How Accurate Is The Bible?

New Testament. Many are under the impression there was a great debate about which books should be added to the New Testament. The truth is the apostles affirmed and confirmed the contents of the New Testament. The great church debates were largely attempts to remove certain books which some considered to not be authoritative.

Maybe the most significant statement about the New Testament actually comes from Jesus,

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. (NASB) John 16:13

Jesus tells His apostles the Holy Spirit will guide them into truth: that is, He will reveal truth to them, just as we have already observed with Paul! This was required since Jesus wanted His church to be built on the apostles,

. . . having been built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone, (NASB) Ephesians 2:20

So Jesus endorses His apostles through the ministry of the Holy Spirit. As the years elapsed, the apostles wrote the majority (81%) of the New Testament books and their companions and Jesus’ brothers wrote the balance. It must have been a surprise to them to discover that Paul the apostle would write just about half of the books. His letters and the letters of the other apostles were passed around for all to read (Col. 4:16; 1 Thess. 5:27). The letters could be reviewed by the other apostles. Peter reviewed Paul’s writing. Listen to this,

. . . 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. (NASB) 2 Peter 3:15-16

Peter considered Paul’s letters to be scripture (“the rest of the scriptures”). So Peter endorses Paul and then Paul in turn endorses Luke when he writes,

For the Scripture says, “YOU SHALL NOT MUZZLE THE OX WHILE HE IS THRESHING,” and “The laborer is worthy of his wages.” (NASB) 1 Tim. 5:18