this book agree with the Apostle’s teaching?

Does the book speak to you?

Hebrews 4:12 ESV

12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

The word of God is experiental.

-Example the Didache - Considered the teaching of teh 12 Apostles. Summarizes many Christian teachings.

-It is a great document. It is helpful and good.

-Something is off when you read it.

Conclusion - One of the ways that we can be confident we have God’s Word is that there has been careful & rigorous examination and protection of what has gone into the scriptures.

Read you Bible with confidence that every word is from God.